CONFLICT MANAGEMENT The Psychology of conflict and conflict ...

10. THE ROLE OF THIRD PARTIES/MEDIATION IN MANAGING CONFLICT 295
Walker’s (1975, 1978) work suggested that disputants willingly give up
process control under certain conditions. For example, individuals are
more willing to surrender process control when there is a need for speedy
resolution (LaTour, Houlden, Walker, & Thibaut, 1976), when the conflict
is a serious one (Bigoness, 1976; Johnson & Pruitt, 1972), and when there is
a need for face saving (LaTour et al., 1976). On the other hand, LaTour et al.
found that, when disputants have an established pattern of cooperation,
they seem more eager to take on process control. Indeed, under certain
conditions, the two conflicting parties may even forgo decision control to
a third party, so long as they believe that this loss of decision control will
facilitate successful resolution of their disagreement (Rubin, 1980).
Mediation. When a manager mediates, he or she retains process control
but allows the two conflicting parties to select their own resolution. Mediation
is quite similar to advising, in that the disputants retain decision
control. Indeed, the two are sometimes categorized together (e.g., Cropanzano
et al., 1999; Folger & Cropanzano, 1998), but there is a meaningful
difference in degree. Mediation implies that the third party retains relatively
more control over the process; advising or facilitation implies that
he or she retains relatively less.
As is true for advising, people tend to prefer mediation to methods that
vest control of the outcome in a third party (Karambayya & Brett, 1989),
and this is especially so when time is available and the conflicting parties
must continue to work together (Lewicki & Sheppard, 1985). A general
preference for mediation, as opposed to more autocratic strategies,
has been observed in both Canada and the Netherlands (Leung, Bond,
Carmet, Krishnan, & Liebrand, 1990; for a correction, see Leung, Bond,
Carment, Krishnan, & Liebrand, 1991), as well as for Hong Kong and the
United States (Leung, 1987; Leung & Lind, 1986). However, as in the case
with advising, mediation may not be the most appropriate form of thirdparty
tactic when time is limited, the matter is complex, or the need for
strong authority is otherwise perceived to be needed (e.g., certain crosscultural
situations; see the following section).
adversarial or arbitration. When employing the adversarial method, the
manager listens carefully as each party presents his or her case without
interference. Subsequently, the third party issues an opinion. The tactic
has been called “adversarial” by Lewicki and Sheppard (1985), “arbitration”
by Kolb and Glidden (1986) and Shapiro and Rosen (1994), and “adjudication”
by Karambayya and Brett (1989). Individuals prefer to retain
decision control, unless there are no alternatives for reaching a settlement
(Rubin, 1980). Nevertheless, the adversarial approach is generally preferred
to more autocratic methods (Folger et al., 1996), and this is true in
Canada and the Netherlands (Leung et al., 1990), as well as in the United
States. Having said that, there do seem to be some cross-cultural differences
regarding preferences for this tactic. The adversarial style comes