Strategic conflict in this work refers to the spectrum of co-operative and oppositional
activities in which organisations engage when their interests meet. The origin of the work
is in the management and prediction of corporate strategic conflict, but it will be seen that
there are significant similarities between corporate struggle and that of international relations.
Following a review of the nature of conflict and the characteristics of strategic decision
making, the work examines the effectiveness of three existing general approaches to conflict
modelling and management, namely
informal and qualitative methods;
general systems analysis methods;
and game theoretic approaches.
Desirable criteria for a strategic conflict management framework are derived and a framework
is then proposed which has three components: -
Setting thefuture environment
The future of the organisation is described by a network of states of nature.
Resolving the Conflict
Within each of the states which represent the future, the options for participants are
identified and the possible outcomes and interim states identified. An analysis of the
influence and power of the participants over transitions between states is carried out,
which indicates likely development paths in the conflict, from which conclusions
can be drawn about both the likely outcomes, and about the actions which should be
taken by a company to bring about preferred outcomes.
Closing the Loop
Feedback of information obtained by analysis and by contact with the real world
back into the two structures described above allows examination of the effect of
changing perspectives and the differing beliefs of participants.
The application of the framework is shown through case studies examining thejustifiability
and appropriateness of each of its elements and as a whole. These case studies cover
both small and large companies, a variety of business conflict cases, both live and retrospective
and draw on the recorded material in international relations for examples of non-
. commercial conflict.
Future development paths are identified for the concep