PACS 4500 Senior Seminar in Peace and Conflict Studies Guy Burgess Co-Director Conflict Information Consortium, University of Colorado UCB 580, University of Colorado, Boulder, CO , (303) Copyright © 2014 Guy Burgess and Heidi Burgess

Class Activity Notes

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Sign-Up Sheet / PACS ID#

Martin Luther King

Obama the-union-address/2015/01/17/22ecec32-9cd6-11e4-a7ee d665b4_story.html

Inequitable Inequality Source: Non-partisan Congressional Budget Office

Having It All and Wanting More

Technology / Social Equity opportunity-social-equity

Needed: An “A Prize”

Course Project Topic Ideas Project Teams

Beyond the Invisible Fist A Very Large-Scale Strategy for Promoting More Constructive Forms of Competition and Conflict Destructive Conflict: As Serious a Threat As Climate Change Guy Burgess & Heidi Burgess Co-Directors Conflict Information Consortium, University of Colorado UCB 580, University of Colorado, Boulder, CO , (303) , Copyright © 2014 Guy Burgess and Heidi Burgess

Threat #1: Violence 80,000,000 Dead Since 1950

Unnoticed Wars

Killed Wounded Refugees Survivors Destruction Expenditures Costs of War

Threat #2: Political Tyranny

Authoritarian Dystopias 2024

Threat #3: Failed Revolutions The Exchange of Elites Problem

Threat #4: Economic Tyranny / Plutocracy The Robber Barons Late 19 th Century The.01% of the 1% ?? !! The Robber Barons Early 21 st Century

Threat #5: Failed & Fragile States Social – Demographic pressures – Refugee movement – Human flight – Vengeance seeking Economic – Group-based inequality – Economic decline Political – Delegitimization of the state – Deterioration of public services – Out of control security apparatus – Widespread violations of human rights – Outside intervention 24/2013_failed_states_interactive_map?utm_ source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaig n=the-2013-failed-states-index-interactive- map-and-rankings

Threat #6: “Perfect Storm” Conflicts

Threat #7: Failed Problem-Solving

Society’s Big Problems Are All Symptoms of the Conflict Problem Climate Change Inequality Economic Alienation Discrimination And many more…

The Ever Present Conflict Problem The Economic Stagnation Problem The Conflict Problem The Tyranny / Plutocracy Problem The Commons Protection Problem

Conflict Problems Span the Political Divide The Conflict Problem Grassroots Democratic Problems Grassroots Republican Problems

The “Boiled Frog” Syndrome

Tough Problems Machiavellian Spoilers Tyrant Wannabes

Tough Problems CONF 756 The Crane Brinton Effect

Tough Problems Tragedy of the Commons

Tough Problems Side A Side B Compromisers Side A FightersSide B Fighters Swing People CONF 756 Attacking the Compromisers

Conflict: A “Global Warming-Class” Problem

Conference Planning Working Groups? Conference Planning Working Committee

Questions Considered Last Week  What are the big trends that the Conference should consider?  Positive trends to encourage?  Negative trends to limit?  What are the formal and informal decision points leading to those trends that need to be examined for problematic conflict dynamics.  What strategies should be considered for limiting problematic dynamics?  Bottom line: Are poor conflict handling skills really a global warming-class problem?  Also: Who should be involved? Names? Perspectives? Strategies? Multiple “ways of knowing.”

Addressing the Conflict Problem: Concrete Steps  Mobilize a wide range of experts to call widespread public attention to the threat.  Offer concrete examples of situations where conflict problems are now creating severe hardship Violence Bad decisions  Distinguish the effort from self-serving, naïve, Kumbaya conflict approaches  Be clear about (and don’t oversell) the current “state- of-the-art”  Knowledge utilization issues  Knowledge availability issues  Outline a realistic long-term effort to address the problem – one that is likely to span the major political divides

Do’s / Don’ts  With last week’s discussion as a starting point, what are the things that that need doing as part of any comprehensive effort to address the conflict problem? What things must be avoided/limited?  Send in notes again.

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Do’s / Don’ts  With last week’s discussion as a starting point, what are the things that efforts to address the conflict problem should do? Should avoid?

Extra Slides

Beyond the Invisible Fist A Very Large-Scale Strategy for Promoting More Constructive Forms of Competition and Conflict The Concept of Intractability Guy Burgess & Heidi Burgess Co-Directors Conflict Information Consortium, University of Colorado UCB 580, University of Colorado, Boulder, CO , (303) , Copyright © 2014 Guy Burgess and Heidi Burgess

Beyond Intractability History

Intractability & The Limits of Resolution Conflict Resolution Consortium Research Information

SPIDR Best Practices

Definition by Example  International: Israel/Palestine, Tibet, Kashmir  Public Policy: Taxes, climate change, homosexual marriage, abortion, affirmative-action, unionization  Interpersonal: Innumerable conflicts between individuals in family, workplace, and community settings

Intractability Continuum Tractable Intractable Individual conflicts all at various points along a continuum from tractable to intractable

Coleman’s Definition: The Five Percent

Attractors  Like a black hole, everything nearby is pulled into them, and escape is very difficult, if not impossible.

No Zone of Possible Agreement (ZOPA) Party A Winning Outcomes Party B Winning Outcomes Party A Winning Outcomes ZOPA Party B Winning Outcomes Intractable Tractable

Simplified to “Us vs. Them” “Intractability happens,” according to Coleman, “when the many different components of a conflict collapse together into one mass, into one very simple “us versus them” story that effectively resist change.”

Polarization Alliance Formation, Coalition Building Cold War Alliances

Interlocking Issues mobile.html?from=homepage

Intractable Conflicts / More Tractable Dispute Episodes  Conflicts – underlying, long-running, tensions between the parties based on differing interests with respect to distributional issues, moral questions, status, and identity.  Disputes – episodes within the context of the larger conflict that may be resolved by agreement or various types of legal, political, military or other power contests.

Conflicts and Disputes  The underlying conflict is intractable and cannot be resolved in the near (or even long) term.  Dispute episodes within the context of that conflict are, however, routinely resolved by power contests (or, sometimes, agreement).  The cumulative effect of these resolved disputes determines the “outcome” of the larger conflict for the moment.  The underlying conflict is only “resolved” when there is no significant challenge to the prevailing situation (outcome) for an extended.

The Football Analogy (sort of) Disputes are the plays and conflict is the game with special rules: 1) the game never ends, and 2) the goal is to keep the ball at your end of the field.

Abortion Dispute History A partial list of major abortion-related disputes in the United States and associated shift in aggregate social policies. Pro-ChoicePro-Life Abortion prohibition laws Abortion legalization efforts (state-level) Roe v. Wade GOP decision to focus on the abortion issue Pro-Choice interest group organization Pro-Life interest organization Pro-Life Supreme Court appointments Pro-Choice Supreme Court appointments Threats abortion providers State-level abortion restriction legislation Many other disputes in various arenas

Climate Change Dispute History Kyoto Protocol – 1997 IPCC Gore Nobel Prize – 2007 Copenhagen Conference – 2009 US Stimulus/Alternative Energy – 2009 Climategate Controversy – CAFE Agreement – Summer 2011 ? Keystone XL Pipeline Permits – 2013 ? More Favorable to Environmental Interests More Favorable to Pro-Fossil Interests

1 st Party / Advocacy Perspective The field’s heroes and heroines are almost always associated with long-term efforts to promote social justice through constructive, nonviolent, confrontation strategies. Compromise / final resolution model virtually never delivers.