The main reason that conflicts are so difficult to resolve is that they are predominantly influenced by emotions. When emotions like anger and resentment are felt it is often difficult for people to behave rationally. The likelihood of the person understanding the others point of view diminishes as their own strong emotions take over.



Emotions play a role in how people make sense of their relationships, concept of power, and social status. People constantly evaluate situations and events to work out if they are personally relevant. These understandings and appraisals are infused with various emotions and feelings. So, emotion not only serves a side effect of conflict, but also frames the way in which parties understand and define their dispute.

Secondly, within the context of relationships, emotions typically express people's agendas, desires, and goals. When people perceive that they have incompatible goals or that others are interfering with their desires and pursuits, this elicits emotions and leads to conflict.

Imagine an iceberg, a small percentage is above the iceberg and visible, while a large part is below the water line and obscured from view. The small part represents our behaviour; we can see and hear it.

Just below the surface is our emotions – we can neither see nor hear them, but we can often guess how we and others are feeling by observing the behaviours. For example; when someone is smiling, we can guess they are happy, when they frown we guess they are sad etc.

If we go deeper down the iceberg we get to a place that represents the things that are most important to us: our needs and interests. These are the things that drive our emotions and in turn cause us to act and react the way we do when in conflict.

When dealing with conflict it is tempting to overlook the emotional aspect and often we are told to treat things only from an objective point of view. This is dangerous and usually leads to failure. Our aim should be to identify that emotions play a part and look for methods of addressing the emotive issues. Only then can we overcome the substantive needs of those involved.

Another reason why conflict can be so hard to resolve is that people tend to focus on positions rather than interests. The difference between the two is both important and significant.

A position represents a person's perception of the solutions that will meet their own needs, whereas an interest represents their underlying concerns. Interests lie at the bottom of the iceberg and positions are above the surface.

It is often the case that although two parties have a differing position, there is much that they would agree on if they focused on their interests instead.

In the wheelie bin debate you have the opposing POSITIONS of the locals and the council. The locals are extremely angry that they have to pay for wheelie bins and refuse to do so. The council are sticking fast to their position and say that if the locals refuse to pay for their own wheelie bins, then taxes will be made on collections. Both positions are held strongly and any debate around them seems to be fraught with problems as no side will budge.

If both parties focussed solely on their positional needs in this scenario then the likely outcome is one of dissatisfaction on both sides. However, there is an alternative and that is to focus on the INTERESTS.

These are the underlying thoughts and beliefs that are held by both parties. It is typical that the thinking behind their positions is similar. However, if they only focus on the positions rather than these underlying interests, the outcome is one of impasse. Focussing on interests tends to find many and varied methods of resolving issues.

The most effective way to uncover someone's interests, even your own, is to ask questions that are probing while expressing a degree of empathy.