Towards reframing professional expert support

The paper addresses practical ways of reconfiguring professional expertise in development practice in moving away from the expert as a technocrat. Two projects associated with managing natural resource dilemmas suggest an alternative way of framing intervention involving professional experts providing a more appropriate collaborative learning space for development practice. The paper describes the heuristic devices generated by each project as helpful in bringing out dialectic tensions between practice and understanding, and between systems of interest and situations of interest (or situated problems). Firstly, SLIM (social learning for the integrated management and sustainable use of water at catchment scale) - a European Framework Programme 5 project - exemplifies social learning as a measure of sustainable development. The heuristic illustrates the dependence of sustainability on changes in practice and understanding amongst professionals and other stakeholders as part of concerted - rather than merely individual or even collective - action. Secondly, ECOSENSUS (Electronic/Ecological Collaborative Sensemaking Support System) - a Guyana focused intervention involving several UK universities in collaboration with the University of Guyana and Amerindian community representatives from the North Rupununi wetlands - builds on the SLIM heuristic in supporting the development of practice. Additionally, the ECOSENSUS heuristic provides conceptual space for the interaction between conceptual constructs of distributed stakeholders (that is, systems thinking) including those with professional expertise, and the actual context of intervention (the situated problem). Both SLIM and ECOSENSUS provide heuristics for process-orientated management enabling more meaningful and purposeful interaction between professional/ technical experts and other stakeholders, as an alternative to conventional project-orientated management intervention. An alternative framing may help to steer practice away from the apoliticised comforting linearity of professionalised systematic project management towards more constructive systemic endeavours involving multiple stakeholders

Online Dispute Resolution Through the Lens of Bargaining and Negotiation Theory: Toward an Integrated Model

[Excerpt] In this article we apply negotiation and bargaining theory to the analysis of online dispute resolution. Our principal objective is to develop testable hypotheses based on negotiation theory that can be used in ODR research. We have not conducted the research necessary to test the hypotheses we develop; however, in a later section of the article we suggest a possible methodology for doing so. There is a vast literature on negotiation and bargaining theory. For the purposes of this article, we realized at the outset that we could only use a small part of that literature in developing a model that might be suitable for empirical testing. We decided to use the behavioral theory of negotiation developed by Richard Walton and Robert McKersie, which was initially formulated in the 1960s. This theory has stood the test of time. Initially developed to explain union-management negotiations, it has proven useful in analyzing a wide variety of disputes and conflict situations. In constructing their theory, Walton and McKersie built on the contributions and work of many previous bargaining theorists including economists, sociologists, game theorists, and industrial relations scholars. In this article, we have incorporated a consideration of the foundations on which their theory was based. In the concluding section of the article we discuss briefly how other negotiation and bargaining theories might be applied to the analysis of ODR

The Influence of Type a Behaviour and Locus of Control of Conflict Resolution Strategies Among SME Employees in Ondo State

The ability of employees to resolve conflicts is as important as making profit for the organization. Conflict within and outside an organization takes an enormous toll in the growth, development and sustenance of the organization. The study examined the influence of Type A behaviour and locus of control on conflict resolution among employees in SME’s in Ondo State. The study made use of Pearson Product Moment Correction (PPMC) to measure the extent of relatedness of the predictor variables on conflict resolution among SME employees in Ondo State. A total of 210 SME employees participated in the study. Convenient sampling technique was used to select the participants. The result of the study show that Type A had a significant relationship with conflict resolution strategies [r (210) = .31; p > 0.05]. This implies that as Type A behaviour significantly predicted conflict resolution strategies.  Similarly, openness to experience had significant relationship with conflict resolution strategies [r (210) = .44; p < 0.05].based on the findings of the study, the result of the analysis revealed that An all-inclusive, effective and functional conflict resolution support system should be established by SME organizations to replace the existing system. Also, employees should be vested with reliable information through conferences, seminars, consultations and workshops on current conflict resolution practices systems as obtainable in developed societies. Keywords: Type A behaviour, locus of control and conflict resolution strategie

Fifty-Sixth Annual Report of the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service, Fiscal Year 2003

Federal Mediation and Conciliation ServiceFMCSFY2003_Annual_Report.pdf: 385 downloads, before Oct. 1, 2020

The Politics of Risk: A Human Rights Paradigm for Children’s Environmental Health Research

A human rights paradigm for environmental health research makes explicit the relationship between poor health and poverty, inequality, and social and political marginalization, and it aims at civic problem solving. In so doing, it incorporates support for community-based, participatory research and takes seriously the social responsibilities of researchers. For these reasons, a human rights approach may be better able than conventional bioethics to address the unique issues that arise in the context of pediatric environmental health research, particularly the place of environmental justice standards in research. At the same time, as illustrated by disagreements over the ethics of research into lead abatement methods, bringing a human rights paradigm to bear in the context of environmental health research requires resolving important tensions at its heart, particularly the inescapable tension between ethical ideals and political realities

An overview of ethical frameworks in public health: can they be supportive in the evaluation of programs to prevent overweight?

Background. The prevention of overweight sometimes raises complex ethical questions. Ethical public health frameworks may be helpful in evaluating programs or policy for overweight prevention. We give an overview of the purpose, form and contents of such public health frameworks and investigate to which extent they are useful for evaluating programs to prevent overweight and/or obesity. Methods. Our search for frameworks consisted of three steps. Firstly, we asked experts in the field of ethics and public health for the frameworks they were aware of. Secondly, we performed a search in Pubmed. Thirdly, we checked literature references in the articles on frameworks we found. In total, we thus found six ethical frameworks. We assessed the area on which the available ethical frameworks focus, the users they target at, the type of policy or intervention they propose to address, and their aim. Further, we looked at their structure and content, that is, tools for guiding the analytic process, the main ethical principles or values, possible criteria for dealing with ethical conflicts, and the concrete policy issues they are applied to. Results. All frameworks aim to support public health professionals or policymakers. Most of them provide a set of values or principles that serve as a standard for evaluating policy. Most frameworks articulate both the positive ethical foundations for public health and ethical constraints or concerns. Some frameworks offer analytic tools for guiding the evaluative process. Procedural guidelines and concrete criteria for solving important ethical conflicts in the particular area of the prevention of overweight or obesity are mostly lacking. Conclusions. Public health ethical frameworks may be supportive in the evaluation of overweight prevention programs or policy, but seem to lack practical guidance to address ethical conflicts in this particular area

Reflective Argumentation

Theories of argumentation usually focus on arguments as means of persuasion, finding consensus, or justifying knowledge claims. However, the construction and visualization of arguments can also be used to clarify one's own thinking and to stimulate change of this thinking if gaps, unjustified assumptions, contradictions, or open questions can be identified. This is what I call "reflective argumentation." The objective of this paper is, first, to clarify the conditions of reflective argumentation and, second, to discuss the possibilities of argument visualization methods in supporting reflection and cognitive change. After a discussion of the cognitive problems we are facing in conflicts--obviously the area where cognitive change is hardest--the second part will, based on this, determine a set of requirements argument visualization tools should fulfill if their main purpose is stimulating reflection and cognitive change. In the third part, I will evaluate available argument visualization methods with regard to these requirements and talk about their limitations. The fourth part, then, introduces a new method of argument visualization which I call Logical Argument Mapping (LAM). LAM has specifically been designed to support reflective argumentation. Since it uses primarily deductively valid argument schemes, this design decision has to be justified with regard to goals of reflective argumentation. The fifth part, finally, provides an example of how Logical Argument Mapping could be used as a method of reflective argumentation in a political controversy

Preventing and resolving design conflicts for a collaborative convergence in distributed set-based design

En conception distribuée, dans la phase du dimensionnement du produit, des incohérences peuvent émerger entre les objectifs de conception et entre les procédures de travail des sous-systèmes hétérogènes. Dans cette phase, les acteurs de conception doivent collaborer d une manière concourante, car leurs tâches sont reliées les unes aux autres par les couplages de dimensionnement entre leurs sous-problèmes. Les incohérences peuvent provoquer des conflits de conception en raison de ces couplages. La question est de savoir comment obtenir une convergence collaborative pour satisfaire les objectifs globaux et individuels des acteurs de conception lorsque ces acteurs prennent des décisions de conception sous incertitude. L'objectif de cette thèse est de proposer un modèle pour empêcher et résoudre les conflits de conception, tout en surmontant le problème de l'incertitude de la conception avec l'approche de conception basée sur les ensembles (SBD). Pour cela, les attitudes de conception sont modélisées avec le paradigme Croyances-Désirs-Intentions afin d'explorer les incohérences et gérer les conflits dans les processus de conception. L'approche ascendante conventionnelle est ainsi étendue grâce à des techniques de modélisation multi-agents. Dans cette approche, les agents de conception peuvent fixer des exigences directement sur leurs indicateurs de bien-être . Ces indicateurs représentent la manière dont leurs objectifs de conception sont susceptibles d'être satisfaits à un moment donné du processus. Des simulations de Monte Carlo sont effectuées pour évaluer la performance de cette approche, offrant une variété d'attitudes de l'agent. Par rapport aux approches classiques de conception ascendante et descendante, les résultats révèlent moins de conflits de conception et une intensité des conflits réduite. Les techniques de problème de satisfaction de contraintes (CSP) et les attitudes de conception sont appliquées pour détecter et justifier des conflits de conception entre les agents hétérogènes. Une nouvelle forme du modèle Cooperative CSP (CoCSP) est ainsi mise au point afin de résoudre les conflits de conception en détectant le compromis entre les contraintes. Le système de résolution des conflits peut être adopté grâce à différentes stratégies proposées qui prennent en compte l'architecture de solidarité des agents. Les résultats des simulations montrent que l'intensité des conflits en conception distribuée est réduite par la promotion de la solidarité qui déclenche une aide aux agents en souffrance.In the product dimensioning phase of a distributed design, inconsistencies can emerge among design objectives as well as among working procedures of heterogeneous subsystems. In this phase, design actors which compose subsystems must collaborate concurrently, since their works are linked to each other through dimensioning couplings among their sub-problems. Inconsistencies through these couplings yield thus to design conflicts. The issue is how to obtain a collaborative convergence to satisfy the global and individual objectives of design actors when making design decisions under uncertainty. The objective of this dissertation is to propose a model for preventing and resolving design conflicts in order to obtain a collaborative convergence, while overcoming the design uncertainty through Set-based Design (SBD). Design attitudes are modeled with Belief-Desire-Intention paradigm to explore inconsistencies and manage conflicts in design processes. The conventional bottom-up approach is thus extended through agent-based attitude modeling techniques. In this approach, design agents can set requirements directly on their wellbeing values that represent how their design targets are likely to be met at a given moment of the design process. Monte Carlo simulations are performed to evaluate the performance of this approach, providing a variety of agent attitudes. Compared to conventional bottom-up and top-down design approaches, the results reveal a fewer number of design conflicts and a reduced aggregated conflict intensity. Constraint satisfaction problem (CSP) techniques and design attitudes are both applied to detect and justify design conflicts of heterogeneous design agents. A novel cooperative CSP (CoCSP) is developed in order to resolve design conflicts through compromising constraint restriction. The conflict resolution system can be adopted for different proposed strategies which take into account the solidarity architecture of design agents. The simulation results show that while promoting solidarity in distributed design by helping agents that suffer, the conflict intensity is reduced, and better design results are obtained.CHATENAY MALABRY-Ecole centrale (920192301) / SudocSudocFranceF