On Stages of Conflict Escalation - Conflict and Multimodal Communication: Social Research and Machine Intelligence - page 65

three activities. This also applies to the expected result. These differences in goals
and expected results will affect the type of conflict that occurs. The presence of
an audience and of a leader or mediator is most likely in the political debates and
would have a fairly different role in the conflict between neighbors or in a conflict
in a work group.

3.8.2 Activity Comparison in Relation to Taxonomies

of Conflict

In relation to the taxonomies of conflict, presented in Sect. 3.2 , a political debate can
be a two-party conflict or involve more participants, but often, there are two main
contenders or sometimes two main groups in conflict. The relation between number
of participants and the occurrence of bystanders and some type of audience can be
dynamic, so that it is sometimes hard to know who is actually involved and who is
a bystander or part of the audience. A neighbor conflict also typically involves two
main parties (which can be groups), and a work group conflict can be between two
or more parties. In the two latter cases, however, there is often no audience, whereas
an audience is essential and the main real addressee in a political debate. Thus, many
of the “stances” in the political debate, such as pretending outrage, sarcasm/irony
and a triumphant look, gazing, and perhaps smiling demonstratively, are meant for
the audience and might, for that reason, not be as prominent in the other activities.
The political debate is typically a two-way conflict, while in both the other types
of activity, the conflict can be one-way or two-way. Political debates are also clear
cases of overt conflicts, where exposing a conflict is actually one of the goals of the
activity. The fact that the political debates are televised and in front of an audience
gives them a more public and “demonstrative” function than the other two types,
which are typically conducted in a small group or just between two persons.
Another related difference is that while political debates typically have a win-lose
goal, the other two activities would often both benefit from some kind of solution,
compromise, or reconciliation. Even though the other types of conflict can escalate
and have a winner, this is less often the optimal solution in these activities, whereas
it standardly is in the political debate. Strategies and stances aiming to promote
joint solutions, compromises, mediation, etc. are, therefore, not very prominent in
the political conflict (even though the moderator might sometimes attempt calming
the argument down), but are more important in the other types.
The distribution of power can be symmetrical or asymmetrical in all the activities,
depending on other circumstances. In political debates, it is usually known which
of the participants has more voters than the other and which participant might be
in power, e.g., part of the government, there may also be differences in political
experience, thus, power differences are often present.
Political debates represent manifest, actual conflicts, rather than latent or poten-
tial conflicts, whereas this need not be as clear in the other two types. The conflict in