Geoscience Reference
In-Depth Information
Table 14.4
Synthesis
Conflict situations
g
l
s
l
˃
l
/
ʼ
l
S
1
(0,0)
3.1416
0
S
2
(
0.1875,
0.0625)
1.8408
0.4472
S
3
(
0.0625,0)
0.3472
0.3416
S
4
(0,0)
0
0
Min
a
,
b
,
c
˕
¼
e
'
X
'
Xe
2
i
'
Xe
ð
14
:
25
Þ
s.t.:
a
u þ
b
v þ
c
z i 0
ð
14
:
26
Þ
, 1.8408 and 0.3472; one
notices the progressive decrease of the area of the “conflict surface”.
Again, for complete conflict resolution, the area would be zero.
The respective areas,
s
l
, have been computed as
ˀ
14.3.4 Extensions
Other measures could of course be added, such as, e.g., an extra indicator of
“skewness” of a given conflict situation, in addition to the location of the center
of gravity; an obvious choice would be the coefficient of variation. Table
14.4
summarizes all the findings, including
S
4
, total conflict resolution.
Hopefully practical applications will contribute to enrich the arsenal of useful
describers of disagreement occurrences.
Conclusions
The two parts of this study may, at first sight, appear to be unrelated or
disconnected; however, this is not the case.
Sure, the second part seems to be more linked to practical applications, the
first one to pure theory. But the latter allows to analyze in depth the reasons for
some observed negotiating behaviour, as already hinted at in Sect.
14.2.4
, where
examples were given.
The second point taken up there—extension of the feasible space—leads
immediately to possible stages of the negotiation process, as illustrated by
graphs 2 and 3 and the computational results of Tables
14.3
and
14.4
.
The general point then is to underscore the importance of appropriate mathe-
matical representation structures to investigate complex processes, of which
conflict and negotiation are outstanding examples.
