Synopses & Reviews
Includes bibliographical references (p. 437-448) and index.
Synopsis
Despite a vast amount of effort and expertise devoted to them, many environmental conflicts have remained mired in controversy, stubbornly defying resolution. Why can some environmental problems be resolved in one locale but remain contentious in another, often carrying on for decades? What is it about certain issues or the people involved that make a conflict seemingly insoluble.
Making Sense of Intractable Environmental Conflicts addresses those and related questions, examining what researchers and experts in the field characterize as intractable disputes--intense disputes that persist over long periods of time and cannot be resolved through consensus-building efforts or by administrative, legal, or political means. The approach focuses on the frames parties use to define and enact the dispute—the lenses through which they interpret and understand the conflict and critical conflict dynamics. Through analysis of interviews, news media coverage, meeting transcripts, and archival data, the contributors to the book:
- examine the concepts of frames, framing, and reframing, and the role that framing plays in conflicts
- outline the essential characteristics of intractability and its major causes
- offer case studies of eight intractable environmental conflicts
- present a rich body of original interview material from affected parties
- set forth recommendations for intervention that can help resolve disputes
Within each case chapter, the authors describe the historical development and fundamental nature of the conflict and then analyze the case from the perspective of the key frames that are integral to understanding the dynamics of the dispute. They also offer cross-case analyses of related conflicts.
Conflicts examined include those over natural resource use, toxic pollutants, water quality, and growth. Specific conflicts examined are the Quincy Library Group in California; Voyageurs National Park in Minnesota; Edwards Aquifer in Texas; Doan Brook in Cleveland, Ohio; the Antidegradation Environmental Advisory Group in Ohio; Drake Chemical in Pennsylvania; Alton Park/Piney Woods in Tennessee; and three examples of growth-related conflicts along the Front Range of Colorado's Rocky Mountains.
About the Author
Roy J. Lewicki is Dean's Distinguished Teaching Professor of Management and Human Resources at the Ohio State University and lead author of the textbook Essentials of Negotiation, 2nd edition (McGraw-Hill, 2000).
Barbara Gray is professor of organizational behavior and director of the Center for Research in Conflict and Negotiation at The Pennsylvania State University.
Michael Elliott is associate professor of city planning and public policy, co-director of the Southeast Negotiation Network, and director of the Public Policy Program, Consortium on Negotiation and Conflict Resolution at the Georgia Institute of Technology.
Table of Contents
Contents
Introduction
Roy J. Lewicki and Barbara Gray
1. Framing of Environmental Disputes
Barbara Gray
2. Intractability: Definitions, Dimensions, and
Distinctions
Linda L. Putnam and Julia M. Wondolleck
I. Natural Resources Cases
3. When Irresolvable Becomes Resolvable:
The Quincy Library Group Conflict
Todd A. Bryan and Julia Wondelleck
4. Freeze Framing: The Timeless Dialogue
of Intractability Surrounding Voyageurs
National Park
Barbara Gray
5. The Edwards Aquifer Dispute: Shifting Frames in
a Protracted Conflict
Linda L. Putnam and Tarla Peterson
6. Comparing Natural Resource Cases
Barbara Gray, Tarla Peterson, Linda L. Putnam, and Todd A. Bryan
II. Water Cases
7. Doan Brook: Latent Intractability
Sandra Kaufman and Mehnaaz Momen
8. Portraits of Self and Others: State-Level Conflict
over Water Regulation in Ohio
Carolyn Wiethoff, Roy J. Lewicki, and Craig B. Davis
9. Comparing Water Cases
Roy J. Lewicki, Sandra Kaufman, Carolyn Wiethoff, and Craig B. Davis
III. Toxics Cases
10. The Story of Drake Chemical: A Burning
Issue
Ralph Hanke, Adam Rosenberg, and Barbara Gray
11. When the Parents Be Cancer-Free: Community
Voice, Toxics, and Environmental Justice in
Chattanooga, Tennessee
Michael Elliott
12. Framing Effects in Toxic Disputes: Cross-Case
Analysis
Michael Elliott and Ralph Hanke
IV. Growth Management Cases
13. Colorado Growth-Related Environmental
Conflicts
Robert Gardner, Carol Conzelman, Karen Mockler, Kim Sanchez,
and Guy Burgess
14.. Analysis of Colorado Growth Conflict
Frames
Robert Gardner and Guy Burgess
V. Conclusion
15. Lessons Learned about the Framing and
Reframing of Intractable Environmental
Conflicts
Michael Elliott, Barbara Gray, and Roy J. Lewicki
Bibliography
About the Contributors
Index