**2. Background**

In order to understand the importance of managers' conflict resolution practices in organizations, it is necessary to have a more precise understanding of the concept of conflict. Theorists differ somewhat in their definitions of the concept, but there is widespread consensus that a conflict involves more than disagreement: conflicts involve use of power and means to realize interests [4, 7, 9]. This means, as Sibana ([16], p. 11) observes, that conflicts are 'derived from social beliefs and involve two or more parties who share incompatible objectives.'

Note that this definition of a conflict is neutral with respect to whether conflicts may be good or bad for an organization. In conflict theory, the potential positive and negative dimensions of conflicts have often been connected to the distinction between productive and destructive conflicts [2–4, 6]. As thoroughly elaborated by Rahim [8] in his influential analysis of conflicts in organizations, a productive conflict is a conflict that has positive functional effects for an organization. Destructive conflicts, on the other hand, are conflicts that have dysfunctional outcomes. Thus, if an organization is to benefit from a conflict, 'the negative effects of the conflict must be reduced, and positive effects must be enhanced' ([8], p. 7).

The importance of recognizing productive conflicts should not be underestimated [16, 17]. At the same time, it is not difficult to understand why destructive conflicts have received most attention in the literature on social interaction in organizations. It is when cooperation breaks down, when poor interaction undermines organizational performance, that the importance of conflict resolution as a management responsibility really becomes crucial [17]. Further on in this chapter, this will be a key point. Although many of the analyses developed in this chapter can be used to understand all social conflicts, I focus particularly on destructive conflicts.
