Call for papers for volume 3:
Conflicts and Conflict Management in Intentional Communities
Guest editors: Michal Palgi and Shlomo Getz, University of Haifa, Israel
Intentional communities are a combination of complex economic organizations and communities run by their members; that is, they have the characteristics of multifaceted cooperatives. As cooperatives, they are productive organizations, controlled by their members. As residential communities they oversee all the activities and services that municipalities provide to their inhabitants.
This volume will explore various types of conflicts that can arise in these communities: among members of the community, between the community officials and members, and between the community and the administration of the state.
As in any human organization, conflicts frequently occur in these communities. They can derive from internal communal aspects – conflict between members of the same community, or between members and community officials who represent its democratically-adopted by-laws. They can also derive from the organizational aspect – as a work place owned by its employees, a residential place governed by its inhabitants, and so on. Other sources of conflicts are external – between the community and the surrounding neighborhoods, the state, or other official entities.
Intentional communities exhibit many ways of managing conflicts, some of which have changed over the years. The main motive of these practices is to avoid formal types of conflict management such as state court. They usually have local by-laws that aim at avoiding conflicts and rely on local committees to deal with conflicts that do arise.
In many cases, reaching agreement on strategic issues in these complex communities needs a substantial majority. In response, members of the communities usually discuss, develop, or transform the mechanisms for reaching consensus.
המכון לחקר הקיבוץ והרעיון השיתופי kibbutz@univ.haifa.ac.il :מייל; 04-8240409 :פקס; 04-8240418 .טל; 3498838 חיפה, חושי אבא שדרות
The Institute for Research of the Kibbutz
and the Cooperative Idea
המכון לחקר הקיבוץ והרעיון השיתופ
This volume will focus on experiences, relevant to intentional communities of various types: communes, kibbutzim, eco-villages, cooperative housing, co-housing communities, etc. We invite submission of original articles that address ways that intentional communities use to cope with conflicts, the mechanism of conflict management, and conflict resolution in intentional communities.
Tentative chapters of the volume will include:
1. Processes and reasons for transferring local conflict resolution in intentional communities to national arenas
2. Ways of reaching agreement in intentional communities when conflicts arise
3. The dilemmas of conflict resolution in intentional communities and organizations
4. Conflicts between internal and external intentional communities' by-laws.
5. Artists' representation of conflicts in intentional communities
6. Conflicts as reflected in the media
Contact persons:
Michal Palgi - palgi@research.haifa.ac.il
Shiomo Getz - getz@research.haifa.ac.il