The Cyprus problem has now been an ongoing dispute for 40 some years. The two main ethnic communities, Greek Cypriot and Turkish Cypriot, has since the unrest following independence in 1960, been separated both in space and mind. A military coup, supported by Greece, followed by a Turkish invasion, caused a violent division of the island in 1974, a division that remains today. The UN has facilitated dialog and negotiation between the communities since the establishment of UNFICYP in 1964.The objective of this study is to identify whether the parties have been and are aiming for long-term or short-term perspectives in negotiation. With the help of the theoretical framework of Conflict transformation, resolution and management the study aim to answer the question – What signs of conflict transformation could be identified within the high level peace negotiation process in Cyprus?The study will be done through a process tracing case study of the peace negotiations in the Cyprus conflict. The study aims at depicting the negotiation process from 1974 and onwards. This by exploring UN position papers, resolutions and reports together with descriptions and statements from the negotiating parties.The study found that the phases of negotiation have differed considerably over time and that a general shift from conflict management to conflict transformation did appear.

"The Organisation of African Unity (OAU), in spite of its commitments to human rights, failed to develop its institutions for conflict resolution and thus address the problem of massive and grave human rights violations that occurred as a result of conflicts. The OAU failed to actively engage the African Commission, which was established to promote and protect human rights, in addressing any of the conflicts in Africa. The OAU also failed to take action on the reports of the African Commission, in which the Commission had highlighted cases of massive and grave violations of human rights occasioned from conflicts. Consequently, most of the conflicts in Africa have not been fully resolved and there are still instances of sporadic outbreaks of violent conflicts with fatal consequences. The African Union (AU) improves upon the commitment of the OAU to human rights and conflict resolution by incorporating human rights norms into its Constitutive Act and the establishment of the Peace and Security Council of the African Union (AUPSC). However, the AU is yet to demonstrate its real commitment to human rights and conflict resolution particularly in taking action on reports of violations of human rights occurring as a result of conflicts. ... This thesis is composed of five chapters. This first chapter provides a general introduction to the thesis and outlines its structure. Chapter two looks at the relationship between human rights and conflict resolution and examines some of the tensions that exist between the two fields in terms of their normative standards, objectives and strategies. The third chapter then looks at the mechanisms for conflict resolution in Africa under the OAU, manely the Commission of Mediation, Conciliation and Arbitration (CMCA) and the Mechanism for Conflict Prevention, Management and Resolution (MCPMR), their successes and failures and the lessons that can be drawn from their performance and also discusses the role of the African Commission in conflict resolution. Chapter four discusses the AUPSC, its structure, powers, organisaton and performance so far. Chapter five covers the conclusions and recommendations of the study." -- Introduction. / Thesis (LLM (Human Rights and Democratisation in Africa)) -- University of Pretoria, 2004. / Prepared under the supervision of Dr. Enid Hill at the Department of Political Science, School of Humanities and Social Sciences, American University in Cairo, Egypt / http://www.chr.up.ac.za/academic_pro/llm1/llm1.html / Centre for Human Rights / LLM

The main aim of the master thesis titled "Syria and the concept responsibility to assist: new approach towards conflict resolution?" is to find out whether the extension of the doctrine of responsibility to protect by the concept of responsibility to assist that is based on the support of nonviolent movements could work as a new approach towards conflict resolution and thanks to this it could constitute another way of international assistance and civilian protection in cases when it is the regime that perpetrates the violence against its own population. For this reason the thesis, via the Syrian civil war that offers wide range of internal responses to the violence perpetrated by the regime against civilians, focuses on three different forms of international involvement and assistance. These are the international military intervention under the third pillar of R2P, the backing of domestic violent groups and insurgents and last but not least the assistance to nonviolent movements and civil initiatives in the form of R2A as a potential expansion of the second pillar under the R2P doctrine. These approaches are analyzed with regard to the issues of state sovereignty and moral responsibility to protect civilians that arises from the inconsistency of these two aspects in relation to any kind of...

Syftet med arbete är att undersöka hur pedagoger arbetar med barns konflikter med andra barn där frågeställningarna är följande: Hur berättar pedagogerna utifrån sina erfarenheter om sin hantering av barns konflikter? samt Hur görs barnen delaktiga i konflikthanteringen enligt intervjupersonernas berättelser? Den teoretiska utgångspunkten i studien är socialkonstruktionismen, där språket ses som en social handling där vår verklighet är socialt konstruerad och utvecklas i sociala interaktioner med andra, samt det sociokulturella perspektivet. Insamlingen av empiri skedde i form av intervjuer med 4 pedagoger. Resultatet är uppdelat i två teman som lyder: Verbal kommunikation och Icke-verbal kommunikation. Slutsatsen i studien är att pedagoger ofta vill stötta och hjälpa barnen i konflikthanteringen genom att prata med dem och lyfta fram problemet tillsammans. Men också att vid enstaka fall så använder pedagoger strategiersom separerar eller distraherar barnen när de riskerar att skada sig. Det kan även dras slutsatsen att barn gör delaktiga i konflikthanteringen genom att pedagoger ger barnen möjligheten att framföra sina tankar, känslor och perspektiv på konfliktsituationer. / The purpose of this study is to acknowledge educators’ conflict resolutions strategies in children’s conflicts with other children. The questions at issue are the following: Based on their experiences, how do educators tell about their handling of children's conflicts? and How are children made involved in conflict management through the interviewers’ stories? The theoretical framework of this study is social constructionism, where language is seen as a social act and our reality is socially constructed in interactions with others, as well as the sociocultural perspective where human social experiences is formed in the reality that we are living in. The data in this study was collectedthrough interviews. The results are divided into three themes wish are the following: verbal communication, stop the conflict and non-verbal communication. The conclusion of this study is that educators more often want to scaffold children through cooperative strategies. But in some cases, educators need to use cessation strategies when children are at risk. There is also the conclusion that children are given the ability to be involved in conflict resolution when educators give them the ability to bring forth their own perspective during conflicts.

The thesis deals with the question of Egypt's role of a biased mediator towards the Palestinian side in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and its stabilising effects on the region in the form of a case study applying the theory of a biased mediator in conflict resolution on the Egyptian example. In addition to this, the goal of this thesis is to demonstrate the beneficial effects of different forms of mediation activities and their combination, including biased and neutral mediation, in the transformation of intractable and protracted conflicts into their tractable form, using the example of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The identification of Egypt's positive role in contributing to the resolving of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, of which it was once a warrying party, portrays the transformational capacity of conflicts. The thesis also highlights Egypt's potential in moderating extremist trends in the region, also through the successful mediation efforts in the inter-palestinian conflict involving the Fatah and Hamas movements, contributed to by Egypt's changing position in the region, her historical role in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and her strategic and security concerns in the region.

This master thesis deals with past mediation attempts of Turkey to solve the Israeli- Palestinian conflict and with the potential of future Turkish mediation in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The Israeli-Palestinian conflict have been for several decades one of the biggest problems for the international security, therefore, analysing possible solutions is very important. Turkey is an actor with a special position, because it is a regional power with ties both to Islamic culture and to the West. That is why it has in theory a potential to play successful mediation role in this conflict. In this thesis, we will evaluate Turkey's existing role and after that, we will analyse the future potential with the help of the mediation conceptual framework that is described in the scholarly literature on conflict resolution and conflict management. Our research questions are: Can Turkey play a successful mediator role in the future? If yes, what conditions have to take place? Turkey tries to play a role in this conflict since the early 1990s and despite the fact that there has been a disruption of the diplomatic relations between Israel and Turkey, it is very likely that in the future a normalization will occur. If that happes, can Turkey broker peace?

Master thesis "Strategy of Armenia-Azerbaijan conflict resolution by participating states and key external actors"deals with the conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan, in the center of which lies the dispute about the Nagorno Karabakh. Using qualitative analysis of grand strategy of Armenia and Azerbaijan and grand strategies of key regional and external stakeholders it uncovers interests, objectives and postures of the players in their strategic environment. On the basis of comprehensive analysis of the grand strategies I assess their effectiveness in relation to fulfillment of the state's goals and also the role, which conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan plays in their strategy. In theoretical part I present short overview of the evolution of the concept of grand strategy and also operationalization of assessment of the strategies. In the second chapter I describe the historical background of south Caucasus, which is crucial for understanding of the conflictive nature of some interstate states in the region. In the third chapter I analyze grand strategies of Armenia, Azerbaijan, Iran, Turkey, Russia, USA and EU. In the last chapter I summarize the effectiveness and relevance of chosen strategies.

Since the dissolution of the Soviet Union, the two de-facto regimes of Abkhazia and South Ossetia have fought actively for their independence from Georgia and international recognition, until the conflict in the Southern Caucasus has reached a frozen status quo in 2008. To maintain peace in the region and to ultimately achieve a resolution of the conflict, the European Union (EU) has become actively involved as an external mediator and has introduced several bilateral agreements and monitoring measures. In this thesis, the EU’s conflict resolution mechanisms towards the territorial and political conflict in Georgia are evaluated through an input-output analysis to answer to which extent these measures are effective or not. Obstacles like identarian differences between the conflicting parties have to be considered, and political, as well as economic motivations for bigger actors, that hinder this process. The result of the evaluation is that in the field of conflict prevention, the EU’s measures and implemented policies are contributing effectively, while the active promotion of conflict transformation or conflict settlement is only achieved to a small degree, and is not effective within the current approach.

It has been the desire of the ANC government ever since it came to power in 1994 to develop a unity of purpose and spirit that cherishes and celebrates the diverse nature of the South African population in terms of culture, language and religion and to transform existing inequalities that are deep-rooted in South African educational history and religion in particular. In order to satisfy this desire, a whole plethora of legislation and policies was developed. Amongst the developments entailed in these laws and policies were religious rights and freedoms guaranteed to all South Africans as well as the establishment of democratic structures vested with powers to govern schools while school principals manage them. In terms of education legislation, one of the functions of the governing body of a school is to develop and adopt a school policy on religion (as per the study) which is accordingly implemented by the school principal. It is in the policy implementation stage that the school principal is expected to play a mediating role and resolve possible conflicts erupting due to different religious interestThis study is based on the assumption that the management and leadership training they received and the position they hold as school managers and leaders, enabled participating school principals to mediate the implementation of new religion policies. The research question driving this study was “How do school principals deal with implementation of the National Policy on Religion and Education in schools?” Informed by this question the focus of the study was to explore “how principals describe and experience their mediating role in implementing the religion policy within an existing religious context in schools”. Following a qualitative research approach a phenomenological research design was employed in order to understand and describe the meaning of the lived, felt and narrated experiences of school principals. Data were collected by means of narrative interviews where twelve school principals pursuing postgraduate studies with the University of Pretoria and who have been in education for at least ten years, told their religion in education stories. These stories were subsequently transcribed, analysed and interpreted to determine the impact of principals’ past religious experiences and their management training on their implementation of religion policies at their schools. This study found that in dealing with the National Policy on Religion and Policy (2003) implementation in schools, participating principals ignore the policy in preference of maintaining the status quo. When faced with conflicts related to religious interests, they partially sub-contracted into the policy. They did not seem to consider transformative mediation as a possible leadership strategy for conflict resolution in the existing religious context of schools. The study also found that amongst these principals, there were those who displayed a confident attitude, values of openness, generosity and integrity and had used their past religious experiences to transform the quality of conflict interaction in schools. My recommendation in this regard would therefore be threefold. One, Higher Education Institutions should provide appropriate training by introducing suitable courses that will yield adequate knowledge, skills and opportunities for professional attitude, value attainment and determination for continuous learning and development to principals as key change agents. Two, there is a need for these organizations to re-evaluate and re-organise existing courses for better recognition of transformative mediation as a leadership strategy to conflict resolution in schools. The provincial departments of education need to provide appropriate training for prospective principals as part of professional development programmes to address the essential needs pertaining to policy implementation that could create conflict in schools. Training in mediation of conflict would therefore be essential. / Thesis (PhD)--University of Pretoria, 2013. / gm2013 / Education Management and Policy Studies / unrestricted

This document discusses and analyzes the theoretical implications as of developmental psychology, relating to variables that are essential for the study of socialization, such as parental ethno-theories and the context of the mother-child interaction, from the specificity of a cultural context. A relevant subject for psychology is approached, focusing on subjects of cultural, trans-cultural, and developmental psychology. Parental beliefs, conflict resolution strategies, and cultural orientation were assessed in two Costa Rican samples, a rural (n=14) and an urban (n=14). 28 mothers and their pre-school children were assessed in three interaction episodes (free play and two scenario conflict situations). Collectivis Scale (Yamaguchi, 1984), Family Allocentrism Scale (Lay & others, 1998) and Socialization Goals Inventory (Harwood, 1992) plus a semi-structured interview were applied. Interdependent cultural orientation among Costa Rican mothers and differences among zone were tested. Despite an interdependent cultural orientation, urban and rural samples showed certain variability concerning interactive compenents, parental beliefs and cultural values related to conflict resolution and conflict resolution styles. Results allow to detail certain cultural specific values concernin parenting, interaction patterns, parental beliefs and social values related to conflict resolution.