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Tensions and conflicts are a regular, but complex, part of organizational life. Triangulating multiple related theories is useful in gaining deeper insights into the complexities of tension or conflict management processes in organizations. This dissertation consists of three related essays that collectively contribute to answering a common research question: How and why tensions or conflicts are experienced and managed in different organizational contexts? The focus is on how three theoretical perspectives (contingency, paradox and dialectic) can be deployed to understand tension or conflict management in different contexts. This topic is relevant for three reasons. First, recent evidence demonstrates that both tensions and conflicts have constructive potential for individual and/or organizational change. Second, conflict studies have been shifting from short-term focused resolution to long-term-oriented transformation. This trend suggests that conflict studies might benefit from tension research, which is often long-term oriented due to the persistence of organizational tensions. Third, the advancement of tension research at the organization level calls for more tension research at the individual level. This presents a good opportunity to complement conflict studies, which mainly focus on individual and team level analyses. The dissertation uses a multi-perspective framework to analyze tension or conflict management in three organizational contexts that are rich in tensions and conflicts: family businesses, innovation in government, and the entrepreneurial university. The contingency perspective features either-or thinking that stresses the importance of making either-or choices according to contingencies. The paradox perspective features both-and thinking which favours strategies that address competing demands simultaneously. The dialectic perspective involves more-than thinking that aims to transcend tensions or conflicts through third parties, reframing, or other workarounds. The study of three different contexts (family business, government, and the university) allows for a better understanding of how different contexts shape the manifestation of tensions and conflicts and influence the choice of tension and conflict management strategies. The first essay (presented in chapter 2 and co-authored with Professor Mark Freel) is based on a literature review of family-related conflicts and how these conflicts are managed in family businesses. The review illustrates how the popularity of certain conflict management strategies is associated with some unique aspects of family businesses, such as the prevalence of relationship conflicts and the relatively high emotional bonding in families. The second essay (presented in chapter 3 and co-authored with Professor Samia Chreim) uses a longitudinal case study to examine how tension management evolves regarding two tensions observed in a government innovation diffusion process: control versus resistance and competing interests among stakeholders. The study demonstrates how tension management strategies evolve from simple to complex through a mechanism of joint learning between innovators and the government. The study also finds that tensions can be leveraged strategically to move the innovation project forward. The third essay (presented in chapter 4 and co-authored with Professor Samia Chreim and Professor Mark Freel) explores how academic and non-academic staff in two Canadian universities manage the reward and resource tensions associated with entrepreneurship-related activities. The study finds that individuals' strategies in managing the reward tension influence the type of entrepreneurship-related activities they engage in, and individuals' strategies in managing the resource tension influence the scale and scope of entrepreneurship-related activities at the university level. The study also illustrates that power relations are dynamic and that the implementation of both-and strategies can help balance power relations in a tension context. Collectively, the three essays in this dissertation shed light on how organizations, teams or individuals manage tensions or conflicts in three organizational contexts featuring hybrid logics (family and business; innovation and bureaucracy; entrepreneurship and scholarship). The multi-perspective framework has proved useful as a tool for analyzing both tension and conflict management. It also helps to frame important new research questions around topics such as how constructive potential is realized, why certain management strategies are more or less popular, and how strategies evolve with different types of tension or conflict.

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According to orthodoxy the study of the Soritical and semantical paradoxes belongs to the domain of the philosophy of language. To solve these paradoxes we need to investigate the nature of words like `heap' and `true.' In this thesis I criticise linguistic explanations of the state of ignorance we find ourselves in when confronted with indeterminate cases and develop a classical non-linguistic theory of indeterminacy in its stead. The view places the study of vagueness and indeterminacy squarely in epistemological terms, situating it within a theory of rational propositional attitudes. The resulting view is applied to a number of problems in the philosophy of vagueness and the semantic paradoxes.

Middle Pennsylvanian (Desmoinesian) strata of the Lower Desert Creek (LDC) sequence within the sub-surface Greater Aneth Field (GAF) reflect a hierarchy of 4th and 5th order carbonate-dominated cycles. The Lower Desert Creek sequence, along the studied transect are composed of eight carbonate facies deposited on an east-facing shelf. There is a lateral transition from open marine algal buildup from the southeast (cores R-19, Q-16, O-16, and J-15) to a more restricted lagoonal environment to the northwest (core K-430 and E-313). The Lower Desert Creek sequence within the GAF contains three main parasequence sets: a basal, relatively deep-water unit (LDC 1), a middle skeletal to algal unit (LDC 2-4), and a shallow, open-marine/restricted lagoon unit (LDC 5-7). The southeast cores (R-19, Q-16, O-16, and J-15) contain the dolomitized basal unit in parasequence LDC 1. The northwest cores (K-430 and E-313) also contain the dolomitized basal unit in LDC 1, but show a deeper facies succession through LDC 2-4. Parasequences LDC 2-4 are the heart of the algal buildup in the GAF particularly in the southern part of the transect. The upper few parasequences (LDC 5-7) are dominated by an open marine environment represented by robust fauna. The upper parasequences (LDC 5-7) show the same shallowing upward trends with algal facies in K-430 and restricted lagoon facies in E-313. Shoaling upward trends that characterize the Lower Desert Creek sequence terminate with an exposure surface at the 4th order (Lower Desert Creek-Upper Desert Creek) sequence boundary. Porosity and permeability is weakly correlated to facies. Diagenesis within the algal reservoir is the most important factor in porosity and permeability. Marine diagenesis is observed in the form of micritization of Ivanovia, a phylloid algae. Thin fibrous isopachous rims of cloudy cement also indicate early marine diagenesis. Ghost botryoidal cements are leached during meteoric diagenesis. Meteoric drusy dog tooth cements as well as sparry calcite fill most depositional porosity. Neomorphism of micrite and the isopachous rim cements reflect meteoric diagenesis. Burial diagenesis is represented by baroque dolomite cement, compaction, and mold-filling anhydrite cement.

Seeing as fashion companies today have a proclaimed desire to act sustainably, we wanted to explore their explanations regarding the paradoxical phenomenon which is based on having CSR strategies, yet still advocating for consumption. The consumption rate in today’s society is not sustainable, and it appears that it has lead to some confusion regarding where to start or how to handle the paradoxes. Massive amounts of wastage, environmental pollutions and social issues in the supply chain are only a few components in the fashion industry which is full of paradoxical phenomena and tensions. This study aims to explore companies who have well established CSR principles, yet still contribute to mass production within the supply chain which consequently leads to overconsumption. Paradox perspective acknowledges tensions between and among various desirables, yet interdependent and at times conflicting sustainability objectives. In this study we look at the three aspects of CSR, and the tensions that exists when competing demands and goals of these aspects needs to be considered by the fashion companies. By viewing the three aspects of CSR through three dimensions (rearward, nearby and forward), we have analyzed our interviews and identifying different paradoxes that existed. The paradox of need for profit, the paradox of sustainability communication and the paradox of sustainable consumption. Conclusions drawn from these existing paradoxes are that fashion companies might be using more sustainable materials, but that the massive volumes of garments remain. Fashion companies are flexible with their goals of CSR, but stubborn with their methods of doing business, when the opposite is in fact required in order to improve the three aspects of CSR in various dimensions.