Pathways of Change: Organizations in Transition

This article discusses and illustrates organizational changes as initiated by ownership transition. It develops and elaborates three different pathways that organizations might follow through the process of transformation from government departments to state‐owned enterprises, and then to privately‐owned companies: the incremental, radical and reductive pathways. The research reported here is based on 11 case studies of New Zealand privatized companies. The pathway approach develops and extends existing models of transitional organizational trajectories, emphasizing the importance of antecedent conditions of organizational development, current environmental patterns and the strategic choices of the government and new owners.     

School Climate as a Predictor of Incivility and Bullying Among Public School Employees: A Multilevel Analysis

We surveyed public school educators on the workplace incivility and workplace bullying they experienced and obtained their ratings of the organizational climate of the school. We used multilevel modeling to determine the effects of individual-level and school-level predictors. Ratings of school climate were significantly related to incivility and bullying. We found inverse relationships— the better the organizational climate, the lower the incivility and bullying. Several demographic variables of educators and two school-level variables were not significant predictors. Leaders who focus on improving organizational climate may find that their efforts benefit both student achievement and relationships among educators.     

Conflict resolution symposium derails a potential tobacco “war”

Conclusion While it is, of course, very satisfying to see measurable results from a conflict resolution initiative, the immeasurable byproducts of the symposium are no less important. All who were present will never forget the evening at dinner when a preeminent cancer surgeon diagnosed skin cancer on the face of the oldest tobacco farmer and offered to fly across country to help treat him. The doctor who had earlier almost resorted to blows when the symposium began, made a commitment to visit North Carolina and see the plight of tobacco farm families firsthand.In debriefing the symposium's design and outcomes, many of the participants expressed desires that such processes could be used more routinely. Value was seen in having meetings throughout the country to teach such skills and model the processes of alternative dispute resolution. One member of the Congress even expressed a desire that training be offered on Capitol Hill, so that all members could benefit from becoming better at resolving disputes.What the tobacco symposium participants experienced is not unique. It demonstrates the positive experiences that can occur when people in conflict are empowered to resolve their differences in ways that uplift them and result in mutual gain. Instead of focusing on each other as enemies, their creative powers were focused on common problems and redirected; they were then able to design creative solutions. Dayle E. Powell is a Fellow and Director of Conflict Resolution Programs at the Carter Center of Emory University, One Copenhill, Atlanta, Georgia 30307. The Center, founded by former U.S. President Jimmy Carter, is a nonprofit, nonpartisan institution focusing on conflict resolution, human rights, international affairs, and health policy.     

Persistent Fighting and Shifting Power

Three striking features about both interstate and civil war are (1) there are often periods of persistent fighting, (2) fighting commonly ends in negotiated settlements as well as in militarily decisive outcomes, and (3) fighting sometimes recurs. This article links these features to shifts in the distribution of power and to the fact that one of the functions of fighting is to forestall adverse shifts. The analysis centers on a simple model of state consolidation. The equilibrium displays these features: Fighting occurs when the distribution of power is shifting rapidly. The factions avoid fighting and cut deals when the distribution of power shifts slowly or is stable. Fighting resumes if the distribution of power again begins to shift rapidly. The analysis also shows that state consolidation can occur without fighting if the process is sufficiently slow. Fighting now rather than later can also reduce the total cost of fighting.     

The relationship between investigative interviewing experience and open-ended question usage

We present three studies examining the role of prior job experience in interviewing and interviewers' ability to learn open-ended questions during a training program. We predicted a negative relationship such that more experienced interviewers would perform worse after training than less experienced interviewers, and that (irrespective of baseline performance) the more experienced interviewers would improve the least during training. These predictions were made for two reasons. First, specific questions are commonly used in the workplace (i.e. open-ended questioning constitutes new learning). Second, experience in the use of specific questions potentially interferes with newly learned open-ended questions. Overall, our predictions were supported across different participant samples (including police officers specialized in child abuse investigation and social workers from the child protection area), time delays, and modes of training. The results highlight the need for investment in ongoing investigative interviewing training commencing early during professionals' careers, prior to the establishment of long-term habits in the use of specific questions.     

Reply to Critics

This article responds to the four contributors to the book symposium on Conscience and Conviction: The Case for Civil Disobedience. Those four contributors are Thomas Hill Jr, David Lefkowitz, William Smith, and Daniel Weinstock. Hill examines the concepts of conviction and conscience (Chapters 1 and 2); Smith discusses conviction and then analyses the right to civil disobedience and my humanistic arguments for it (Chapter 4); Weinstock explores democratic challenges for civil disobedience (Chapter 5); and Lefkowitz assesses the merits of a legal demands-of-conviction excuse for civil disobedience (Chapter 5). This ‘Reply to Critics’ addresses them in turn.     

Family Law,Parents with Disabilities,and the Americans with Disabilities Act

Parents with disabilities contend with bias within the family law system, often threatening their custody and visitation rights. The overarching goal of this article is to explore the experiences of parents with disabilities involved in custody and visitation disputes and the application of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) in these cases. This article begins with an overview of parents with disabilities and their interactions with the family law system. Next, the article examines the ADA and its applicability to custody and visitation disputes. Finally, the article offers thoughts about strategies that can be utilized by attorneys to ensure that the rights of parents with disabilities are protected.