PSY2506 – Green Mediation: Conflict, Collaboration, and Change Towards a Sustainable Future

Schedule, syllabus and examination date

Course content

Implementing changes towards more sustainability on the societal, economic and individual levels poses opportunities and threats. For example, the costs and benefits of sustainable energy transitions are not usually evenly distributed, and people may not always perceive them accurately. This reality has generated numerous place-based resistance movements and intractable, intergroup stakeholder conflicts that stall progress toward decarbonization, which in turn exacerbates the climate change crisis that we collectively face. Globally, some relevant examples include local opposition to wind energy turbines, hydropower plants, and large-scale solar power installations. In this course, we will analyze such environmental conflicts to understand the realistic and symbolic threats involved. We will also learn about various models and methods of collaboration and conflict management, and practice applying them to conflicts surrounding global climate change and sustainability.

Learning outcome

  • Know some of the prototypical conflicts in climate change mitigation, the parties involved and their positions

  • Identify causes of conflicts related to resources, ideology, and identity

  • Understand the social and cognitive dynamics behind these conflicts, including underlying interests and needs, perceived threats and opportunities, social norms, and heuristics/biases

  • Examine the roles of cooperation and competition in the escalation of conflicts

  • Describe the "tragedy of the commons" and the conditions for cooperation in this dilemma

  • Distinguish the issue level from the relational level in the analysis of conflict

?Skills:

  • Analyze conflicts through the lenses of different conflict models

  • Identify integrative potential in conflicts that facilitate win-win solutions.

  • Principled negotiation

  • Trust-building through cooperation

  • Practical know-how in negotiation, mediation, and collaborative processes

  • Fostering mutual recognition and tolerance

  • Develop sound judgment in situation assessment

General competencies:

  • Reflect on values and standards in conflict management approaches

  • Awareness of one’s own role and how one’s identity, ideology and values impact one’s feelings, decisions and actions

  • Thinking strategically about when, where and how to engage, and when to disengage