Volume 11 – 2018, No. 1

This essay provides a practical introduction to the basic terms, relations, model of consciousness, style of inquiry, and theory of change that constitutes the method in analyzing conflict behavior employed by practitioners of the Insight approach to conflict analysis and resolution. 

This article addresses how a practitioner can help to dissipate interpersonal conflict by recognizing and responding to feelings. Using conceptual resources from the Insight approach, the article proposes that reflexive inquiry into feelings as indicative of valuing can generate more expansive possibilities in transforming conflict. A case study of an intervention into workplace conflict explores how asking about feelings can elicit reflexive curiosity, rather than defensiveness, when a practitioner’s questions focus on discerning significance registered in a party’s felt response. The article’s autoethographic method indicates practical strategies as well as theoretical supports to analyze and respond to interpersonal conflict.

Conflict behavior, as explained by the Insight approach, is the function of a decision to defend against a valuing of threat. However, defending against threat isn’t simply a choice, but a product of the biology of survival. This essay explores the psychological effects of threat, as well as their antidote: curiosity, showing that curiosity targeted toward the interiority of decision making in conflict can generate both a feeling of being understood and a self-awareness that sets the stage for new, transformative possibilities.