The Containment And Resolution Of Public Conflict Management

How to effectively deal with all kinds of conflicts in the public domain, it has been the question that the practice of China management and theoretical research must answer. The core purports of this article are that detailly analysising of the development and changing trend of public conflict management mode, Exploring the coupling models and characteristics of conflict management means under different social background, revealing the complex relationships between the coupling degree and governing effects.The public conflict management means in the present, which can be classified into two categories as conflict containment and conflict resolution, on the basis of the implementation is mandatory or not,they have significant differences in connotation, method and goal orientation. conflict containment is oriented towards ending conflict,it has the advantages of less time and high efficiency, but it has no intention to listen to the parties in the conflict about the interest appeals,so it’s unable to evacuate the fundamental energy of conflict; However,the conflict resolution is oriented towards eliminating the roots of conflict, The resolving process also takes into account the equality and participation between the participants, so it is good at dispelling the deep discontent and build long-term cooperative relationship, but if the conflict subject has other alternative ways of lower cost and better efficiency, it is still difficult to avoid a "voluntary" predicament.Around of reforming and opening, when the governer selectes the different management means according to the different situations of conflict, it will cause the different effect. From the founding of new China to the reform and opening up, the basic idea of management in China is dominated by conflict containment and aided by conflict resolution.At that time,the domestic conflicts are divided into two categories as contradictions between ourselves and the enemy and the contradictions among the people,the nature and treatment of the two contradictions are different, generally speaking, it need to carry out the containment on the enemy,and the democratic solution on people, but even the handling of contradictions among the people, is still dominated by conflict containment. On the one hand, the government uses the containment means to deal with various conflicts,such as the ideology control, information control, economic resource control, population flow control, even violent repression and so on; on the other hand, the people’s mediation committee has been setted at all levels of urban and rural, it united with the administrative mediation and judicial mediation to deal with people’s internal disputes, it worked very well at resolving the conflicts,and promoting the social stability.Therefore, this conflict management which is dominated by conflict containment and aided by conflict resolution,is effective to deal with the single status of political conflict at that time. But after the reform and opening up, the political conflict was replaced by various kinds of interest conflict, the conflict management which is dominated by conflict containment gradually lose its effectiveness,in response to the new situation of diversified conflicts,although the governer continuously strengthen the containment,the effect declines.Facing the suitation that the energy of conflict is rising,and the management effectiveness is poor,the conflict management means of government is necessary to change, from the containment-oriented to the resolution-oriented, appropriately using the conflict resolution in the management practice, in this way, it will preferably coordinate the complex relationships between multiple subjects, promoting the actual effect of management.In fact, the improving of management effect depends on not only each kind of means, also depends on whether they can coordinate,to realize the effectlivly coupling. In order to reveal the relationship between the management means and its internal coupling degree with the management effect, the author analysed the collected235conflict cases, attempting to construct a relation model about the coupling of containment and solution and the management effect in the conflict management process,carriying on the empirical analysis with the method of structural equation model.The results show that,although some assumptions are not set up in the conditions of the sample data, but the coupling degree of containment and resolution is indeed playing a significant role as moderator between the management methods and effects, this conclusion provides a new idea for governing practice, that means the governer can’t only depend on one way, they should pay attention to the coordination between the containment and resolution,by mastering the mechanism of selection and transformation about the two ways, enhancing the coupling degree of containment and resolution,fainally achieving the goal of improving the management effect.The coupling of conflict containment and resolution shows the different patterns and characteristics in different social structures.In the background of vertical hierarchy, conflict containment and resolution show the characteristics of containment coupling, conflict containment control the resolution by the subject, means and goal, making the resolution get the colour of mandatory. At that time, the government accomplish the controling about the whole society through all levels of company and commune, containment subiect toally control the resolution subject, and achieve the ideological remoulding and conflict resolution by various forms of movement, conflict containment itself is the means, also is the goal, and the resolution is to serve the containment, the ultimate goal of the two ways is gradually converging, that is, all their goal is to realize the integration and control of public conflicts and social aspects.This containment coupling model is very effective for coping with the class conflict of adversarial at that time. But after the reform and opening up, the sever,sustained and intensive differentiation of social structure makes the containment coupling mode face a series of severe social challenges:one is the raising of economic conflicts reduces the application of the containment coupling model; two is the expanding of social forces provide them the chance and possibility to involve in the process of conflict management;three is the failing of the original unit’system, commune system and the resident registration system reduce the ability of government to control the conflict fundamentally.Facing the multiple conflicts during the reform and opening-up,in the process of conflict management, the coupling model of containment and resolution must be changed, it need change from the model of containment coupling to the interactive model, when the governor restore the order quickly,through the interaction and cooperation of containment and resolution, the deep-seated conflict energy also can be effectively dispelled,only in this way,we can give the lower governing cost in exchange for a long period of stability of society.Therefore, the interactive coupling model of containment and resolution is more suitable for governing the multiple conflicts at the new period.In the process of public conflict management,the coupling of containment and resolution has the problems of timing mismatched, improper containment and resolution lacked, the causes of these are driven by the confusion of conflict governing basis, the pressure of the longitudinal system,the absence,offside and "taint" of resolving subject. In order to improve the coupling of containment and resolution, it need to do something from the two aspects:one is to make clear the relationship of the containment and resolution, such as clearing the leading role of conflict resolution in the management, strengthening the protective function of containment, realizing the coordinative coupling of containment and resolution, etc.; two is to build the three mechanisms about the coupling of containment and resolution, including the the synergistic mechanism of different subjects, the interaction mechanism of different means,and the balance mechanism of different target, the purpose is to digesting the conflict in the framework of system as far as possible.