The designations employed and the presentation of material throughout this publication do not imply the expression of any opinion whatsoever on the part of UNESCO concerning the legal status of any country, territory, city or area or of its authorities, or concerning the delimitation of its frontiers or boundaries. The authors are responsible for the choice and the presentation of the facts contained in this book and for the opinions expressed therein, which are not necessarily those of UNESCO and do not commit the Organization. ACKNOWLEDGMENT This article is a contribution from UNESCO’s International Hydrological Programme to the World Water Assessment Programme. It was prepared within the framework of the joint UNESCO–Green Cross International project entitled “From Potential Conflict to Co-operation Potential (PCCP): Water for Peace, ” and was made possible by the

Managers in a global business environment work with people who have different values, behavioral norms, and ways of perceiving reality. Team members bring their different national and professional backgrounds to the table, and suppliers and clients come from different corporate cultures. Consequently, intercultural competencies have become important for a wider range and larger number of people in business than ever before. In order to prepare students to become effective in the multiple cultural contexts they will face, business educators must clarify what constitutes intercultural competencies and how to develop them within the context of a business school classroom. In this paper we present the idea of learning to “negotiate reality ” as a core intercultural competence and we describe an approach we designed and used for developing this competence at an international business school in Europe. Zusammenfassung

Some mediators feel that loss of control is unavoidable, part of the process, or even necessary. Most third-party neutrals, however, would probably welcome an approach where such dysfunctional escalations were either greatly reduced or completely eliminated. Drawing on his work as a researcher and practicing mediator in interpersonal organizational conflict, the author argues that pre-caucusing—a separate meeting between the mediator and each of the stakeholders before they are ever brought together into a joint session—can not only overcome many of the negatives often associated with caucusing, but has the potential of becoming a pillar of conflict management. This is especially so when pre-caucusing is integrated into a transformative mediation framework. Pre-caucusing affords stakeholders the opportunity to vent and be heard at a critical time in the mediation process, when it can reduce defensiveness and increase creativity. Once in the joint session, stakeholders communicate with each other with less mediator interference. Key Words: caucusing, pre-caucusing, mediation, conflict resolution, alternative dispute resolution, conflict management skills, conflict