Dangerous Love

Longtime international mediator Chad Ford says love--yes, love--is the missing ingredient in conflict resolution. "If we can learn to see our "enemies" as we see ourselves, we can break down barriers and open up paths for creative problem-solving.

Knowing how to transform conflict is critical in both our personal and professional life. But generally, we are terrible at it. Chad Ford believes that we are missing a critical word in our discussions about conflict resolution: love. What if we could learn how to love the people we are in conflict with through the conflict? It's a dangerous move: we have to confront our fears and stereotypes and shed our protective presuppositions. But when that sort of love takes hold, we no longer see enemies--we see us. This book is about everything Ford has learned in the last fifteen years working as a conflict mediator, professor, and researcher. It shows how we disconnect from people at the very time we need to be most connected to them, which leads to the predictable patterns of justification and conflict escalation that ensue. It also shows how to break the cycle. Whether you are struggling with a difficult family member, a lack of unity in your work team, or problems in troubled communities, Ford offers a new way of thinking and dealing with deep-rooted conflict.