use the competitive strategy with minimal risk to itself. Threats, for 

 example, work better — and lead to more concessions from the other side--when 

 made by powerful players. Noncompetitive strategies, of course, are best for 

 low-power players. Less powerful organizations have three options in this 

 situation: increase their own power, decrease the power on the other side, or 

 convince powerful competitive organizations to adopt a noncompetitive approach 

 (Gifford 1985). When an organization is confronted with an extremely powerful 

 opponent, it may have no choice but to play a competitive game. 



A third factor is dead! ines--real or artificial. When an organization is 

 under the pressure of a deadline, the competitive strategy should be avoided. 

 This is because competitive negotiations are the most likely to break down. 

 If an agreement is mandated by law, cooperation is most likely to come from 

 those organizations standing to lose the most if an impasse occurs. Indeed, 

 the threat of litigation often provides a powerful incentive for compromise 

 (Clyde 1985). Delay tactics, then, may convince even powerful, normally 

 competitive organizations to consider an alternative approach (Gifford 1985). 



Finally, if an organization is interested in maintaining trusting and 

 long-term relationships with the other parties, a noncompetitive approach is 

 best (Gifford 1985). Since many of the organizations are repeat players in 

 the resolution of instream flow issues, interorganizational relationships are 

 highly val ued. 



Once a competitive strategy has been ruled out, a choice must be made 

 between the two noncompetitive approaches. In general, the cooperative 

 approach is most suitable in a zero-sum ganie, in which a limited amount of 

 resources are to be divided among the players. Conversely, if the conflict 

 is — or can be converted into — a positive-sum game, the integrative approach is 

 best. In positive sum games, the gain of one party does not necessarily have 

 to result in losses for the other side. The potential exists for all sides to 

 a conflict to benefit. Further, the more issues there are, and the more 

 diverse, the greater the potential for identifying trade-offs, a crucial 

 ingredient of the integrative approach. Last, the greater the need for a 

 timely resolution of the conflict, the more appropriate the cooperative 

 approach — rather than the integrative one. This is because, of the three 

 approaches examined here, the integrative is the most time-consuming (Gifford 

 1985). 



In determining the most appropriate approach to a particular negotiation, 

 the output from the computerized version of LIAM is worth examining closely. 

 First, the role map provides an analyst with a pictorial representation of the 

 organizations participating in the conflict as they are distributed among the 

 16 subquadrants on the map. The analyst is also provided with the numerical 

 scores — indices — for each organization analyzed, for each of the four major 

 role types. Indices for each of the three power variables — resources, 

 expertise, and support — are also provided, along with a pictorial representa- 

 tion of these scores in the form of power columns for each organization. 

 Finally, the analyst is provided with a description of the behavior that is 

 predicted for each of the organizations analyzed, based on its location on the 

 role map (see Appendix I for all of these descriptions). The role map, more- 

 over, can be directly related to one of the three strategies outlined above. 



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