What is Globalization's Relationship to Workplace Conflict?

In general, globalization is “the widening, deep­ening, and speeding up of worldwide intercon­nectedness in all aspects of contemporary social life” (Held, McGrew, Goldblatt, & Perraton, 1999, p.

Studying conflict from a global communica­tive perspective integrates these approaches, addressing conflict quite broadly across mul­tiple levels of the social system. We define conflict as any situation in which incompatible goals, attitudes, emotions, or behaviors lead to disagreement between two or more entities, whether those entities be individuals, represen­tatives of groups, organizations, or interorga- nizational alliances. Conventionally, conflict in the workplace arises from two primary motiva­tions: (1) the desire to obtain goals (concern for production) and (2) the desire to retain interpersonal relationships (concern for people) (Rubin, 1994). Rather than exploring intercul- tural or interpersonal communication dynamics in isolation of the historical, economic, and/or sociopolitical context, a global communication approach addresses the ways in which macrois­sues of convergence and the dynamics of glo­balization are entrenched in the microprocesses of divergence and cultural variability.