Abstracts and Biographies:
Asia-Pacific
Chinese Culture and Mediation Techniques
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Siew-Fang Law
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| All societies have values, beliefs, ideologies and
institutionalised means to interpret differences, to define relationships, to justify
inequality, and to deal with conflicts. Similarly, the definition of peace and conflict
could be varied in different cultures. An examination of conflict in social-cultural
contexts is necessary and could enhance understanding of cultural differences in
perceptions of, and approaches to, conflict.
Chinese view social harmony as a main key in interpersonal interaction. This paper
would bring in a few principles of keeping harmony in Chinese values: such as, the Chinese
ideology of harmony (he), relationship (guan xi), face (mian zi), emotional debt (ren
qing), and different emotional expressions. I would discuss how would these values,
attitudes and behaviours hinder and/or help resolving their conflicts. |
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| Siew-Fang Law, a Chinese Malaysian, PhD student of RMIT
University. Her research interest is in the intercultural mediation techniques and
conflict resolution. She is a currently project officer with the Centre of the
Intercultural Development at the University of Melbourne. She also has been actively
involving with the work at the International Conflict Resolution Centre the University of
Melbourne. Through the centre, she was assisting in the 'Conflict, Culture and Language'
course at the University of Melbourne and also acting as the Coordinator of the Culture of
Peace News Network, which is one of the UNESCO peace project. She has a Master's degree
in Psychology from England, and a Bachelor's degree from Canada.
Her previous work involved social identity theory, inter-group attitudes and
behaviours, and acculturation orientation of different ethnic groups were studied.
Measures such as social distance, authoritarian values, social dominance, self-construal,
implicit theory, personal and collective self-esteem, social desirability, and host
community versus immigrant acculturation orientation were adopted. |
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