Music, Leadership and Conflict

In this chapter Ippolito introduces the conflict crisis: the inability to effectively negotiate and problem-solve in a twenty-first-century environment. Rooted in dominant culture war and game metaphors that encourage adversarial competition and define success on the basis of “winning”, Ippolito advocates for a cooperative approach to negotiation in order to achieve subjectively and contextually defined optimal outcomes. Such a paradigm shift requires a new metaphoric frame and a new pedagogical approach to negotiation and dispute resolution. To respond to the conflict crisis, Ippolito puts forward the musical ensemble as the new metaphor and model and an arts-based teaching and learning method to explore the effects of this new paradigm.

Ippolito provides an in-depth discussion of the phenomenon of ensemble music-making and how its key elements overlap with negotiation and dispute resolution processes. She discusses the essential mindset, skills and behaviours needed for effective engagement in collaborative music-making, the importance of “relationship” to self, other and process, and the need for mastery of “the Three C’s” of successful negotiation—communication, community and communion. These concepts, skills and how to achieve them are explored through interviews with five leading Canadian and American jazz and classical musicians and Ippolito’s own reflections as a classical pianist. Insights into ensemble music-making and core themes emerging from the musician interviews were foundational in the design of the comparative teaching study detailed by Ippolito in Chap. 4.

In this chapter Ippolito sets the stage for the comparative teaching study that follows in Chap. 4, placing the research study in theoretical context. Against the backdrop of twenty-first-century learning science concepts and objectives, and changing philosophies in education, the chapter reviews key literature related to experiential learning and arts-based learning as a specific form of experiential learning. Ippolito then looks at the use of arts-based modalities in the “signature professions” of management, medicine and law, and at leading research conducted in these fields that relates to the impact of arts-based methods on practice. Ippolito provides an overview of arts-based initiatives in the teaching of negotiation and conflict resolution specifically, and the express use of music as an arts-based teaching modality.

Ippolito details the design and implementation of a comparative teaching study using music as metaphor, model and arts-based teaching medium. Ippolito takes us, step-by-step, through the curriculum design and teaching of an 11-week course in negotiation and dispute resolution. The chapter presents grounded empirical data and findings from the study that looks at how adopting an “ensemble” approach to negotiation and problem-solving might assist in shifting adversarial combative and competitive frames towards more collaborative settlement-oriented mindsets, and how music-infused pedagogy might assist in developing enhanced skills and practice behaviours leading to more desirable outcomes. The data are expressed through the voices and experiences of the study participants. The chapter summarizes skills development in the areas of relationship-building, increased social and emotional competence, and creative capacities. It compares the outcomes of the two classes engaged in the study—the music group and the non-music group—in a series of simulated negotiations.

Ippolito speaks to the need for foundational change in how we approach conflict, negotiation and problem-solving in response to the present global conflict crisis. Focused on the need to create a new conflict culture and a new professional capable of optimally operating within that new paradigm, Ippolito offers examples of how we might achieve these goals by enlivening our classrooms and adopting frame-breaking behaviours in practice. Success—and survival—in the twenty-first-century global community depends upon our ability to change and respond to the needs of a constantly changing world. Ippolito emphasizes that the ability to interact, negotiate and problem-solve in a way that connects us to others rather than alienating us from them is critical to achieving short-term as well as long-term goals, and to the ultimate goal of helping to create a more settlement-oriented, peaceful world.