Getting to Peace [Hardcover]

William L. Ury (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 1, 1999

A millennium manifesto for achieving peace at home, at work, in the community, and in the world from the co-author of the bestselling Getting to YES

Almost twenty years ago, Getting to YES revolutionized the way we think about negotiation. Now, on the verge of the millennium, bestselling author William Ury tackles the most critical challenge facing all of us: getting to peace. In our rapidly-changing workplaces, stressed-out families, and violent world, we need cooperation more than ever and yet everywhere destructive conflict poisons our relationships and our communities. How can we learn to deal with our differences without going to war? Is it humanly possible?

In Getting to Peace, Ury challenges the fatalism that is so fashionable. Using new archeological and anthropological evidence, he overturns old myths about human nature and offers a new and hopeful story about human conflict. He suggests a powerful new approach for turning conflict into cooperation which he calls the "Third Side." For in every dispute, there are not just two sides, but a silent third side that can help bring about agreement. By discovering the ten roles of the third side, each of us can act as teachers, healers, and mediators to achieve fair and non-violent conflict resolution. Our happiness at home, our productivity at work, and our very lives depend on Getting to Peace.

"Bill Ury has a remarkable ability to get to the heart of a dispute and find simple but innovative ways to resolve it."--President Jimmy Carter

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Ury, coauthor of Getting to Yes and Getting Past No, takes on a global issueAhow people can live at peace with one another. Citing last spring's shooting at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colo., as an example of horrible violence, Ury examines the myths about violence and offers some surprising insights and solutions. Using his anthropological fieldwork, Ury describes how the African Bushmen solve conflicts: no violence, whether it be raised voices or hitting children, is permitted; instead, there must be a dialogue until a solution to the problem is achieved. Anyone who is unwilling to work on a resolution verbally ends up leaving. Ury reports that Bushmen speak of a "third side," a point of view that represents not the interests of one of two parties to a conflict but rather the interests of the community as a whole. Ury then enumerates 10 "third side roles" that can be brought to bear on a conflict. These include mediator, arbitrator, equalizer and healer. Though filled with intelligent insight into the nature of human conflict, Ury's ideas are based on the premise that "humanity is in the midst of a social, economic, and political transformation just as far-reaching as the Agricultural Revolution ten thousand years ago." Skeptical readers will find that Ury comes close to asserting that human nature itself is changing. The book is full of good advice about conflict resolution, even if its more sweeping generalizations about the future eradication of war appear to be based more on optimism than on observation. (Oct.)
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal

Anthropologist, prolific author, and mediator Ury believes all citizens should play an active role in conflict as the "third side." Citing many cultures where community members facilitate conflict resolution, Ury suggests that it is in our best interests to learn how to "prevent, resolve, and contain" conflict. "No dispute takes place in a vacuum," he insists. In the heart of the book, Ury discusses ten "third side" roles--the Provider, for example, enables people to meet their needs; the Mediator reconciles conflicting interests; the Peacekeeper offers protection. He then puts these strategies in an interesting historical context. In the knowledge age when information, not money or land, is the new power source, he argues, society experiences an "equalizing of power" independent of traditional political or geographical confines. In a world where "pyramids of power" collapse, everyone has knowledge, and with it some degree of power, the role of the "third side" in new "networks of negotiation" becomes critical. For public and academic libraries, especially those with business collections.
-Julie Denny, Alliance for Mediation & Conflict Resolution, Amenia, NY
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 192 pages
• Publisher: Viking Adult (October 1, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0670887587
• ISBN-13: 978-0670887583
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 5.9 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #686,060 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

William Ury is the co--founder of Harvard's Program on Negotiation, where he directs the Project on Preventing War. One of the world's leading negotiation specialists, his past clients include dozens of Fortune 500 companies as well as the White House and Pentagon. Ury received his B.A. from Yale and a Ph.D. in Anthropology from Harvard. His books Getting to YES and Getting Past No have sold more than five million copies worldwide.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

11 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A lucidly written must-read on how to contain conflict, October 22, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Getting to Peace (Hardcover)

A powerful treatise on ways that human beings can live together peacefully in the new millennium. The first part of the book invites the reader to re-imagine conflict as three-sided, with those on the Third Side in the role of peacemaker. The second part revisits mankind's past and offers powerful evidence to suggest that destructive conflict may not be part of human nature. The third part invites the reader to become a Third Sider, and offers practical suggestions on how to prevent, resolve, and contain conflict. Ury brings to his work the perspectives of a meticulous anthropologist, brilliant mediator, and compassionate humanitarian. In Getting to Peace the result is a lucidly written book that I highly recommend as a thought-provoking, practical, and stimulating read.

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Conflict is not the norm, peace is!, August 19, 2002

By 

Harold McFarland (Florida) - See all my reviews
(HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)    (VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Getting to Peace (Hardcover)

In "Getting to Peace: Transforming Conflict at Home, At Work, and In the World" William Ury, a world famous negotiator, brings his years of experience to the average person. The book takes the view that conflict always has three sides, the two opposing sides and the third side which is that of a peacemaker. Contrary to what most people might think, William Ury takes the position that conflict is not a normal part of human nature, so destructive conflict is not inevitable. He proves his point well by pointing out that while conflict and strife make news, the basic human condition is peaceful conflict resolution punctuated by periods of strife and not strife punctuated by periods of peace. Peace is the norm.

The ability to resolve conflict gives us the ability to choose peace in all aspects of our life, at home, at work, at school or anywhere else. By discovering the ten roles of the peacemaker, everyone can learn to mediate destructive conflicts. A highly recommended read.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A hopeful, broad look at the steps toward peace, December 29, 2005

By 

M. Telfer - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Getting to Peace (Hardcover)

An anthropologist and expert on negotiation takes a look at violent conflict, both interpersonal and international, and optimistically describes what we can do to prevent, resolve, and contain it. The book is divided into three parts:
1. a description of the importance of the "third side" in a conflict
2. an examination of the history of violent conflict and speculations about its future
3. explanations of ten ways the third side can help to avert violence

Ury argues for the importance of what he calls the third side in a dispute, separate from the two conflicting parties but active in resolving conflict. He writes that violence is the ultimate arbiter when there is no other authority to decide an issue between people or groups. When left only to themselves, therefore, disputants tend to spiral into violent conflict to resolve their disagreements. The presence of a third party, however, changes the nature of an argument. Ury contends that a strong third side can go far toward keeping quarrels from becoming battles.

One of the book's big ideas is that, although conflict is inevitable (and even helpful), war and violence are not. By taking a historical and anthropological perspective, Ury questions the widely held assumption that war is an inherent part of human nature. He examines the archaeological evidence formerly used to "prove" our violent nature and argues that peace was the norm for the overwhelming majority of the time humans have existed. Ury contends that it was only with the shift from being hunter-gatherers to a settled agricultural and then industrial existence that war became feasible. He then holds out the hope that with the increasingly horizontal relationships and "expanding pie" of the knowledge age, we can return to peaceful coexistence.

Finally, the book describes ten different roles that the third side plays to prevent conflict from going out of control, resolve disputes that threaten to escalate, and contain fights that do break out. Ury uses numerous examples to illustrate these roles and show how individuals, organizations, and nations can fill them.

The book includes a "road map" outline of the main ideas and an extensive index, both of which help greatly in reviewing its contents.

I was impressed by the breadth of Ury's understanding. He brings not only a great deal of academic knowledge but practical experience ranging from resolving union-labor disputes to improving U.S.-Soviet relations during the Cold War to studying how African hunter-gatherer tribes resolve conflict. His optimism about the feasibility of conflict without violence caused me to reevaluate my notions about war and peace.

Getting to Peace was published in 1999, before the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and America's subsequent invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq. I found it interesting to interpret these events using Ury's framework and to see how the conflict in Iraq might have been handled differently. If the European nations that had objected so vociferously had sent peacekeeping troops to Baghdad, would the U.S. still have invaded? If there had been more bridge building between the Islamic world and the U.S. and a more equalized distribution of power, would the terrorist attacks even have occurred?

My questions and reservations about Ury's ideas revolve primarily around his hopes for a peaceful future through the knowledge economy. While it is true that most of the value of products created today comes from scientific knowledge, the way it is currently being applied is ecologically unsustainable. Will the pie continue to expand if the life support mechanisms of the planet begin to fail or if key resources become even scarcer? Despite these doubts, I found Getting to Peace thought provoking and readable, with both a comprehensive philosophical/historical framework and numerous down-to-earth examples and suggestions.