Protracted Conflict in the Entertainment Industry: The Case of the 2008-2009 Screen Actors Guild Negotiations

• In Event: ICA Interactive Paper/Poster Session III
  In Interactive Poster Session: Journalism Studies Interactive Poster Session

Abstract

Protracted conflicts are common and complex, and differ from other types because of their ongoing escalation, non-negotiable issues, unsuccessful interventions, and passage of time. This study develops codes for features of protracted conflict, and then applies those to the case of the news coverage (n=148) of the 2008-2009 negotiations between the Screen Actors Guild of America and the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers. Results demonstrate the applicability of these features to a labor-management conflict setting, illustrate how these features vary over time, and show how features are interrelated, to reveal two underlying dimensions of the particular conflict (temporal context and resolution flexibility), and possibly protracted conflicts in general.

Authors

• Ryan Patrick Fuller, California State U, Sacramento

• Ronald E. Rice, U of California, Santa Barbara