Justice, Conflict and Wellbeing

Justice, conflict and wellbeing are large topics that occupy researchers from a variety of disciplines, as well as laypeople and policy makers. The three concepts are closely connected: conflict often (though not always) impairs wellbeing, whereas justice often (though not always) enhances it; perceived injustice is a common source of conflict, at multiple levels and calls for justice are a common response to conflict. In addition, each construct has subtypes, such as distributive and procedural justice, individual and group conflict and physical and psychological wellbeing. Although there are established traditions of research on the topics in multiple disciplines, there is little cross-fertilization across disciplines. This volume brings together researchers from social, clinical and educational psychology; law and political science. The unifying theme is how injustice and conflict pose threats to wellbeing, at the micro (individual) and macro (groups and societies) levels. Multi- and interdisciplinary research are at the vanguard of science in the twenty-first century and the present work applies multi and interdisciplinary perspectives to the important real-world topics of justice, conflict and wellbeing.

Brian Bornstein & Richard Wiener are Associate Director and Director, respectively, of the University of Nebraska-Lincoln (UNL) law-psychology program. The UNL law-psychology program is the nation's oldest such program and the editors have an established track record of conducting multi and interdisciplinary research. Both editors conduct research and publish extensively on the topics covered by the present volume. The chapter contributors are leading researchers in social science and law.