MANAGEMENT OF CONFLICTS IN UNIVERSITIES: THE UNIVERSITY OF NIGERIA NSUKKA, EXPERIENCE

Conflict is inevitable in any given organisation; the Universities as centres of ideas, experimentation, and diversity of philosophies, ethnicities, and beliefs are not immune to conflicts. In the University system, certain conflicts may have negative consequences, including disruption in academic programmes. Thus, the need to adopt effective management approaches to conflicts. The University of Nigeria has witnessed some conflicts through the years, but have adopted some innovative approaches in curbing the conflict. The study, sought to: examine the different conflict management approaches employed by the University of Nigeria in restoring peace in Enugu campus in 2016, determine the effect of mixed conflict management approaches employed by University of Nigeria Enugu on the effectiveness of the resolution strategy, and evaluate the extent to which the committee recommendations have been implemented to forestall such conflict in the future. The study adopted the survey design with a population of thirty-seven (37) ad-hoc panel members of enquiry on student conflict in 2016 at Enugu Campus of the University of Nigeria which was purposely selected and considered to be the sample. Primary data was sourced through the administration of a structured questionnaire designed on a five-point Likert scale. The instrument was tested for reliability using Cronbach's Alpha which gave r=0.89 indicating a high degree of item consistency. The opinion of experts was sought to ensure face and content validity of the research instrument. The data collected were analysed using descriptive statistics such as tables, frequencies, and percentages while the hypotheses were tested with ordinal logistic regression using Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS v.20). The study concludes that the school management would do better by adopting proactive preventive measures against conflict occurrence. However, if conflicts occur, there is a need to adopt a win-win strategy. It is recommended that in the university setting, the high handed winner takes all approach to conflict resolution would not work and may merely escalate the conflict.