Abstract
Although the institutional or structural methods of conflict resolution have received attention in marketing channels literature, processual strategies have been subjected to less academic scrutiny. The purpose of this research is to contribute to conflict resolution literature by comparing two competing processual conflict resolution strategies within the business-to-business relationship context. This is accomplished by conducting two studies. Study one operationalizes problem solving, persuasion, bargaining and politicking as conflict resolution strategies which act as predictors of key relational constructs. This study represents an extension of Dant and Schul’s (1992) work, as different inferential techniques are used to examine the efficacy of this CR taxonomy. The second study operationalizes problem solving in a similar way but introduces compromising and aggressive strategies as predictor strategies. This study extends Ganesan’s (1993) CR model by applying the taxonomy in a franchising context. The results of the two studies show that the mutuality driven strategies (i.e., problem solving, compromise, and persuasion) were positively related to constructs such as trust and commitment, which have a positive influence on relational outcomes. However, unilateral strategies were positively related to harmful outcomes such as perceptions of stress and conflict.