The aim of this book is to bring together approaches from different subfields of Artificial Intelligence as well as adjoint disciplines in order to characterize a "computational model" of conflicts. The different views on computational conflicts are motivated as follows: Conflicts can occur in organizations among human agents, as well as in computational systems such as knowledge-based systems, or multi-agent systems. They can appear during problem solving or during communication. Their nature or processing can also be specific for some tasks (such as concurrent engineering and design). They can be formalized and techniques can be offered for detecting, managing or avoiding them. 1. On Conflicts in General and their Use in AI in Particular.- 2. Conflict Ontology.- 3. Modelling Conflict-Resolution Dialogues.- 4. Managing Conflicts in Reflective Agents.- 5. Difference: a key to enrich knowledge - Concepts and Models.- 6. Detecting Temporal Conflicts in Integrated Agent Specifications.- 7. Conflict Management in Concurrent Engineering: Modelling Guides.- 8. Modeling Conflicts Between Agents in a Design Context.- 9. Conflict Management as Part of an Integrated Exception Handling Approach.- 10. Conflict Resolution in Distributed Assessment Situations.- 11. The Iterated Lift Dilemma.- References.- List of Contributors.
