One of the effective resources available to us as a group of people wanting to live in harmony and peace, in my opinion, is Byron Katie's THE WORK.  Link to the worksheet:
http://thework.com/sites/thework/downloads/worksheets/JudgeYourNeighbor_Worksheet.pdf

• Adaptability: Prepared to change directions and delve into issues participants are most concerned with rather than strictly following your pre-planned agenda. 
• Non-defensiveness: Being able to hear people’s critical comments without defending yourself and your actions as soon as the criticism is expressed. 
• Empathy: Putting yourself in another’s shoes and understanding what they are experiencing. 
• Creativity: Building a just peace requires everyone’s creativity. 
• Modeling good conflict resolution skills and relationship behavior:
• We teach by what we do as well as what we say. 
• Be comfortable with ambiguity: We don’t have to know exactly what direction the group is headed at each moment.

Source.  

Trust is the glue that holds relationships, societies, and economies together. Violent conflict results in the breakdown of trust and that is why rebuilding it is a core element of our approach. By working with all sectors and levels of society to develop a common vision for the future, we contribute to increased mutual understanding and the rebuilding of trust.
Conflict tears apart the fabric of societies. Mistrust colours all relationships, including between people and their leaders. In such contexts, even small problems can escalate into wide-scale violence.

By providing safe spaces for dialogue, Interpeace helps societies re-establish trust through the collaborative identification of obstacles to lasting peace and the development of solutions to common problems.

Trust gives institutions lasting legitimacy and helps individuals and groups remain engaged in the long and arduous process of building lasting peace.  Source.

The process determines the result

We put as much effort into what needs to be done to enable a society to build peace as in how the process is approached. There is a need not only to focus on the end goal of building peace, but also on making sure that the process leading to it is managed in a way that allows for inclusion, constructive dialogue and consensus-building – rather than confrontation and power games. This is the only way to build sustainable peace.
Strengthening the foundations of a society that is divided is not business as usual. Mistrust tends to be deeply engrained. Major issues tend to be politically sensitive and urgent. Because of this urgency, the tendency is to propose technical solutions rather than to seek holistic solutions to complex problems. How the process is managed and how the engagement of all sides is carried out will determine, in large part, the success of an initiative.
​Source:  Interpeace

~ ​Robert McCloskey.

How to Discuss What Matters Most 
Book Notes:  difficultconversations.pdf
​
What influences you the most during contentious negotiations?