Can unofficial, academically based, third-party approaches contribute to the prevention and resolution of international and intercommunal conflicts? The article focuses on one such approach, interactive problem solving, which the author has applied primarily in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. After describing the central tool of the approach, the problem-solving workshop, the article goes on to address the role of interactive problem solving and related approaches to the larger process of conflict resolution. In this context, it discusses the relationship of the microprocess of problem-solving workshops to the macroprocess of international conflict resolution, the relationship between official and unofficial diplomacy, the relationship between practice and scholarship in conflict resolution, the role of the university in the process, and the possibilities for institutionalizing this model of conflict resolution.