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When we think about conflict, we often associate it with something negative, pain- and harmful. We might think about a disagreement that we have had last week with one of our best friends, or a difficult working environments, where internal conflicts make it hard for us to be productive. In the field of peacebuilding, conflict can inevitably be associated with suffering, violence, destruction. However, is this the full picture? Let's have a look at a number of conflict definitions, in order to get a fuller picture:

The Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary has the following entry for the word "conflict":

Main Entry: 1con·flict
Function: noun
Etymology: Middle English, from Latin conflictus act of striking together, from confligere to strike together, from com- + fligere to strike -- more at PROFLIGATE
1 : FIGHT, BATTLE, WAR <an armed conflict>
2 a : competitive or opposing action of incompatibles : antagonistic state or action (as of divergent ideas, interests, or persons) b : mental struggle resulting from incompatible or opposing needs, drives, wishes, or external or internal demands
3 : the opposition of persons or forces that gives rise to the dramatic action in a drama or fiction

<http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/conflict%5B1%5D> (accessed 23 June 2009)

On the website of the Conflict Resolution Studies Center of El Centro College, Dallas (Texas, USA), I found the following about conflict:

What Is Conflict?

Conflict has been defined by different scholars in very many different ways, the different disciples like mathematics, physics, social sciences, Economics Pyschology, Philosophy and others have diffrent perspectives of conflict.
Attitudes About Conflict
Conflict is one of the most pervasive aspects of human affairs. Conflict exists in almost all social relationships, whether they be personal and informal or impersonal and formal. Most people are afraid of conflict and avoid it if at all possible. There is a widespread attitude of hopelessness and helplessness in coping with conflict.

[...]

Harmful Aspects of Conflict
When conflict cannot be contained in a functional way, it can erupt in violence, war, and destruction. The harmful aspects of conflict are pretty obvious if you read the newspaper or watch the news. Less obvious is the loss of productivity on the job, the destruction of relationships, organizational breakdown, and psychological damage to individuals.

Benefits of Conflict
Conflict has many benefits if it is contained before people turns violent. It can motive people to needed action and break them out of complacency. Sometimes conflict is necessary to bring an awakening to dysfunctional relationships or behavior.

Definition of Conflict
Conflict is behavior in which people oppose one another in their thoughts, feelings, and/or actions. All conflict involves the mind. The meanings, judgements, and values that crowd our minds move us to conflict. Feelings are an important dimension of conflict. For example, anger, hostility, fear, jealousy, insecurity, pain or sadness, inadequacy, are some of the feelings underneath conflicts. Although most conflicts involve disagreements of some kind, some of them can be more about feelings than thoughts. Finally, all conflicts have an action component—external behavior such as body movements, facial expressions, or speaking, This dimension of conflict can be observed, recorded, and measured.

Source: http://www.mediationadr.net/Conflict/WhatIsConflict.html


An experimental peace education video created by European University Center for Peace Studies (EPU) Students of the Fall Term 2008 can provides a good introduction to the multifacetted nature of conflict. This video brainstorm session starts from the question: 'What is conflict?' and expands from there.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u5pU5DNjoXY


Definitions and models of conflict (a conflict theory) have been developed by peace and conflict academics. Some definitions shall be presented here:

Johan Galtung: Conflict Triangle and the Life Cycle of Conflict

Professor Johan Galtung, who is considered as one of the key founding figures of peace and conflict studies as an academic discipline, developed the following model - called Conflict Triangle - describing the architecture of conflict (Johan Galtung, Peace by Peaceful Means. Peace and Conflict, Development and Civilization, International Peace Research Institute Oslo, London/Thousand Oaks/New Delhi: Sage Publications, 1996, p. 72):


Galtung's Conflict Triangle

According to Galtung, a conflict consists of behaviour (B), assumptions (cognitions) and attitudes (emotions) (A) and a contradiction (C). While the B-component is manifest (behaviour is by definition observable), both A and C are latent. Conflicts take the form of a triangle and there are flows and interactions between the three corners of the triangle which illustrates the dynamic nature of conflicts. Connected to this triangle, Galtung describes conflict as something almost organic, that has its own life cycle:

It appears, reaches an emotional, even violent climax, then tapers off, disappears - and often reappears. There is a logic: - individuals and groups (such as nations and states) have goals:
  • goals may be incompatible, exclude each other, like two states wanted the same land, or two nations wanting the same state;
  • when goals are incompatible a contradiction, an issue, is born;
  • any actor/party with unrealized goals feels frustrated and more so the more basic the goal, like basic needs and basic interests;
  • frustration may lead to aggression, turning inward as attitudes of hatred, or outward as behaviour of verbal or physical violence;
  • hatred and violence may be directed towards the holders of the goals standing in the way, but it is not always that "rational";
  • violence is intended to harm and hurt (including oneself), and may breed a spiral of counter-violence as defense and/or revenge;
  • that spiral of hatred and violence becomes a meta-conflict (like meta-stasis relative to cancer), over the goals of preserving and destroying.
In this way, a conflict may almost get eternal life, vexing and waning, disappearing and reappearing. The original, root, conflict recedes into the background like when Cold War attention focused mostly on such means of destruction as nuclear missiles.
Conflicts may combine, in series or parallel, into complex conflict formations with many parties and many goals, because the same parties and/or the same goals are involved. The elementary conflict formation with two parties purusing one goal is rare, except for pedagigical purposes, or as the polarized products of hatred and violence leading to simplified conflict formations. The normal conflict has many actors, many goals and many issues, is complex, not easily mapped, yet that mapping is essential.

The life-cycle of a conflict may be divided into three phases, before violence, during violence and after violence, separated by outbreak and cease-fire. This does not imply that violence is unavoidable, or that conflict = violence/destruction.

Source: Galtung, Johan, Conflict Theory and Practice. A Perspective, in: Galtung, Conflict Transformation by Peaceful Means (The Transcend Method). Participants' Manual and Trainers' Manual, United Nations Disaster Management Training Programme, 2000, p. 13. <http://www.reliefweb.int/rw/rwt.nsf/db900SID/LHON-66SN46/$File/Conflict_transfo_Trnascend.pdf> (accessed 23 June 2009)

The Heidelberg Institute for Peace and Conflict Studies' definition

Conflicts
Conflicts are clashes of interest (differences of position) concerning national values (territory, secession, decolonization, autonomy, system/ideology, national power, regional predominance, international power, resources, other). These clashes are of a certain duration and scope, involving at least two parties (organized groups, states, groups of states, organizations of states) determined to pursue their interests and win their cases.

Conflict Intensity
The Conflict Barometer distinguishes (as does the conflict database, COSIMO/CONIS) between violent and non-violent conflicts. Due to the fact that – unlike other lists of conflicts – we also mention non-violent conflicts, we gain two important advantages:
1. All violent conflicts evolve from non-violent conflicts. Further, violent conflicts are not terminated through “sudden peace”. Instead, tensions are reduced gradually and and this process will have its ups and downs. The Conflict Barometer also monitors a conflict if it is no longer conducted with the use of violence, and checks whether the end of a violent dispute actually means the end of a conflict. The same applies to COSIMO/CONIS.
2. Restricting oneself to researching violent conflicts alone means losing sight of conflicts solved peacefully. Noting and analyzing cases in which crisis management succeeded in preventing outbreaks of violence, however, provides for a comprehensive and intelligent view of the world and its conflicts.
Table: Conflict Intensities
State of Violence Intensity Group Level of Intensity Name of Intensity Definition
non-violent low 1 Latent Conflict A positional difference over definable values of national meaning is considered to be a latent conflict if respective demands are ar ticulated by one of the parties and perceived by the other as such.
2 Manifest Conflict A manifest conflict includes the use of measures that are located in the preliminary stage to violent force. This includes for example verbal pressure, threatening explicitly with violence, or the imposition of economic sanctions.
violent medium 3 Crisis A crisis is a tense situation in which at least one of the par ties uses violent force in sporadic incidents.
high 4 Severe Crisis A conflict is considered to be a severe crisis if violent force is repeatedly used in an organized way.
5 War A war is a type of violent conflict in which violent force is used with a certain continuity in an organized and systematic way. The conflict parties exercise extensive measures, depending on the situation. The extent of destruction is massive and of long duration.

Source: Heidelberg Institute for Peace and Conflict Research, e.V. (http://www.hiik.de/en/methodik/methodik_ab_2003.html)

Peter Wallensteen, Understanding conflict resolution. War, Peace and the Global System, 2nd edition, London 2007, p. 16.
Peter Wallensteen defines conflict as "a social situation in which a minimum of two actors (parties) pursue incompatible goals/objectives (or perceive them as being incompatible)."
Note for trainers:
  • You can focus on only some definitions in your lecture.
  • You can use interactive lecture methods:
    • Prepare handouts with the definitions you selected and give participants after each definition time to discuss in groups. Or:
    • Use the idea mapping method in order to get through the lecture. In this graphic method, the main idea of a lecture (here: conflict) is placed in the middle of a page. Related ideas that are mentioned in the lecture are noted in smaller circles on the same page, around the main idea and related with lines to it. Before you start your lecture, you need to explain the method to the participants and encourage them to take notes with this method. Stop your presentation from time-to-time, for instance the presentation of a conflict definition, and ask small groups of participants to spend some time collaboratively to draw an idea map of what was just said. Then continue your presentation and repeat the idea mapping work. After the final round, ask groups to briefly present their final product and review the idea maps of the other groups. As a facilitator you can then comment on common elements or elements that are missing from the lecture.






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