POS 212 -Methodology of Conflict Resolution

Conflict of any kind is a great debacle in any human society, many countries in the world have suffered from one conflict or another. Conflict is inherent in all human society and has been a matter of concern to social and political thinkers. Conflict is as old as mankind. This is because the word has been in existence in all spheres of human life since the inception of the world. It is a salient feature of the human society.  The most common language to man and every day assumption is that conflict is necessarily negative and dysfunctional i.e. conflict doesn’t allow society to function well. Men must fight even if they do not possess arms or when tools of violence are not within reach; and as Morgenthau (1948) posits, when there are no arms to fight, men will fight even with their bare fists. This presupposes that men will continue to fight as long as they have emotions that have the potential to love or hate; to be happy or sad; to be pleased or angry. So long as man has other men around him, there will be issues of disagreement, because interest differs and interests do clash, which may lead to disagreement or confrontation. A community or society of men thus creates room for explosive attitudes and relations. The laziest explanation of conflict in Africa is that conflict is often understood as an atavistic (the resurgence of the old hatred or the re-occurrence of the old quarrel). Just because conflicts in African society today are both the resurgence of old hatreds and the present happenings.