The No-Nonsense Guide to Conflict and Peace

Introduction

In 1971, standing in a market in Eastern Nigeria, I commented how many vultures were settled on the roofs of the meat stalls. ‘Ah,’ said my companion, an ex-general from the Biafran army, ‘isn’t it wonderful to see them back? During the war they were all away on the battlefields.’ Only people who have lived through war can truly appreciate peace. Nigeria showed me how pragmatically colleagues, who had fought on opposite sides, worked together to solve practical problems without rancor or recriminations, in a lasting peace which was greatly assisted by a booming economy. We hear so much about the enduring nature of inter-ethnic hatreds that it is salutary to realize that even civil wars do end and that people in Nigeria then, as in Cambodia or Mozambique now, do get back to planting their crops and raising their children if the politicians will let them.

What we learn as children about conflict, peace and justice stays with us for life – which is why it is so unfortunate that dealing with discord is a skill rarely taught in schools. And why it is especially tragic that children who have never learnt to play are taught to use guns for real.

I had two grandfathers: one jailed as a pacifist during the First World War and the other a patriotic volunteer for France who came back deeply shocked and totally opposed to the sheer random wastage of war. My parents were equally divided, since my mother was a pacifist medical researcher and my father developed new explosives.

The debates of my childhood as to how to deal with men who attack with guns are still valid today. However, two things have changed. Firstly, nine wars out of ten are now civil wars in which the great majority of the casualties are civilians. And secondly, we know much more about working to build peace and that there are techniques for conflict resolution which work.

As a diplomat in Zambia in the 1980s I dealt with exiled radicals from South Africa and Namibia, who were either freedom fighters or terrorists depending on one’s viewpoint. When the leaders of the South African army first met with the armed wing of ANC, it was a revelation to see how the fighters shared so much more in common than the civilians. This was a great time to be where freedom was finally on the march, especially for the ordinary people who had suffered for so long.

Now I and my colleagues work as a team, teaching and researching peace studies at the University of New England in rural Australia. We are ethnically, religiously and ideologically a very mixed group from Australia, England, Malawi, Northern Ireland and Sri Lanka. Opinions range from the absolute pursuit of nonviolence to a pragmatic acceptance that faced with a Rwanda, a Kosovo or a Darfur, nonviolence cannot save lives fast enough. But we share a passion for peace and justice. This book is the product of our working together and our desire to share our knowledge of peace-building from the grassroots up.

Helen Ware

Armidale, Australia

Chapter 1

War and peace

‘After a lifetime of war-watching, I see war as an endemic human disease, and governments the carriers.’

Martha Gellhorn (1908-1998),

US journalist and author.

Conflict need not be a bad thing, but it can quickly spin out of control. With so much violence in the world we need to understand its causes and find ways to deal with it.

‘Violence just hurts those who are already hurt; instead of exposing the brutality of the oppressor, it justifies it,’ noted Cesar Chavez, leader of the US United Farm Workers’ union. Fights and upsets between people and groups are a part of everyday life, at home, at work, with family, friends or colleagues. They occur because each of us has needs, beliefs and desires and works towards fulfilling them as best we can. Tensions result when the goals and aspirations of one party clash with or contradict those of others.

Clashes occur at different levels and scales. First, there is personal conflict: ‘Shall I be good (diet)? Or shall I be happy (chocolate)?’ Second is disagreement between individuals: ‘My football team is better than yours’/‘No, mine is’. Thirdly, there is discord between distinct groups (communities, militant groups, government departments, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), corporations and agencies). Finally, there is international conflict that usually takes place between states or between coalitions of nations. As with the ‘War on Terror’, some of today’s violence cuts across national borders and makes it difficult to see who is on ‘our’ side and who is on ‘theirs’, which makes life very difficult – for example for Muslims born or living in Western countries.

Many international conflicts in the post-Cold War era take place within states and thus are civil or ‘intra-national’. These are mostly based on distinctions of difference that occur within a nation – between different indigenous, ethnic, language and/or religious groups often opposing the dominant groups in the state.

Creative differences

Sometimes of course major differences can be creative and do not inevitably have to lead to violence. Like other social processes, the outcome is determined by the nature of the issues, the number of people involved and the relationships between them. How people respond to and manage differences will determine whether the outcome is violence or new, positive developments. For example, a film crew arguing with each other over artistic matters may create a confused disaster or a creative triumph. Conflict can prevent stagnation; stimulate interest and curiosity, the airing of problems, the development of solutions. External conflict can promote internal group cohesion. Creatively handled, discord can enable social structures to readjust by eliminating sources of dissatisfaction and removing the causes for opting out, so creating a new balance in a society.

There are many ways to ‘manage’ conflict: through accommodation, policy changes, legal processes, mediation and negotiation, as well as through the use of force. The possible outcomes include:

A lose-lose situation where all parties are discontented with the outcome (all the fish are killed during the fighting).

A win-lose situation where the needs of one (or more) party are met or perceived to have been met to a greater extent than for the other party(s) (one party gets most of the fish).

A desirable win-win situation where needs of all parties are addressed to the satisfaction of all (a new, sustainable fishery development is equitably shared).

So much violence

Despite overall improvements in people’s quality of life, violence to one another continues at a frightening level.

Every year over 1.6 million people lose their lives to violence

Every day 849 people are killed as a result of armed conflict

Every day 1,424 people are killed in acts of interpersonal violence

Source: World Report on Violence and Health (WHO 2002)

Are we inherently or naturally violent and competitive, or is this a learned response? (see box ‘Programmed for violence?’ in chapter 2). Whatever the answer, one of the most common causes of discord is disputes over access to and use of resources. The more scarce the resource, the greater the likelihood of tension. However, there is always scope for learning to compromise and co-operate rather than competing to ‘win’. As seen, we mostly find ourselves at odds out of our desire to do everything necessary to secure our basic needs.

People may indeed be willing to fight for abstract rights, such as freedom of speech or the right to self-determination, before basic needs. In this case, there can only be resolution if these contingent needs are addressed directly.

There are many other reasons too. Discord can also arise from injustice, human rights abuses and inequality created by repressive social, cultural, structural and economic frameworks or socio-political systems. In this case, the settlement has to address the injustices and allow for changed systems to build fairer relationships and interactions that promote equity, justice and peace.

Destructive conflict tends to blow up because the harmful and dangerous elements overcome those people who would keep it within bounds. As the disagreement expands there is increasing reliance upon power, threats, coercion and deception, and movement away from persuasion, conciliation, minimization of differences and the enhancement of mutual understanding and goodwill. Within each of the conflicting parties there is increasing pressure for uniformity of opinion and a tendency for the leadership to be taken over by the more extreme groups who are better organized for combat. Escalation results from competition to win, misperceptions and uncritical commitment to the cause.¹ This is why early intervention works so much better.

‘You must have been taught – and I was taught – that peace is the opposite of war. But is it? In India, peace is a daily battle for food and shelter and dignity.’

Arundhati Roy (1961- ), Indian writer and activist.

Today’s conflicts

Since the end of the Cold War in 1989, there has been a shift from international aggression to civil wars. Although there have been wars between states such as those fought by the ‘coalitions of the willing’ in Afghanistan and Iraq, conflicts within a country are more common today as seen in Aceh and West Papua (Indonesia), Bougainville (Melanesia), Chechnya in Russia, Israel/Palestine, Sierra Leone, Sudan, and Sri Lanka. Frequently, these internal conflicts are over issues such as justice, political representation, security and self-determination. Discontent may lead to demands for political change, a separate state, increased participation in decision-making and equality in relation to issues of race or identity recognition (of ethnic, religious or linguistic differences). A number of these conflicts arise from historical mistakes that over time have led to animosity, stereotyping, domination and suspicion – positions that are now difficult to shift. For example, the Sri Lankan conflict that began in 1983 and is now hovering on the fragile 2002 ceasefire could have been stifled at the outset by an agreement for political power-sharing between the ethnic groups, but that was before the build-up of discrimination against the Tamils and the creation of political parties based on ethnic exclusion.

Another spur to warfare is resources. Conflict such as that in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) is fueled by greedy corporations, caring little for the people that their activities often damage. ‘Corporations should ensure their activities support peace and respect for human rights in volatile areas such as north-eastern Congo, not work against them,’ says Anneke Van Woudenberg of Human Rights Watch.

‘It is said that our indigenous ancestors, Mayas and Aztecs, made human sacrifices to their gods. It occurs to me to ask: How many humans have been sacrificed to the gods of Capital in the last five hundred years?’

Rigoberta Menchú Tum (1959- ), Guatemalan activist for indigenous rights, and Nobel Peace Prize winner, 1992.

Violence

Unfortunately, violence is still the main means used in attempting to resolve conflict. This is as true for crime on the streets, violence in schools and in homes, as it is for the role of militants or the police and troops engaged in controlling civil disturbance or fighting wars in the interests of a state. Violence is just one method of pursuing social, economic and political goals. There are many alternatives (see final chapter) but where these appear to have failed, the situation often spins out to one of violence.

Civilians suffer most

Modern wars have a significant impact on civilians by destroying their homes and agricultural systems, polluting their water, land and air, and killing or injuring old people, women, children and parents. There is also the catalogue of rape, torture, imprisonment, brutality, starvation, trauma and disease. Usually both sides have engaged in deplorable acts of terror. In the aftermath of such violence, societies are left angry and confused, seeking retribution and revenge to pay back perpetrators. In turn this feeds the cycle of violence, prolonging and perpetuating the fighting. This is why, sadly, the best statistical predictor of a civil war is an earlier civil war: conflicts are dampened down, simmer and