Resolution of Conflicts

Democracy isn’t just about equality, liberty, secularism, and other such loaded terms that fill the popular narrative. We have far moved beyond the French Revolution, however our obsession with these terms continues. We often forget another pillar of democracy, a pillar of successful society rather, “Resolution of Conflicts”. Though a ranking or hierarchy of various aspects of a thriving state can’t be made, or at least is difficult to make, we can be relatively certain that “resolution of conflict” is an important aspect which we often miss in our discussions.

Conflicts keep lingering along and often end up shaping the sentiments of communities in a long run. Such a happening affects a community’s choice of leaders, the leaders’ policies, often ending up making a populist Government. Or the other way round, conflicts give politicians a bait to catch fish with and this they do every second day. Conflicts tend to weaken a country from within, eating and dismantling its social fabric. Polarization caused by conflicts leads to loss of life and damage to public property. Tensions in a society have a clear economic impact including, and not limited to, loss of economic activity, non optimal use of resources, diversion of resources, loss of man days, negative investor sentiment etc. The Socio-Political effect of conflicts is the feeling of betrayal in the afflicted parties which drive many a political agenda. It has rightly been said that jutice delayed is justice denied, a lingering conflict means delayed justice.

The conflict-economy creates its own industry having its own workforce, the major chunk of such workforce remains visible to an untainted eye in the form of the politicians, small minorities turn out to be film makers, news anchors or writers, and/or activits. If conflicts are resolved the industry loses access to its raw material and with it its workforce their relevance. It is probably because of this particular fact that the industry forces manufacture of new conflicts while trying its best that older conflicts linger on! The untainted eye understands, and a common man has to understand, what and who is fueling any conflict and who benefits from its economics and politics and what are a conflict’s associated profits and losses. Only then we may realise that many a times, the good work that could have been done in a conflict free environment gets delayed and many a times the good work is left almost entirely undone!

The resolution of conflicts may not be very easy, it is easier than one would think, more so are the steps leading towards it. A conflict can be diffused, for example, if the parties to the conflict agree on the priorities – the human priorities. If peace is the priority, everything else can be sacrificed for the want of it. There are no ceasefire violations at the state borders, there are no Human Rights Violations in the territory, there is no stone pelting, the conflict is diffused, if not resolved, with all parties on the same page.

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