Peace And Conflict
Resolution
By Asghar Ali
Engineer
08 September, 2005
Countercurrents.org
The
whole world is faced with conflict and violence today. In fact there
has been no period in history, which has not witnessed violent conflicts.
But at the same time there have been sages, prophets, thinkers, religious
personalities, writers, poets and Sufis who always emphasised love,
peace and harmony. Though both trends i.e. of violence and of peace
and harmony have gone together violence and conflict remains predominant
in our memory.
Peace is desired
by overwhelming majority of human beings and it is few who want to perpetuate
violence, war and conflict. We must remember that violence and conflict
is perpetrated by powerful vested interests whether they are local,
regional, national or inter-national. Conflict is product of clashes
of interests, not of religion or civilisation, as some theorists maintain.
These interests can also be divided into various categories i.e. economic,
political, religious or social.
It is also important
to remember that vested interests often invoke religion, language, nation
or ideology to legitimise their interests. It should not deceive us.
A peace activist should be able to see through these interests and not
be deceived by an attempt to legitimise. Because of attempt to seek
legitimation by vested interest we often think that conflict is religious
or national though it is not. Categories like religion or nation are
not fundamental causes of conflict or violence. They are instrumental
causes i.e. they are used as powerful instruments by the vested interests.
Thus we should distinguish between fundamental and instrumental causes.
If we keep this
in mind it will be easier to understand these conflicts, if not resolve
it. Resolving conflicts needs different kind of skills. We will throw
some light on this little later. When one nation attacks on the other
or one religious group attacks on the other they use emotional national
or religious rhetoric as a strategy or even outright deception to mobilise
support of their respective countrymen or religious community. A peace
worker should never be deceived by such emotional rhetoric.
It is also important
to remember that root cause of conflict is often injustice with weaker
sections of society and the weaker sections may be poor, may be linguistic,
cultural or religious minorities or migrants from other countries. Justice
and peace, it should be remembered, are inseparable. Where there is
injustice, there will be conflict. Peace can never be established by
using mere rhetoric or exhortation. For peace to prevail one must first
establish justice.
For example, you
cannot establish peace in Palestine unless question of Palestinian territories
captured by Israel in 1967 war is resolved to their satisfaction. Similarly,
one cannot establish peace in Sri Lanka unless the question of Tamilian
people and their aspirations for autonomy is solved. The Kashmir imbroglio
can never be resolved if the Kashmiri people feel justice is not being
done to them. Appeal in the name of patriotism, religion or nationalism
is never going to resolve such complex issues.
The communal conflict
in India is again very burning question. It is not creation of Islam
and Hinduism but creation of conflict of interests between the Hindu
and Muslim elite. Religion per se, as pointed out above, does not lead
to conflagration until the political or economic interests use religious
rhetoric and create conflict. Even partition of our country was not
caused by Islam. It is very wrong perception. The causative factors
for partition of the country were political and economic, not religious,
though rhetoric was religious. Jinnah was a liberal constitutionalist,
not a religious fanatic. Yet it is Jinnah who led the Partition movement,
not religious leaders and scholars like Maulana Husain Ahmad Madani
and Maulana Abul Kalam Azad, they opposed the partition tooth and nail.
This itself shows the conflict was political and economic rather than
religious.
Communalism is a
political phenomenon, not a religious one. The RSS and the BJP have
been using Hindu religious rhetoric to grab Hindu votes. The RSS and
the BJP leadership is also in the hands of those who can be described
as â?~political Hindusâ?T, not in the hands of Hindu religious
leaders like Shankracharya. The Ramjanambhoomi movement was through
and through political. It had nothing to do with devotion to Lord Ram
or even for establishing Ram Rajya but for capturing power in the name
of Ram Mandir.
Ramjanambhoomi conflict
was not creation of Hindu religion or even Hindu religious leaders.
Only BJP politicians were mainly involved so as to mobilise the Hindu
voters in favour of their party and they succeeded eminently in this
project. But their â?~successâ?T was at the cost of peace
and communal harmony. They provoked unprecedented communal violence
in the country. And a new conflict was created where there existed none.
Thus all these examples
show that interests play a major role in promoting conflict and violence
and religions or ideologies play merely an instrumental role. And peace
cannot be established without understanding the role of these deep rooted
interests. The US invasion of Iraq was supposedly to fight the menace
of terrorism and to destroy â?~Weapons of Mass Destructionâ?T
(WMD) but the fact is that it was only a cover. The real intention was
to dominate Middle East politics, as it is an oil rich area. After invasion
no WMD were found and instead of reducing terror it has increased many
fold in Iraq. One cannot establish peace in Iraq without understanding
the role of US interests in the Middle East.
CONFLICT RESOLUTION
Conflict resolution is an extremely challenging job. It requires not
only correct understanding of the causes of conflict but also inexhaustible
degree of patience. To deal with the conflicting parties great deal
of objectivity and patience is needed. The nature of the conflict differs
from case to case. It is also necessary to understand that every conflict
is not necessarily violent. Non-violent conflicts could also play a
positive and creative role in many cases.
But here we are
mainly concerned with violent conflicts. Our aim should be to resolve
the conflict and bring reconciliation. To attempt to resolve the conflict
one should acquaint oneself thoroughly with the history of the conflict
and its historical, political, social and economic roots, if any. One
should also be very clear that real resolution of the conflict can be
brought about only through a just solution what some people describe
as â?~win-winâ?T situation. Both the parties, if it is a
bilateral conflict, should feel that they have gained, and not lost
or at least should have spirit of give and take. And if it is trilateral
or multi-lateral conflict he ask gets even more complicated.
But as pointed out
above justice should appear to have been done to all the parties. Sometimes
and attempt is made to coerce the one or the other party to accept a
solution. But such coercively imposed solution can never be a lasting
solution. A conflict can be said to have been resolved only if it is
freely acceptable by all the parties concerned. Some conflicts have
not only long history but also extremely complicated like the conflict
in Kashmir.
This conflict has
an international dimension as it is between two countries who have never
been at best of the terms. And because of hostile climate between the
two countries solution becomes even more difficult. Now that Indo-Pak
relations are improving the Kashmir problem has become more amenable
to solution though by no means it is about to be solved. But if the
present climate of improved relationship continues it may become possible
to solve the problem.
The ethnic problem
in Assam is less complicated â?" though by no means easy
to resolve â?" as it is purely internal problem of India
and it has no international dimension. There is one more dimension to
the violent conflicts like the one in Kashmir or in North East in India.
Once a group takes to arms it aquires powerful vested interest in retaining
arms as arms empower them and enable them to dictate terms. To lay down
arms is to again disempower themselves and such disempowerment is not
easily acceptable.
Often resolution
is not the problem but laying down of the arms is. We see this in Sri
Lankan Tamil-Sinhala conflict also. The LTTE refuses to lay down arms
and now they have acquired their own naval and air force. In most of
such struggles arms smuggling is a big business and these smugglers
often become stumbling block for resolution of conflicts. Unless such
powerful vested interests are eliminated no conflict can be resolved.
As far as communal
conflict is concerned it has a long history since the British days and
one can say communal forces have created a communal psyche among a large
section of people, especially urban educated class both through informal
propaganda and through officially prescribed text books. The communal
conflict has no easy solution. First one has to strike at its very root
i.e. the education system. Our education system is being used by the
communal forces in perpetuating colonial conflict. The medieval history
is being taught on a divisive communal basis. Our education system also
lacks value base and without sound value base we cannot create healthy
mindset. Our education system is not doing enough to impart secular
values and our social environ is also far from being secular. Thus communalism
is flourishing and without striking at the very roots it will be very
difficult to remove communal conflict from our midst. It requires prolonged
and sustained efforts. We also lack committed political leaders. Most
of our political leaders are in a hurry to capture power. They would
do anything for capturing power including inciting communal passions.
Thus communal conflict can be tackled on adhoc basis but only with strong
commitment to secularism and secular values.