Social Conflict: A Philosophical Perspective

Shivesh Upadhyay - Economist

Conflict is a persistent behavioral aspect of human existence from the time immemorial. Of course, the form and means of conflict has changed over time but the basic philosophy of conflict remains same.There are several bases of conflict – social, economic, political, theoretical, or philosophical. The social conflict incorporates them all. But in my view, philosophical differences dominate as reason for conflict.

Society and its people may enter into conflict unintentionally. There are two ways people may view things in this world. First, the truth of nature on basis of something which they can see, smell, touch, or feel. Second, the power of belief on basis of something which we cannot see, feel or touch, but still believes to be true. In such scenario, people cannot experience or test the truthfulness of thoughts or theories propounded by others so easily.

In the first case, the nature of conflict is economic or political and scarcity of resources acts as a platform for conflict. In this case, conflict can be ended by making resources available to the deprived. The second basis of conflict is philosophical. When we cannot see or touch anything,we have to believe it. To believe, a person has to internalize the situation or entity for which he wants to believe. Hence, believers tend to become rigid. This is in sharp contrast with seekers who continue to reason and move on.But the percentage of seekers is very low. When two groups of believers come across, there is bound to be conflict because seeking and reasoning ends with believing.

Now comes the interesting point - the conflict in most of the society is unintentional. The very moment a person acts according to his belief, another person with different belief system gets hurt. In other words, there is always a situation for everybody where he or she gets provoked. For example - when a believer of idol worship installs an idol of god, it hurts the non-believer automatically, although the believer’s intention was not to hurt anybody. The non-believer destroys the statue and establishes his own belief but the believer gets hurt. Here the intention of non-believer was not to hurt the believer, but to reform the society according to his or her philosophy. Hence, the advent of new empires started with either wiping out the old belief system or killing people with different belief system. This wiping or killing is not necessarily physical, but can be ideological or theological. Conversion mechanism is functioning entirely on this philosophical non-violent mechanism where money power is being used to create social conflict. 

The larger question is the solution. Can these conflicts be ended? If we go by the history of 3000 years, the answer seems to be a big no. The solution to this conflict is rather radical. The conflict will end if whole world becomes seeker but that is not so easy. Else establish same belief system all over the world so that no one is left to seek. Islam and Christianity works on the same philosophy. 

It has been observed that even when the society has been turned into same belief system, the economic conflicts never resolves and that keeps on fueling the social conflict in long run and ultimately, challenges the same belief system. This explains why today’s world have more intense conflict in areas where same belief system is prevailing and is less stable than societies which have diverse belief system.