1) Preface: –
“Better than a thousand hollow words is one word that brings peace.” – Lord Buddha
“Conflicts have no beginning and no end; everything grows together in mutual causation; no single actor carries all the responsibility and no single actor carries all the guilt” – Johan Galtung
- Conflict is avoidable facet of human life
- The absence of conflict is impossible to reach
- The maturity of society it thus measured not on the basis of absence of conflict but it’s capacity to resolve it
- The state with its judiciary is the final arbiter of all conflicts , but there always exists traditional way of setting disputes at family or village level.
- India was and is a mosaic of languages, cultures and ethnicities, not simply tolerating each other but accepting and harmonising all the diversities as part of the composite whole.
- India is a modern state created upon an ancient civilization and secular one created on the basis of profoundly religious society.
2) Genesis of Conflict :-
- The real problem in many of our States and regions is economic; the conflict is over resources but camouflaged in various forms of identity politics based on religion, on caste, on region, on ethnicity, on language and less frequently based on ideological divides.
3) Concept of Conflict : –
Incomatibility of perspective
- Conflict has been defined as a situation between two or more parties who see their perspectives as incompatible. Conflicts have a negative beneficial connotation, but some conflicts are desirable as they can create change.
Search for identity , Sense of Belonging & Social Capital
- Individuals see themselves as members of a variety of groups which often span a number of their interests. For example, an individual’s geographical origin, gender, caste, class,language, politics, ethnicity, profession and social commitments make him a member of various groups. Each of these collectivities, to all of which the individual belongs, tends to give him a particular identity,but together he has multiple identities.
- The search for identity is a powerful psychological driving force which has propelled human civilization.Identity is often evocative. It deals with a myth or an imagined community which has all the power and potential necessary for political mobilization.
- The sense of identity can contribute enormously to the strength and warmth of an individual’s relations with others such as his neighbors, members of his community, fellow citizens or people who profess the same religion.
- The concept of social capital, advocated by Robert Putnam, tells us how a shared identity with others in the same social community can make the lives of all those in that community so much more harmonious and meaningful. To that extent, the sense of belonging to the social community becomes a valuable resource;almost like capital.
- And yet, identity can also kill – and kill with abandon.A strong and exclusive sense of belonging to one group does, in many cases, lead to conflict.
- We live in an increasingly violent world, because of the conflicts we generate.The twentieth century was, by far, the most violent period that humanity lived through.Almost three times as many people were killed in conflicts in the twentieth century than in the previous four centuries combined together.
- The collateral damage of conflict is of both physical and mental. In the physical sense it leads to loss of life, infrastructure damage etc, but from psycological perspective it leads to erosion of faith in institution , public order , mutual trust . Building a road is easier than building the trust.
Conflict Life cycle
- The potential for conflict will always exist in a society with its members having different mores, interests, and socio-economic conditions and needs.
- Individual tension-An individual or a group have a sense that they are wronged.Poor Governance & Socioeconomic inequality are major reasons.
- Latent Conflict – Tensions may lead to simmering discontent and may manifest as request /milder protest before authority. This is the most opportune stage for administration to intervene and stop the conflict.
- Escalation of Tension :-The manifestations are being processions,, strikes, bandhs etc.Unattended grievances, overlooked concerns, neglected tensions by the Administration leads to this stage.
- Eruption:- Tensions if not managed properly lead to a situation where a small ‘spark’ leads to eruption of violence. The ‘spark’ or the trigger may by itself not be a major event, but it leads to further polarization of the people involved, and becomes an excuse for the violent eruption.Usually this the stage where administration engages in ‘fire-fighting‘ strategies.
- Stalemate: This is a situation similar to the ‘latent tension’ and has the potential to erupt at regular intervals.
4)History of Conflict and Resolution in India :-
- Multi-ethnic , religious and identity based conflict with serious geographical and historical overtones include secessionist movement in N-E region, Kashmir and Punjab.The conflict resolution for these have different dimensions such as – peace instruments like – Assam accord, Autonomous territorial councils , extension of PESA and Forest rights act in N-E region to enforcing AFSPA in disturbed areas and deployment of military personnel in ares like Kashmir and Punjab where the issue is not only of national security and sovereignty but also of national strategic importance.
- Linguistic conflict led to creation of states on the lines of language and protection of language through constitutional means resolved this issue
- Water conflict is yet to be resolved . Thought constitution has provided enough provision for water conflict resolution , the issues are far from over.The issues is intense in peninsular India (south India) as the river in this regions are mostly seasonal or carry a very low volume of water in the dry seasons.While north India fights against flood , south India fights against drought. Water management has been a great challenge for this vast county and the issue can be resolved only through comprehensive action by multiple civil society actors . water pollution only aggravates the woes .
- Ideological Conflict – Left wing extremism and their method to capture the state through revolution and exploiting the innocent of tribal to fight for their cause has been one of the major internal security threat that India has ever faced, however comprehensive approaches by govt has been able to contain the situation and deny them the ideological advantage.
- Communal Conflicts – Partition of India happened on communal lines and it is no wonder the issue still persists today with abrupt manifestations in isolated corners of society.Thanks to the visions of leader of India to establish a secular state , India is far more less communal the time of partition. More secular measures are need of the hour to eradicate this social bigotry.
- Regional Inequality – It is one of the major issue of conflict that India faces today. Bifurcation of Andhra Pradesh is its very recent manifestations.Economic deveopment and equitable distribution of fruits of growth can only contain this issue in a long term.
5) Role of state and solution for conflict resolution :-
- States and its apparatus tended to view conflicts more in terms of break-down of law and order and less in terms of failure of socio-economic , governance and political processes.Thus resorting to fire fighting mechanism .
- State should pay adequate attention to genesis and try to contain the conflict before it appears .
- capacity building and enhancing effectiveness of institutions.
- Indian Constitution with democratic polity has the ability for conflict resolution in a diverse society as India. Their measures if implemented in letter and spirit can bring transformation in Indian society and conflict of serious nature will be a thing of the past.
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Steve Ovett, the famous British middle-distance athlete, won the 800-metres gold medal at the Moscow Olympics of 1980. Just a few days later, he was about to win a 5,000-metres race at London’s Crystal Palace. Known for his burst of acceleration on the home stretch, he had supreme confidence in his ability to out-sprint rivals. With the final 100 metres remaining,
[wptelegram-join-channel link=”https://t.me/s/upsctree” text=”Join @upsctree on Telegram”]Ovett waved to the crowd and raised a hand in triumph. But he had celebrated a bit too early. At the finishing line, Ireland’s John Treacy edged past Ovett. For those few moments, Ovett had lost his sense of reality and ignored the possibility of a negative event.
This analogy works well for the India story and our policy failures , including during the ongoing covid pandemic. While we have never been as well prepared or had significant successes in terms of growth stability as Ovett did in his illustrious running career, we tend to celebrate too early. Indeed, we have done so many times before.
It is as if we’re convinced that India is destined for greater heights, come what may, and so we never run through the finish line. Do we and our policymakers suffer from a collective optimism bias, which, as the Nobel Prize winner Daniel Kahneman once wrote, “may well be the most significant of the cognitive biases”? The optimism bias arises from mistaken beliefs which form expectations that are better than the reality. It makes us underestimate chances of a negative outcome and ignore warnings repeatedly.
The Indian economy had a dream run for five years from 2003-04 to 2007-08, with an average annual growth rate of around 9%. Many believed that India was on its way to clocking consistent double-digit growth and comparisons with China were rife. It was conveniently overlooked that this output expansion had come mainly came from a few sectors: automobiles, telecom and business services.
Indians were made to believe that we could sprint without high-quality education, healthcare, infrastructure or banking sectors, which form the backbone of any stable economy. The plan was to build them as we went along, but then in the euphoria of short-term success, it got lost.
India’s exports of goods grew from $20 billion in 1990-91 to over $310 billion in 2019-20. Looking at these absolute figures it would seem as if India has arrived on the world stage. However, India’s share of global trade has moved up only marginally. Even now, the country accounts for less than 2% of the world’s goods exports.
More importantly, hidden behind this performance was the role played by one sector that should have never made it to India’s list of exports—refined petroleum. The share of refined petroleum exports in India’s goods exports increased from 1.4% in 1996-97 to over 18% in 2011-12.
An import-intensive sector with low labour intensity, exports of refined petroleum zoomed because of the then policy regime of a retail price ceiling on petroleum products in the domestic market. While we have done well in the export of services, our share is still less than 4% of world exports.
India seemed to emerge from the 2008 global financial crisis relatively unscathed. But, a temporary demand push had played a role in the revival—the incomes of many households, both rural and urban, had shot up. Fiscal stimulus to the rural economy and implementation of the Sixth Pay Commission scales had led to the salaries of around 20% of organized-sector employees jumping up. We celebrated, but once again, neither did we resolve the crisis brewing elsewhere in India’s banking sector, nor did we improve our capacity for healthcare or quality education.
Employment saw little economy-wide growth in our boom years. Manufacturing jobs, if anything, shrank. But we continued to celebrate. Youth flocked to low-productivity service-sector jobs, such as those in hotels and restaurants, security and other services. The dependence on such jobs on one hand and high-skilled services on the other was bound to make Indian society more unequal.
And then, there is agriculture, an elephant in the room. If and when farm-sector reforms get implemented, celebrations would once again be premature. The vast majority of India’s farmers have small plots of land, and though these farms are at least as productive as larger ones, net absolute incomes from small plots can only be meagre.
A further rise in farm productivity and consequent increase in supply, if not matched by a demand rise, especially with access to export markets, would result in downward pressure on market prices for farm produce and a further decline in the net incomes of small farmers.
We should learn from what John Treacy did right. He didn’t give up, and pushed for the finish line like it was his only chance at winning. Treacy had years of long-distance practice. The same goes for our economy. A long grind is required to build up its base before we can win and celebrate. And Ovett did not blame anyone for his loss. We play the blame game. Everyone else, right from China and the US to ‘greedy corporates’, seems to be responsible for our failures.
We have lowered absolute poverty levels and had technology-based successes like Aadhaar and digital access to public services. But there are no short cuts to good quality and adequate healthcare and education services. We must remain optimistic but stay firmly away from the optimism bias.
In the end, it is not about how we start, but how we finish. The disastrous second wave of covid and our inability to manage it is a ghastly reminder of this fact.