Conflict Management and the Multi-ethnic State

Abstract

Like other types of social and political struggles, ethnic confrontations seem to undergo cycles during which they wax and wane. In earlier chapters we have seen that the emergence of ethnic conflicts can be the result of multiple causal and contingent factors, and their eventual solution also depends on a series of circumstances. Much has been written about conflict resolution, management, regulation and reduction, and there now exists an array of academic institutions devoted to research and training in this field. Sometimes resolution, regulation and reduction are seen as alternative or even mutually incompatible approaches. In some of the relevant literature, it seems as if there were a basic contradiction between the proponents of conflict resolution and those of conflict management¹ Horowitz, however, only calls for techniques of conflict reduction. He argues that the reduction of ethnic conflict depends on two prior crucial conditions, namely, the motives of policy-makers and the timing of policy innovation. The motives of policy-makers may be fickle: they may indeed tend to favour the solution of a conflict, or then again they may simply favour the advantage of a particular ethnic group. As regards timing, Horowitz rightly points out that there is a greater chance of success if reciprocal concessions between the groups in conflict, sometimes referred to as a ‘grand settlement’, are agreed upon before a pattern of conflict emerges which makes going back especially difficult.