Comprehensive Study Notes: Conflict (Group 3, Engaging with Ethnography)
Welcome to one of the most vital and challenging chapters in Social and Cultural Anthropology: Conflict.
Don't worry if this seems heavy; anthropologists view conflict not just as violence, but as a crucial process that reveals how societies are structured, how power works, and how people define who "we" are versus who "they" are.
What we will learn: We will move beyond newspaper headlines to analyze conflict through the core anthropological concepts of power, identity, social relations, and symbolism.
1. Defining Conflict: The Anthropological View
In SCA, conflict is much broader than just war. It refers to contestation—situations where groups or individuals have incompatible goals, leading to friction, disputes, and, sometimes, violence.
Distinction: Dispute vs. War
- Dispute (Micro-Conflict): These are disagreements within a small group or society, often resolved through internal mechanisms like negotiation, mediation, or rituals. Example: A family feud over land rights, a disagreement in a village over livestock.
- War/Violence (Macro-Conflict): Large-scale, organized hostility between distinct political or cultural groups, often involving systematic violence and high risk.
The Anthropological Focus: We study the cultural logic (rules, beliefs, norms) that surrounds fighting, revenge, and resolution. Why do people choose to fight? Who is allowed to fight? And how is peace achieved?
Key Takeaway: Conflict is a social process, not just an event. It is culturally structured and reveals underlying issues of power and social relationships.
2. Power and Structural Violence in Conflict
The study of conflict must be rooted in the concept of power. Conflict often erupts when existing power structures are challenged, or when inequalities become unbearable.
A. Power as a Root Cause of Friction
- Control over Resources: Conflict is frequently a struggle for control over scarce resources (e.g., water, oil, fertile land). The group with greater power often defines who has access.
- Hegemony: This refers to the dominance of one group over others, maintained not just through force, but through consent. Conflict can arise when subordinate groups reject the ruling group's definition of reality.
B. Structural Violence (A Critical Concept)
Structural violence (coined by Johan Galtung and popularized by medical anthropologist Paul Farmer) refers to harm caused to individuals or groups by systematic, invisible, and long-standing social structures (economic, political, legal).
Step-by-Step Understanding:
- Systemic inequalities (e.g., poverty, racism) are built into the society's structure.
- These structures limit opportunities and cause suffering (malnutrition, lack of healthcare).
- This suffering is a form of violence, even if no single person is directly hitting the victim.
- When people fight back against these oppressive structures, direct conflict (violence) often erupts.
Did you know? Paul Farmer’s work showed how poverty in Haiti was not just unfortunate, but a direct result of political and economic structures—a crucial anthropological way of viewing injustice.
Quick Review: Avoid This Common Mistake!
Mistake: Thinking structural violence requires physical fighting.
Correction: Structural violence is invisible, chronic suffering caused by unjust systems. It is the underlying pressure cooker that often leads to open, physical conflict.
3. Social Relations and Kinship in Conflict
Anthropologists, especially those studying small-scale societies, focus heavily on how social relations—particularly kinship ties—shape the rules of engagement and resolution.
A. Feuding and the Lineage System
In many non-state societies, where there is no central police force, conflict is managed through mechanisms like feuding, which is a state of recurrent hostility between kinship groups.
- Reciprocity of Violence: Feuds often follow a principle of reciprocity: a death or injury must be avenged by the offended group to maintain honor and balance. This creates a dangerous cycle.
- Segmentary Lineage Theory: Anthropologists like E.E. Evans-Pritchard (studying the Nuer) noted that groups fight based on how closely related they are. "I and my brother against my cousin; I and my cousin against the stranger." Conflict reinforces identity and boundaries at different social levels.
B. The Role of the Mediator
When conflict breaks out, social relations dictate who has the authority to step in. A mediator (often an elder, a ritual specialist, or a person neutral to the dispute) attempts to restore social harmony, focusing less on legal guilt and more on mending fractured relationships.
Memory Aid: Think of Conflict as a broken "Social Contract." The goal of anthropological resolution is to repair the contract, not just punish the violator.
4. Identity, Symbolism, and the Culture of War
Before conflict can scale up into organized violence, groups must establish a strong sense of "us" versus "them." This relies heavily on identity and symbolism.
A. Constructing the 'Other'
Anthropologists study the process of Othering, where one group defines another as fundamentally different, inhuman, or a threat to their survival. This cultural work justifies violence.
- Narratives and Myths: Groups use historical myths, religious narratives, or stories of past injustice to create a collective identity that demands revenge or self-defense. These narratives become powerful symbols that mobilize people.
- Dehumanization: Symbolism is key here—using language or imagery that reduces the enemy to animals or objects, making it psychologically easier to commit acts of violence.
- Example: In the Rwandan genocide, propaganda used the symbol of 'cockroaches' (Inyenzi) to refer to Tutsis, symbolically stripping them of their humanity.
B. Materiality in Conflict
The objects and spaces involved in conflict also carry symbolic weight and matter materially.
- The Symbolism of Destruction: Destroying the opponent’s cultural heritage (temples, libraries, historical sites) is not just random violence; it's an attack on their collective identity and memory.
- War Technology: The materiality of weapons (e.g., AK-47s) can transform social relations, potentially granting power to youth or marginalized groups who gain access to them, shifting traditional power hierarchies. (This links the concept of materiality directly to change.)
Key Takeaway: Conflict is deeply symbolic. The fight is often not just over territory, but over the right to define reality and identity.
5. Anthropological Approaches to Resolution and Peace
Anthropology is crucial in studying how societies transition from conflict to peace, offering insights that legal systems often miss.
A. Rituals of Reconciliation
Unlike Western judicial systems focused on punishment (retributive justice), many societies employ restorative justice, aimed at repairing harm and rebuilding social ties.
- Truth and Reconciliation: These processes often rely on public confession, apologies, and shared ceremonies (rituals) to symbolically cleanse the community and restore balance. The focus is on the future relationship, not just the past crime.
- The Role of Performance: Formal rituals (like sharing a meal or smoking a pipe together) act as performative symbols that publicly confirm that hostilities have ceased and a new, peaceful social relationship is established.
B. Challenges for Peacekeeping
Anthropologists often critique top-down, Western-imposed peacekeeping efforts, arguing that they fail because they ignore local knowledge, traditional methods of resolution, and existing social hierarchies.
The Lesson: Effective peace requires deep ethnographic understanding of local social relations and belief systems regarding justice and forgiveness.
6. Study Focus and Critical Reflection (HL/SL)
When analyzing ethnographic material on conflict, ask yourself these critical questions:
How does conflict illuminate power structures?
How is identity used to legitimize or mobilize violence?
A. Connecting Conflict to Other Areas of Inquiry
The "Conflict" chapter never stands alone. You must be prepared to connect it:
- Conflict & Development: Violence often derails development projects, and unequal development can cause conflict.
- Conflict & Production/Exchange: War can be a major source of production (arms trade) and can fundamentally reorganize exchange systems (looting, war economies).
- Conflict & Health: Conflict causes trauma, mental illness, and breakdowns in health infrastructure (linking to Health, Illness, and Healing).
B. Mnemonic for Anthropological Conflict Analysis
Remember the four key forces that define conflict:
C: Culture (Rules of fighting/revenge)
O: Othering (Identity construction)
R: Relations (Social and Kinship ties)
E: Equality/Power (Structural causes)
You've got this! By focusing on the why and the how—using your anthropological toolkit—you can analyze conflict in a sophisticated and critically sensitive way.