Why Do We Fight? Conflict, War, and Peace

Why Do We Fight? Conflict, War, and Peace — page 3 — introduction No matter how thin you slice it there will always be two sides Baruch Spinoza Jewish-Dutch philosopher 1632 77 6

Why Do We Fight? Conflict, War, and Peace — page 4 — (cid:34) What Is (cid:38)(cid:50)(cid:49)(cid:41)(cid:47)(cid:44)(cid:38)(cid:55) Battles protests standoffs strikes You hear about them all the time On the surface a battle and a protest don’t seem to have much in common right A battle involves guns and bombs while a protest has signs and picket lines But they’re really just two ways of handling a dispute One uses violence and the other doesn’t or not in most cases anyway Both start as a disagreement between two groups of people BOTH ARE CONFLICTS So have you been part of any conflicts this week Before you say no stop and think about it Did you agree with everything everyone around you said Did you feel like doing everything people asked you to Unless you’re the only person ever who’s okay with everything going on around you chances are pretty good you’ve been in a disagreement before Maybe you had a fight with your sibling over what to watch on TV Or maybe a kid in math class wanted to cheat off your test but you didn’t want her to Since it’s impossible for people to agree on everything all the time conflicts naturally pop up anywhere people get thrown together at school at work at home in big cities and small towns and whole countries Conflicts are part of life Con flict An intense disagreement that can lead either to violence or to a peaceful solution depending on how it’s handled 7

Why Do We Fight? Conflict, War, and Peace — page 5 — No one really likes conflict but disagreements don’t always have to be violent Or even unpleasant They can be a chance to make changes happen if the people involved are willing to listen and work things out The way a conflict gets resolved or settled depends on how the people involved handle it Sometimes conflicts get resolved by talking them out before they blow up into major fights Sometimes they get settled by fighting That’s true of conflicts between people on the street It’s also true of conflicts between countries on the world stage too We call those conflicts global conflicts When we talk about global conflicts we’re talking about major disagreements that get the world’s attention These break out among groups of people inside a country’s borders or between countries They are disputes that involve many thousands or even millions of people And yes global conflicts often get violent Sometimes they turn into full-blown wars They’re a lot trickier to understand than the conflicts that come up in everyday life and even trickier to settle So how can we even start to understand global conflicts and how they get resolved By breaking them down into their basic parts Look at the facing page to see what those parts are and learn how they fit together Meet a (cid:42)(cid:47)(cid:50)(cid:37)(cid:36)(cid:47) Conflict Although most conflicts around the world from all-out wars to arguments over trading are unique they actually all have the same basic parts Glo bal con flict An often violent disagreement between countries or groups within countries that gets the world’s attention and sometimes involvement 8

Why Do We Fight? Conflict, War, and Peace — page 6 — You’ve got two sides side A and side B A side B side You have the source of the conflict That’s the thing the two sides disagree over You have their relationship going into the conflict SOURCE Are they friendly Are they hostile or somewhere in between options for talking it out or asking for ready to settle it Or are they with war Do they have outside help You have how they’re handling their dispute The two sides usually also have allies friendly nations that support their decisions and want to see them win the conflict If you want to begin to understand any conflict you need to start with the source that is what the countries or groups are fighting over That’s the root of the conflict and it’s not always easy to determine Often the source of a conflict isn’t quite what you think it is and there can be more than one source too But even though there are many conflicts in the world over different issues between different countries and involving different groups of people when you get right down to it they all start for a lot of the same reasons 9

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