Chapter 12: Conflict and Peacemaking Flashcards
What is conflict?
- A perceived incompatibility of actions or goals between 2 or more groups
- Incompatibility = one’s gain is perceived as another’s loss
What does the Realistic Group Conflict theory claim?
- 2 groups in competition for resources is what leads to conflict
- Scarce resources can be tangible (i.e., land, oil) or intangible (i.e., political power)
- Negative attitudes start to develop towards the other group
- Conflict also increases in-group solidarity, and can increase stereotyping
What’s the Prisoner’s Dilemma and what does it try to portray?
- A non-cooperative game where two people have been caught doing something illegal (both are guilty)
- Both people are provided a better option for themself if they don’t cooperate (when both don’t confess)
- They will receive mutual benefit if they both cooperate, but may suffer immensely if they don’t
- No matter what the other prisoner decides, each person is better off confessing than being convicted individually
- Works at the individual and group level
What are some criticisms of the prisoner’s dilemma?
- It assumes rationality in decision-making when humans are not always rational
- There are also motives beyond costs/benefits in conflicts
- Also ignores altruistic motives
What’s a real-life scenario that applies well to the Prisoner’s Dilemma?
- The Nuclear Arms Race between the Soviet Union and America after WWII
- Both countries know the other has nuclear weapons, but don’t know how they’ll act
- Both would benefit if both disarmed, and a treaty were signed
- If they continue to build arsenal, they could also win in a war (i.e., maximize benefits)
How does perceived incompatibility contribute to conflict?
- There’s often a very high degree of misperceptions between groups that contributes greatly to the conflict, compared to the small degree of true incompatibility
- Indicates how groups do not always act rationally and can make bad decisions due to these misperceptions
- Where the Prisoner’s Dilemma fails to justify conflict
What does Symbolic Threat Theory claim?
- When there’s a conflict over a perceived difference in values between groups, which contributes to escalations in conflict
- Ex. Can help explain why many Canadians are against the LGBTQ community. Individuals who are anti-LGBTQ view them as a symbolic threat to their own beliefs
What are the four major types of threats described in Integrated Threat Theory?
1) Realistic threats (i.e., scarce resources)
2) Symbolic threats
3) Intergroup anxiety (the awkward feeling of encountering an outgroup member)
4) Negative stereotypes (create negative expectations towards the other group)
*3 and 4 are linked
How does complexity or rhetoric contribute to expressing/resolving conflict?
- In international crises, leaders who speak in ways that are more complex, taking into consideration the other side’s views, are more likely to avoid escalating conflicts.
What were the results of the Conway, Houck, and Repke (2016) study regarding the relationship between perceived complexity and conflict?
- Liberals and conservatives were more biased to less complex speeches
- Ex. Conservatives viewed Obama’s speech as less complex but McCain’s speech as more complex, once the authors were known
- The complete opposite outcome occurred when the author (either Obama or McCain) was unknown
- Illustrates why communication between two groups is very important
What was the general methodology for the Robber’s Cave Experiment?
- Involved two separate summer boy camps, which were initially separated
- Phase 1 - Ingroup formation (in-group bonding is encouraged)
- Phase 2 - Group conflict (2 camps are introduced and scarce resources are introduced, trash-talking starts happening)
- Phase 3 - Conflict resolution (“councillors” make 2 groups cooperate on common problems and form resolutions)
What are the most common ways to promote cooperation among groups?
- Create a superordinate goal that is usually unrelated to conflict (removes competition)
- Create a common threat
- Create superordinate identity (groups now share similar features)
- Reduce group sizes (encourages mingling)
- Privatize resources (ex. specific institutions in control of resources)
What’s a real-world example of a superordinate goal that was created during a real-world conflict?
- The pursuit of space exploration that occurred among the US and the Soviet Union during the Cold War
- Helped reduce polarization between the two nations
What’s GRIT?
- Graduated and Reciprocated Initiatives in Tension Reduction
- Requires one side during a conflict to initiate a few small de-escalatory actions, after announcing a conciliatory intent
- Used during the Suez Canal Crisis
What’s the major goal of mediation during conflict?
- Helps in unravelling misperceptions with controlled communications
- Turns win-lose conflicts into win-win
