How can one shift from destructive violence to constructive conflict?
Our human relations (i.e. our social life with other humans), lead to opposing opinions, tensions and conflicts. The key questions are thus: • How can we canalise the urges for violence that can surge up from a disagreement so that these remain the least destructive possible? • How can we make this disagreement become a constructive conflict so that the disagreement can be transformed into an agreement, without degenerating into violence? • Or, if violence has already broken out, how can we transform the destructive impulses on both sides into a constructive conflict where the diverging positions are instead transmitted with words? Possible ways for a conflict to evolve Conflict, in the sense of opposing positions, can be resolved if the two parties either agree to reciprocal concessions or creatively develop a third possibility. Conflict will get bogged down and worsen, however, if the two parties camp on their positions, without making the effort to imagine other mutually acceptable
