Conflict\Consensus
products of human activity, then innovation can gain
acceptance. It is the higher selectivity which reduces
the fear of new elements of social order.
It cannot be stated, however, that such a society
would be ‘more highly developed’ than others.
Depending upon the type of social environment,
different types of conflict regulation appear as optimal
adaptations (Hallpike 1973). Avoidance-biased so-
cieties are among the most expansive types of social
organizations in an environment characterized by
raiding, especially slave raiding. Avoidance produces
a high dispersion and thus hinders the population
concentrations necessary to make slave raiding a
profitable enterprise, e.g., in some regions of the Sahel
and the Sudan. At the margins of aggressive im-
perialisms, feud-biased societies appear to be one of
the most stable arrangements. These societies keep
internally a high level of warring competence which
act as deterrent or repellent to these imperialist
forces—as can be shown in the case of the Caucasus or
some regions of the Balkans. If societies interpenetrate
each other by means of a reciprocal competition on
their markets, a high innovation capacity gives an edge
to this competition. Procedure-biased societies appear
to be especially strong in this respect, e.g., some
medieval oriental societies and some modern Western
ones.
See also: Conflict and Conflict Resolution, Social
Psychology of; Conflict and War, Archaeology of;
Conflict\Consensus; Conflict Sociology; Malinowski,
Bronislaw (1884–1942); Mauss, Marcel (1872–1950);
Simmel, Georg (1858–1918); Violence in Anthro-
pology; War, Sociology of
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study of Pathan organization. JRAI 89(1): 5–21
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& Winston, New York
Dahrendorf R 1954 Out of utopia. AJS 64: 115–27
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KoW lner Zeitschrift fuW r Soziologie 4: 681–704
Elwert G 1997 Deutsche Nation. In: Scha$ fers B, Zapf W (eds.)
Zur Gesellschaft Deutschlands. Leske & Budrich, Opladen,
Germany, pp. 123–34
Elwert G 1999 Markets of violence. In: Elwert G, Feuchtwang S,
Neubert D (eds.) Dynamics of Violence. Processes of Escalation
and De-escalation in Violent Group Conflicts. Duncker &
Humblot, Berlin, pp. 85–102
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Fikentscher W (ed.) Begegnungen und Konflikt. Beck, Munich,
Germany
Elwert G, Feuchtwang S, Neubert D 1999 The dynamics of
collective violence. In: Elwert G, Feuchtwang S, Neubert D
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Berlin, pp. 7–31
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Hallpike C 1973 Functionalist interpretation of primitive war-
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Mountains. Oxford University Press, London
Helbling 1999 The dynamics of war and alliance among the
Yanomami. In: Elwert G, Feuchtwang S, Neubert D (eds.)
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escalation in Violent Group Conflicts. Duncker & Humblot,
Berlin, pp. 103–16
Hirschman A 1994 Social conflicts as pillars of democratic
market society. Political Theory 22(2): 203–18
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Frankfurt Main
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3: 165–83
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Luhmann N 1969 Legitimation durch Verfahren. Luchterhand,
Neuwied am Rhein, Germany
Malinowski B 1941 War—past, present and future. In: Clarksen
J, Cochrane T (eds.) War as a Social Institution. Columbia
University Press, New York
Mauss M 1923\24 Essai sur le don. AnneT e Sociologique 1: 30–186
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Polanyi K 1968 Dahomey and the Sla
e Trade. Montagu,
Seattle, WA
Pospisil L 1958 Kapauku Papuans and Their Law. Yale Uni-
versity Press, New Haven, CT
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Society. Cohen & West, London
Sahlins M 1961 The segmentary lineage: An organization of
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Schlee G 2000 Identita$ tskonstruktionen und Parteinahme:
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Schwandner S 1999 Humiliation and reconciliation in Northern
Albania. In: Elwert G, Feuchtwang S, Neubert D (eds.)
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Germany
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G. Elwert
Conflict/Consensus
Conflict refers to a situation in which there is dis-
agreement over how to divide scarce resources. Con-
flict resolution thus decides who gets what (Lasswell
1936), and politics is the process of raising and settling
this question. An individual experiences inner conflict
2547
Conflict\Consensus
when he or she faces a choice between incompatible
values. This psychic conflict may have political conse-
quences, as when a voter is torn between lower taxes
and more spending, but political scientists generally
study conflict situations where two or more indivi-
duals, groups, political parties, or nation-states seek
the same object or maintain incompatible goals. The
stakes involved in a specific conflict thus vary widely.
Although conflict refers to disagreement and con-
sensus to agreement among political actors, they are
not mutually exclusive. Without agreement about
what is desirable, there could be no conflict over its
possession. Contact and interaction also are necessary
for conflict; there can be no conflict between an
earthling and the man in the moon. It also is important
to distinguish between a conflict situation and the
beha
ioral responses of the parties involved. The
potential responses range from peaceful negotiation to
unlimited aggression and violence, and outcomes vary
from a stable compromise to total victory and de-
struction. For example, two states claiming the same
territory may settle the conflict by partition or by war
leading to occupation of the disputed land by the
victor.
Since political conflict involves a struggle for ad-
vantage, generally arising from a challenge to the
status quo, strategic behavior is a natural focus for
analysis. The rational choice paradigm imported from
economics (Elster 1986) and codified in game theory
(Von Neumann and Morgenstern 1944, Axelrod 1984)
represents an effort to explain how contending parties
‘should’ behave in zero-sum and nonzero-sum games
(conflicts), two and n-person games, games with or
without full information, and so forth. More psycho-
logically oriented scholars (Simon 1957, Kahneman et
al. 1982, Janis 1982) have emphasized the cognitive
and motivational impediments to ‘pure’ rationality.
1. Normati
e Aspects of Conflict
Scarcity and selfishness assure that conflict is a
perennial feature of society. Weber (1949) noted that
‘conflict cannot be excluded from social life,’ regarding
peace as a momentary pause in the flow. Because
conflict is disruptive and inevitably results in some-
one’s disappointment, many theorists regard it nega-
tively and stress the need for harmony and common
values (Parsons 1952, 1960). Even Marx, for whom
class conflict was the key explanatory variable in social
development, rhapsodized about how the proletarian
revolution would replace the government of people by
the administration of things.
On the other hand, Simmel ([1908] 1955), Coser
(1956), and Dahrendorf (1959) emphasize the positive
functions of conflict. Conflict binds members of one
contending group together, forming bonds of soli-
darity and fostering cooperation, even as it fuels
antagonism toward the opponent. In fact, social
2548
identity theory in psychology (Tajfel and Turner 1986)
posits that mere membership in a social category is
sufficient to foster ethnocentric thinking. Further-
more, the appearance of harmony often masks entren-
ched social injustice, so conflict may be a necessary
spur for the moral improvement of society. Finally,
conflict may result in innovation, as when debate and
negotiation stimulate the development of reforms that
all contending parties accept.
When interactions among antagonists or potential
antagonists persist over time, prudence tends to dictate
the establishment and maintenance of reciprocal
norms and understandings concerning conflict be-
havior. For example, there are international treaties
concerning diplomatic immunity and the treatment of
prisoners of war and refugees. Other limiting rules,
such as a norm against assassinating leaders of other
countries are more informal. Both the formal and
informal arrangements confining conflict tend to
evolve as the intentions and relative capabilities of the
contending actors change.
Agreement on the rules of the game domesticates
conflict by legitimating outcomes reached through
accepted procedures. This insight leads scholars to
argue that consensus on constitutional principles is a
prerequisite for democratic stability (Lipset 1960).
This consensus can develop in a number of ways. It
can be the outcome of negotiations, of a recognition
that the alternative to institutional arrangements
limiting conflict may be violence and the risk of
permanent loss, or, in a stable society, of socialization
into a stable political culture.
2. Foundations of Conflict
Politics is the attempt to use state power to achieve a
favorable distribution of scarce goods or values.
Conflicts over such allocation frequently are termed
realistic or objective and tend to group people ac-
cording to shared positions with respect to the desired
value. Perhaps the most common basis for conflict is
economic, pitting town against country, worker
against manager, and so forth. However, conflicts
among religions, races, and cultures also are pervasive
and often are more intense than conflicts over econ-
omic issues because they seem to touch more directly
on people’s fundamental sense of identity. Lines of
political cleavage therefore reflect the structure of
society, and as demographic, economic, and tech-
nological changes occur alignments shift and new
layers of conflict are added to the old (Lipset and
Rokkan 1967). Political party systems articulate the
objective bases of conflict by aggregating coalitions of
interests.
Since there are multiple sources of division in any
complex society, the degree to which cleavages are
cross-cutting rather than overlapping is important.
Where religious and economic fault-lines coincide as,

for example, in Northern Ireland where Catholics tend
to be lower on the income and occupational ladder
than Protestants, conflict tends to be more intense and
peaceful compromise harder to reach. By contrast,
where the connections between religion or language
and economic position are loose, individuals tend to
have multiple affiliations and groups who are anta-
gonists in one conflict may be allies in another, a
circumstance that may moderate their behavior (Horo-
witz 1985).
Political scientists have contrasted instrumental
with expressive conflicts. The former type refer to the
pursuit of specific, tangible goals such as political
office or economic gain. By contrast, expressive con-
flicts seek the redistribution of group recognition and
esteem, and their outcome may be to supply psychic
satisfaction for the many without changing their
objective social circumstances (Edelman 1964). In the
United States, ethnic group competition for social and
political status hampered the development of class-
based parties (Lipset and Marks 2000). Conflicts over
collective ideals or a group’s way of life are more likely
to be infused with great emotion than struggles for
personal advantage, and participants in such battles
between ‘good’ and ‘evil’ are more likely to resort to
aggressive or ruthless tactics (Coser 1956).
3. The Impact of Consensus on Conflict
Political consensus exists when a large proportion of
the members of a society agree about how decisions
regarding the distribution of values should be made.
Such agreement may center on outcomes or on the
procedures to reach them. The idea of political
consensus has been used primarily to study the
stability and effectiveness of democratic political
processes. In that sense, a common hypothesis is that
the existence of consensus mitigates the intensity of
conflicts regarding the allocation of scarce resources.
The function of consensus in this view is to maintain
civil peace by reducing the probability of disagree-
ments and by fostering a sense of mutual restraint
among contending parties.
The crucial features of consensus refer to general
principles and values rather than to preferences
regarding specific policies. The degree to which there is
common acceptance of existing institutions as legit-
imate, agreement that the society’s political laws and
rules are fair, and a shared sense of identity is the focus
of empirical studies of political consensus. Political
theorists diverge about the elements of social structure
and culture that foster agreement on the allocation of
values such as power, wealth, and status. Economic
inequality and rigid barriers to upward mobility
generally are viewed as impediments to consensus
(Lipset 1960) whereas cultural unity often is regarded
as facilitating agreement on political values (Schle-
singer 1991). In traditional societies, religious unity
Conflict\Consensus
tended to promote social harmony, but modern states
usually have a plurality of religious and ethnic back-
grounds, with nationalism emerging as an integrating
ideology (Haas 1964). More generally, advocates of
consensual patterns of belief and identity view these as
a lubricant that enables political liberty and social
complexity to coexist.
4. The Rele
ant Contours of Consensus
Social change poses a challenge to the prevailing
political consensus by introducing new conflicts over
the distribution of values. Rising groups seek power
and recognition, while declining groups fight against
displacement. As these conflicts are settled, the content
of the political consensus shifts as resources are
redistributed. So, for example, the general acceptance
of welfare state policies mitigated class-based political
conflict in industrialized democracies. A new con-
sensus emerged over what benefits were untouchable
and hors de combat. Similarly, the successes of the civil
rights movement simultaneously produced consensus
on the illegitimacy of official racial discrimination and
initiated dissensus over the proper role of government
in promoting equality of results rather than oppor-
tunity.
Since there is no natural harmony of interests among
groups in a differentiated society, political consensus
will always be incomplete. A certain number of people
will always feel the prevailing norms are unjust. In
addition, the belief systems of most people are only
loosely integrated. There may be a consensus of values,
such as liberty and equality, that collide in concrete
situations without awareness of the ultimate need to
make trade-offs. Furthermore, those sharing a pol-
itical outlook differ in the intensity of their beliefs and
in their level of political engagement. Hence, the
significance of consensus for the government’s effec-
tiveness and stability depends not just on how wide-
spread is popular agreement but on which groups in
society have shared commitments and values.
In a study of US political culture, McClosky and
Zaller (1984) found a broad consensus (defined as 75
percent agreement) within the general public on
abstract principles of democracy and free enterprise.
Agreement on the principle of minority rights tended
to erode, however, when questions centered on what
should be allowed to unpopular groups. There also
was less consensus on questions of economic and
social equality. Previously, Dahl (1961) and McClosky
(1964) argued that consensus among the politically
active was more significant than disagreement with
democratic norms among the general public who often
are apathetic and whose choices are structured by
elites. The acceptability of existing institutions and
important government policies to most significant
social groups thus matters more than the universality
of agreement within the entire population. In par-
2549
Conflict\Consensus
ticular, since consensus within groups can enhance
conflict across groups, it is important for agreement
on fundamentals to encompass leaders of all the major
political parties in order to encourage collaboration in
the peaceful adjudication of conflicts.
There is, then, a reciprocal interaction between
conflict and consensus. When disagreement over the
allocation of values is relatively circumscribed, it is
easier for feelings of unity and a common fate to
develop. At the same time, agreement about what is
fair and about accepted ways of pursuing one’s
interests facilitates settling conflicts of interest. This
suggests that the significance of political consensus
as a unifying or stabilizing force varies with the sev-
erity of the challenges confronting society. The benefits
of consensus for democratic governments are felt
mainly during times of external threat or internal
convulsion.
5. Creating Consensus
Since political conflict never disappears, the problems
of creating and sustaining consensus are ongoing. One
source of consensus is the development of mutual trust
among political actors through incremental steps of
cooperation (Axelrod 1984). Another is the incor-
poration of previously disadvantaged groups into the
polity through a combination of political and econ-
omic changes. Finally, consensus develops through
the process of socialization that transmits values from
one generation to the next. Families and schools are
important agents in this process. The degree to which
political regimes self-consciously strive to inculcate a
supportive consensus varies, but the increasing diffi-
culty of controlling access to divergent values makes
the success of such efforts fragile.
See also: Cleavages: Political; Conflict and Conflict
Resolution, Social Psychology of; Conflict: Anthro-
pological Aspects; Conflict: Organizational; Conflict
Sociology; Cooperation: Sociological Aspects; Inte-
gration: Social; Internal Warfare: Civil War, Insur-
gency, and Regional Conflict; Marx, Karl (1818–89);
Political Culture; Simmel, Georg (1858–1918); Soli-
darity, Sociology of
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J. Citrin
Copyright # 2001 Elsevier Science Ltd.
All rights reserved.
Conflict: Organizational
We make two explicit assumptions in this article. First,
a life conducted in, or mediated through, organiz-
ations is one of the defining aspects of being a modern
citizen. Second, and despite the best intentions of some
theorists and practitioners, relations in organizations
will always entail a degree of conflict and political
maneuvering because ‘[r]easonable people can be
expected to disagree on major, uncertain and ambig-
uously defined issues, and to argue strongly for their
ISBN: 0-08-043076-7