Conflict is often referred to as if it were a self-contained entity – a single thing, existing on its own, something that we might encounter, if you like. There is conflict in the Middle East, in Zimbabwe, within the Liberal party. It might leap out us from the woods, or in the middle of a sporting contest – we could be led to believe.
But such an image is misleading. Conflict does not exist on its own – there must be at least two opposing forces, or impulses, or interests, or desires, or…whatever, conflict is between things. It could be two people or bodies wanting the same thing, or one person wanting two mutually exclusive things, but it does not exist in isolation. Conflict is a term used to describe a situation when not everyone, or perhaps not anyone, can be satisfied.
Given the human condition and human nature, it is perhaps surprising that there is so little conflict, or at least that it is so seldom expressed overtly. I could suggest this is because of a conflict (ironically) between the desire or need to exist socially and the impossibility of infinite, ubiquitous, compatibility between interests and needs.
In truth, we go to great lengths to avoid conflict. Consider the infamous Neville Chamberlain declaration that he had negotiated ‘peace in our time’ with Adolph Hitler. Living in society necessitates compromise, the recognition that the rights of others cannot be dismissed lightly. It is interesting to look at ‘The Secret River’ in this regard. Despite the inequity in the British society that Will and Sal spring from, despite the gross inequity that creates a downtrodden underclass for whom it is a truth a family cannot live on a wage , an underclass that must choose between legal starvation or illegally scraping by, there is no revolution nor any thought of revolution. Rather, those for whom it is a benison that, once caught, they have friends who can pay the hangman to make a clean job of their end, thank the lords that intercede to grant them a suffering that Will at least reflects, could well be ‘worse than death.’ We might wonder, then, when considering this Context, what conditions break down this impulse to co-exist.
In ‘The Secret River’, again, we see that those poor off-casts from society aspire not to the creation of a more just and equitable system, but a replication of that which they were spurned by, with themselves in the positions of power. If their suppression of those they must see as ‘insects’ is violent, perhaps that is because it requires an explosive force to move us beyond civilised behaviour, to do that which is normally unacceptable. How can one reconcile murder with being an upstanding leader of a new world? The propaganda and demonization we see of the enemy in times of war fits this theory. When we actually accept the need for conflict, we move beyond our social impulses. We say what should not be said, we do what should not be done. We step outside the ordinary boundaries of restraint. It should not be surprising that the narrower the boundaries are, the tighter the restrictions, the greater the pressure that can build up – as we see in The Crucible.
When we encounter conflict therefore, we may well be confronting an unpalatable truth about ourselves and humankind. This can be liberating and upsetting simultaneously – not unlike vomiting perhaps!
