OPTIONS FOR SETTLEMENT

As discussed at greater length below, one option for settlement of intractable conflicts is to let the conflict settle itself: that is, to abstain from intervention and hope that the sides either come to their own compromise or that one side wins.

A second approach for dealing with intractable cases is conflict management. Typically, this involves freezing the conflict, through a negotiated and durable cease-fire and the subsequent, long-term deployment of outside forces. Conflict management may be the best option among bad alternatives. In Cyprus and the Balkans, conflict management has helped quell the violence and allowed time and changing circumstance to moderate political passions in the hope that new forms of political accommodation can develop. This process is not necessarily linear, because vio­lence can erupt again unless a capable third- party peacemaker simultaneously supports an ongoing negotiating process and demonstrates a real commitment to achieving a negotiated result. Intractable conflicts do not necessarily subside if they are simply managed below the boil for some years. After the Simla agreement (Thornton & Bokhari 1988), the conflict in Kashmir was managed—in the sense that there was little direct fighting— for eighteen years and yet violent conflict broke out again in the mid-1990s.

Peaceful settlement by means of mediation and conflict resolution is the third option for handling intractable conflicts. Here, one of the central challenges is not only to wean the parties from their “addiction” to violence, but also to change incentive structures so the parties see that there are real, concrete gains to be realized by ending violence. Negotiated settlement, in other words, has to be made more attractive than continued fighting to those who are in control of the decision-making. Mediators need to acquire resources of leverage and influence in order to address the parties' interests, objective needs, vulnerabilities, insecurities, fears, and their sense of “sunk costs” in the conflict to date.

At the same time, intractable conflicts are not just battles of interest, but also battles of wills, beliefs, values, and sub­jective needs. There are critical psycho­logical elements of intractable conflict that cannot be left unattended or ignored by third parties. Powerful actors are sometimes capable of deciphering and responding to such conflict dimensions. Official mediators with experience of intractable conflicts may become expert at learning the parties “political requirements” for going to settlement. Often, however, various unofficial intermediaries have played a key role in addressing the “subjective” dimensions of the conflict, including such issues as identity, survival, and the demonization of the other side. Informal dialogue and communication that deal with deep-rooted fears and perceptions are often key to changing attitudes and the hostile images warring parties have of each other. The solution may lie in what Harold Saunders in a later chapter calls a process and pattern of “circum-negotiation”—working in the wider community to supplement and reinforce so-called track-one diplomacy by creating a supportive political climate and Constituencyfor peacemaking.

These latter options do not exist in hermetically sealed, separate compartments. To illustrate, negotiated solutions to conflicts mediated by powerful actors may depend upon reaching down to their constituencies and enabling decision-makers to build support for compromise, at least on those issues where compromise is possible. Or, to take another example, it may take many years of protracted third-party efforts to move decision-makers— and their publics—to a different place where the idea of reconciliation and compromise is less easily dismissed. Conflict management— that is, suppression or control of a conflict— can under the right circumstances become a way station on the road to eventual resolution or even transformation. Powerful third parties will require the staying power to see the task through, as well as the imagination to recognize the limits of managing the manifestations of conflict; in the end, they may need to engage and eventually hand off to local civil society and non-official third- party actors in building peace (Lederach 1998, 2007).