Lesson 1 – Conflict and Its Resolution

Former President Jimmy Carter, who has helped resolve many international conflicts, says, “On
the most basic level, conflict occurs when interests differ.” This is true for individuals – in
families, classrooms, or on the job. It is also true among nations. In this lesson, students learn
about conflict. They discuss five basic kinds of conflict. They role play an example of
interpersonal conflict, then gain experience – again through role play – in one method of solving
conflicts, mediation.

Pennsylvania Education Standards Met in This Lesson:

Career Education: Career Retention and Advancement

Explain and demonstrate conflict resolution skills (13.3.8). Evaluate conflict resolution
skills as the relate to the workplace (13.3.11): Constructive criticism, Group dynamics,
Managing/leadership, Mediation, Negotiation, Problem solving.

Civics and Government: Rights and Responsibilities of Citizenship

Analyze skills used to resolve conflicts in society and government. (5.2.9) Interpret the
causes of conflict in society and analyze techniques to resolve those conflicts. (5.2.12)

Learning Objectives

Students will be able to discuss and analyze the meaning of conflict as it applies to individuals,
communities, and nations.

Students will learn about and put into practice one of the methods of conflict resolution –
mediation.

What You’ll Need

 A copy of Handout #1, “Mediation,” for each student
 A copy of Handout #2, “Acting as a Mediator,” for each student
 Optional: An overhead transparency of Handout #2 and an overhead projector
 A copy of Handout #3, “Making War: Centuries of Conflict,” for each student

Teaching This Lesson

1. Write the word “conflict” on the board. Ask students to define it. Say to students, “There
are many types of conflicts in the world today. Let’s think of all the different types of
conflict we can.” List the following types of conflict across the top of the board:

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International National Community Government- Interpersonal
Conflict Conflict Conflict sponsored Conflict
Conflict

Ask students to define each type of conflict. Also ask them to think of specific examples of each
type of conflict occurring in the world now. Examples might include:

International National Conflict Community Government- Interpersonal

Conflict Conflict sponsored Conflict
Conflict
Conflict between Conflict within a Violence that State-sponsored Violence
nations – wars, nation – civil takes place on a forms of violence between two or
terrorism war, mass rioting large scale within more people –
a community – The Holocaust murder,
Gang warfare, muggings, rapes,
the L.A. riots assaults

2. Say, “Many of the things that cause conflicts between nations or groups of people also cause
conflict between individuals.” The following role play will help students understand some of
the causes of conflict:

Jason and Antonio used to be close friends. But this year, Antonio is doing well
in school, while Jason has seemed to lose interest. While Antonio generally is
prepared for class, Jason talks back to teachers and falls behind. Jason also has
a new group of friends – a crowd Antonio doesn’t like. Jason says mean things
about Antonio behind his back and harasses him in the gym and in the halls.

Today, Jason said, “You think you’re smart. Fight me and prove it.” Antonio
thinks fighting is wrong, and he also knows that it could get him suspended from
school and grounded at home. On the other hand, he worries that if he doesn’t
stand up to Jason, he’ll become an easy target. In the hall, Jason and his
girlfriend Elena meet Antonio and his girlfriend Sara. Role play their
conversation.

 Ask four students to volunteer to play the roles of Jason, Antonio, Elena, and Sara. (If
any of these names corresponds to the name of a student in your class, choose another
name). Make it clear to all students that no actor is playing himself or herself. Say,
“They are acting.”

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 3.
Helping Students Role Play

 Make sure the four actors understand the basic story line, what each character wants, and
why.
 Encourage the actors. Be positive. Involve the audience. Have them say, “Action” to begin
the scene. Have them clap when the actors are finished.
 If an actor doesn’t know what to say next, encourage her to ask for suggestions from the
audience.
 Give the students these tips:
 Speak loudly.
 Face the class. Don’t turn your back. Try not to move in a way that will make other actors
turn their backs.
 Listen to each other. Don’t talk if someone else is.
 Speak slowly.
 Think of what someone you know might do or say. Make it realistic.

Tell the audience to watch and listen closely. After the role play, they’re going to have to talk
about what they saw. Also remind them once again that the students aren’t playing themselves.

3. Have students act out the argument among the four teens. Afterwards, ask these questions:

 Conflicts have both immediate causes and root causes (things that have occurred in the
past). What is the immediate cause of Jason and Antonio’s conflict from Jason’s point of
view? What are some of the root causes? What is the immediate cause of the conflict
from Antonio’s point of view? What are some of the root causes?

 Conflicts can be resolved in many ways. One way to resolve conflicts peacefully is
through mediation. A student mediator gets the people who are in conflict to talk about
the problem and see if they can come up with a solution. Ask for a volunteer to be the
mediator.

4. Pass out Handout #1, Mediation. (You may also wish to make an overhead of this handout.)
Lead a discussion with students to make sure they understand each of the steps involved in
mediation. Talking points for the teacher are listed below:

Step 1: Set the Ground Rules

The mediator explains that each person will have a chance to talk and tell their side of the
story. The rules are:

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  No interrupting
 No name calling or put-downs
 Be honest
 Work hard to solve the problem

Step 2: Define the Problem

Ask each person to tell what happened. Then the mediator should restate and summarize
the story. Finally, the mediator should ask, “How did that make you feel?” and restate
what the person says.

Step 3: Find Solutions

The mediator should identify the issues to be solved. Then the mediator may ask each
person, “Can you think of any solution to this problem?” Or, the mediator can ask both
parties to brainstorm for 2 minutes. Remind students that when they are brainstorming,
they should throw out any idea that occurs to them. Say, “Brainstorming is not the time
when we criticize other people’s ideas – we’re trying to come up with as many answers
as possible. Later, we’ll do some evaluating.” Once the list is developed, the mediator
asks, “Which of these solutions could you agree with?”

Step 4: Final Agreement

The mediator restates the final solution. Tell students this solution should be a 4WH
solution: it should say Who, What, When, Where and How. The mediator should ask
each person what he or she can do to keep the problem from happening again. Then the
mediator should congratulate both sides on reaching a solution.

5. Now have the students and the mediator role play a mediation to this conflict. Give the
students Handout #2: Acting as a Mediator. Discuss the steps that mediators should follow
when trying to find a resolution to a conflict.

6. Say, “Finding an agreement to conflict is not easy. Many of the same things that cause
conflict between people also cause conflict between nations. In Lesson 2, we are going to
read a selection by former President Jimmy Carter about the history of war. Then we are
going to discuss his analysis of the causes of war. You will see many similarities between
the causes of conflict that we have just identified and the causes of conflict that former
President Carter identifies in this essay.”

7. Pass out a copy of Handout #3, “Making War: Centuries of Conflict,” and assign students to
read it before the next class period. (Note: some groups might need to read this assignment
in class.) Ask them to consider the following questions as they read: What is the reason that
conflict occurs? What are some ways of resolving conflicts? Do you think war is ever
justified? What makes a war a “just” war? How has war changed in the 20th century? What
led to the development of the cold war?
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Handout #1:
Mediation
 Step 1: Introduction and Ground Rules

 Do Not Interrupt

 No name calling or putdowns

 Be honest

 Work hard to resolve the problem

 Step 2: Define the Problem

 Step 3: Find Solutions

 Mediators do not suggest solutions

 Step 4: Final Agreement

 Who, what, when, where, how

(Written by Fran Schmidt, Alice Friedman and Jean Marvel. The Grace Contrino
Abrams Peace Education Foundation, 1992. All Rights Reserved. Reprinted by
Permission.)
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Handout #2 – Acting As a Mediator

Step 1: Introduction and Ground Rules

1. “Hello. My name is …” (shake hands)

2. “Would you like to use mediation to solve your problem?”
3. “Everything that you say will be kept confidential…”
We are not here to judge…
We will not decide the solution for you…
Each of you will get a chance to tell your story without interruption.
You will create the solution yourselves.
Together, you will create an agreement that you can both accept.

4. There are a few ground rules that you need to agree to:
 Not to interrupt
 No name calling or putdowns
 Work hard to solve the problem
 Be honest

Step 2: Define the Problem

Storytelling and uninterrupted listening
5. “Please tell us what happened…(ask one person)
6. Let them tell their story.
7. “So…(restate and summarize the story)
8. “How did that make you feel?” (restate)
*****************************

9. “Please tell us what happened…(ask the other person)

10. Let them tell their story.
11. “So…(restate and summarize the story)
12. “How did that make you feel?” (restate)
*****************************

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 Step 3: Find Solutions
Creating options

13. “The issues to be solved are…Are there any other issues?”

14. “Can you think of a solution for the issue of …?” (ask one person)
15. “What do you think of this solution?” (ask the other person)

***************OR*************

16. “Let’s brainstorm for 2 minutes. Can you think of some different ways this can be
solved?
17. List these ideas.
18. “Which solutions could you agree with?”

Step 4: Final Agreement

Mutual satisfaction

19. Restate final solution.

20. 4WH (who, what, when, where, how)
21. “What could you do to keep the problem from happening again?”
(ask each person)
22. “Do you think the problem has been solved?”
23. “Please tell your friends that you have solved the problem. This will prevent rumors
from spreading about you and this problem.
24. “Congratulations. You have worked hard to solve this problem.”
25. Everyone shake hands.
26. Have people sign a final agreement.

(Written by Fran Schmidt, Alice Friedmand, and Jean Marvel. The Grace Contrino Abrams
Peace Education Foundation, 1992. All Rights Reserved. Reprinted by Permission.)
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Handout #3: “Making War: Centuries of conflict,” by Jimmy Carter
From Talking Peace, (Dutton Children’s Books). All rights reserved. Used with permission.

[W]ar has been a fundamental force in human history…. The history of conflict is as old as
humanity itself.

On the most basic level, conflict occurs when interests differ. As soon as two or more groups
exist in a situation, there are two or more points of view- and two or more sets of ambitions as
well. While sometimes each group can pursue its own ambitions without interfering with the
others, quite often conflicts will arise…

Conflicting views do not necessarily lead to fighting. War is merely one form of resolving
conflict, a violent form. Nonviolent alternatives include negotiation and mediation to reach
compromises and passive civil disobedience to emphasize and publicize the absence of
agreement. This was how the American civil rights movement forced an end to legalized racial
discrimination. But for various reasons at different times, hundreds of leaders in the history of
the world have felt that war was an appropriate and justified means to resolve a conflict.

The reasons for going to war are many and varied. Battles may occur because a piece of land
that has long been related to one group is taken over or controlled by another. Nations struggle
over natural resources, including access to seas and oceans. Historically, ideas also have led to
war. When one group has no tolerance for the religious opinions, race, or ethnicity of its
neighbors, violent conflict can erupt. A change in the politics of a government that harms the
average citizen’s quality of life may inspire war. An oppressive regime’s abuse of the people
may eventually incite protest or outright rebellion.

In 1775, American colonial leaders chose armed resistance to the British monarchy in order to
protect what they considered to be their rights of self-government. When the British government
refused to yield, the conflict became a war for independence. Shortly before the battle at
Lexington, which began the American Revolution, Patrick Henry made his famous statement of
resolve, “I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty, or give me
death!” Another advocate of the Revolution, Thomas Paine, later said, “It is the object only of a
war that makes it honorable. And if there was ever a just war since the world began, it is this in
which America is now engaged.” Few Americans today would criticize the military actions our
forefathers took to liberate America from British rule and to support democratic ideals for all
people.

Though it is often obvious why one country would want to escape another’s domination, it is
sometimes harder to explain why citizens of a single country begin fighting among themselves in
a civil war. It would seem that two peoples living close together would be more sympathetic
toward each other and less likely to go to war. Time and time again, civil wars have erupted,
proving that this theory is not true.

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Almost ninety years after the revolution against the British, we Americans experienced our own
civil war, as states and even members of the same families fought against one another. The
causes of this tragic War Between the States were complicated. Among them was the struggle to
abolish slavery, the assertion by certain states of their right to withdraw from the Union, and the
domination of the northern states’ industrial economy over the South’s traditional agricultural
way of life. After four years of bloody conflict and tragic loss, slavery was abolished and the
Union was preserved. But as with most wars, the question remains: Could these goals have
been reached peacefully?

There is no way to rewrite history, but who knows what would have happened if negotiation
between distinguished and respected leaders has resolved the basic differences between North
and South concerning the abolition of slavery and the elimination of what the South considered
to be unfair economic discrimination against its region. Was there some peaceful alternative to
the war’s destruction and the hundreds of thousands of battlefield deaths? Although we will
never know, we can apply the same kinds of questions to modern-day threats to peace.

Historians who study why leaders are willing to risk battle have found that usually one of two
conditions exist: Either the leaders are highly confident that they will win, or they are more
concerned about what will happen to them if they do not fight than if they do. Since the
invention of massively destructive nuclear weapons earlier in this century, many people felt that
no leader would ever consider the risks of war to be worth it again. Yet smaller wars continue to
explode all over the globe. This is in part because our human history of thousands of past wars
sets a strong precedent.

It would be very difficult to explore all of the history of war…but it is important to remember
that as the nature of warfare itself has changed, opinions on the morality and advisability of war
have also changed.

Despite the promise of the Hebrew prophet Isaiah some twenty-seven hundred years ago that a
time would come when “nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war
anymore, “ few nations have abandoned war as a means of advancing their interest. In the
ancient world, few moral limits were placed on the conduct of war. When an army of Egypt,
Assyria, Rome, or the ancient Israelites conquered a city, the soldiers believed the gods gave
them the right to loot the city and to kill or enslave their captives.

Nations did develop ways of avoiding war through diplomacy, however. The Greek city-states,
especially, cultivated the arts of negotiation and arbitration, usually to form beneficial alliances,
Also, rules of warfare evolved. In Christian Europe during the Middle Ages, knights followed
the customs of chivalry when they fought among themselves. However, their rules on how to
treat their rival knights were not observed when they fought against people of different religions,
such as the Muslims.

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In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, advances in knowledge and science brought changes
to the conduct of war and to attitudes about war. Weapons grew more destructive as the
technology for using gunpowder improved. Nations began to see the military as a job for
professionals who could apply scientific knowledge to make war efficient. At the same time,
new ideas were in the air about the responsibilities and rights of human beings and of nation-
states.

Some nations in western Europe were coming to the conclusion that limits needed to be placed
on war. They considered it criminal to murder or enslave the civilian population of an occupied
territory…

Early in the twentieth century, the leading nations of Europe became embroiled in World War I,
which proved to be more costly and destructive than any previous war in history. The military
strategists were slow to adjust to the more powerful weapons at their disposal. Soldiers were
slaughtered by the thousands as they attempted frontal assaults against the exploding shells and
rapid-fire weapons of their entrenched enemies. Even though the nations engaged in the war
recognized that civilians should be treated differently than soldiers, some of the new weapons
made it difficult to follow the rules of war that had developed. The submarine is one example.
When a surface naval warship caught an unarmed or lightly armed enemy merchant ship, it was
required to give the merchant ship the opportunity to surrender. But when a submarine caught an
enemy ship, it had to rely on a surprise attack for effectiveness. The merchant ship might be able
to outrun the submarine if able to detect it. The outrage caused by German submarine attacks on
American and British merchant ships with American civilian passengers on board ultimately
helped bring the United States into the war against Germany.

The danger to civilian populations increased even more with the outbreak of World War II.
Airplanes sent to bomb military targets often hit civilians as well. Both sides in the war
conducted deliberate air raids on the cities of their enemies, and the Germans also launched
missiles at Great Britain strictly to terrorize the British people. German treatment of Jewish
civilian populations in Germany and in occupied territories included mass murders and
enslavement in labor camps. After the war, some German leaders were convicted of war crimes.
High civilian casualties were inevitable when the United States dropped the atomic bomb on
Japan…President Harry Truman explained that many more (people) would have perished with
prolonged conventional bombing and a military invasion of Japan.

The terrible threat of nuclear weapons may be the most important reason that no other world
wars have occurred since 1945. The hope of many of the world’s people was that the United
Nations would prevent war. Its charter, created in 1945, prescribes that “all members shall
refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial
integrity or political independence of any state, or in any other manner inconsistent with the
purposes of the United Nations.” Unfortunately, soon after its establishment, increasing hostility
developed between the two superpowers, the United States and the Soviet Union.

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The building up of nuclear arsenals by the superpowers and the three other permanent members
of the Security Council (China, Great Britain, and France) made the organization incapable of
fulfilling its potential. Under the UN charter, any decision of the Security Council can be
blocked by the veto of just one of these five. Since practically all important issues affect one of
these major powers or its allies, the United Nations became relatively ineffective in making or
implementing decisions. The United States and its allies, and the Soviet Union and its allies,
engaged in a cold war. They saw each other as the enemy and threatened massive retaliation if
the other dared to strike first.

Until the cold war, the globe had never before been split so neatly between the influences of two
powers. According to some analysts, the superpowers’ arms race and rhetoric succeeded in
deterring a major war because there was always relative equality between the two countries
militarily and economically. At no point did either feel truly confident in its ability to win a war
against the other…

The end of Communist domination of the government, freedom of speech, economic reforms, a
reduction of Soviet influence in neighboring countries, and the eventual breakup of the Soviet
Union into more than a dozen independent countries brought an end to the cold war by 1990.

The cold war definitely had a major impact on the rest of the world, whether or not it was the
only way the two superpowers could have saved themselves from mutual destruction…

It is important to remember how powerful an impact young people can have on the policies of
our nation…[T}ens of thousands of students helped to end racial discrimination with their lunch
counter sit-ins. The environmental movement was given great impetus when young Americans
organized Earth Day…

Almost all American families have been touched by the tragedy of war at one point in their
history, or at least have had members who served in the military during a time of national crisis.
Families who have recently emigrated to America often come with experiences of war in other
countries…We have been very fortunate that except for the bombing of Pearl Harbor in Hawaii
on the morning December 7, 1941, Americans have not seen combat on our own soil since the
Civil War…Other nations have not been so fortunate.

-Jimmy Carter, Talking Peace

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