As social beings, conflict is intricately linked to our lives and is almost inescapable in daily human interactions. Conflicts are bound to happen in our interactions with one another but, our ability to resolve it would determine its impact as either negative(destructive) of positive(constructive). Conflicts resolution and conflict management are terms that are often used interchangeably however, a more nuance look at their definition,processes and outcomes suggest they are mutually exclusive though people used the terms synonymously to mean the same thing.
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Conflict can be termed as a struggle between people with opposing needs, ideas, beliefs, values etc. Conflict management involves designing effective strategies to minimize or mitigate the destructive outcomes in conflict. Conflict Resolution on the other hand is the process by which more parties engaged in a dispute and reach an agreement of resolving it.
Conflict management does not seek to create peace at the onset but, tries to create the environment for feuding parties restrict themselves. This provide the avenue on which peaceful resolution is can be hinged on. This means that in conflict management,feuding parties are held separately and talked to the prevent the destructive nature of the conflict before they are brought together to amicably resolve the conflict.
Conflict resolution on the other hand, seeks to examine the root cause by bringing feuding parties together to settle their differences mutually. This means that, conflict resolution is the last stage of peace building where parties are likely to embrace themselves. But unlike the management stage, feuding parties still harbour hatred and mistrust towards each other and thus, would be counter productive to bring them under one roof.
In essence, the two are vital process that needs to be followed if the intended outcome is peace is to be realize. Failure to skip one process may compromise the entire peace-building process where and interlocutors may not be trusted.
