All those represented in a conflict must be distinguished in order to reveal what a conflict is. Your opinion?

Answer 1

Unless you have some principled way of categorizing individuals and their interests that are relevant to the conflict, you face data that is opaque to useful interpretation, if not a vast regress.

Answer 2

It's a little different to present an opinion without the context. I figure the answer would differ slightly if you're talking about literature or real life.

However, in either case, there does seem to be some meaning in the statement. Conflict is fundamentally a problem and tension between two forces. In literature, there are a handful of "types of conflict" such as man vs. man (Les Miserables), man vs. nature (Old Man and the Sea), man vs. society (Scarlet Letter), and man vs. self (Sophie's Choice).

What's essential in all of these conflicts is that there is something different between the two sides of the conflict. Whether it be something regarding law and order, nature and civilization, or even the struggling issues internally.

Conflict arises when the various factors have distinguishing factors that must be reconciled in order to resolve the problem. A conflict between like elements presumably wouldn't occur (as the sides agree) and, in literature especially the distinguishing factor is very important because knowing the distinguishing factor is what will contain the "moral".

E.g. in Les Miserables, the conflict is between rigid lawfulness and unlawful righteousness. Upon the resolution the reader knows who "won" the conflict and can attribute that to the differences in the sides to draw the moral.

Answer 3

I would venture to say that the actual point of contention suffers the possibility of being masked if the individuals who represent the opposing forces are too closely focused on. While this polarity could potentially serve to help illuminate the situation, the risk is run of clouding the picture by serving to distract one from the actual issue. This is more of a practical point than a logical one.

Answer 4

Yes, conflict implies difference - unless differentiated, conflict can not be identified.