Conflictualization: Theorizing how relations, societies, and issues come to be formed by the logic of conflict

This article presents a Luhmann-inspired theory of conflictualization, that is, how objects, relations, and societies come to be defined by the logic of conflict. This article presents a Galtung- and Luhmann-inspired theory of conflictualization, that is, how objects, relations, and societies come to be defined by the logic of conflict. The article conceptualizes conflictualization as a threefold process of (1) forming social relationships, (2) displacing the focus toward “winning” the conflict, and (3) making an increasing number of issues into objects of contestation. It positions the concept of conflictualization in relation to contemporary (Nordic) peace research, securitization, politicization, and polarization, showing the added value of the theory in terms of teasing out how conflict “does something” and should therefore not be reduced to its causes or effects, but understood distinctly as conflict. To illustrate this, the article discusses three examples of how a society, a relationship, and an issue, respectively, are conflictualized: (1) how the Danish-Greenlandic relationship has been conflictualized, (2) how the war in Gaza has shaped social relations and conflictualized other issues like climate activism and LGBTQ+ rights across the Nordic countries, and (3) conflictualization of the Colombian society post-accord. Moreover, we discuss how conflictualization relates to agency and change, that is, the degree to which conflictualization can be seen as a deliberate process and calls for strategies of conflictualizing and de-conflictualizing issues.