Intergroup Conflict - Nature and Its Causes

Intergroup conflict refers to the disagreement or confrontation between two or more groups and their members. It may occur when members of a group feel that they do not have what they desire to have or not doing good in comparison to other groups.

It can also reflect any type of formal or informal disagreements between different groups such as political parties or activist groups. It usually involves disagreements between two opposing forces over goals or the sharing of resources.

Nature of Intergroup Conflict

Conflicts are natural in all walks of daily life- both that workplace and home. Conflict is a process meanwhile it occurs in layers. First layer of intergroup conflict is always misunderstanding. 

The other layers are differences of values, difference of viewpoint, differences of interest, and interpersonal differences. It exists everywhere. No two persons are the same.

Hence, they may have individual differences. Conflict is inevitable and often good, for example, good teams always go through a form, storm, norm and perform  period.

It may occur within an individual, between two or more individuals, groups or between organizations. It comes in different ways in accordance with the degree of seriousness and capacity. At times, it may improve a difficult situation.

Causes of Intergroup Conflict

One of the most notable reasons for conflict is simply the nature of the group. Other reasons may be work independence, goal variances, differences in perceptions. Also miscommunication is a common cause of an intergroup conflict and faulty communication leads to suspicion and lack of trust. 

Lack of resources, like if the resources are less in an organization, or the budget
for the particular project is small, then there may be conflict around which group can use the resources available for the project. Similar to lack of resources, competitiveness for respect between the groups will often lead to conflict when the project is based on collective work.

Another cause of this conflict is rejection of norms. Each group will have a set of norms that are followed in the group, from their workstyle to feedback and when a group norms are violated by another group, the conflict will often result. The most affected cause is biased perception. That the feeling of "they" and "we" lead to the conflict.

Individual differences, it means that individuals in different groups will have differences or conflicts that may affect the group. Another cause of conflict arises when one party believes that it is better than the other, and what it is saying should be done. 

When this doesn't happen, both parties start accusing each other. In other words, they feel that they are not doing well in comparison to the other groups. This may lead to the feeling of deprivation and discontentment which may trigger conflict.

Conclusion

Basically, we know if our group is not responsible and if there is already conflict in our group then how can we deal with other conflicts where we need group advantage. So, it's important to do group tasks like if we're in a company that won't get any profit. Hence, the conflict is not good for any condition.

Written By - Akshita Sharma

Edited By - Vanshu Verma