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Conflict, Power and Relative Deprivation*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 September 2013

Walter Korpi
Walter Korpi
Affiliation:
University of Stockholm
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Abstract

The widely accepted expectation achievement approach to conflict, which views conflict primarily as a response to relative deprivation, has recently been challenged by proponents of a political process approach, the central features of which are mobilization of power resources and the struggle for power. Here a power balance model of conflict is developed which incorporates the core concepts from both approaches. In this model the difference in power resources between the contending parties is used as the central independent variable. Relative deprivation, utility of reaching the goal and expectancy of success are introduced as intervening variables to relate the effects from changes in the balance of power between the parties to the probability of manifest conflict between them.

According to the power balance model of conflict different types of relative deprivation (aspirational, decremental and progressive) will be differently correlated with the probability of conflict. The overall correlation between relative deprivation and conflict is expected to be insignificant. Situations where the difference in power resources between two parties is decreasing are seen as most conducive to conflict. When the power resources of an already weaker party are decreasing, the probability of conflict is assumed to be lower than when the weaker party is gaining power resources.

Type
Research Article
Information
American Political Science Review , Volume 68 , Issue 4 , December 1974 , pp. 1569 - 1578
Copyright
Copyright © American Political Science Association 1974

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References

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7 See Atkinson, John W., An Introduction to Motivation (Princeton: Van Nostrand, 1964)Google Scholar and Blalock, Toward a Theory of Minority Group Relations, chap. 4. One should also remember that the classical concept related to mobilization in conflict, the class consciousness of the working class, includes relative deprivation as an integral part. See Leggett, John C., Class, Race and Labor (New York: Oxford University Press, 1968), pp. 34–42Google Scholar.

8 See Lenski, Gerhard E., Power and Privilege (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1966)Google Scholar, chap. 3.

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13 See Caplow, Theodore, Two Against One: Coalitions in Triads (Englewood Cliffs: Prentice-Hall, 1968)Google Scholar and Gamson, William A., “A Theory of Coalition Formation”, American Sociological Review, 36 (June 1961), 373–382CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

14 Some points of departure for such a connection and comparison can be suggested, however. The basic idea in the cross-cutting cleavage theories is that if the possible lines of cleavage in a society are not superimposed but rather cut across parties, the probability of manifest conflict will decrease and, “society is sewn together by its inner conflicts.” This theory thus apparently assumes that each party is internally heterogeneous and has internally opposed interests. Therefore mobilization of power resources incurs costs which makes coalition formation and conflict less likely. In coalition theory on the other hand, it is apparently assumed that parties are homogenous with respect to interests. Mobilization of power resources is therefore easy and does not incur high costs, something which facilitates coalition formation and conflict.

15 For an exception see Dahlström, Edmund, “Exchange, Influence and Power”, Acta Sociologica, 9, No. 3–4 (1966), 237–284CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Even in exchange analyses where inequalities in power resources are recognized, the consequences of such inequalities are often not assumed to be crucial for the result of the exchange, see Homans, George C., Social Behavior: Its Elementary Forms (New York: Harcourt, Brace & World, 1961), pp. 77–78Google Scholar and Blau, Peter M., Power and Exchange in Social Life (New York: Wiley, 1964), pp. 157–158Google Scholar.

16 See Blalock, , Toward a Theory of Minority Group Relations, pp. 118–119Google Scholar.

17 See Blau, pp. 151 ff.

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19 This paper adheres to the sociological convention of defining relative deprivation in terms of the perceived discrepancy between on the one hand the actual position or state of the actor with respect to some good or value dimension, and on the other hand the level of aspiration or the normative expectations of the actor with respect to the dimension, i.e., what he believes he is justifiably entitled to. Gurr (pp. 23–30) defines the concept somewhat differently to include both present and future connotations. It would appear, however, that for the present discussion this difference in definitions is not crucial.

20 This assumption is similar to the proposition by Lenski, , Power and Privilege, p. 44Google Scholar, that “power will determine the distribution of nearly all of the surplus possessed by the society.”

21 Hirschman, Albert O. discusses similar issues in his Exit, Voice, and Loyalty (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1970)Google Scholar.

22 See Thibaut and Kelley, The Social Psychology of Groups chap. 6.

23 Rex, , Key Problems in Sociological Theory, pp. 181–182Google Scholar.

24 Dahrendorf, , Class and Class Conflict in Industrial Society, p. 176Google Scholar.

25 Gamson, , Power and Discontent, p. 98Google Scholar, Snyder, and Tilly, , “Hardship and Collective Violence in France, 1830 to 1960”, p. 526Google Scholar and Tilly, , “Does Modernization Breed Revolution?” p. 437Google Scholar.

26 Blalock, , “Toward a Theory of Minority Group Relations,” p. 110Google Scholar.

27 Oberschall, , Social Conflict and Social Movements, p. 28Google Scholar.

28 The use of power resources by collectives has also been termed “collective action”; see Olson, Mancur Jr.,, The Logic of Collective Action; Public Goods and Theory of Groups (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1965)Google Scholar and Coleman, James S., “Foundations for a Theory of Collective Decisions” in Social Choice, ed. Lieberman, Bernhardt (New York: Gordon & Breach, 1971)Google Scholar.

29 Such probabilistic relationships allowing for influences from variables not included in the model are also assumed among the other variables in the model.

30 Atkinson, , An Introduction to Motivation, p. 242Google Scholar.

31 Blalock, , Toward a Theory of Minority Group Reations, p. 127Google Scholar.

32 See Harsanyi, John C., “Measurement of Social Power, Opportunity Costs, and the Theory of Twoperson Bargaining Games”, Behavioral Science, 7 (Jan., 1962), 67–80CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed; and also Baldwin, A., “The Costs of Power”, Journal of Conflict Resolution, 15 (June 1972), 145–155CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

33 Atkinson, p. 242, assumes utility or value of achieving the goal to be a multiplicative function of an actor's motivation (need) to achieve the goal and of incentives (objective rewards or punishments associated with the goal). The costs associated with reaching the goal should be deducted from its objective incentive value to find the “net” value of reaching the goal. Utility is thus here regraded as “net” utility derived from different types of outcomes as, for example, costs of reaching the goal and improved exchange rates.

34 To the extent that power resources overlap with investments, this assumption is a parallel to the “rule of distributive justice” proposed by Homans, Social Behavior: Its Elementary Forms, chap. 12, but has different implications.

35 See Gurr, aWhy Men Rebel, chap. 4.

36 Ibid., pp. 234 and 277.

37 The prediction of some degree of decrease in the probability of manifest conflict around the point of parity in power resources derives from an assumption that changes in the difference in power resources have somewhat different effects on the probability of initiation or attack and on the probability of retaliation or defense in a conflict situation. This aspect of the power balance model of conflict is not of immediate significance for the present discussion and is developed in another paper by the present author, Korpi, Walter, “Conflict and the Balance of Power”, Acta Sociologica, 17, No. 2 (1974), 99–114CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

38 Gurr, pp. 46–58. More complex varieties of these basic patterns are discussed by Feierabend, Feierabend and Nesvold in “Social Change and Political Violence: Cross-National Patterns.”

39 A very high utility can of course sometimes offset the effects of decreasing expectancy of success. Utility, being a multiplicative function of motivation and incentives (Atkinson, , An Introduction to Motivation, p. 242Google Scholar), can be very high in situations which are of vital concern for the actor and where incentives thus are exceedingly high. For example, where extermination is threatened, mobilization can be expected in spite of very low prospects for success.

40 Davies, “Toward a Theory of Revolution.”

41 Improvements in the social and economic conditions of the lower strata in the society can occur also when the going rates of exchange remain stable if the total surplus in the society increases. The improvements achieved by the lower strata in the industrial societies during the last hundred years is presumably an effect of improved exchange rates as well as of increasing surplus.

42 Gurr, , Why Men Rebel, p. 320Google Scholar.

43 The magnitude of political violence is also assumed to be affected by legitimacy, coercive potential and social-structural facilitation (Gurr, chaps. 6–9).

44 Ibid., chap. 8.

45 Snyder, and Tilly, , “Hardship and Collective Violence in France, 1830 to 1969,” p. 527Google Scholar, and Tilly, “Does Modernization Breed Revolution?”, p. 437Google Scholar.

46 Tilly, pp. 438–439.

47 Ibid., p. 438.

48 See Snyder and Tilly: also Lodhi and Tilly, “Urbanization and Crime in 19th-century France.”

49 The original findings in Phillips, A. W., “The Relation between Unemployment and the Rate of Change of Money Wage Rates in the United Kingdom, 1861–1957,” Economica, 25 (November, 1958), 283–299Google Scholar, have since been replicated in many studies. See, for example, Jacobsson, Lars and Lindbeck, Assar, “Labor Market Conditions and Inflation—Swedish Experiences 1955–67,” The Swedish Journal of Economics, 81, No. 2 (1969), 64–103CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

50 See Knowles, K. G. J. C., Strikes—A Study in Industrial Conflict (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1952), 143–150Google Scholar; Rees, Albert, “Industrial Conflict and Business Fluctuations,” Journal of Political Economy, 60 (October, 1952), 371–382CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Korpi, Walter, Vilda Strejker inom Metall- och Verkstadsindustrin [Wild-cat Strikes in the Metal Working Industry], (Stockholm: Department of Sociology, University of Stockholm, 1968)Google Scholar; Hibbs, Douglas A. Jr.,, “Industrial Conflict in Advanced Industrial Societies” (Cambridge, Mass.: Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 1973. Mimeo.)Google Scholar; O'Brien, F. Stephen, “Industrial Conflict and Business Fluctuations: A Comment,” Journal of Political Economy, 73 (December, 1965), 650–654CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

51 Rees, “Industrial Conflict and Business Fluctuations.”

52 O'Brien, “Industrial Conflict and Business Fluctuations: A Comment.”

53 Rees; O'Brien.

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