Conflict

Abstract

The category of conflict has been, in the West, the object of theoretical formulation and at the same time the central
core of social research since the 19th century. Thus, in the lengthy cycle opened by the material transformations
dragged by the industrial revolution, the question about conflict constituted part of the management of the effects
of the association among that process and the social change derived from it. The transformations of social relations
from those made in the production system, operated by nascent capitalism and, from the values that guide human
behavior, promoted conflicts between social groups whose interest is recognized as opposed in relation to the
idea of society, work, authority, order. The text that follows presents a conceptual guide to address the question
of conflict, taking up the contributions of the main theoretical perspectives that have dealt with it and emphasizing
its constitutive nature of the political.