Armed conflicts have occurred all over the world, and can be seen as social conflict between two or more parties.
This website will focus on the different theories used in social conflicts, special armed conflicts. I will use three examples, the Vietnam War, Rwandan Genocide, and the Yugoslav Wars, to illustrate the use of the theories.
I will use the term "armed conflict" rather than "war", as the term "war" sometimes is restricted by legal definition to those conflicts where one or both parties have made a formal declaration of war. Parties in a war without formal declaration have officially chosen other terms than "war". Other definitions include "state aggression by armed force", "police actions" and "crime against international peace."
I have used the book Social Conflict: Escalation, Stalemate, and Settlement by Dean G. Pruitt and Sung Hee Kim as the basis for this webpage. The authors are both social psychologists.
There are a number of other theories used in armed conflicts than the ones described here. These can be split up in the following categories.
See the other theories page for further details.