Conflicts in Nigerian Politics: Diagnosis and marketing Prescriptions

Abstract

Politics is simply the art and science of governance, (Horby, 1974). This art or science of governance is often conducted via political parties which compete among themselves for power in a democratic system. Conflict, on the other hand, is disagreement arising from variations of social and cultural identities among such people existing together in a defined setting. Such a setting, in our case- the Nigerian political space, creates challenges and opportunities. Thus, managing conflict in our political life means understanding its nature and effects to enable political actors to implement behaviours and policies that respond to them in an effective way. The focus of this paper, therefore, is to interrogate the subject of political conflict in Nigeria from etymological and theoretical perspectives with a view to providing solutions based on political marketing paradigms.