Force Force Paul Wehr Force is a form of conflict behavior that should be used cautiously if at all. As competitive action, it moves a conflict away from cooperative resolution. It also tends to be more costly to both users and their opponents.
Force is a threatening type of social action.
One makes or promises to make someone do something against their will. Even if force is not actually used by conflict parties, the possibility that they could or will use it is present and will influence the conflict. Potential force is usually more useful for cooperative resolution than applied force. Since less harm is done, less needs to be undone later. We can think of threat as a moderate type of force.