Sociology describes the way that groups interact and develop towards violence. A book written in 1953 by Sherif and Carolyn Muzafer describes the way that groups, originally friendly, grow towards hostility. Psychologists look at the aggression and violence which breaks out both in the criminal individual and the person who never gets into criminal activity. Literature describes violence and conflict at the heart of the human condition. Christian theology has long sought to emulate Jesus in his reaction to violence and injustice.
Philosophy examines the structure and meaning and ethics of violence.
Economics zeroes in on the role of poverty and markets and unequal distribution in conflict, while political science describes political structures which arise to deal with conflict and to control it. But more and more, our world and indeed each one of us have felt the need of understanding how to resolve conflict in ways that the world has left largely unexplored. We have, especially in the U.S., found ourselves resorting to violence as a way of eliminating criminal activity. But criminal activity goes on. We have sought to make war on everything from poverty to drugs, from sexism and racism to Grenada and Guatemala, from Panama and Nicaragua to Iraq and Somalia.