In this article, I move away from the rather active and bloodier conflicts to which there exists significant academic literature to the rarely researched, less bloody and latent communal violence. Based on archival documents and in-depth semistructured interviews conducted in Ghana with analysis of transcript following a thematic approach, I examine from the perspective of the Nkonyas, the intractability of the Nkonya-Alavanyo conflict in Ghana, which, despite many attempts at resolution, persists for almost a century. The findings suggest that, in the view of the Nkonyas, the conflict remains insoluble due to (1) the nonexecution of the various courts' judgments in their favour, (2) the lack of punitive measures against violators of the law, (3) the nature of the conflict resolution mechanisms practised, (4) greed of the Alavanyos and ( 5) the political undertones that underpin the conflict. Public Significance StatementWith such understanding of the conflict, I bring to fore, the reasons behind the insolubility of the Nkonya-Alavanyo conflict from the standpoint of disputants which is hugely unexplored not just in the communal violence in Africa in general but also, in Peace and Conflict studies. Secondly, I use this article to emphasise the need for re-thinking and rejuvenation in the discussions around the transformation and resolution of this conflict considering the findings. Thirdly, I draw attention to the quantitative imbalance on communal violence literature relative to latent and less bloody forms of conflict. Finally, I present this article as a reference point for further studies that will lead to a deeper deconstruction of not only the Nkonya-Alavanyo conflict but also similar communal conflicts in Africa and their ultimate resolutions.

In this article, we suggest rethinking the conflict resolution agenda among seemingly latent intractable communal conflicts by moving toward a constructive transformation of these conflicts. We connect Coser's theorization on social conflict and Lederach's conflict transformational ideas to, first, offer an alternative way of reconceptualizing conflict in ways that focus on harnessing the inherent potentialities of conflicts while changing the negative relational patterns among disputants; second, we propose emancipation from the local turn in peacebuilding to a local-local turn that will create a sense of local ownership, legitimize the process and increase the likelihood of acceptable and durable outcomes. To substantialize our argument, we present phenomenologically generated evidence from the Nkonya–Alavanyo conflict, which persists for over a century despite several attempts at its resolution. The conflict revolves around two truths derived from two maps and two tales and is overshadowed by mutual accusations and historically conditioned distrust of mediators.

No abstract