Conflict in the Village, Fernanda Pirie
Pirie's fieldwork in the village of Photoksar revealed that strong moral disapproval attached to villagers who engaged in disputes, argumentation, and fights: “The phrase used to describe people who got into quarrels was usually tsokpo, a general word meaning bad or dirty but also used to signify strong disapproval” (2006:70).
Anger in itself was regarded as an undesirable character trait, as were selfishness and lack of dedication to social harmony and the welfare of the community as a whole. Conversely, emotional selfdiscipline was highly valued, even in the face of personal affronts such as marital infidelity. In this regard, Pirie's findings in Ladakh may remind us of Nader's description of the “harmony ideology” among the Zapotek, who also disfavored conflict within the community. According to Nader (1990:309), “What resulted is a peace at any price culture that is a social success, sometimes at a cost to individual Zapotec. Harmony comes at a price.” Nevertheless, disputes inevitably arose in Photoksar from time to time. Pirie describes the process through which the goba (village head) and the yulpa (meeting of village men) could become involved. As she explains, their efforts were usually directed at suppressing conflict and restoring harmony rather than adjudicating the rights and wrongs of a situation. Nevertheless, in some situations they imposed punishment on a perceived wrongdoer.When anger leads to a quarrel but the protagonists walk away or make up their differences then the incident remains merely a talking point in the village. If animosity remains active, however, it becomes a village concern. An unresolved dispute is an ongoing problem for the households involved and, ultimately, for the village as a whole. It is primarily the goba's duty to engineer a form of resolution. Whenever we discussed the role of the goba, both in Photoksar and other villages, people always also mentioned dispute resolution, very often first, among his list of duties.
The primary concern of his intervention is to restore good relations between the individuals, shakhs choches. One day, for example, one of the village women came in a state of high indignation to talk to Paljor, who was then village membar [a village official]. She had just had a quarrel with her daughter-in-law's mother, a woman from another village. Paljor listened and a few days later accompanied the goba to a meeting to resolve the problem. Choron told me that the two women had argued and thrown stones and that the meeting was to make them shake hands so that they did not throw stones any more. She also used the expression chams chug. Chug means ?to cause' and chams was explained to me in terms of the affection that family members feel for each other. A relationship of chams was to be restored between them. No-one could tell me what the quarrel had actually been about, however. That was not the point. It was the argument that was the problem and Paljor's responsibility, as village membar, was to ensure that good relations were restored.For the villagers, disputes are events of public significance and shakhs (mediation) is a conscious, deliberate process. It is a widely discussed village practice which follows a hierarchical pattern culminating in the meeting of the yulpa, the village's ultimate judicial authority. There are two phenomena here, which could be distinguished as ?differences’ and ?disputes'. The words used to describe disputes are roughly translatable as ?shouting’, ?flinging abuse’, ?arguing’, ?quarrelling’ and ?fighting’, in other words overt forms of antagonism. Their public nature means that disputes affect the whole community. Mere differences that do not result in overt antagonism, by contrast, are dealt with as practical problems. On the border between differences and disputes are those bad relations between individuals who, nevertheless, avoid an open quarrel. [...]
Differences or disputes that do not involve violence might be resolved by employing the services of a mediator, a barmi.
As already mentioned, shortly after I arrived in the village Tsewang, Paljor’s younger brother, had had an argument with his wife, Yangzes, during the course of which he had hit her. It was reported to me that she had then ?become angry’, sho yongse, and returned to Wadze, her natal home. In the days that followed there was much contact between the families. Meme Sonam, Gyaltsen and Morup from Khangltakh all went to Wadze to ask her to come back but she said that she did not want to return. Tsewang did not go and there was much shrugging of shoulders about his attitude. Maybe he did not want her back. Eventually they called in the onpo to act as mediator. According to Morup, he ?talked wisely’. At first he told Tsewang to go and bring Yangzes back but Tsewang said he did not want to do so. The onpo, therefore, consulted Yangzes who also said she did not want to return. So he suggested a divorce: one of the two children should belong to Khangltakh and the other to Wadze. Later they drew up an agreement which included the payment of half a yak from Khangltakh to Wadze. The whole issue was resolved within a month. Tsewang and Yangzes remained on bad terms but the continuation of good relations between the two households was assured by this settlement.Although the resolution of disputes is ultimately the goba's responsibility, others can, thus, act as mediators. There are no individuals who are particularly qualified to assume this role, however. It is generally older men who are asked to do so but, as with other matters of village politics, there is no status of ?village elder’, or the like. It is considered to be more important that the mediator should know the parties and, therefore, the background to the dispute. [... ]
There was a perceived need to restore good relations, chams, in all these cases and in all of them the mediation of the goba and yulpa was ultimately successful. Lingering antipathy might have remained, as it did between the father and brother and between Tsewang and Yangzes, but workable relations were restored, most importantly between their respective households.
Village life, with its networks of cooperation and assistance, could, therefore, continue as normal. Similar attitudes towards the restoration of good relations were expressed in conversations I had about disputes with informants from all over Ladakh. One striking example is reported by Kim Gutschow from Zangskar.[90] A case of rape, which had resulted in the death of the girl, was dealt with entirely internally to that village. The girl's father merely demanded and obtained, against an admittedly guilty party, a donation to the monastery and a payment for a sangs, purification ritual. Gutschow comments on the way in which the following year the father and his daughter's attacker were again working side by side in the fields without any apparent residue of animosity between them.The resolution of fights in Photoksar can involve an element of punishment by the community of the individuals involved, with the protagonists called to justify themselves before the village meeting and fines being paid to the village, ?for the fight'. When we were discussing the mediation carried out by the yulpa, for example, Paljor was quite specific about the sort of fines they would impose in different cases. In a bad case of fighting the protagonists would have to give khatags and yal and a fine of between Rs6,000 to Rs9,000, but the fine would only be around Rs 1,000 if the case was less serious. If it was just an argument then they would only have to give khatags and yal. I never encountered any cases of theft but Paljor said that if they caught a thief then the goba and membars or the yulpa would beat him. [...]
The villagers effectively preclude the expression of individual rights by concentrating on the course of the disruption and expression of anger and antagonism. What could be analysed as a clash of interests is, rather, described as a disturbance to order. This is what marks the distinction between differences (clashes of interests that require a pragmatic solution) and disputes (overt antagonism that requires reconciliation). It is the latter that disturbs the village order and requires the most immediate and deliberate remedy.
According to this epistemology, all overt antagonism is a danger to the order of the community requiring resolution and the ceremonial restoration of good relations. This is supported by the local scheme of morality according to which all such behaviour is reprehensible on the part of the individuals involved, who are labelled tsokpo.