Since the 1980s some theorists of international relations, though certainly not all, have been interested in the role played by language and discourse. There is something intuitively plausible both in the notion that violent conflictis linked with dysfunctions of human communication and in the notion that communicative strategies are equally involved in the repair of conflict. How, to what degree, and with what, if any, causal force are language, communication and discourse bound up with conflict and conflict resolution? Answers are a matter of empirical investigation. However, it is necessary first to clarify the confusion surrounding the terms relating to language. This paper reviews the distinctions between 'language' (the universal human capacity), 'a language' (in the modern state system, a product of political, often nationalist forces), 'communication' (the modalities of linguistic interaction) and 'discourse' (recurrent, often ideological forms of communication). It is useful to view all these categories in terms of both cognitive and interactive dimensions. This distinction makes it possible, on the one hand, to focus on the issue of who talks to whom (or who is permitted to talk to whom), and, on the other hand, the practices in such communication that contribute to or impede conflict or its resolution.
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