Conflicts are inevitable in any human relationship. They are omnipresent and part of everyday life. We live in a society where the temptation to conflict and the desire for peace are closely related. Since conflict is natural and there is hardly any such thing as a life without conflict, it is crucial to be conscious of conflict in everyday life.

Who among us hasn’t experienced conflict in our communities? We are far from a paradisiacal state of absolute peace. From my experience, the theme of conflict easily provokes a feeling of malaise. It brings us back to the day-to-day realities that we experience. Ignoring conflicts, not wanting to see them, not talking about them, ignoring them or rushing back to a state of apparent tranquillity without managing them constructively are attitudes and habits that we observe, particularly in our religious circles.

Peace is the desire of every member of any community or society. Regrettably, conflict is part of social dynamics, part of any progress and of any human development. Conflict brings crisis. Crisis is a “wake-up call” to tend to neglected issues which are essential for a healthy life together.

With the multiplicity of values proposed for our society today, it is no longer easy to define education. With the current tendency to relativise everything, how can we determine the appropriate education or distinguish between right and wrong? In this article, concerning the values and practices of the Senoufo people of yesteryear, we propose endogenous values and mechanisms as a possible way of inculcating a culture of peace.