From Frustration-Aggression to Peace: Advancing Stakeholder Engagement Through Communicative Action in Post-Conflict Niger Delta, Nigeria

Based on Habermas’ communicative action model, the purpose of this paper is to explore the effectiveness and possibility of engaging stakeholders (the multinationals and community people) in the Niger delta via Peaceful Stakeholder Engagement Strategy (PSES) framework for socially responsible business and inclusive engagement. As this paper maintains, the insights generated from engaging stakeholders via PSES will be useful in managing corporate-stakeholder relation and to deflect frustration-aggression hypothesis in the region particularly in the wake of the amnesty deal (post-conflict era) for lasting peace. Given that Habermas’ communicative action suggests that the engagement process should be fair (normative) by representing complete range of relevant stakeholders and equalising power between participants, including being ‘competent’ (resulting in settled claims), the PSES framework is modelled on this. Thus, this paper utilises the PSES framework to test the validity of engagement procedures, which stakeholders (the multinationals and community people) use in their engagement for better corporate-community engagement. It is hoped this process can addresses some of the issues that trigger frustration-aggression. PSES can be a potent instrument in consolidating peace in post-conflict Niger delta as it is premised on normative (communicative) engagement process rather than pragmatic (strategic) procedures.