Abstract. The article reviews the present state of analysis of social-cultural integration as a tool for regional conflict resolution in foreign and Russian literature. The modern theory of conflict resolution focuses on the potential of social-cultural integration to transform destructive identity-based conflicts into conflicts of interest. The author considers the structural factors of the identity-based conflicts and emphasizes destabilizing role of the politicization of ethnicity. Among the systemic conditions of the escalation of regional conflicts covered in research literature, the author identifies social inequalities, economic polarization, contradiction between the system modernization and social disintegration.