Having established that the person effecting forcible entry was indeed the legal owner and resident, he was preparing to leave. There is no evidence to suggest he said anything even remotely racist or was discourteous towards the professor. Instead of being thanked by a grateful resident that the police were on the job and alert to burglary, he was shouted at and unjustly abused.

Gates had just returned home from a long overseas trip, only to find his front door jammed. Annoyed and irritable, he entered through a back door and asked the driver to help him force the front door open. Presumably, all he wanted to do was rest and recuperate. Instead, he was accosted by a police officer demanding proof of identity. He was entitled to feel aggrieved at having to bow to white authority in his own home.

Fourth, it is possible for both parties, good and honourable people, to be wrong. Gates was wrong to hurl charges of racial bias at the police officer in the absence of any evidence to that effect, seeing racial slights where none exist. It turns out that the sergeant teaches courses against racial profiling and is well known for having performed first aid on a black athlete on a previous occasion.

Crowley was wrong to arrest Gates. Hurling verbal abuse at a police officer, so long as it does not trip over into action, is constitutionally protected freedom of speech. Courtesy is a civic virtue, not a legal duty. Disrespecting the police is not ''disorderly conduct'' and does not warrant handcuffing and arresting a citizen, complete with mug shots. There is no such crime as contempt of cop.

Gates, a senior and respected professor at the world's most prestigious university, has clout. Many victims of this particular police excess don't. This is why some are still urging Gates to sue, not as an act of personal greed or vengeance but of civic virtue, to highlight, through a high-profile case that will garner national and worldwide publicity, the daily misuse of police powers against vulnerable individuals.

Fifth, combining the last two, it is possible for any one party to be both right and wrong at the same time. This is why it is often said that the colour of truth is grey, not black and white.

Sixth, it is dangerous to ascribe patterns of behaviour to groups based on assumptions of monolithic identity. Many whites have been critical of Crowley's behaviour and acknowledge the reality of racially segregated justice in the US legal system and law enforcement practices. Several blacks have criticised Gates for having overreacted against an officer doing his duty and also faulted President Barack Obama for rushing into judgment prematurely.

Seventh, despite these individual variations, it is still possible to generalise at the group level. Proportionately, far more blacks and Hispanics than whites will have readily empathised and sympathised with Gates, for they come out of the same historical narrative and collective consciousness.

Similarly, in world politics, at a certain level of analysis, it is possible to argue that in general, developing countries are more suspicious of claims to a right of humanitarian intervention, more interested in justice among rather than within nations, more concerned about the root causes of terrorism such as poverty, illiteracy and territorial grievances, more interested in economic development than worried about nuclear proliferation, and more committed to the defence of national sovereignty than the promotion of human rights, than the industrialised Western countries.

The fact that there are individual differences within developing countries and among Westerners neither negates nor invalidates the generalisation.

To the extent that developing country viewpoints rarely get an airing, let alone a respectful hearing, in Western mainstream media, Western publics and governments typically have a seriously distorted understanding of many international issues.

The other lessons are relevant to international politics too. It is possible to outline two different models of conflict resolution. One model assumes that in a conflict between two parties, one side is completely right and the other totally wrong, the proper course of action is to sift the evidence and determine accordingly, and there can be no compromise of principles as it amounts to a refusal to stand up for the courage of one's convictions and impose an artificial moral equivalence between the two sides.

The alternative model acknowledges elements of right and wrong on both sides, recognises that both sides have to live with each other even after the dispute is resolved, sees mutual accommodation as a virtue and the only way forward, acknowledges the importance of saving face and achieving reconciliation, and therefore looks for creative solutions that do not necessarily establish guilt of one party and offer concessions and partial solutions to both sides.

We instinctively tend towards the second model of conflict resolution with respect to disputes among others, while falling into the trap of the first, conflict perpetuation model when our own country is involved.

Alas, inviting the two sides to share a beer of a lazy afternoon on the lawns of the White House is not a realistic option for resolving international disputes.

Ramesh Thakur is director of the Balsillie School of International Affairs and a distinguished fellow at the Centre for International Governance Innovation in Waterloo, Ontario.