essay on world peace and education

What is peace education exactly and why do we need it?

When I started my peace education journey, I barely knew what this syntagma meant. I was very versed and knowledgeable about the education part and the nuances of teaching, but the peace part, and especially the combination of peace and education was quite new to me. So, I was learning while working and immersing myself into peacebuilding in my postwar, still very conflicted country of Bosnia & Herzegovina.

In the process I discovered something called facilitation and being a facilitator, being someone who eases the process of learning and who facilitates learning space, instead of “instilling the knowledge into the heads of my participants”. I grew up and I was educated in a very traditional teacher-oriented system, where the teachers are the sole authority who possess all the knowledge. Of course there were some quite bright, but rare examples of the teachers and professors who were actually facilitators, who were leading us through the process of learning and working “out of the box”.

Over time peace education became my passion, and I even enrolled in another MA (Interreligious Studies and Peacebuilding) to enhance my knowledge on the peace and interfaith part of this equation. Now that I have more than 7 years of experience in my head, heart and hands I cannot but notice that peace education is still a very contested notion. Many things are being put under this umbrella term, people who work in the field are not always taken seriously as they should be, peace in general is taken for granted and all the efforts of countless people who work in the field are not emphasized and appreciated enough.

This article aims to bring a bit more clarity to this term, through a small desk research on the existing bibliography on peace education. Also, as someone who has been working for 7 years in the peace education sector, I want us to be clear that we know what we are talking about when we say that we are peace educators, since this discipline deserves more attention and much more credibility than it has been given to it. Let us begin with how and when peace education efforts started and later on we will focus on a description of peace education and contents of it, which will help us to understand branches of this type of education.

The term peace education can be traced back to the 17th century and Czech educator (pedagogue) named Jan Amos Komenský (Comenius), but the term and movement of peace education got its prominence and flourished with famous Italian educator Maria Montessori at the beginning of the 20th century. It is worth mentioning that way before the two of them, forms of peace education existed within different communities. According to Harris (2008) peace education has been practiced informally by generations of humans who wanted to resolve conflicts in ways that do not use deadly force. Indigenous peoples have conflict resolution traditions that have been passed down through millennia that help promote peace within their communities. Also, we should not forget to mention religious teachings that promote peace and uphold the peace education efforts for thousands of years. Religious and spiritual figures such as Buddha, Jesus Christ, Muhammad, Moses, Lao Tse or Baha’u’llah are often considered peace educators. Even though we should be aware that many religious teachings have been instrumentalized for the opposite as well, for wars and violence.

While reading different articles on peace education, I found the way that Kester (2010) describes peace education to be very clear and encompassing. He stresses that “in practice, peace education is problem-posing education that attempts to build in every person the universal values and behaviors on which a culture of peace is predicated, including the development of non-violent conflict resolution skills and a commitment to working together to realize a shared and preferred future”. He also adds that “peace education includes the cultivation of peacebuilding skills (e.g., dialogue, mediation, artistic endeavors). Peace educators, then, teach the values of respect, understanding, and nonviolence, present skills for analyzing international conflict, educate for alternative security systems, and use a pedagogy that is democratic and participatory. Thus, peace education as a practice and philosophy refers to matching complementary elements between education and society, where the social purposes (i.e., why teach), content (i.e., what to teach), and pedagogy (i.e., how to teach) of the educative process are conducive to fostering peace” (Kester, 2010: 2).

To help us better understand peace education (PE) it is useful to mention 5 principles of this education. According to Harris (2004) these 5 principles are the following:

PE explains the roots of violence
PE teaches alternatives to violence
PE adjusts to cover different forms of violence
Peace itself is a process that varies according to context
Conflict is omnipresent

Now that we know what peace education is about, we could ask ourselves about the content and branches. Different authors propose diverse approaches to this question, but here I would like to emphasize the one from Ian Harris (2004) and Navarro-Castro and Nario-Galace (2010). Harris divides peace education into 5 categories: international education, development education, environmental education, human rights education, and conflict resolution education. On the other side Navarro-Castro and Nario-Galace propose a 10-fold model that besides the above mentioned 5 categories includes: disarmament education, global education, multicultural education, interfaith education, and gender-fair/non-sexist education.

To make peace education closer to us, I also would like to mention two models of peace education: Learning to Abolish War Model (Reardon and Cabezudo 2002)and Flower-Petal Model of Peace Education (Toh 2004).

As already noted, we need to be aware that it’s not just what we teach, but how we teach as well, i.e., how we facilitate the process of learning. It’s hard to imagine peace education programs and values, implemented through traditional authoritarian models of education that most of us grew up with. How can we practice nonviolent methods of resolving conflicts, when we impose on learners our own way of thinking, when we ask them to learn things through rote learning, instead using meaningful or active learning through which they can develop critical thinking skills.

Ian Harris (1988) , one of the leading authors in the field of peace education, stresses a holistic approach to peace education that could apply to community education, elementary and secondary schools, as well as college classrooms. According to him, peaceful pedagogy must be integral to any attempt to teach about peace and key ingredients of such pedagogy are cooperative learning, democratic community, moral sensitivity, and critical thinking. Duckworth (2008) emphasizes that for peace education to be effective, the methods teachers and administrators use must be consistent with the values purportedly being taught to students. They must be modeled as well. The implicit curriculum must harmonize with the explicit curriculum.

In the words of Kester (2010) “an education for peace program, thus, pedagogically emphasizes values (tolerance, respect, equality, empathy, compassion), capacities (cultural proficiency, sensitivity), skills (nonviolent communication, active listening, competence in a foreign language, gender-inclusive language), and knowledge (of history and cultures, peace movements) for peace. The pedagogy includes cooperative learning activities, gender perspectives, creative reflection and journaling, theatre games, role-plays, empathy-building activities, and alternative futures exercises” (Kester, 2010: 5).

One very important thing we need to mention and know about peace education, is that this education depends on the context. Peace educators around the world practice different approaches and different types of peace education depending on what is a burning issue in their communities. For example, somewhere conflict resolution education is more needed than global education or environmental education, due to ongoing religious, ethnic, or national hostilities. This doesn’t mean that other types of peace education are not important or needed, but one type is more urgent than the other. And of course, the content facilitated, relies heavily on the context.

Now that we know all this about peace education, we can ask a question where to teach peace education and in which manner. Should it be in formal or non-formal contexts, should it be taught as a single subject, or should it be holistic and transdisciplinary? I think a very good answer could be found in the Declaration and Integrated Framework of Education for Peace, Human Rights and Democracy (1995) which suggests that education for peace must be trans-disciplinary and included in all learning spaces. It should not be limited to a single classroom or subject. The institution or space in which education for peace operates should be in harmony with the goals and lessons of peace education and peace education should be integrated into all learning spaces.

And last but not the least, comes the question, why do we need peace education?

Like many other things, I believe that education can be used for both: as a space for nurturing and developing cultures of peace or cultures of war. This solely depends on us, i.e., if we want to see our youth militarized, afraid of the other ethnic and religious groups, afraid of their neighbors, ready to obey and listen to calls for violence in order to protect their land, culture, religion etc. (for the gains of the elites who profit from the war) or if we want our youth to think critically, know their neighbors, be culturally sensitive, ready to speak to and understand those who belong to other groups, who are often portrayed as enemies. It also depends on us if we will employ education as a way to protect our environment or if we will teach our children to exploit the planet and its resources for their own gain (including waging wars that could destroy our habitat). The future is blurry and unknown, but it is up to all of us to shape it and give our best to actually leave a planet where our children and grandchildren can live (in peace).

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What you need to know about UNESCO’s Recommendation on Education for Peace, Human Rights and Sustainable Development

What is the Recommendation about?

The Recommendation on Education for Peace, Human Rights and Sustainable Development is a non-binding guidance document that focuses on how teaching and learning should evolve in the 21 st century to bring about lasting peace, reaffirm human rights and promote sustainable development in the face of contemporary threats and challenges.

It acknowledges that education in all its forms and dimensions, in and out of schools, shapes how we see the world and treat others, and it can, and should, be a pathway to constructing lasting peace. The Recommendation logically links different thematic areas and issues, from digital technologies and climate change to gender issues and fundamental freedoms. It indicates that positive transformations are needed in all these domains because education cuts across all of them, being both impacted by all these factors and influencing them. To realize these ambitions, this text outlines what exactly needs to change in approaches to education and how.

The newly adopted text updates the " 1974 " Recommendation that almost 50 years ago united Member States in positioning education as a key driver of peace and international understanding. For the past two years, UNESCO has been revising this visionary tool.

What is unique about the Recommendation?

It outlines 14 guiding principles, concrete learning outcomes and priority action areas for holistically reshaping all aspects of education systems, from laws and policies to curricula development, teaching practices, learning environments and assessment. For example, it highlights that beyond critical literacy and numeracy skills, learners should acquire competencies like empathy, critical thinking, intercultural understanding and environmental stewardship.

It covers educational activities in all settings and at all levels, and throughout life , connecting the dots between areas that have not been previously considered together. For example, the nexus between learners' physical and mental health and their ability to access and attain education, the impact of climate change on the education system, as well as knowledge gained outside the classroom.

It applies to all education stakeholders – from policy-makers and teachers to informal educators and tradition-bearers – as a baseline to transform their policies, practices and approaches to build empathetic and inclusive learners. For example, using this document, teachers can see how to adapt their lesson plans to integrate specific topics and activities, or local community leaders can advocate for specific changes in policies and curricula.

What are the highlights of the Recommendation?

New understanding of peace

Peace in the 21st century is not just the absence of violence and conflicts. It is also a positive, participatory, and dynamic process that nurtures our ability to value human dignity and take care of ourselves, each other, and the planet we share.

Education for sustainable development

Education systems need to effectively improve their resilience to climate-driven crises and deal with their repercussions. Fostering knowledge about the root causes of climate change, its impact, and ways to adapt and mitigate while not causing further damage to the planet is needed for individuals to make informed decisions and work towards creating a more sustainable society.

Global citizenship education

The new text states that promoting the philosophy, principles, and components of global citizenship education is essential to preparing learners that value human dignity, cooperation and dialogue. This may encompass teaching and learning about the impact of past and current events and conflicts, exploring economic, social, and political linkages between countries and societies, and nurturing empathy and respect for the diversity of cultures and opinions.

Gender equality and education

Women still account for almost two-thirds of all adults unable to read, and girls often cannot fully enjoy their right to participate in, complete, and benefit from education. Promoting gender equality and acknowledging its importance for realizing the right to education for all is one of the Recommendation's guiding principles, reflecting UNESCO’s global priority.

Education in the digital era

In an age where information is abundant, diverse, and easily accessible, media and information literacy , and digital skills are tools educators and learners need to navigate the world. The Recommendation underscores the challenges of misinformation and hate speech, as well as the opportunities of new technologies for teaching and learning. It highlights the importance of critical thinking, empathy, and understanding of key principles of digital security, privacy, and ethical online interactions.

Why is the adoption of the Recommendation so timely?

There are new challenges and threats to human rights and international understanding that require new approaches to education. The legal landscape has transformed, too: over the past 50 years, the international community has developed a robust set of agreements and frameworks to promote peace and prevent violence. New research and data have also enriched the development of effective policies and monitoring of their impact.

The new Recommendation is inspired by the “ Futures of Education ” report that highlighted the need for a more relevant and forward-looking vision for teaching, learning, and innovating. It brings education with the times, considering how the world has changed and will continue to evolve in the decades to come.

How will we know the real impact of the Recommendation?

The "1974" Recommendation, predecessor of the current text, has been found to have triggered a wide range of initiatives all over the world. These initiatives include introducing new course content into curricula and teacher training, utilizing new teaching methods such as learner-centered and participatory approaches, creating new institutions, and developing exchange programs.

Member States will submit reports on implementing the new Recommendation to the UNESCO Executive Board – its governing body, every four years. This report will then be analyzed, transmitted to the General Conference, and shared with other specialized agencies. It demonstrates their commitment to international solidarity and helps monitor their progress towards Sustainable Development Goal 4, target 4.7 .

What is the next step?

Now that Member States have adopted the Recommendation on Education for Peace, Human Rights and Sustainable Development, UNESCO will support countries in translating these ideas into action at the local, national, and international levels.

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The International Day of Peace – a day devoted to strengthening the ideals of peace, both within and among all nations and peoples – is observed around the world on 21 September. The theme for 2017 is “Together for Peace: Respect, Safety and Dignity for All.” Education is a core element of peace.

As the former UN Secretary General said: “Education is, quite simply, peace-building by another name."

Nowadays, violent conflicts pose the greatest development challenges in the world. Children and education systems are often on the front line of these violent conflicts. The rise in violent extremism and radicalization represent a significant threat to all of us. Members of radical groups adopt increasingly extreme political, economic, social, cultural, and religious ideologies and use undemocratic and violent means to achieve their objectives. African countries also face the challenge of objectively addressing deeply rooted structural causes of conflicts emanating from historical injustices, marginalization and corruption.

Can education rise to the challenge?

Education imparts knowledge, skills, values and attitudes that are important for the social, economic and political development for any country. This role is well articulated in Sustainable Development Goal 4 (SDG 4), which seeks to ensure inclusive and equitable quality education for all and promote lifelong learning.

Moreover, the objective of SDG 4.7 is to ensure that all learners acquire the knowledge and skills needed to promote sustainable development, including, among others, through education for sustainable development and sustainable lifestyles, human rights, gender equality, promotion of a culture of peace and non-violence, global citizenship and appreciation of cultural diversity and of culture’s contribution to sustainable development.

Education: a double-edged sword

While education is central to peacebuilding it is important to note that it has two facets. There is evidence to the view that when equitably available, of good quality, relevant and conflict sensitive, education can help promote peace and provide safe environments. On the other hand, when its delivery is characterized with exclusion and inequity, it can exacerbate conflict. It is for this reason that deliberate effort need to be made to put in place necessary policies and strategies to maximize the positive effects of education on peace.

The Continental Education Strategy for Africa (CESA 2016 - 2025) has embraced a paradigm shift in the policies and planning of education so as to adopt “the new approaches” desirable for promoting peace in the continent.

Education has to be sensitive to context, including conflict and disaster, and has to pay attention to disparities, including equity.

What kind of education can respond to this challenge?

One of the key interventions in promoting peace through education is development of conflict-sensitive education policies and plans. This entails conducting conflict analysis on education systems, structures and delivery to identify the drivers of conflict and violence, and the dynamics therein leading to development of concrete and realistic intervention that leverage on the capacity for peace through education.

There should be a paradigm shift towards programs that encourage maximum realization of an individual’s potential and optimal development of human capital.

Unless young people’s skills are developed for work, they will be ultimately excluded from active participation in their societies.

Current shifts in the continent that enhance peace and global citizenship include adopting curriculum models that provide for flexible pathways to develop all learners’ abilities and talents; improve efficiency in provision of education and reduce wastage at all levels.

There is need to shift from content-based to competency-based, from more summative assessments and less formative assessments. There is also need to shift focus from content-based teaching and learning resources to activity-based, interactive workbooks.

It is imperative to adopt transformative pedagogy, such as dialogic, active and inquiry-based learning and engaged learning based on context and learners’ interests. The learner is at the center of the learning process where he/she is able to explore, dialogue, discover new knowledge, reflect and is spurred into action.

The curriculum and education services should be designed in such a way that they are culturally and economically relevant to local contexts, with a special focus on minorities, nomadic and other mobile communities, while at the same time developing alternative education opportunities for marginalized and at-risk adolescents and youth.

Lack of capacity in the ministries of education to translate the policies and commitments into actions and form desirable partnerships at the national and school level.
Inadequate investment in education to match the demands of the 21 st century.
Teachers’ lack of capacity to deliver education using transformative pedagogy.
Inadequate, poorly paid and unmotivated teaching force.

Call to action

We call on African governments to:

Review and enhance education curriculum to ensure that it is sensitive to context, including conflict and disaster, and pays attention to disparities, including equity.
Develop conflict-sensitive education policies and adapt pedagogy.
Address issues related to structural violence, marginalization, and social exclusion.

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Bonjour. Ancien Ministre de l’Education nationale en période de transition dans mon pays, la Centrafrique, je félicite ce rapport. Il relève très justement les problèmes qui paralysent notre système éducatif. J’ai porté le plaidoyer pour mon pays la Centrafrique en 2014 à la conférence du Partenariat Mondial pour l’Education en Belgique . Et mes propos se résument ainsi : notre crise politique est d’abord une crise de l’éducation.

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Peace education

Peace education promotes the knowledge, skills and attitudes to help people prevent conflict occurring, resolve conflicts peacefully, or create conditions for peace.

Peace education activities promote the knowledge, skills and attitudes that will help people either to prevent the occurrence of conflict, resolve conflicts peacefully, or create social conditions conducive to peace.

Core values of nonviolence and social justice are central to peace education. Nonviolence is manifested through values such as respect for human rights, freedom and trust. Social justice is realised by principles of equality, responsibility, and solidarity.

In order to achieve these ideals, peace education programmes across the world address a wide range of themes. These include nonviolence, conflict resolution techniques, democracy, disarmament, gender equality, human rights, environmental responsibility, history, communication skills, coexistence, and international understanding and tolerance of diversity.

Peace education can be delivered to people of all ages, in both formal and informal settings. Programmes exist at local, national, and international levels, and in times of peace, conflict, and post-conflict.

To create public dialogue different factions of society are often brought together in peace education programmes – these typically include civil society groups, schools, tribal leaders and the media. Yet due to the many areas covered by peace education, initiatives are primarily determined by culture and context, as well as by the projects’ scopes and objectives.

Peace education and peacebuilding are therefore intrinsically linked. The UN’s actions for peacebuilding include education as one of its principle components. For peacebuilding initiatives to remain sustainable it is vital that attitudes towards war and violence are transformed and translated into long-term behavioural change which seek alternative solutions to armed conflict.

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Reflections on Peace Education

Alicia Cabezudo International Association of Educators for Peace

Education for peace and respect for human rights is particularly important in this period, if we compare the values this education promotes with the daily violence, the horrors of war and the gradual destruction of values such as solidarity, cooperation and respect for others: all of them problems that assault us every day.

Indiscriminate persecution, massacres and ethnic cleansing are difficult to explain when our shocked and surprised students ask us about them; perhaps they are even incomprehensible in the context of education. It is harder still to clarify these processes when the possible solution for acts such as these is, in fact, the continued bombing of cities and of a desperate civilian population.

We also come across extreme everyday situations when we analyse the inequality and injustice of our socio-economic surroundings and the brutal violence of our “ideal” modern societies… in which it is the state itself that attacks the population, where individualism and self interest are promoted and where whatever is considered “different” becomes “dangerous”. These are all wars, of a different type, but with the same ingredients of injustice, violence and destruction.

Here the responses of educators become drained of content and their explanations no longer work. The practice of building knowledge through research, reading, the analysis of information, interviews, genesis of conflicts, systematisation of what has been learnt, the development of critical thinking, etc, should lead us to rethink the educational model applied until now. This model is perhaps slightly naive, despite its apparent progressive pedagogical nature, and it is one with which educators ourselves have come to be unhappy.

I believe that Peace Education, although considered a transversal element in many educational curriculum models around the world, has in fact been conceived as a secondary matter. Something necessary but accidental, important but not essential, present but “absent”. A view of the curriculum which dignifies it without modifying it, without designing new alternatives for a humanitarian, ethical, civic education — something increasingly necessary in the world we live in.

Because Peace Education means developing a critical, serious and profound approach to the current situation of which we form a part and the historical epoch in which we find ourselves, an undeniable reality that does not always appear in the plans of the Ministries, of educational institutions nor of many principals and teachers.

Peace Education has been conceived as a secondary matter; something necessary but accidental, important but not essential, present but “absent”

“Peace is not defined only by the absence of war and conflict, it is also a dynamic concept that needs to be grasped in positive terms, such as the presence of social justice and harmony, the possibility for human beings to fully realise their potential and respect for their right to live with dignity throughout their lives. Sustainable human development is not possible without peace. And without just, equitable, ongoing planning, peace cannot be maintained.” 1

These concepts, particularly relevant in the context of the analysis we are currently trying to develop, should influence all imaginable pedagogical proposals for Peace Education, giving it a multidimensional character, able to reach into different areas.

We are witnessing today a reworking of our models and our vocabularies and we understand that there are major changes in the concept of peace, above all as it relates to the opposite term, “war”. This conceptual modification should be integrated, along with the methodology for teaching it, into the learning of teachers and students.

Indeed, after many years the idea of peace has evolved and a broader and more complex understanding of it now relates it to the concepts of fairness, justice, respect for human rights, the rights of peoples and tolerance. Alongside this process, teaching practices in Peace Education have also been modified, taking on a clear commitment to the principles of democratic participation along with the implementation of educational activities which include issues of nonviolence and conflict transformation by peaceful means, with a view to building a more compassionate, juster and fairer society.

Peace, as an individual, social, national and international value must be analysed in depth from an interdisciplinary and multidimensional perspective

Armed conflicts in other parts of the world now make us more open to a cognitive, systematic and up to date treatment of the miseries and cruelties of war and also to the analysis of its terrible consequences, using the multiple resources that the media allow us, bringing it closer to us. Peace, as an individual, social, national and international value must be tested and analysed in depth from an interdisciplinary and multidimensional perspective.

The geographical and historical treatment of the subject is necessary but not sufficient. Concepts and issues such as nationalism, sovereignty and the state; the role of the UN in the world of today; the reality of different ethnicities and their complicated coexistence; intercultural dialogue; solutions and disagreements within conflicts; the situation of refugees and their terrible defencelessness before the attacks of “friends” and enemies; crime related to drugs and prostitution; the dangers of nuclear war; the arms race and the arms trade as a profitable global business are urgent and important issues.

All of these issues desperately need to be the subject of reflection, debate, research and criticism by both teachers and students in an ongoing exercise of deepening knowledge, developed both individually and collectively on the basis of obtaining information from many sources, promoting the exchange of different opinions, developing critical judgment and the respect for diversity 2 .

But even this is not enough if we isolate the international problems that distress us so much from the everyday “wars” of the society in which we live. Marginalisation, social exclusion, violence and persecution are not things that we can only find in news reports about Mexico, Colombia, Syria, Crimea, Iran, Iraq, Pakistan, Afghanistan…

An obligatory task of education is to link direct open conflicts with those “wars” which have other features

There are other “wars” much closer to home, right next to us. Social inequality, lack of vital resources for much of the population, unemployment and poverty create hopelessness and distrust of democratically elected governments. Authoritarian mechanisms, the control of information, crimes, delinquency and impunity are part of our political life.

In this sense, war is not so far away… and not only because of the globalisation of the arms trade or the information that we receive from the transnational media. It is a daily war to survive in terrible conditions of housing and health, of education and employment, of the insufficiency of essential public services and insecurity, with basic inherent principles of human dignity being trampled on every day in many countries and continents.

It is an obligatory task of education to link these two aspects: the direct open conflicts with those “wars” which have other features but are no less intense. Only through a comprehensive analysis of the roots of violence, its characteristics, forms and consequences can we make it possible to achieve a critical reflection, at the levels of both the individual and society, so as to generate possible changes that may lead towards a lasting peace in today’s world.

This is the great educational challenge for the coming years and for our pedagogical work in the field of Peace Education.Let us dare to face up to it.

1. Iglesias Díaz, Calo (2007). Educar pacificando: Una pedagogia de los conflictos , 1ª edición, Madrid, Fundación Cultura de Paz Editorial.

2 Bazán Campos, Domigo (2008). El oficio de pedagogo. Aportes para la construcción de una pràctica reflexiva en la escuela , Rosario, Argentina, Ed. Homo Sapiens.

Photography : United Nations Development Programme in Europe and CIS / CC BY / Desaturada. – Kids celebrate peace, friendship and tolerance on United Nations day –