Peace Education

Conflict is a natural part of human existence. Peace is the outcome of an agreeable resolution to conflict, and peace education is the process of learning about peace. The purpose of peace education is for people to gain knowledge, skills, dispositions, and values that will allow peaceful [Page 689]resolution of conflict. Never in the history of the human race has there been a more critical need for peace education than exists in the modern globalized world. Those focused on reform understand that the school curriculum necessarily must focus on issues of fairness and multiculturalism as a way of mitigating the injustice that so often results in acts of violence.

Violent acts and threats of violence have always existed, but the potential for total annihilation due to weapons of mass destruction, biowarfare, and terrorism make peace education a priority for all who are seriously focused on questions of educational reform. Personal acts of violence in our homes and neighborhoods prioritize safety as a major concern for our children within the school environment. Peace education is not a 21st-century innovation, but it is increasingly addressed by those who care deeply about the political and social well-being for future generations.

The advent of peace education coincides with the advent of civilization and war sanctioning the violence as a means of solving problems. Individuals have historically relied on each other for survival, which has spawned cultural values of competitiveness, dominance, and self-centeredness. Such values laid the foundation for social injustices evident in the modern world. It was at the turn of the 20th century, through the efforts of Alfred Nobel (1833–1896), capitalizing on the international movement against war, that the world began to recognize those who truly contributed to the advancement of a peaceful society. Even so, it is in the past 100 years that society has experienced the greatest devastation from warring countries and the perpetuation of violence that permeates all levels of society. One hundred years of an international antiwar movement could not stop the invasion of social injustices and extreme violence into our schools and into American culture. The escalating violence witnessed by children in schools throughout the United States at the end of the 20th century has initiated a sense of urgency for peace education. The call for social change through peace education has never been more critical than it is today, with educators seeking reform relative to sex bias and gender stereotyping, the type of programming permitted on television, and the ways in which the media deal with conflict and conflict resolution.

Recent and current world leaders such as Mohandas K. (Mahatma) Gandhi (1869–1948), Mother Teresa (1910–1997), Nelson Mandela (1918-), and the Fourteenth Dalai Lama (1935-) spent or are spending much of their lives advocating nonviolence and peace building. Addressing poverty, racism, and other forms of social injustice, they endeavored to facilitate social change through peace. Their concern for the well-being of all serves as the foundational model for others to follow. Peace education has evolved to encompass a much broader perspective to include global education, human rights education, and conflict resolution as a means of violence prevention. In the United States, political leaders such as Martin Luther King, Jr., building on the ideas of Gandhi and others, have articulated the different ways in which American society can more fully embrace issues of justice.

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