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Educating Critical Citizens
The 20th century has witnessed the most bloody and destructive wars ever known. The development of weapons of mass-destruction continues, as do conflicts between states and ethnic groups over scarce resources, racism is wide spread and there is a widening gap between rich and poor throughout the globalized economy. The need for peace education is greater than ever before, a recent international conference concluded. But how can peace education really be effective and how should complex and interwoven problems such as the above be tackled? © By Maaike Miedema
‘Education has to face up to the problem that people have a dizzying feeling of being torn between globalisation whose manifestations they can see and sometimes have to endure, and their search for roots, reference points and a sense of belonging’, writes Jacques Delors, former Chairman of the EU-Commission, in ‘Learning: The Treasure Within’. This Report to UNESCO of the International Commission on Education for the Twenty-first Century, describes the ‘painful struggle’ of the world society to be born. Education, argues the Commission, which is composed of fifteen internationally respected personalities, is ‘at the heart of both personal and community development; its mission is to enable each of us, without exception, to develop all our talents to the full and to realise our creative potential, including responsibility for our own lives and achievement of our personal aims.’
Education, the Commission stresses, is an essential instrument in the search for a better and more just world. ‘There is every reason to renew emphasis on the moral and cultural dimensions of education, enabling each person to grasp the individuality of other people and to understand the world’s erratic progression towards a certain unity; but this process must begin with self-understanding through an inner voyage whose milestones are knowledge, meditation and the practice of self-criticism.’
More and more people feel that peace-building should start ‘at home’. At a recently held preparatory conference for the Hague Appeal for Peace (‘Building a Campaign for Peace Education’, Geneva, November 1998) young people actively participating in the event stated: ‘Many felt that before taking a wider global perspective, we needed to first find peace in our homes, schools, and communities. It was agreed that themes of justice, tolerance and peace had to be woven into the education of the children of the world, as they are the future leaders of the 21st century.’
This call for a new form of education is heard from many sides. The Delors-Commission sees ‘a learning society’ and ‘learning throughout life’ as keys to the 21st century. ‘The far-reaching changes in the traditional patterns of life require of us a better understanding of people and the world at large; they demand mutual understanding, peaceful interchange and, indeed, harmony - the very things that are most lacking in our world today.’
Having adopted this position, the Commission further emphasises one of the four pillars that it describes as the foundations of education: Learning to Live Together. ‘By developing an understanding of others and their history, traditions and spiritual values and, on this basis, creating a new spirit which, guided by recognition of our growing interdependence and a common analysis of the risks and challenges of the future, would induce people to implement common projects or to manage the inevitable conflicts in an intelligent and peaceful way.’ (The other three pillars are Learning to Know, Learning to Do and Learning to Be).
Student activities during the Values and Citizens programme of the
Center for Tolerance Education in Jerusalem.
Photos Center for Tolerance Education
Utopia? Maybe. But most people would agree on the desirability of reaching this Utopia. To move in this direction, developing skills for interpersonal contacts as well as the skills that enable independent thinking are seen as indispensable instruments.
‘Teaching and learning never can be neutral’, Marigold Bentley, educational advisor to the Quakers stresses. ‘Education, through its place in any establishment, serves interests and power structures. We currently live in a world in which the system of nation states with national armies and national and regional defence systems are relied upon to keep the peace. It is this system, and the set of assumptions which underpin this system, which dominate what is taught in schools.’
For this reason, ‘critical citizenship education’ is seen by many as necessary to allow young people to develop moral and political autonomy. In order for there to be civil society, young people must understand the underpinnings of that society. ‘Critical thinking and thinking processes are at the heart of being able to understand, acknowledge and challenge what is identified as needing change’, Bentley concludes.
Professor Chetkow-Yanoov of the Israeli Bar-Ilan University (see Box) agrees. In his opinion all citizens have to be taught how to use modern conflict-resolution technologies (like mediating, emphatic listening, negotiation and bargaining) at interpersonal and inter-group levels. ‘That is why independent thinking skills have to be developed, not only to study the underpinning of the society, but also to analyze and understand their own behaviour. Because: peace begins with me.’
The Children Teaching Children programme in Israel (see case-study), one of the programmes initiated by the Jewish-Arab Center for Peace, could be seen as an example. The programme tries to establish a permanent dialogue between pupils of Jewish and of Palestinian descent. Over 50,000 children, young people and adults from Israel and abroad come to the Center each year to actively participate in seminars, workshops, courses, conferences and formal and informal educational programmes.
In modern society teaching information is not enough, researcher Edward De Bono states: ‘Information is easy to teach. Information is easy to test. It is not surprising that so much of education is concerned with information. Thinking is no substitute for information but information may be a substitute for thinking.’ De Bono claims that teaching thinking skills is most essential for the modern world.
A De Bono model of teaching thinking skills has for instance been used with children by the Education Advisory Programme of Quaker Peace & Service, and has been found particularly effective in dealing with playground violence. The students learn to look at a conflict situation from different points of view, with different ‘thinking caps’. They are trained to look carefully at what they see around them, not just seeking facts and information, but also taking emotions, and new ideas seriously.
‘Active learning (process and content) must be at the heart of peace education’, Bentley argues. ‘Evidence shows that through active learning methods, the young person understands issues more thoroughly and is more likely to take action as a result of that understanding. Active learning skills include valuing oneself and one another, understanding of other values and ideas, the ability to acquire and critically analyse information. These skills are a central part of peace education.’
Early peace education before World War I came largely from the
pacifist movement. Despite calls for an international centre to
develop peace education, much of the work remained with small
project and groups.
Peace Education through the Years
After the war the movement for peace education became international
and was subsequently sponsored by the League of Nations. In 1925
a League General Assembly resolution established a committee of
experts ‘to consider the best methods of co-ordinating all official
and non-official efforts designed to familiarise young people
throughout the world with the principles and work of the League
of Nations and to train the younger generation to regard international
co-operation as the normal method of conducting world affairs.’
The same dilemma’s which face much peace-work today, concludes
educational advisor Marigold Bentley, ‘were prevalent for peace
educators in the 1920’s and 1930’s. The League of Nations, like
the United Nations today, recognises the right of self defence
and the right to go to war if deemed necessary. As a consequence,
some peace education has been rejected if it adopts a pacifistic
approach.’
So the dilemmas may have remained the same, but the focus of peace
education has always changed and shifted, says Bentley, depending
not only on current international affairs but also on the dominant
ideas of the time. Movements such as moral disarmament, pacifism,
nonviolence, international understanding, and intercultural exchange,
have all contributed to peace education.
‘The means through which peace education has been promoted has
also chopped and changed this century. Whilst the bedrock of exploration
and development of peace education has remained with small groups
of people, there have been times when large congresses, international
committees, and international legislation have been seen as paramount.
The latter seem to have been far more influenced by the dominant
political views of time.’
Over the last 25 years, much important work has been done in the
field of peace education on the international level, in a host
of different forums, concluded the participants at the conference
‘Building Campaign for Peace Education’: from the UN’s educational
organisation UNESCO’s 1974 peace education policy Recommendations,
to its 1994 Declaration on Peace, Human Rights and Democracy.
This Declaration was signed by almost all governments in the world.
‘However’, the Geneva conference’s Statement declares, ‘while
saluting the efforts of the pioneers, we are profoundly disappointed
that worthy declarations and even formal commitments have in most
countries not made a real impact on curricula, on teacher training,
on classroom practice and on resource materials.’
One of the most effective places to start peace education with young people is with themselves, because peace in itself is an abstract and difficult concept, particularly for those who have no direct experience of war. In the UK anti-bullying programmes are part of peace education. Good programmes include workshop-style interactive- or participatory-learning lessons. Young people learn how to value themselves and the people they meet and they develop their communication skills.
Bentley: ‘Through this work young people actively develop their problem-solving and thinking skills and are then equipped to take on responsibility for their own behaviour and, to a degree, the behaviour of the people around them. Long term work on these subjects is aimed at not only a short-term change of immediate behaviour, but attitude change over time.’
The anti-bullying programme is not only a good peace-keeping practice for children, teachers and parents. It also shows the problems of peace keeping in a nutshell. Bentley: ‘The difficulty in dealing with bullying is that it can stem from the autocratic nature of the school itself.’ When teachers don’t listen to their students and abuse their power to discipline them, they lose their credibility in peace-keeping programmes.
‘Needless to say, it is very difficult for any school to come to terms with institutional assumptions about the way things are done, particularly because it calls into question discipline, relationships and most of all, power structures’, says Bentley. Truly dealing with conflict from a whole school perspective may demand changes throughout the institution. If we genuinely mean we want people to relate honestly to one another, a broad transformation of our social constructs and institutions is needed.’
Effective conflict resolution relies on close cooperation with
education and healing professionals, argues Israeli professor
B. Chetkow-Yanoov. ‘When these three disciplines work together
well, we become equipped to bring about system-wide transformation.’
Dealing with Conflict Today
• When conflict resolution efforts are supplemented to therapy,
it can generate the individual and group healing which must precede
mediation between bitter enemies;
• Conflict resolution, linked with education, makes theory-derived
knowledge and skills available to various audiences;
• The linking of education and therapy enriches conflict resolution
by equipping us to deal with value as well as behavioural changes.
Skills such as buffering, mediating, arbitrating, and compassionate
listening should be in the tool kits of all involved in conflict
resolution.
All societies might well invest in formal educational services
in order to prepare youngsters or newcomers for a future of peaceful
coexistence, argues Chetkow-Yanoov. Such educational efforts might
include the following:
1. help to unlearn/outgrow childish values, attitudes, and habits
(for example: lessons at various curricular levels should teach
that human beings can advance their careers on a basis of self-awareness,
assertiveness, and actual accomplishments - not by rejecting or
downgrading others);
2. teaching values (e.g. tolerance or respect for others) and
practical ethics as part of the regular curriculum;
3. teaching children aspects of ethnic groups or cultures other
than their own;
4. teaching all citizens how to use modern conflict-resolution
technologies at inter-personal and inter-group levels;
5. making sophisticated healing and guidance services available
to all persons or groups who have been exploited or abused;
6. reinforcing school-based lessons by parallel experiences in
special summer camps, international youth seminars, organised
tours to other countries, one year studies in schools/universities
abroad, etc.;
7. updating the contents and experiences used to train student
teachers (if coexistence values and technologies are to be taught
in a wide range of school class rooms, teachers will have to be
exposed to such topics, examine their own value commitments, and
become convinced that such knowledge and involvement is indeed
‘professional’;
8. strengthen the impact of coexistence promotion at schools
by enlisting the cooperation of parents and parent organisations;
9. recycling the teaching of peace-making knowledge, attitudes
and skills several times during a persons’s learning career;
10. making the mass media into partners in the resolution of conflicts
(‘if media people can be persuaded to report conflicts accurately
rather than sensationally, they can contribute to conflict de-escalation’);
11. promoting peace by offering appropriate courses and workshops
on a wide range of topics.
‘If we are taught to be afraid of snakes, wary of strangers, racist,
or sexist, we can also be socialized to trust others, to cooperate,
and to respect the law’, concludes Chetkow-Yanoov. ‘We can be
taught how to negotiate, to compromise, and to bargain in situations
of new or ongoing conflict.’
(Based on the book ‘Social Work Approaches to Conflict Resolution’,
by B. Chetkow-Yanoov)
The statement from the Geneva Conference stresses this point too: ‘We strongly promote the view that peace education should be a holistic process, extending far beyond the school’s walls into community life, the mass media and popular culture and as such must incorporate perspectives from all disciplines.’ At the same time, it is argued, peace education must be recognised as a fundamental part of the formal (and non-formal) system in all countries. ‘If not, it will lack credibility, status and accountability.’
Teachers and students have tried to integrate peace education at all levels at the City Montessori School in Lucknow, India - the world’s largest private school, with 22,000 students (see case-study). Here, peace education has become an integrated part of the school curriculum and parents, teachers and peers are involved in the education and upbringing of children aged 4-18. One of the founding principles of CMS Education is that a school is an extended family with the teacher acting as a role model and an example. Everyone involved in education must learn to consult, co-operate and participate for the benefit of the child.
The Center for Tolerance Education at the Van Leer Jerusalem Institute
focuses on all segments of the educational system in Israel, to
promote democracy and coexistence. The Center has two main activities.
It functions as an umbrella organisation of all entities in Israel
dealing with tolerance education. It enables exchanges of views
and the adoption of Best practices. Furthermore, it aims to stimulate
local authorities and schools to include tolerance education as
a substantial part of their curriculum. ‘In a global world with
many conflicts and with increasing violence within educational
institutions, a major educational effort for the youth must encourage,
through inter-group dialogue and other educational initiatives,
the growth of tolerance and mutual respect among peoples of various
faith, ethnic groupings, cultures and value perspectives.’
The Center for Tolerance Education
The second activity is the Study Program Values and Citizens.
The programme is conducted in 160 schools throughout the country
-including state-religious and Arab- and uses current events as
the point of departure for the study and discussion of fundamental
issues on the public agenda. The students sum up their work on
portable wall boards, that are taken from classroom to classroom
to elicit discussions and are finally hung in the room in which
the programme is to take place. The Center provides guidebooks,
a video on running the programme, mobile poster boards for walls,
and a year-long programme of conferences and in-service courses
for the teacher-coordinator and student representatives.
Not only parents and teachers, also older students can help. In the Peer Mediation Project in the UK, older students learn how to intervene in conflicts between younger students. Older students can be trained to guide younger students in conflict resolving. In the school different ‘generations’ teach each other to be peace keepers.
The final declaration of the Geneva conference stresses the important roles other actors should play. ‘We encourage publishers to promote peace education material and to ensure its effective distribution. Furthermore, development assistance agencies should promote elements of peace education as a component of their teacher training and materials production activities. Efforts of humanitarian agencies to introduce education for conflict resolution/transformation, reconciliation and peace to refugees and conflict-affected populations should be expanded. Above all, we demand that Education Ministries give peace education high priority and take systematic initiatives to implement it at local and national level.’
Selected Bibliography
Three Decades of Peace Education Around the World, Robin J. Burns and Robert Aspeslagh (ed.). Garland Publishing, Inc., 1996
The International Peace Education Movement 1919-1939, E. Hermon. In: Peace Movements and political Cultures, Charles Charfield and Peter van den Dungen, Knoxville Press, 1988
Education for the Real World - Learning from the Real World Coalition, John Huckle. Development Education Journal 1997
Teach Your Child How to Think, Edward De Bono. Penguin, 1992
The Contribution of Education to Peacebuilding, Marigold Bentley. 1999
Social Work Approaches to Conflict Resolution, B. Chetkow-Yanoov. NY/London, The Haworth Press, 1997
Celebrating Diversity - Coexistence in a Multicultural Society, B. Chetkow-Yanoov. NY/London, The Haworth Press, 1999
Mediation Works! Conflict Resolution and Peer Mediation - Manual for Secondary Schools and Colleges, Mediation UK, 1998
Human Dignity - The Right to be Respected and the Obligation to Show Respect. The Centre for Tolerance Education, 1998
Root Causes of War/Culture of Peace, International Fellowship of Reconciliation, 1998.
Learning: The Treasure Within. Report to Unesco of the International Commission on Education for the Twenty-first Century. Unesco Publishing, 1996
Education for Global Citizenship - Examples of Good Practice in Global Education in Europe, North South Centre/Council of Europe, 1996
How Can We Learn to Live Together? A Handbook on Evolving Questions and Partial Answers around Coexistence and Community-Building. State of the World Forum Coexistence Initiative, 1997
Feedback please to
j.verhoeven@euconflict.org