Peace Education: International Perspectives 9781474233682, 9781474233699, 9781474233675, 9781474233712

Table of contents :
FC
Half Title
Title Page
Copyright
Contents
Notes on Contributors
Acknowledgments
Acronyms
Introduction: Theory, Research, and Praxis of Peace Education: Monisha Bajaj and Maria Hantzopoulos
Part One: Educating for Peace in Conflict and Post-traumatic Contexts
1. Emotion, Trauma, and Critical Pedagogy: Implications for Critical Peace Education: Michalinos Zembylas
2. Building Peace: The Opportunities and Limitations of Educational Interventions in Countries with Identity-based Conflicts: Karen Murphy, Sean Pettis, and Dylan Wray
3. Experimenting with Integrated Peace Education: Critical Perspectives in the Israeli Context: Zvi Bekerman
Part Two: National Landscapes for Peacebuilding and Education
4. Peace Education and Peacebuilding across the Conflict Continuum: Insights from Lebanon: Zeena Zakharia
5. Educating for Peace in Kenya: Insights and Lessons Learned from Peace Education Initiatives across the Country: Mary Mendenhall and Nivedita Chopra
6. In the Gaze of Gandhi: Peace Education in Contemporary India: Monisha Bajaj
Part Three: Navigating Structures of Violence
7. Uncertainty, Fluidity, and Occupying Spaces in-between: Peace Education Practices in Mindanao, the Philippines: Lindsey K. Horner
8. Lingering Colonialities as Blockades to Peace Education: School Violence in Trinidad: Hakim Mohandas Amani Williams
9. Teaching for Peace in Settings Affected by Urban Violence: Reflections from Guayaquil, Ecuador: Maria Jose Bermeo
Part Four: Peace by Piece: Approaches and Models for Peace Education
10. Beyond American Exceptionalism: Centering Critical Peace Education in US School Reform: Maria Hantzopoulos
11. Nurturing and Growing the “Ceeds” of Peace: A Peacebuilding Model for Educators: Maya Soetoro-Ng and Kerrie Urosevich
12. Promoting Peace through Children’s Media: The Case of Sesame Workshop: Mathangi Subramanian, June H. Lee, Lilith K. Dollard, and Zainab Kabba
Conclusion: Critical Directions for Peace Education: Maria Hantzopoulos and Monisha Bajaj
Further Reading List
Bibliography
Index

Citation preview

Peace Education

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ALSO AVAILABLE FROM BLOOMSBURY: Education and International Development, edited by Tristan McCowan and Elaine Unterhalter Education and Reconciliation, edited by Julia Paulson Education as a Global Concern, edited by Colin Brock Global Education Policy and International Development, edited by Antoni Verger, Mario Novelli and Hülya Kosar Altinyelken Schooling for Social Change: The Rise and Impact of Human Rights Education in India, Monisha Bajaj

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Peace Education International Perspectives Edited by

MONISHA BAJAJ AND MARIA HANTZOPOULOS

Bloomsbury Academic An imprint of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc

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Bloomsbury Academic An imprint of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc 50 Bedford Square London WC1B 3DP UK

1385 Broadway New York NY 10018 USA

www.bloomsbury.com BLOOMSBURY and the Diana logo are trademarks of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc First published 2016 © Monisha Bajaj, Maria Hantzopoulos and Contributors, 2016 Monisha Bajaj, Maria Hantzopoulos and Contributors have asserted their right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as Authors of this work. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage or retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publishers. No responsibility for loss caused to any individual or organization acting on or refraining from action as a result of the material in this publication can be accepted by Bloomsbury or the author. British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. ISBN: HB: PB: ePDF: ePub:

978-1-4742-3368-2 978-1-4742-3369-9 978-1-4742-3371-2 978-1-4742-3370-5

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data A catalog record for this book is available from the Library of Congress. Typeset by Fakenham Prepress Solutions, Fakenham, Norfolk NR21 8NN

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Contents Notes on Contributors  vii Acknowledgments  xii Acronyms  xiii

Introduction: Theory, Research, and Praxis of Peace Education, Monisha Bajaj and Maria Hantzopoulos  1

PART ONE  Educating for Peace in Conflict and Post-traumatic Contexts 17 1 Emotion, Trauma, and Critical Pedagogy: Implications for

Critical Peace Education, Michalinos Zembylas  19 2 Building Peace: The Opportunities and Limitations of Educational Interventions in Countries with Identity-based Conflicts, Karen Murphy, Sean Pettis, and Dylan Wray  35 3 Experimenting with Integrated Peace Education: Critical Perspectives in the Israeli Context, Zvi Bekerman  51

PART TWO  National Landscapes for Peacebuilding and Education 69 4 Peace Education and Peacebuilding across the Conflict

Continuum: Insights from Lebanon, Zeena Zakharia  71 5 Educating for Peace in Kenya: Insights and Lessons Learned from Peace Education Initiatives across the Country, Mary Mendenhall and Nivedita Chopra  89 6 In the Gaze of Gandhi: Peace Education in Contemporary India, Monisha Bajaj  107

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vi Contents

PART THREE  Navigating Structures of Violence 123 7 Uncertainty, Fluidity, and Occupying Spaces in-between:

Peace Education Practices in Mindanao, the Philippines, Lindsey K. Horner  125 8 Lingering Colonialities as Blockades to Peace Education: School Violence in Trinidad, Hakim Mohandas Amani Williams  141 9 Teaching for Peace in Settings Affected by Urban Violence: Reflections from Guayaquil, Ecuador, Maria Jose Bermeo  157

PART FOUR  Peace by Piece: Approaches and Models for Peace Education 175 10 Beyond American Exceptionalism:  Centering Critical Peace

Education in US School Reform, Maria Hantzopoulos  177 11 Nurturing and Growing the “Ceeds” of Peace: A Peacebuilding Model for Educators, Maya Soetoro-Ng and Kerrie Urosevich  193 12 Promoting Peace through Children’s Media: The Case of Sesame Workshop, Mathangi Subramanian, June H. Lee, Lilith K. Dollard, and Zainab Kabba  215 Conclusion: Critical Directions for Peace Education, Maria Hantzopoulos and Monisha Bajaj  233 Further Reading List  239 Bibliography  251 Index  279

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Notes on Contributors Monisha Bajaj is Associate Professor of International and Multicultural Education at the University of San Francisco, USA, where she directs the MA program in Human Rights Education. She is the editor of the Encyclopedia of Peace Education (2008) and author of Schooling for Social Change: The Rise and Impact of Human Rights Education in India (Bloomsbury, 2012, winner of the Jackie Kirk Outstanding Book Award of the Comparative and International Education Society), as well as numerous articles. She has also developed curriculum—particularly related to peace education, human rights, anti-bullying efforts, and sustainability—for nonprofit organizations and intergovernmental organizations, such as UNICEF and UNESCO. Zvi Bekerman teaches anthropology of education at the School of Education and The Melton Center, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel. His research interests are in the study of cultural, ethnic, and national identity, including identity processes and negotiation during intercultural encounters as these are reflected in inter/multicultural, peace and citizenship education, and in formal/informal learning contexts. He has published numerous papers and books in these fields of study; his most recent book is Teaching Contested Narratives: Identity, Memory and Reconciliation in Peace Education and Beyond (2012, with Michalinos Zembylas). Maria Jose Bermeo is a doctoral candidate in the International and Comparative Education program at Teachers College, Columbia University, USA. Her current research focuses on perspectives and practices of teachers working in neighborhoods impacted by urban insecurity and micro-trafficking in Guayaquil, Ecuador. Previously, she has worked as a researcher, educator, and project manager in Ecuador, New York, Tanzania, and Sri Lanka. She holds an Ed.M. in International Educational Development from Teachers College, Columbia University, USA, an MA in International Relations from St. Andrews University, USA, and an Advanced Certificate in Cooperation and Conflict Resolution from the International Centre for Cooperation and Conflict Resolution at Teachers College, Columbia University, USA.

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Notes on Contributors

Nivedita Chopra is a curriculum specialist at the International Rescue Committee. In the past, she has worked with organizations like Save the Children and the Aga Khan Foundation, providing technical leadership to their education programs in urban and rural India. She received an MA in Education in International Development from the Institute of Education, University College London, UK, where she was the selected Staff Scholar for the Centenary Scholarship Award. She recently graduated with a Master of Education from the Harvard Graduate School of Education, USA, where she specialized in integrating human values in education in emergencies. Lilith K. Dollard is a Senior Educational Content Specialist in the Global Social Impact department at Sesame Workshop. Lilith currently manages educational content development and community engagement activities for international coproductions of Sesame Street in South Asia, and has worked with local teams to develop educational content for a variety of multimedia initiatives in Northern Ireland, Israel, Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Bangladesh. She holds an MA in International Education Development from Columbia University, USA, and a BA in Cultural Anthropology from Hunter College, USA. Maria Hantzopoulos is Associate Professor of Education at Vassar College, USA, and a participating faculty member in the Programs in International Studies, Urban Studies, and Women’s Studies. A former high school teacher, she also coordinates the Secondary Education Certification Program.  Maria is the coeditor (with Alia Tyner-Mullings) of  Critical Small Schools: Beyond Privatization in New York City Urban Educational Reform and is finishing a book on human rights education in New York City. Her work has appeared in a variety of peer-reviewed journals, and she remains active with many schools and nonprofits locally and globally on curriculum writing, advocacy, teachertraining, and policy. Lindsey K. Horner is a postdoctoral research fellow in Education at the University of Sussex, UK, where she is a member of the Centre for International Education (CIE). She obtained her PhD from the University of Bristol, UK, through conducting ethnographic field work in Mindanao, the Philippines, which explored the interaction of multifarious understandings of peace (understood as a Derridean event and utopian hope) which forms the basis of her chapter. Her research interests are Interdisciplinary in nature and cut across themes such as social justice, violence, conflict, peacebuilding, international development, representation, religion/theology, qualitative methodology, and education. Zainab Kabba is a doctoral candidate in the Department of Education, University of Oxford. Her research interests lie at the intersections of

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Notes on Contributors

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education, media, and religion. She has a combination of both technical and pedagogical training and has leveraged this knowledge in media and education in both K-12 classrooms and higher education institutions. Previously, she worked as an Assistant Director of Global Education at Sesame Workshop. She has experience in the field of education research and development, designing and managing education initiatives in parts of Africa and the Middle East. Zainab holds a BS in Information Systems and an MA in Computing in Education. June H. Lee is the Vice President of International Research at Sesame Workshop. She directs the formative research and summative evaluations for Sesame Workshop’s international projects and works with partners around the world to elevate the rigor of the company’s research. She has also overseen content development and outreach projects in Asia. June received her PhD in Human Development and Family Sciences from the University of Texas, Austin, where her work focused on the contexts and effects of children’s media use. She is currently coediting a book about Sesame Workshop’s international impact, and has coauthored several reviews and research papers. Mary Mendenhall is an Assistant Professor of Practice in the International and Comparative Education Program at Teachers College, Columbia University, USA, and the Chair of the Working Group on Peace, Conflict and Education. Her research interests include education in emergencies, refugee education and urban refugees as well as the quality, relevance, and sustainability of educational support provided by international organizations for displaced children and youth in conflict-affected and post-conflict countries in Sub-Saharan Africa. Mary has an EdD in international educational development from Teachers College, Columbia University, USA, an MA in college administration from New York University, USA, and a BA in psychology from Ohio University, USA. Karen L. Murphy is Facing History and Ourselves’ International Director. Karen oversees Facing History’s work outside of North America. She has a particular interest in the role of education in countries in transition, particularly those in the wake of mass violence and with identity-based conflicts, including South Africa, Northern Ireland, Bosnia, and Colombia. She is currently immersed in a longitudinal study of how adolescents in divided societies with identity-based conflicts (South Africa, Northern Ireland, and the US) develop as civic actors. She is also the coauthor with Dylan Wray of the upcoming Children’s Report of the Kenya Truth, Justice and Reconciliation Commission (TJRC).

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Notes on Contributors

Sean Pettis is Project Coordinator for the “Facing Our History, Shaping the Future” project with the Corrymeela Community in Northern Ireland, UK. Sean has ten years of experience in the design, delivery, and evaluation of peace, reconciliation, and active citizenship programs as both a trainer of educators and a youth work practitioner. Maya Soetoro-Ng is a specialist for the Matsunaga Institute for Peace, USA. She is the cofounder of Our Public School, a nonprofit that connects schools to their communities, and the cocreator of Ceeds of Peace, a peace education program that has been implemented in schools and communities around Hawai’i. Previously, Soetoro-Ng worked as an assistant professor at the University of Hawai’i and taught in both private and public settings in New York City and Hawai’i. Maya received an MA in Secondary Education from New York University, USA, and a PhD in Multicultural Education from the University of Hawai’i, USA. Mathangi Subramanian is a Program Officer at UNESCO’s Mahatma Gandhi Institute for Education for Peace, Sustainability and Global Citizenship. Her work has appeared in numerous publications, including Quartz, Al Jazeera America, The Hindu, Gender and Education, and the anthology Click! When We Knew We Were Feminist (2010). She is the author of  Bullying: The Ultimate Teen Guide (2014)  and Dear Mrs. Naidu (2015), and the  coeditor of US Education in a World of Migration: Implications for Policy and Practice. A former public school teacher, senior policy analyst for the New York City Council, and assistant vice president at Sesame Workshop, she is now an associate editor at Anthropology and Education Quarterly. Kerrie Urosevich serves as Affiliate Faculty at the Matsunaga Institute for Peace at the University of Hawai‘i at Manoa, USA, teaching peace and conflict resolution courses, and is cofounder of Ceeds of Peace with Maya Soetoro-Ng. She is currently the Governor’s Early Childhood Coordinator, overseeing Hawai’i’s early childhood system’s integration plan. Kerrie has spent the past twenty years in community mobilization, planning, and peace building. Previously, she ran her own mediation and facilitation consultancy Can U Summit, working with communities in conflict. Kerrie holds an MA in International Policy Studies from the Monterey Institute of International Studies and a PhD in Political Science, with a specialization in policy and peace building from the University of Hawai’i. Hakim Mohandas Amani Williams is Assistant Professor of Africana Studies and Education at Gettysburg College, USA, where he is also a member of their Globalization Studies and Public Policy programs. He is also a 2015–16

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Visiting Scholar at the Advanced Consortium on Cooperation, Conflict, and Complexity (AC4) at the Earth Institute, Columbia University. He received his BA (honors) in Psychology (St. Francis College, USA) and MA, MEd, and EdD in Comparative and International Education/International Educational Development (Columbia University, USA). Teaching and research interests include: school violence, educational inequity, youth empowerment, participatory action research, social change, human rights, peace education, Caribbean Studies, and postcolonial theory. Dylan Wray is the cofounder and executive director of Shikaya, a civil society organization that recognizes the crucial role that teachers can play in strengthening South Africa’s democracy.  He has also led the  Facing the Past—Transforming our Future programme, cofounded Education Week and the South African Curriculum Advisor Conference (SACATS), and developed educational resources for classrooms across South Africa.    He has worked with education departments, teachers, and civil society in  Uganda, Kenya, and Colombia and has facilitated online courses for  teachers around the world.  Dylan  was previously the Head of History at Wynberg Girls’ High School, Cape Town, South Africa. Zeena Zakharia is Assistant Professor of International and Comparative Education at the University of Massachusetts Boston, USA. Her publications examine the interplay of language, conflict, and peacebuilding in education. These interests stem from over a decade of educational leadership in war-affected contexts. She is coeditor (with O. García and B. Otcu) of Bilingual Community Education and Multilingualism: Beyond Heritage Languages in a Global City (2012). Michalinos Zembylas is Associate Professor of Educational Theory and Curriculum Studies at the Open University of Cyprus. He is also Visiting Professor and Research Fellow at the Institute for Reconciliation and Social Justice, University of the Free State, South Africa. His research interests are in the areas of educational philosophy and curriculum theory, and his work focuses on exploring the role of emotion and affect in curriculum and pedagogy. He is particularly interested in how affective politics intersect with issues of social justice pedagogies, intercultural and peace education, and citizenship education. His most recent book is entitled Emotion and Traumatic Conflict: Re-claiming Healing in Education (2015).

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Acknowledgments A

s coeditors of this book, we met more than 12 years ago during our graduate studies in peace education. That experience formed the basis of a profound friendship that has grown deeper through our continued professional collaborations on projects about which we both care so passionately. We are grateful and consider ourselves extremely fortunate to have had the opportunity to work together on this project. We are also deeply appreciative of the contributors to this volume. Each author worked tirelessly to adhere to suggestions, incorporate feedback, and share their amazing work to make this volume a complete whole. Our immense thanks also go to Eunice Roh and David Pham from Vassar College, who offered reliable support and immense contributions as the research assistants at different stages of this project. Our editorial team, Kasia Figiel, Jyoti Basuita and Maria Brauzzi at Bloomsbury Publishing, offered a tremendous amount of advice and support throughout the process of compiling and developing this book as well. We also want to acknowledge Colette Cann from Vassar College, who offered support on this project at a crucial time when we needed it. Personally, we would like to thank our families for their support and love. Maria: I am indebted to the amazing caregivers of my children, especially the teachers and staff at Les Enfants Montessori, Q300, and Serious Fun after school. Without them, I would not have the time to write about, and be engaged in, this work. I am truly grateful for my partner Johnny Farraj and my children Dalia and Ziyad, who are always a source of support, inspiration, and love. Special mention goes to my fellow mamas, Dina Lopez and Carmina Makar, for struggling with me as we navigate this scholar-mama life. My writing group of Dana Wright, Leonel Howard, Emma Sterret, and Ari Rotramel provided critical feedback throughout this process. Finally, I acknowledge my parents, Peter and Chris, who in their own ways emit light, life, and hope, especially in times of struggle. Monisha: I’d like to express my gratitude to my wonderful partner, Bikku, and my son, Kabir, who provide endless amounts of love, support, and laughter. While I entered the field of peace education committed to its ideals, being a parent in more recent years has strengthened my belief in the need for, and promise of, peace for all children. Thank you also to my parents—Asha and Dinesh Bajaj—who were my first teachers.

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Acronyms ADEA

Association for the Development of Education in Africa

AIDS

acquired immunodeficiency syndrome

BBC

British Broadcasting Corporation

CAPS

Curriculum Assessment Policy Statements

CCEA

Council for the Curriculum, Examinations, and Assessment

CDR

Centre for Dialogue and Reconciliation

CODESA Convention for a Democratic South Africa CRED

Community Relations, Equality and Diversity

CSO

civil society organization

DAC

Development Assistance Committee

DENI

Department of Education Northern Ireland

GDP

Gross Domestic Product

GMO

genetically modified organisms

GOTT

Government of Trinidad and Tobago

GPI

Global Peace Index

HDI

Human Development Index

HIV

human immunodeficiency virus

HMSO

Her Majesty’s Stationery Office

HPA

Humanities Preparatory Academy

ICQN

Inter-Country Quality Node

IEF

Integrated Education Fund

IEP

Institute for Economics and Peace

INEE

Inter-Agency Network for Education in Emergencies

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xiv Acronyms

LAF

live action films

MOE

Ministry of Education

NAFTA

North American Free Trade Agreement

NCERT

National Council of Educational Research and Training

NCF

National Curriculum Framework

NCS

National Curriculum Statement

NGO

non-governmental organization

NIC

Northern Ireland Curriculum

NIO

Northern Ireland Office

NYC

New York City

OECD

Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development

PBA

performance based assessment

PBC

Peacebuilding Commission

PBF

Peacebuilding Fund

PBSO

Peacebuilding Support Office

PEP

Peace Education Programme

PEPU

peace as an event, peace as utopia

PLO

Palestinian Liberation Organization

PPP

Peace Education Programme

PSA

public service announcements

SAT

Structural Attitudinal and Transactional peacebuilding

SSS

Survivors Secondary School

TRC

Truth and Reconciliation Commission

TT

Trinidad and Tobago

TWB

Teachers without Borders

UN

United Nations

UNCT

United Nations Country Team

UNDP

United Nations Development Programme

UNESCO United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization

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Acronyms

UNGA

General Assembly of the United Nations

UNHCR

United Nations Refugee Agency

UNICEF

United Nation’s Children’s Fund

UNODC

United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime

UNSC

United Nations Security Council

US

United States

US$

United States Dollar

USIP

United States Institute for Peace

VPA

Violence Prevention Academy

YMCA

Young Men’s Christian Association

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Introduction: Theory, Research, and Praxis of Peace Education Monisha Bajaj and Maria Hantzopoulos

P

eace education is a field of scholarship and practice that utilizes teaching and learning not only to dismantle all forms of violence but also to create structures that build and sustain a just and equitable peace and world. Since World War II, peace education has formally emerged as a global field of scholarship and practice, despite many efforts throughout regions and time to educate for a culture of peace. Peace Education: International Perspectives provides a contemporary cross section of scholarly research in this burgeoning field, and also draws from practitioner reflections on the challenges and possibilities of implementing peace education in their particular locations. There are thus two overarching goals that drive this book: (1) to highlight ground-breaking and rich—primarily qualitative—case studies on peace education from across the globe; and (2) to analyze the prospects and tensions in the localization of peace education in diverse and specific contexts. This book project stems from our work as university professors teaching courses on peace education for diverse students: in Maria Hantzopoulos’ case, to undergraduates many of whom will be teachers, policy makers, and educational advocates in the United States, and in Monisha Bajaj’s case, to primarily graduate students in international education who will work in educational organizations and policy settings in the US and globally. We felt that there was an absence of a comprehensive introductory text on peace education that was both global in scope and attentive to practical and diverse forms of implementation, including: through governmental policies and programs; through the work of intergovernmental organizations (i.e. the United Nations and UNICEF); through non-governmental organizations (NGOs) engaging in teacher training or youth development; through the work of individual educators, schools, and community activists; through faith-based

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organizations; and through educational media and television. This volume offers insights from these various domains, and includes initiatives that geographically span Europe, the Middle East, North America, South America, the Caribbean, sub-Saharan Africa, and Asia. Taken together, the chapters that follow offer a rich panorama of contemporary international peace education. Written by scholars and practitioners who have been deeply engaged in peace education efforts across the globe, the ensuing chapters offer concrete ideas to readers who may seek an entry into this field of research and practice. As editors, we intentionally amplify the voices of those scholars, organizations, and projects that are actively working in, and defining the field of, peace education. This edited volume, then, addresses the question: What is international peace education and what does it look like in diverse places? In this chapter, we offer an overview of the book as a whole and a summary of core concepts in peace education for readers new to the field.

Peace Education: Core Concepts and Current Trends Educational philosopher Paulo Freire noted that education has the dual potential either to indoctrinate, or to liberate: “Education either functions as an instrument … to bring about conformity or it becomes the practice of freedom, the means by which men and women … discover how to participate in the transformation of their world” (Freire 2003: 34). It is a similar premise that also defines the possibilities of peace education; namely, that while educational spaces can be used to foster values like war, violence, competition, militarism, and hatred, it can also be used to develop capacities for peace, nonviolence, justice, dignity, and respect for difference. Diverse scholars and practitioners have drawn on peace education in various ways, with this book highlighting contemporary practice; historically, though, examples such as disarmament education during the Cold War, education about the atomic bomb and its aftermath in Japan, and education for mutual understanding in Northern Ireland are all examples of education for peace (Harris and Morrison 2012). Further, peace studies scholars have regularly convened through the International Peace Research Association, which since 1964 has issued a call for “peace research, peace action, and peace education,” noting the important role that education can play in dismantling structures of violence and promoting peace (Galtung 1973: 317). Betty Reardon, a pioneer in the field of peace education, has highlighted the need to teach about peace as well as to teach for peace. In other words, peace education requires “the transmission of knowledge about requirements

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3

of, the obstacles to, and possibilities for achieving and maintaining peace; training in skills for interpreting the knowledge; and the development of reflective and participatory capacities for applying the knowledge to overcome problems and achieve possibilities” (Reardon 2000: 399). Peace education thus requires transforming content, pedagogy, structures, educational practices, relationships between educators and learners, and the systems by which we measure the outcomes of education as well. Given the strong relationship between the field of peace studies and peace education, central concepts utilized in both fields work in tandem with each other to analyze the nature and manifestations of violence in all its forms. For instance, in order for comprehensive peace to be achieved, both “negative” peace (the abolition of direct and physical violence) and “positive” peace (the abolition of structural and cultural violence) must be attained (Galtung 1969). Moreover, the distinctions among many forms of violence shed light on ways to work towards their abolition. Direct violence, for example, is exemplified by torture, war, militarism, rape, and other forms of aggression. Indirect violence, according to seminal peace studies scholar Johan Galtung (1969), refers to structural and cultural forms of violence—systems such as racism, sexism, colonialism, culturally-condoned exclusion—that privilege some to the denigration of others. Birgit Brock-Utne (1989) further identifies different levels at which violence must be addressed from a feminist perspective, distinguishing between the “organized” level, referring to state involvement or negligence to act despite knowledge of violent acts, and the “unorganized” level, highlighting violence that occurs in microstructures, such as in families and communities. One such example of the latter is Galtung’s (1990) concept of cultural violence, which often occurs at the unorganized level through practices that are culturally legitimized (and often strongly tied to structural inequalities). By understanding the root causes and manifestations of different forms of violence, peace education seeks to critically analyze and dismantle them. Peace education, however, is not limited to this analysis; it also aims to build and create new forms and structures of education through curricula, pedagogy, participatory learning, dialogue-based encounters, and multiple perspectives on historical narratives (Bajaj 2014; Bekerman and Zembylas 2012; Brantmeier 2011; Hantzopoulos 2010, 2011b; Reardon 2000). Early literature in the field analyzed important local and global trends from a North American and Western European perspective, since authors from these locations produced the vast majority of the field’s printed scholarship (Harris and Morrison 2012; Reardon 1988). In recent years, there has been a rise in critical approaches to peace education that both bring in theory from a variety of disciplinary frameworks, as well as highlight marginalized voices and histories to inform peace education theory and practice. This perspective

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has been amplified by proliferating scholarship from regions like South Africa, Israel–Palestine, Northern Ireland, and Cyprus, to name a few. Several authors in this volume draw from these more critical perspectives on peace education to understand how theoretical and conceptual insights from fields such as critical pedagogy, human rights education, critical race theory, and post-colonial and post-structural theory may inform work in critical peace education. As Brantmeier and Bajaj (2013: 145) have argued: Critical approaches offer peace educators and researchers the contextual and conceptual resources for understanding the structural impediments to advancing the possibility and promise of peace education in diverse locales across the globe. Rather than status quo reproduction, critical approaches in peace education and peace research aim to empower learners as transformative change agents (Freire 1970) who critically analyze power dynamics and intersectionalities among race, class, gender, ability/disability, sexual orientation, language, religion, geography, and other forms of stratification. Critical peace education in particular considers the ways in which human agency dynamically interacts with structures and forms of violence; and, in turn, contemplates the potential for educational spaces—formal and informal— to be sites of individual and collective transformation (Bajaj 2008a; Brantmeier 2011, 2014). What distinguishes critical peace education from regular peace education are some key underlying principles. First, while all peace educators draw from analyses of violence, critical peace educators pay attention to how unequal social relations and issues of power must inform both peace education and corresponding social action. Second, critical peace education pays close attention to local realities and local conceptions of peace, amplifying marginalized voices through community-based research, narratives, oral histories, and locally-generated curricula. Third, critical peace education draws from social reproductive theory (Bourdieu and Passeron 1990 [1977]; Bowles and Gintis 1976) and critical pedagogy (Freire 1970) to view schools as both potential sites of marginalization and/or transformation (see also Hantzopoulos 2011b, for example). Further, it considers multiple spaces within and outside of state-run schools—which often serve as forces of exclusion—as conduits for possibility, liberation, and social change (Bajaj 2014). Other critical approaches to peace education also explore the politics and possibilities of enacting peace education in places where contested narratives, identity-based violence, and entrenched structural violence abound. Informed by post-colonial, post-structural, and other critical theories, key insights into how integration, coexistence and “peace” initiatives are fraught with differentiated forms of agency, asymmetries of power, and Western

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notions of dialogue and peace have complicated and enriched discussions in the field of peace education (Bekerman and Zembylas 2012; Hantzopoulos 2010; McGlynn et al. 2009). Moreover, since the 1990s, peace educators have increasingly engaged with the related field of human rights education as it has become a frame around which the right to education, the reform of textbooks, and approaches to teacher training have centered (e.g. Al-Daraweesh and Snauwaert 2015; Bajaj 2012; Hantzopoulos forthcoming; Reardon 1997; Zembylas 2011). Together, these various multidisciplinary and geographical trends have moved the field of peace education in new and broader directions, as we explain in the following section.

Peace Education in Conversation: Larger Questions for Engagement Various approaches and case studies are presented in this book to show the diversity of experience and context-specific nature of the field. The theoretical developments and increased scholarship have helped ground the field, as have the rise in the number of courses, conferences, training programs, international prizes, academic journals, books, and publications on peace education. Taking stock of the nearly five decades of scholarship and practice in peace education, the contributing authors to this book were posed several questions while developing their chapters in order to offer readers a thorough understanding of what the field is and where conversations within it are headed in the future. Taken together, the chapters that follow respond to the following questions: 1 Analysis of the field of peace education: In what ways have the field

of peace education evolved, changed, and/or grown over the past decades? What key research, theory, and praxis inform our work and should inform future efforts? 2 Peace education in global context: Amidst social and educational

inequalities between and within nations, what is the role of peace education as it relates to pursuits of social justice, human rights, reconciliation, and/or the expansion of human capabilities and development? 3 Societal level: How do the various forms of violence as

conceptualized by Galtung (1969, 1990) (direct, structural, and cultural) impact the everyday lives of schools?

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peace education endeavors? How are educators and learners making meaning of such peace education efforts?

Thematic Arguments across Chapters The authors have interrogated these broader questions in their chapters that follow. As a result, there are several emergent themes that thread across and through several chapters to complicate and elucidate our broad understandings of peace education in distinct organizational, national, or community settings. In addition to offering twelve case studies bookended by comments by the editors, this volume contributes to, and moves forward, larger conversations in the field of peace education in various ways. While each chapter will be discussed in the following section in terms of its specific content, there are several arguments that the book as a whole puts forth— the sum is indeed greater than its parts—that can be summarized as follows: 1. The nature and process of peace education is relational, contextual and situational, and not limited to delineated roles of learner and teacher. Several chapters highlight how our preconceived notions of teachers, students, and the educational process itself need to be recast in peace education efforts. In this step back from our assumptions, we humanize educators, exposing their vulnerabilities (see Chapters 8 and 9) and the trauma they may have also faced in conflict settings (see Chapters 1 and 2). In peace education and other alternative forms of education, there is often a predetermined linear formula that posits that teachers—neutral in most discussions and seen as predisposed to issues of peace and human rights—offer students information and experience that then magically lead to their transformation. Chapters in this book instead open up these terms and processes to be situational, contextual, and relational—not linear or formulaic, arguing that teachers also are heavily invested in, and may undergo transformation through, these very educational processes. In some places, educational systems have so often dehumanized and disenfranchised members of certain groups that the most effective and relevant peace education is not happening in schools but elsewhere; we must look to such spaces as sites of possibility and authentic education. The peace education process is about humanizing education—in and out of school settings (see Chapters 7, 10, 11, and 12)—in dynamic and open-ended ways. This argument of the book is that peace education can happen anywhere, with many serving as “educators” and “learners” depending on the context and situation.

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2. Normative and Eurocentric frameworks for understanding peace and peace education must be interrogated and challenged across local and regional contexts (see Chapters 3, 6, and 9). While Western approaches privilege rationality, emotions and affective dimensions of peace work are also central for both teachers and students (see Chapters 1 and 2). The field of peace education has historically been rooted in North America and Europe where scholars had more access to publishing and dissemination of ideas through international mechanisms. The critical peace education perspective—from which many authors write— seeks to uncover subjugated knowledge, challenge normalized truths, and illuminate wisdom from individuals and groups historically silenced (examples from this book draw from regions often underrepresented in discussions of peace education). Additionally, contributors such as Lindsey Horner (Chapter 7) challenge concepts of liberal peace, drawing on post-structural perspectives to consider peace in new and different ways. As Michalinos Zembylas (Chapter 1) and Zvi Bekerman (Chapter 3) implore, we must “interrogate taken for granted assumptions about peace and peace education” (Zembylas and Bekerman 2013a, b). In this vein, Maria Hantzopoulos (Chapter 10) shows how even within North American contexts, American exceptionalism often defines how and for whom peace education is enacted, and that this must also be challenged, as this notion is tied to normative frameworks for engagement. 3. Intentions and outcomes must be integrated in peace education; however, these concepts should be critically reflected upon before, during, and after the process of implementation. Much literature in peace education is prescriptive in nature given the hybrid nature of the field as one of scholarship and educational practice. However, the empirical chapters in this volume analyze research and evaluation studies, and offer important insights into whose ideas get implemented (see Chapters 4 and 5), what happens in the process of implementation (Chapters 3 and 5), and what outcomes are produced—for better or for worse (see Chapters 8, 9, and 12). In the case of bilingual schools in Israel–Palestine, Sesame Workshop’s global efforts, and the “Ceeds” of Peace program in Hawai’i, chapter authors give us complex overviews of how programs are conceived with one idea in mind, and how, in the process of implementation, various outcomes (many intended and others unintended) ensue. Greater alignment is needed between good intentions and strong outcomes, facilitated through critical, ongoing self-reflection on the part of curriculum designers and educators; program design should include regular and reciprocal dialogue with the participants in peace education initiatives.

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4. Complex analyses of violence must undergird peace education efforts. Related to theme three above, good intentions and outcomes result from rigorous analyses of the root causes of problems and the arrangements of power that contribute to violence in a given setting. In many chapters in this volume, authors demonstrate that peace education may transform the contexts in which they operate; however, this is not a given and many efforts go awry and, worse, have the possibility to exacerbate violence. If peace education is more tailored to local contexts, it may have greater capacity to transform those contexts (see Chapters 4 and 10). The power and possibility of peace education require that planners attend to the various vectors and forces of violence that impact teachers, learners, parents, and participants in a particular program, and include those voices in the design and implementation. The examples of peace education positively impacting a refugee camp in Kenya (Chapter 5), victims of Civil War in Lebanon (Chapter 4), and marginalized youth in New York City public schools (Chapter 10) offer hope for the promise of well-designed and locally situated peace education that considers local stakeholders at the center. 5. Examples of effective peace education can inspire other action. Successful models that are contextualized and relevant can offer important inspiration for other peace education efforts. As peace educators travel, share ideas, and disseminate findings of research through conferences and publications, good ideas resonate in different places, taking root in new ways. Identifying and describing these “pockets of hope” (a term coined by education scholars Eileen de los Reyes and Patricia Gozemba [2001]) offers counter-narratives to dominant representations of the intractability of conflict and violence. In Chapter 3, Zvi Bekerman highlights the various integrated schools and encounter camps that draw on Gordon Allport’s (1954) contact hypothesis—that bringing together people from different sides of a conflict can reduce prejudice. Whether Northern Ireland or South Africa (Chapter 2), Israel–Palestine (Chapter 3), or through muppet characters on shows across the globe (Chapter 12), such theories and experiences infuse peace education approaches internationally. Of course, such efforts must be scaffolded by practical concerns such as structures, policies, and funding that support welldesigned and locally-tailored curricula and pedagogy aimed towards peace and justice teaching in a learning setting, whether a high school in New York (see Chapter 10), a university classroom in India (see Chapter 6), educator trainings in Hawai’i (see Chapter 11), a community organization in Mindanao (see Chapter 7), or a refugee camp in Kenya (see Chapter 5). These chapters trace how peace education has been structured, attempted, enabled, and limited at different moments in distinct contexts, offering readers a real and

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comprehensive picture of the pitfalls and promise of implementing peace education. 6. Individuals and organizations can serve as “peace entrepreneurs.” In their work on how human rights norms spread globally, political scientists Margaret Keck and Kathryn Sikkink (1998) discuss how “norm entrepreneurs” enlist the support of various advocacy coalitions to advance support for their platforms. Similarly, throughout the chapters that follow, we see “peace entrepreneurs” with varying levels of funding and support initiating and launching programs, trainings, bilingual schools, and establishing community organizations to reduce inter-ethnic conflict around the world. The founders of “Ceeds” of Peace in Hawai’i (Chapter 11), the Lebanese educator who started a peace education program amidst civil war in the 1980s (Chapter 4) or the founders of Israel–Palestine’s first bilingual school in the 1970s (Chapter 3) could all be considered “peace entrepreneurs,” not because they sought any economic benefit, but because they shared their ideas and visions for peace in ways that spread through inspired action. Organizations can greater amplify the work of individuals and sustain such ‘peace entrepreneurship’ over many decades in the case of the Sesame Workshop (Chapter 12), Facing History’s global work (Chapter 2) and the bilingual schools movement in Israel–Palestine (Chapter 3). 7. The diversity of local meanings of peace and peace education are its strength. Different initiatives and conceptions of peace education are not vernaculars of a standardized language but rather unique efforts that are better conceptualized as songs of many lyrics, forms, and melodies that resonate to one or more of the multiple chords of peace education: justice, dignity, coexistence, critical thinking, transformation, among others. There are just as many similarities that can be found across the twelve chapters in this book as there can be found differences. What is more important than mapping and grouping is to examine in each how peace, and education for and about it, can be locally understood and practiced—and what we can learn from such efforts. If we consider a colorful tapestry, unique patterns, stitches, and threads add to the vibrancy rather than diminish it. What holds the threads together is a shared belief in education as the promise and practice of freedom, and for a comprehensive vision of peace that addresses the various forms of violence that limit human flourishing. While we take up and revisit these themes in the concluding chapter of this book, we wanted to list (as we do above) some of the ways that they speak to each other across a variety of contexts, to bring cohesion to the volume. It is important to note that all the authors have strong connections to

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the work they write about (having been engaged in peace education as practitioners or researchers there for many years, or are leading peace education scholars from the places they write about). Peace education is a field that holds the promise of bridging the divide between scholarship and practice and all of the chapters that follow do precisely that.

Chapter Summaries We have divided the book into four parts, with three chapters in each of the parts, that collectively elucidate the seven themes articulated above.

Part One: Educating for Peace in Conflict and Post-traumatic Contexts Peace education is most often discussed (and funded and implemented) in situations of conflict. It is important for us to start here and understand that conflicts have different roots (Galtung’s [1969] multidimensional analyses of violence discussed above are helpful to apply to the roots of different conflicts). The chapters that follow offer important understandings of how peace education, critical pedagogy and efforts to engage historical and collective memory in education are taken up in very distinct contexts: Cyprus, Northern Ireland, South Africa, and Israel. In Chapter 1, peace education scholar Michalinos Zembylas uses the example of Cyprus to show how education can teach fear and hatred through the politicization of trauma. He theorizes how educators can effectively navigate and work within such settings, acknowledging that educators are often “carriers of troubled knowledge.” Zembylas provides a road map for how “critical pedagogies of peace education” can work emotion and power into their analysis to bring about “small transformations and openings in ethical encounters.” Zembylas’ conceptualization of critical emotional praxis offers the field of peace education a theoretical and practical tool for cultivating empathy and solidarity with the experiences of the “other” in conflict contexts. This ultimately facilitates understanding, analysis, and intervention in situations of entrenched identity-based conflict in order to advance peace and reconciliation. Offering one response to Zembylas’ call for effective educator training in post-traumatic contexts, Chapter 2 profiles the international and collaborative work of the US-based organization Facing History and Ourselves (FHAO), in Northern Ireland and South Africa. Written by FHAO’s International Director (Karen Murphy) and those coordinating community based partnerships, Sean

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Pettis (Corrymeela Community, Northern Ireland) and Dylan Wray (Shikaya, South Africa), the authors discuss the opportunities and limitations of their work with educators and youth in countries with identity-based conflicts. Murphy, Pettis, and Wray acknowledge the historical “baggage” and legacies of violence, noting that educators are not neutral observers of conflict and violence. They highlight Facing History’s partnerships as a “space to realize the impact of the past on [teachers].” Such recognition can facilitate education as a space to foster peace rather than a place to “reaffirm anger and fear … and pass on traumas to the young people in their classrooms.” Chapter 2 highlights educator professional development and international partnerships for teaching for peace in post-conflict settings. Further discussing contested narratives and possibilities for reconciliation, in Chapter 3, peace education scholar Zvi Bekerman brings our attention to the ongoing conflict in Israel–Palestine. From the 1980s onward, binational, integrated bilingual schools emerged as sites of peace education for Palestinian–Israeli and Jewish–Israeli children and families in Israel. Bekerman reviews the theoretical bases of “contact” that have led to integrated schools in the United States, Northern Ireland, and Israel, and the issues of power and inequality that surround them. He highlights the structure and development of bilingual integrated schools, reviews the extensive research on them, and offers a comprehensive analysis of the limits and possibilities of peace education efforts within protracted and ongoing conflict in IsraelPalestine. Bekerman offers a call to the field: “Peace education needs to look beyond dominant curricula and the reproduction of existing knowledge and problematize the politics of identity around issues of justice and coexistence.” This insightful chapter offers the theoretical tools and analyses with which to explore peace education amidst larger social, political, and economic contexts globally.

Part Two: National Landscapes for Peacebuilding and Education Conflict and violence animate many initiatives for peace education at national levels (often with funding from international agencies and carried out by subnational actors such as non-governmental organizations (NGOs)). The second part of the book highlights national landscapes for peacebuilding and education, as they offer a complex picture of the diverse ways that distinct actors in national contexts (in these cases, Lebanon, Kenya, and India) differentially understand and act upon calls for peace education. This part looks vertically at how international consensus around peace education influences policies, the work of international agencies and NGOs, as well as the efforts

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of individual actors past and present to teach for peace in a variety ways (see also the work of Vavrus and Bartlett [2009] on vertical case studies). In Chapter 4, peace education scholar Zeena Zakharia highlights the case of Lebanon in relation to international discussions around peacebuilding and education that have sought to limit education’s role in perpetuating violence. Zakharia challenges the widely-held notion that security must come before other peacebuilding strategies, like education, by offering participants’ perspectives on a peace education effort during Lebanon’s Civil War (1975–90) that was particularly effective despite widespread insecurity in the country at that time. Drawing on her extensive fieldwork in Lebanon and her longtime experience as an educator and scholar in the Middle East and internationally, Zakharia argues that transformative peacebuilding approaches have a role at all phases along the conflict continuum. Particularly considering the United Nations’ role in promoting peacebuilding, she further notes that successful programs must take into account “the varied conceptions of peacebuilding, understanding the source of localized tensions …, and considering those tensions in relation to the positionality of the UN within that context.” Similar to the case of Lebanon, discussions and efforts towards peacebuilding and peace education are underway throughout Kenya with the large population of refugees resettled there and after the election violence in 2007–08 in the country. In Chapter 5, Mary Mendenhall and Nivedita Chopra, experts in the field of emergency education, offer perspectives on peace education initiatives in Kenya in refugee camps as well as in schools and teacher-training initiatives. The chapter offers a glimpse into the range of peace education efforts in Kenya and how they are designed, funded and implemented by diverse stakeholders. Mendenhall and Chopra draw on literature as well as interviews with individuals involved with the programs to offer insights into how peace education varies across location, contingent upon both those implementing and funding the program, and the local dynamics of the place where it is being implemented. The authors offer several lessons for peace educators working in crisis settings who seek to ensure sustainability for their efforts, including ongoing teacher development, engaging universities as partners, evaluating outcomes over the long term, and examining the underlying and structural roots of conflict in peace and peacebuilding education. While peace education efforts are rather recent in Kenya, in Chapter 6 Monisha Bajaj traces India’s engagement with this field of scholarship and practice from the post-independence period (1947) to the present-day. National education policy documents have discussed peace education and many individuals and organizations are involved in teaching and working for peace. She groups the types of peace education underway in contemporary

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India into three categories: efforts aimed at character and peace values; intergroup efforts led by NGOs aimed at coexistence amidst ethnic and religious conflict; and tertiary programs in Gandhian and Peace Studies that espouse a more radical critique of local and global inequalities. Diverse actors are studying and implementing peace education in India with distinct perspectives on what the field is and should be. Bajaj “sheds light on peace education practices from a vibrant corner of the global South” in order to highlight how such diversity aligns with different approaches and trends in global peace education.

Part Three: Navigating Structures of Violence Heeding the call of Gandhian Studies to examine structures of violence, the chapters in the third part of the book explore how larger structural critiques inform how peace and violence are experienced locally in schools and community educational spaces. Each case study in this part operates within a larger context of social and/or political violence with historical roots: the Philippines, Trinidad, and Ecuador. Some efforts described in this section seek to interrupt the immediate presence of violence and engage in everyday peacemaking, while others move towards peacebuilding as a longer-term preventative approach. Teachers and students have the dual potential to be propagators of peace or violence—or may choose to abstain from any action for fear of retribution—in different moments, as these chapters highlight. Moving away from liberal conceptions of peace, in Chapter 7 peace education scholar Lindsey Horner casts our gaze to the space “in-between.” Offering a rich theoretical discussion on the nature of peace, she proposes an alternative conceptualization of peace that informs her case study of a community educational effort in Mindanao, a region in the Philippines that— since colonial times—has been marked by religious conflict. The example she highlights is a nonformal, faith-based peace education program that includes community organizing and local notions of peace. Horner’s chapter “suggests an approach to peace education that forefronts occupying spaces in between; practicing uncertainty; and accepting fluidity, as a way of evoking the promise of peace ‘to come’.” The theoretical contributions of this chapter paired with data from the research of a community-based program help us expand what peace means in local contexts as opposed to the definitions sometimes imposed by international agencies and scholars with assumptions about what peace should look like. While conflicts in the Philippines date back to colonial encounters, educational systems in Trinidad also have colonial foundations as peace education scholar Hakim Williams discusses in Chapter 8. His case study of youth

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violence, and school-based efforts to address it, offers important insights for peace education and its related field of conflict resolution. The author describes diverse forms of violence in and around schools, and categorizes the responses to violence as either “negative peace” approaches (those focused on stopping the immediate incidence of violence) or “positive peace” approaches (those seeking to dismantle structural violence). Williams provides a systemic critique that upends the limited scope of interventions by the Ministry of Education related to school violence, as they do not address the underlying exclusion in an inherited unequal system. He suggests recommendations to address school violence in Trinidad and elsewhere from a holistic and comprehensive peace education approach. Similar to the case of Trinidad, peace education scholar Maria Jose Bermeo examines in Chapter 9 how teachers in schools in Gauyaquil, Ecuador, can be agents of peace amidst widespread urban violence. Exploring the liminal spaces between peace, violence, and education, Bermeo highlights “the range of responses adopted by teachers in this context, illustrating the complex terrain of education’s role in building peace in urban settings and underscores the relevance of critical peace education as a framework of analysis through which to uncover the ways that education may inadvertently reproduce patterns of violence.” Drawing on rich ethnographic data, she offers analyses of the ways in which teachers respond to student involvement in the violent drug trade in and around schools, offering complex analyses of the vulnerabilities and tensions faced by teachers as they confront and navigate structures and processes of violence. Individual and situational responses are one way that peace is promoted in everyday interactions, as highlighted by Bermeo, though models and programs that intentionally seek to foster peace are also useful sites of inquiry, as the following section explores.

Part Four: Peace by Piece: Approaches and Models for Peace Education As in the previous section, various forms of violence surround the case studies and models of peace education programs in action presented in the final part of the book. Despite such limitations and constraints, the chapters in the final part of the book showcase that—by all accounts— peace education can and does work to inspire critical thinking, democratic engagement, and increased respect for difference. Peace education scholarship, while importantly addressing the harsh realities surrounding schools and communities, is a field rooted in hope and possibility. The three cases presented here of an innovative high school in New York, a peace-building model in Hawai’Ii, and the international Sesame Workshop’s global work

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offer compelling models of transformative peace education practice and scholarship that examines it. In Chapter 10, peace education scholar Maria Hantzopoulos offers an important case study of a unique high school in New York City that espouses the promise and possibility of critical peace education. Amidst a landscape of high-stakes testing, accountability, punitive action, and the privatization of public schooling in US educational policy, Hantzopoulos discusses how a critical peace education approach to schooling in the United States can resist the larger forces of exclusion and, instead, create humanizing and transformative educational spaces. Drawing on extensive ethnographic data collected at a public high school in New York City, Hantzopoulos explores “how students make meaning of their educational experiences at a school that emphasizes democratic principles and a commitment to peace and social justice.” Youth voices offer evidence that alternative and innovative approaches to schooling can reaffirm students’ dignity and uphold the promise of peace education within formal educational structures. Hantzopoulos offers many insights for educators in formal schooling contexts to consider vis-à-vis the possibilities of peace education praxis, and argues that peace education is as necessary in a US context, where structural violence abounds, as it is in commonly viewed “conflict-ridden” societies. In Chapter 11, acclaimed educational scholars and practitioners Maya Soetoro-Ng and Kerrie Urosevich similarly present a model of peace education—in this case, a model the authors themselves have created: the “Ceeds” of Peace program. Identifying key skills that international peacebuilders espouse, the authors develop several “C’s” that learners must cultivate, ranging from critical thinking to compassion to civic engagement, among many others. With the objective of developing resilient peacebuilders, Soetoro-Ng and Urosevich offer many practical and grounded examples from their work in Hawai’i of how educators can plant and nourish the “ceeds” of peace in young learners. While these emerged out of their specific local context, they serve as a source of inspiration for others who may consider adapting and creating similar activities in a non-prescriptive way. The authors also highlight positive responses from children and families who have begun to utilize the tools and practices aimed at fostering peace through their program. Moving out of the formal classroom to the domain of educational television, Chapter 12 considers the show Sesame Street—and its many international coproductions—as a model of peace education for young children. The authors of this chapter—educational scholars and practitioners Mathangi Subramanian, June Lee, Lilith Dollard, and Zainab Kabba—are all current or former senior staff members of the Sesame Workshop that produces television shows in the US and internationally. The authors describe the step-by-step

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process of how productions develop localized educational frameworks that engage with issues of peace and violence through character development, music, imagery, content, and community engagement. Drawing on research carried out about Sesame coproductions in conflict and post-conflict contexts, the authors find that “Sesame Workshop’s approach to peace education is rooted in the belief that the world’s young children are capable of critically analyzing their worlds and becoming change makers.” Influencing positive social change and building peace are common themes across the chapters in this part—as in many of the book’s parts—and offer readers accessible examples of how peace education is being implemented across the globe. Overall, this book offers those interested in international peace education a strong introduction to the field and some of the most relevant scholarship within it from across the globe. We close the book with a concluding chapter that offers further insight on the central arguments and issues raised across the chapters to consider the way ahead for the field of peace education. For those designing courses, research programs or thesis projects, we have also included an annotated further reading list at the end of the book to guide such efforts. Our hope is that readers will walk away with more questions than answers informed by the rich and engaging case studies presented here. Students, scholars, practitioners, and policy makers are increasingly looking to peace education as a field full of promise and possibility for a better tomorrow. The chapters that follow offer important insights, lessons, and directions to consider in our individual and collective work towards greater peace, equity, and social justice.

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PART ONE

Educating for Peace in Conflict and Post-traumatic Contexts

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1 Emotion, Trauma, and Critical Pedagogy: Implications for Critical Peace Education1 Michalinos Zembylas

Introduction A Personal Story I went to elementary school in the fall of 1975. One of the first childhood drawings I remember doing depicted the Turkish planes bombing Cyprus and the Turks as monster-like animals who wanted to eat “us,” the Greek-Cypriots. This drawing was put on display on a board and everyone reiterated in class through their own drawings too how evil and barbarian the Turks were. I also remember participating in frequent commemorations of many historical events in which the Greek glories were celebrated. We used to memorize all the heroes of the Greek revolution of 1821 and, in our childhood games, each one of us picked a revolutionary hero and tried to “be” him or her. A few years after the war of 1974, the theme of Den Xehno (I don’t forget) became a prominent educational program in our school life. Pictures of Kerynia, Bellapais, and Famagusta, our occupied places as we called them, would decorate all classrooms. The goal of Den Xehno was to acquire knowledge so that we would never forget these places and care enough so that one day we would be ready to fight for them, if necessary. The most prominent themes of the Den Xehno campaign focused on the remembrance of the Turkish invasion, the thousands of refugees, the missing persons, the enclaved Greek-Cypriots living in the occupied areas in the north, the violation of human rights, and the

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destruction of ancient Greek archaeological places and orthodox churches. I recall how I was encouraged by a teacher in elementary school to write letters to the missing persons telling them how much we loved them and prayed for their return. All these images, pictures, stories and commemorations were part of the traumatic experience of 1974 perpetuated by the media, the newspapers, the school textbooks, and our everyday social and political life. My teachers presented the Greeks and the Turks in stereotypical ways: the Greeks as heroic figures who were always fighting for what was right, for justice, democracy, and freedom, and the Turks as barbarians, unjust, deceitful, evil, and war-loving. We were repeatedly reminded of what the Turks had done to us and that the young generation had a duty to remember and fight, if needed, to throw the Turks out of Cyprus. The perception in my mind about the history of Cyprus was very clear: the victims who suffered were the Greek Cypriots, and the perpetrators who committed barbarisms were the Turks (in those years, I don’t remember anyone teaching us in schools whether there was any differentiation between Turkish Cypriots and Turks). Not a single teacher in my entire primary and secondary education discussed with us who the Turkish Cypriots were, whether they also suffered at the hands of Greek Cypriots, or whether Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots lived together in the past and fought for common social issues. I found out about all these things many years later, only after I left Cyprus to study in the US.

The Politicization of Trauma This is how I and many other Greek-Cypriot children of my generation grew up in the years after 1974—trauma was and still is politicized by all sides in the competition for who is the biggest victim. One may wonder why there is so much fascination with being a victim. Being a victim, explains Elazar Barkan (2000), can be immensely powerful. The categories of “victims” and “perpetrators” are often used to serve manipulative political and ideological agendas. The recognition of the victim as such—by the perpetrator or others— becomes the victim’s ultimate power to be used for political and moral purposes. The consistent failure to acknowledge each other’s victimhood has prevented Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots to rise above their common suffering and transform—not necessarily “overcome,” and I will come back to this—their traumatic experiences in constructive ways. Each side in Cyprus has utilized narratives of trauma and victimization to score moral and political points in the local and international political arena. Trauma studies in the social sciences and the humanities originated in the context of research about the Holocaust, but they did not arise in a vacuum.

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Trauma and its impact had been investigated by Freud, who showed that the ways in which one reacts to a traumatic event depends on his or her personal psychic history, that is, his or her memories and fantasies. Trauma—particularly historical trauma—refers to unthinkable catastrophic events that, when witnessed, evoke painful feelings. Psychoanalytic theories that built on Freud’s work treated trauma as an unclaimed individual experience that needed to be somehow dealt with, using various therapeutic strategies (Caruth 1996). However, work in the post–Holocaust era has begun to engage trauma in a way that respects and contributes to its politics. Although trauma enters the social and political terrain as an expression of personal experience, explains Jill Bennett (2005: 6), “it is always vulnerable to appropriation, to reduction, and to mimicry”; thus, the idea that trauma is “owned” by someone is deeply contested. In light of studies on the cultural politics of emotion, the concept of trauma has been redefined to include how traumas work to shape individual and collective bodies (Ahmed 2004). As Wulf Kansteiner (2004: 193) has argued, trauma after the Holocaust has risen “as one of the key interpretive categories of contemporary politics and culture.” An important distinction that needs to be made at this point is one’s positioning and context of encountering trauma (Kaplan 2005). At one end, there is the direct trauma victim, while at the other there is the person who has no personal connection to the victim but may encounter trauma through other sources such as the media and oral or written accounts of a catastrophe. It is in this context that the notion of witnessing—primary and secondary witnessing—has emerged in the field of trauma studies (Oliver 2001). Becoming a primary witness to traumatic events is painful, because the witnessing experience shatters one’s worldview or, as Shoshana Felman and Dori Laub (1992: 10) write, the witness “becomes radically transformed by the very process of witnessing.” Kelly Oliver clarifies that there is a double meaning of witnessing: “eyewitness testimony based on first-hand knowledge, on the one hand, and bearing witness to something beyond recognition that can’t be seen, on the other” (2001: 16; author’s emphasis). For Oliver, it is the tension between eyewitness testimony and bearing witness that necessitates the infinite responsibility of subjectivity and therefore of ethical relations with the “other.” Given that most teachers and students encounter trauma through the media or literature, it is important to explore how they can engage in witnessing without falling into the trap of voyeurism/sensationalism or in melodramatic attempts to close the wound, as in some Hollywood treatments of historical trauma (see Kaplan 2005). Given the risks of representing trauma and the challenges in forming empathetic connections between witness and testifier, listener and speaker, one wonders what forms of pedagogical engagement may be constituted to deal with trauma and what the limits of teaching and learning about trauma

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testimonies are. What is generally lacking in the popular identifications with the victims of a traumatic event is a conceptualization of critical affect that might enable teachers and students not simply to feel for those victims and their loved ones, but also to understand how trauma operates through affective connection and articulates its differences from other places around the world and the power relations involved in each case. It is this context that provides a compelling basis for a pedagogical exploration of trauma and affect; we need pedagogies that pay attention to issues of power relations and social conflict. We have to consider, therefore, how critical pedagogy, as a pedagogy that takes into consideration such issues, is in a position to address traumatic conflict and enrich peace education efforts.

Emotion, Trauma, and Critical Pedagogy: Working through “Troubled Knowledge” In general, “critical pedagogy” refers to any number of oppositional pedagogies promoting educational experiences that are transformative, empowering, and transgressive (Giroux 2004; Kincheloe 2005; McLaren 2003). Drawn from many theoretical streams (Darder, Baltodano, and Torres 2003) but influenced greatly by the Freirean paradigm (e.g. Freire 2003), critical pedagogy seeks to expose and undo hegemonic values and taken-for-granted conceptions of truth that privilege the oppressor and perpetuate domination and social injustice (Darder et al. 2003). A central aim of critical pedagogy, then, is: to engage teachers and students in a critical, dialectical examination of how power relations (particularly connected to the construction of knowledge) operate in schools and society and create or sustain hegemonic structures; and to equip teachers and students with the language of critique and the rhetoric of empowerment to become transformative agents who recognize, challenge, and transform injustice and inequitable social structures. Critical educators are increasingly faced with what Lynn Worsham (2006) describes as “post-traumatic” cultural moments that infiltrate our current pedagogical work as teachers, students, and scholars. These moments, marked by “unprecedented historical trauma” (Worsham 2006: 170)—such as genocides, apartheid, September 11, wars and conflicts around the world—shape a culture’s emotional landscape in ways that make us “more likely to abide by reductive binaries and black-and-white solutions and therefore to avoid the ambiguity and discomfort that accompanies genuine inquiry into emotional investments” (Stenberg 2011: 350). It is in the context of such moments that we are offered both the challenge and the opportunity to think more deeply about the complex emotional ramifications of critical

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pedagogy in relation to issues of conflict, peace, healing, and reconciliation; that is, moments in which the rhetoric of critical pedagogy as we know it might prove inadequate. Jonathan Jansen, who writes in the context of post-apartheid South Africa, argues that critical theory and pedagogy in post-traumatic contexts is severely limited “for making sense of troubled knowledge and for transforming those who carry the burden of such knowledge on both sides of a divided community” (2009: 256, added emphasis). “Troubled knowledge” is the knowledge of a traumatized past such as the profound feelings of loss, shame, resentment, or defeat that one carries from his or her participation in a traumatized community. As Jansen maintains, critical theory receives and constructs the world as divided (e.g. black/white, oppressors/oppressed) and then takes sides to free the oppressed. The focus of this concern is less on what to do with the racist or nationalist in the classroom and more to do with how to empower the marginalized. Yet, the challenge in traumatized communities is often how to deal with the student who resists or rejects critical perspectives and who openly expresses racist or nationalist views because his or her privileges are being threatened or lost; or the student who is so traumatized from racism or nationalism that he or she feels that nothing can be done to rectify the situation. Considered from the vantage point of the students who carry this differential troubled knowledge, how might critical educators weigh “disruption”? What does the notion “teaching to disrupt” mean in the context of working through troubled knowledge in post-traumatic emotional landscapes? Here I want to begin critiquing, in a constructive manner of course, some of the existing literature in critical pedagogy and the way it tends to overlook or downplay the strong emotional investments of troubled knowledge in post-traumatic situations. Examining existing literature in critical pedagogy reiterates the argument that the discourse of critical pedagogy constructs and sustains its own disciplinary affects—e.g. “noble” sentiments such as “commitment,” “devotion,” and “faith” (Yoon 2005)—which may well be repressive (Ellsworth 1989). My main contention is that some of the theoretical orthodoxies in critical pedagogy can be challenged and may be productively enriched by new ideas on how affect and emotion might be harnessed by teachers to deal with troubled knowledge. This chapter builds on this argument to highlight the importance of foregrounding rather than backgrounding the emotional complexity of “troubled knowledge” and its pedagogical implications in post-traumatic contexts. Although there have been accounts in critical pedagogy literature that critique the overemphasis on cognition or rationality and reason (e.g. Giroux 1991; McLaren 1994), emotion and affect have not been particularly underscored or substantially pursued in much of this literature (Jansen 2009; Liston

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2008; Seibel Trainor 2002). More importantly though, it has been argued that the discourse of critical pedagogy functions as a “pedagogy of affect” that mobilizes dominant tropes, especially in anti-racist pedagogies (Worsham 2001). These dominant tropes are associated with certain affects such as commitment, devotion and faith that may become normalized and even repressive (Ellsworth 1989). In other words, if these affects are not present among teachers or students in the context of critical pedagogy, then an antiracist pedagogy may be considered a failure. However, these accounts have also prompted some critical scholars to suggest that we should be more careful when we examine the affective dimensions of critical pedagogy discourse. For example, Yoon (2005: 743) writes that if affective dimensions are left unquestioned, they “would undermine our ability to understand the ways institutional discourses, even radical ones, keep our work and our imaginations and other real possibilities bound.” Also, Sarah Amsler (2011) wonders about the affective dimensions of critical pedagogy when students’ desire for individual transcendence and social change appears to be absent, rejected, or devalued. “What might conscientization mean,” asks Amsler, “when exposing power relations affirms fatalism rather than inspiring hope?” (2011: 53). Or what happens when a student rejects conscientization altogether and insists on expressing racist views in the classroom? What are the implications when critical pedagogy’s rhetoric of affect fails because it serves exclusionary ends? There is already empirical evidence showing students’ resistance and rejection of critical pedagogical efforts for a variety of reasons (Boler 2004b; Boler and Zembylas 2003; Ellsworth 1989; Zembylas 2008). This evidence exposes how some assumptions that are made in critical pedagogy may overlook the complexity of students’ emotional investments in particular social positions and discourses. The lack or rejection of desire for empowerment and resistance also indicates how pervasive some dominant pedagogies of affect and emotion are in schools and the society, that is, how some school, workplace and societal discourses and practices function in ways that sustain the forms and effects through which hegemony is lived and experienced. These dominant pedagogies of affect and emotion play undoubtedly a structural role in the constitution of subjectivities and in the justification of subjection (Worsham 2001). For example, as Worsham states, critical pedagogy’s rhetoric often seems to perceive student agency as little more than resistance, overlooking the role of affect or emotion sufficiently or in a compelling and holistic manner. What is suggested here is that critical pedagogy’s rhetoric of affect needs to be demystified and the emotional complexities of difficult knowledge have to be analyzed more deeply.

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Demystifying Critical Pedagogy’s Rhetoric of Affect and Emotion The scholars who have already acknowledged the emotional power and tenacity of various pedagogies of emotion—including critical pedagogy as a pedagogy of affect—wonder whether critical pedagogy rhetoric is implicated in serving exclusionary and ultimately conservative ends (Yoon 2005). For example, Worsham (2001) asks (rhetorically) whether critical pedagogy eventually contributes unwittingly to sustain hegemonic structures around class, race, and gender by ignoring the affective implications of transformation and by simply attempting to change students’ rational understandings through replacing faith with reason and belief with knowledge. Lindquist (2004) also questions whether critical pedagogy works to produce a new affective life and culture that takes into careful consideration the deep emotional structures of faith from which critical pedagogy itself works. These concerns reiterate that there are important tasks that need to be further delineated in critical pedagogy, particularly in contexts within which there are strong traumatic experiences. Consequently, part of “demystifying” critical pedagogy’s rhetoric of affect is delving deeper into understanding the implications when students carry a traumatized past—a past that is a source of strong emotions such as shame, guilt, resentment, nostalgia, or loss. For example, traumatic experiences such as genocides, apartheid, September 11, and wars and conflicts, require a more nuanced understanding of the consequences of the emotional burden carried by students’ affective investments to particular ideologies, especially when the desire for empowerment and humanization seems to be rejected or eroded. A more nuanced understanding of critical pedagogy’s rhetoric of affect and its implications implies two important things. First, the recognition that the work of dominant pedagogies of emotion in society and in schools has a powerful negative impact on the affective struggle for empowerment and resistance (Worsham 2001). That is, critical pedagogues need to be more critically aware of the emotional consequences when they categorize individuals into “oppressors” and “oppressed”; failing to understand how students’ emotional attachments are strongly entangled with traumatic historical circumstances and material conditions will undermine teachers’ pedagogical interventions. For example, a teacher who takes sides very quickly in a post-traumatic context in which two conflicting communities have been both “oppressors” and “oppressed”—and presumably students coming from both communities are present in the classroom—will not advance a critique of binary logic and universalizing tenets of fear and loathing toward each other (see Zembylas 2008).

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Second, as Worsham (2001) further states, there are many emotional manifestations of disempowerment and lack of resistance such as boredom, apathy, resentment, hatred, anger, nostalgia, sorrow, loss, shame, guilt, and humiliation, and generally the ways those emotions are organized and practiced across differences of race, class, and gender. A form of critical pedagogy that does not apprehend its own limitations of the complex discourses and practices of emotion that are embedded in post-traumatic situations is less likely to acknowledge emotion as a crucial aspect of political struggle for change. Thus the desire for empowerment and resistance cannot be taken for granted as a “natural resource” for critical pedagogy (Amsler 2011); rather, the emotional tensions around issues of empowerment and resistance must be placed at the heart of critical pedagogy. This understanding implies that a conception of critical pedagogy that is merely grounded in negative dialectics and counter-affirmation—that is, an emphasis on universalizing tenets about emancipatory forces and oppressive processes, ideologies, and identities—has little value in post-traumatic societies (Jansen 2009). Needless to say, this is not to deny the systemic and institutionalized character of oppression, identity, and social injustice; rather, it is to highlight that classrooms are not homogeneous environments with a common understanding of oppression, but deeply divided places where contested narratives are steeped in the politics of emotions to create complex emotional and intellectual challenges for teachers. Teachers themselves can be carriers of troubled knowledge, as Jansen (2009) rightly points out, and this has serious implications for the form that critical pedagogy takes in posttraumatic societies. Consequently, a basic premise of critical pedagogy in post-traumatic contexts should not be simply to question the dominant educational arrangements (curricula, textbooks, pedagogies); it should also be “the people there, the bodies in the classroom, who carry knowledge within themselves that must be engaged, interrupted, and transformed” (Jansen 2009: 258). These bodies and their troubled knowledge constitute the starting point for critical pedagogy in this context. Thus, taking sides early on based on justice and democracy ideals, maintains Jansen, may not be such a wise move when there is clash of embodied knowledge and memories. For instance, to turn back to the earlier example, a teacher who takes sides early on in a posttraumatic context in which two conflicting communities have been both “perpetrators” and “victims” may end up intensifying unsafe classroom spaces. It has long been acknowledged in critical pedagogy rhetoric that the classroom is not a safe space and that some teachers and groups of students may be (unintentionally) burdened, for example, through their minority status in the classroom as representatives of their group—e.g. literature that highlights the ways in which students of color in the United

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States are burdened with the responsibility of teaching White students about diversity (see Boler 2004a). It is my contention here that critical pedagogy in post-traumatic situations needs to move a step further and be attentive and cautious of the increased complexity that troubled knowledge adds to (already) unsafe spaces in the classroom. I want to extend Jansen’s (2009) analysis, therefore, by emphasizing in particular the role of critical pedagogy in highlighting those practices through which certain emotions and knowledge become of most worth, and how traumatized students and teachers might construct (more) “safe” classroom spaces within which the wounded of all sides can engage in critical and productive dialogue. As noted, it is important not to rush and take one side, thus dislodging the participants from a critical involvement with the emotions and the knowledge of one’s self and of the other side. Again, this does not imply that “anything goes” and that the recklessness of accusation is simply tolerated (Jansen 2009). By choosing to adopt a critical pedagogical lens in a post-traumatic context, the teacher is committed to interrogate how received knowledge and reconstructed emotions underlie “structures of feeling” in the teaching of various narratives, without adopting a self-righteous or a therapeutic perspective. In other words, the emotional labor that is demanded for critical pedagogy in post-traumatic contexts is not intended as a self-justified approach or a therapeutic intervention that seeks to validate some selected emotions or dismiss and pacify some others in the name of healing past wounds (see also Amsler 2011). The “healing of past wounds” approach, as Oliver (2001) aptly points out, is problematic because it hides or dismisses the relationship between trauma and power relations. Also, other critics such as Kathryn Ecclestone and Dennis Hayes (2009) emphasize that therapeutic approaches, introduced under the banners of preoccupation with students’ well-being, deliberately decrease the possibility that students will experience complexity, multiplicity, or discomfort in their studies; preoccupation with emotional fragility offers a deeply diminished view of the human subject and undermines the ways in which these feelings contribute unwittingly to the perpetuation of power inequalities and hierarchies. The critical interrogation of troubled knowledge in post-traumatic contexts marks a valuable intervention in the broad domain of critical pedagogy precisely by focusing on identifying and challenging the affective technologies and emotion-informed ideologies that underlie possible responses toward troubled knowledge—by students and teachers alike—and seeking to make a concrete difference in the lives of those who still suffer from carrying the burden of this knowledge. The process of dissolving categorizations of “us” and “them” in post-traumatic settings is a matter of observing very carefully the consequences of the underlying ideological and emotional attachments

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of the pedagogies that are being implemented. These attachments need to be engaged and interrupted in sensitive and critical ways. It is precisely in this context that critical emotional praxis, as an overarching concept that is theoretically grounded in critical pedagogy in post-traumatic societies, intersects with critical peace education.

Intersections between Critical Emotional Praxis and Critical Peace Education A critical consideration of the emotions of conflict and peace in schools enables new directions for a radical reinterpretation of peace education efforts. Principally, this reinterpretation is positioned within the micro-political terrain of the schools and the classrooms, rather than the macro-political structures of a conflict. In this manner, this chapter is essentially concerned with reconsidering the implications of the macro-political structures of a conflict in micro-political pedagogical encounters, and aims at developing capacities for renewed critical approaches in peace education. In particular, this chapter lays out a “road map” for how critical pedagogies of peace education may use the power of emotion to bring about small transformations and openings in ethical encounters with others. And here is where the notion of “critical emotional praxis” provides the overarching theoretical framework to do so. “Critical emotional praxis” is a theoretical and practical tool that recognizes how emotions play a powerful role in either sustaining or disrupting hegemonic discourses about past traumatic events (Zembylas 2008, 2015). Critical emotional praxis is theoretically grounded in a psychoanalytic and a socio-political analysis of emotion and trauma and provides a platform from which teachers and students can critically interrogate their own emotionladen beliefs. This analysis exposes privileged positions of psychic and socio-political power and moves beyond the comfort zones in which teachers and students are usually socialized in a traumatized society. Furthermore, critical emotional praxis recognizes the emotional ambivalence that often accompanies this process and thus creates pedagogical opportunities for critical inquiry into how emotions of uncertainty or discomfort, despite making the world seem ambiguous and chaotic, can restore humanity and encourage healing and reconciliation. Ambivalent emotions—for example, resentment and bitterness with feelings of common vulnerability and empathy—emerge from teaching and learning that recognizes the relationality of trauma; that is, if we can narrate “our” stories of trauma to ourselves and to those who have wounded us and listen to the narratives of those we have wounded, we might set up better conditions for imagining new political

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relations (Georgis and Kennedy 2009; Zembylas 2008). The ambivalence of emotion, then, highlights that positive and negative emotions are provisional readings and judgments of others that change, when there are opportunities to rearticulate the past in new ways. Critical emotional praxis, therefore, offers opportunities to produce transformative action because teachers and students are enabled to translate their critical emotional understandings into new ways of living with others. Emotions of trauma such as fear, when normalized, impede discourse and action for healing and reconciliation in schools in numerous ways—in the denial of the other’s humanity; in the refusal to challenge cherished beliefs; in the perpetuation of the moralistic regime of considering one’s self an eternal victim and the other a permanent perpetrator. In order to oppose the normalization of emotions of trauma and to enact peace and reconciliation practices in schools, educators need pedagogical “tools” that illuminate the interplay between emotions and trauma and critically interrogate their consequences. A critique of the politicization of emotions of trauma in schools offers a deeper understanding of the multifaceted dynamics of trauma; if students and teachers are susceptible to trauma through the normalization of emotions such as fear, then it is incumbent upon educators and policy makers to consider the force of emotions and their implications. Learning from a critical approach on the emotions of trauma is an important departure point for generating new insights into what it might mean to evaluate the prospects and challenges of healing and reconciliation in schools. As noted earlier, emotions of trauma are inextricably woven into historically-based ideologies that teach students and teachers how to perceive themselves and act towards others. This argument indicates how pedagogical practices within a community contribute to the conservation of prevailing psychological and socio-political norms in relation to another (the “enemy”) community. For example, the teaching of us-and-them and good-versus-evil narratives from an early age imposes certain affective associations that stick various signs and symbols together. These hegemonic discourses and practices systematically build a sense of ethnic identity and community that rests on absolute us-and-them and good-versus-evil dichotomies, and encourages members of one community to define themselves as the only victims of conflict. In this manner, there is no middle ground left for revolt or emotional ambivalence—e.g. to acknowledge that the other community has also suffered and its members have been victims of the conflict too. It may be argued, therefore, that school discourses and practices that promote the normalization of trauma are mis-educative and exert pedagogic violence (Worsham 2001), because trauma is politically used to reject the humanity of the “other” and perpetuate hostile relations with them (Zembylas 2008). Research in Israel (e.g. Bar-Tal 2000) and Northern Ireland

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(e.g. McGlynn et al. 2004) confirms the negative pedagogical implications of the political appropriation of emotions to perpetuate divisions and hostilities (see also Chapter 3 by Zvi Bekerman in this book). If students and teachers in traumatized societies want to create a new psychic and sociopolitical order where they do not simply remain traumatized “objects” of history, they need to reconsider their affective relationship with the “other” and how it is constructed. An important issue of reconsideration in this process is coming to terms with the emotional remains of past traumatic legacies in both schools and the wider society. Therefore, instead of taking ideas and feelings for granted, teachers and students begin to interrogate their emotional investments in core beliefs (e.g. the belief in the exclusivity of one’s victimhood and the evil nature of the “other”) and examine the consequences in relation to existing dichotomies and hostilities. These efforts expose monological perspectives and move beyond the comfort zones in which the teacher and his or her students are often socialized. While engaging in this critical interrogation does not guarantee liberatory action in itself, the process challenges students’ understanding of emotions and the ideologies in which they may be grounded (e.g. nationalism). This critical interrogation creates openings for different affective relations—such as empathy, humility, and compassion—that may advance healing and reconciliation in the context of “critical peace education.” Critical peace education pays attention to issues of structural inequalities and aims at cultivating a sense of transformative agency to advance peacebuilding (Bajaj 2008a; Bajaj and Brantmeier 2011; Brantmeier 2011; Trifonas and Wright 2013; Zembylas and Bekerman 2013). Bajaj (2008) discusses Diaz-Soto’s (2005) approach to critical peace education as situated in consciousness-raising inspired by Freire. Bajaj and Brantmeier (2011) also argue that one of the most important features of critical peace education is its alignment with a counter-hegemonic paradigm for social change through education. The goal of critical peace education is to empower young people to engage in practices and activism that increase societal equity and justice, which, in turn, foster greater peace. As Bajaj and Brantmeier write: “What we term critical peace education … is that which approaches the particularistic, seeking to enhance transformative agency and participatory citizenship, and open to resonating in distinct ways with the diverse chords of peace that exist across fields and cultures” (2011: 222). Both Bajaj’s (2008) analysis and Brantmeier’s (2011) identification of critical peace education as the cultivation of transformative agency highlight how injustice and conflict are linked. Hence, the transformation of unjust societal structures addresses conflict, just as the reduction of destructive forms of conflict fostered through critical peace education contributes to dismantling unjust structures and eliminating inequities.

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More recently, Zembylas and Bekerman (2013b) have entered the discussion on critical peace education by arguing that peace education may often become part of the problem it tries to solve if theoretical work is not used to interrogate the assumptions about peace and peace education. For this purpose, they put forward a proposition consisting of four elements aiming to reclaim criticality in peace education: (1) reinstating the materiality of things and practices; (2) re-ontologizing research and practice in peace education; (3) becoming critical experts of design; and (4) engaging in critical cultural analysis. Although their proposition acknowledges the importance of critical ontology and materiality in peace education, there is no explicit attention to the materiality of emotions and their underlying structures that constitute bodily/social/cultural/historical/political arrangements and understandings about peace, conflict, and trauma. An approach grounded in critical emotional praxis offers critical peace education the conceptual grounding to interrogate the “structures of feeling” that prevent the advancement of peace, because it critically analyzes power relations and entanglements between emotion and traumatic conflict. Critical emotional praxis addresses the ways in which traumatic conflict is manifest personally and socially and, through the critical analysis of emotion, it encourages action towards the emancipatory goals of critical peace education. At the same time, as noted earlier, critical emotional praxis takes into consideration the emotional tensions and dilemmas in post-traumatic contexts. In this manner, the notion of critical emotional praxis intersects with both critical pedagogy and critical peace education.

Conclusion Working from the assumption that critical pedagogy in these contexts must engage this terrain of troubled knowledge in ways that have not been sufficiently addressed by the critical pedagogy rhetoric so far, I have looked to work that gestures toward a discourse of critical pedagogy that considers troubled knowledge as a source of fruitful and responsive learning for the benefit of peace and reconciliation. In particular, I have argued that an approach of critical peace education and critical pedagogy that is enriched by the notion of critical emotional praxis offers opportunities to create spaces for healing and reconciliation in schools—that is, spaces that permit encounters “between the open expression of the painful past, on the one hand, and the search for the articulation of a long-term interdependent future, on the other hand” (Lederach 1997: 29). These spaces allow for the flow of alternative ideas and encourage students and teachers to realize that what they share

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with those they had classified as “the enemy” may be greater than what divides them. Undoubtedly, these spaces are messy, troublesome, and emotionally discomforting, but they have three valuable features that can promote healing and reconciliation in schools: first, developing a willingness to meet the other in humility and openness; second, acknowledging not only one’s own pain but also the pain of the other, as well as admitting responsibility for having wounded the other; and, third, putting into practice strategies that promote empathetic and humanizing ways of reconciling past grievances without establishing new moralistic regimes. Furthermore, an approach of critical peace education and critical pedagogy that is enriched by the notion of critical emotional praxis deepens awareness and criticality about the ways in which trauma stories can be used to teach fear, hate, and mistrust, and perpetuate a trauma-based worldview. This approach highlights multiperspectivity and the critical emotional analysis of all trauma stories (see also the approach of Facing History and our Ourselves in their international work discussed in Chapter 2). All stories, according to Kreuzer (2002), even the ones from the perpetrators of violence, need to be considered seriously, because they help us understand the emotional complexities of a conflict. It is in this context, for example, that emotional ambivalence and revolt offer opportunities to revisit one’s feelings and re-create emotional connections with others on a different basis. Critical emotional praxis highlights the ability to incorporate other people’s perceptions, see and feel with the “other’s” experience, and formulate solidarity bonds on the basis of common humanity and common suffering (Bekerman and Zembylas 2012). Therefore, an approach that places psychoanalytically informed perspectives and sociopolitical conceptions of emotions and trauma at the forefront is an important resource for critical peace education. Such perspectives are valuable in developing pedagogical spaces that shift from an uncritical adoption of trauma to an informed insight that “imagine[s] the world altogether differently” (Georgis and Kennedy 2009: 20). Aware of the essentializing features of many pedagogical approaches toward peace education (Zembylas 2007), this chapter emphasizes that rethinking teaching and learning about traumatic conflict, healing and reconciliation requires a subtle understanding of the ambivalence of emotion and the need to rearticulate the meaning(s) of emotions of trauma as well as their manifestations in practice (Ahmed 2004). In other words, the effects of emotional injury are powerful, yet they are also temporary and ambivalent, and do not solidify into moralistic law unless the political appropriation of emotions of trauma remains unchallenged. By paying attention to this temporality and ambivalence of emotions of trauma in the context of schools, teachers and students are essentially invited to confront the psychic, social, and political dilemmas of

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their traumatic histories as “they” encounter “others” who are often defined as “mortal enemies.” Schools are already political terrains in which emotions are ideologically appropriated; however, the role of schools can be further humanized, if they are turned into places of humane connections with adversaries. It is such connections that constitute spaces that oppose polarized trauma narratives and open possibilities for retaining the sense of community and identity. Destabilizing the rhetoric of binary opposites and the hegemonic ways of thinking and feeling about past traumas engages students and teachers in a politics that radically re-evaluates the emotional culture in which they live. From this perspective, reframing trauma stories can help restore both one’s own and the other’s humanity and counteract the confrontational content of competing narratives that lead to dehumanization. The aim is not only to understand what emotions of trauma do in everyday school life, but also to invent new interpretive approaches and practices of relating with “others”—critical pedagogies that do not fossilize emotional injury but move forward. The richness and complexity of the emotional aspects of critical peace education and critical pedagogy call for more refined and more varied pedagogical theories and practices.

Note 1

This chapter draws from material in my recently published book Emotions and Traumatic Conflict: Re-claiming Healing in Education (Oxford, 2015).

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2 Building Peace: The Opportunities and Limitations of Educational Interventions in Countries with Identitybased Conflicts Karen Murphy, Sean Pettis, and Dylan Wray

Introduction While peacebuilding should be part of the work of stable societies as well as those emerging from mass violence, it’s the latter that gets the most attention, and it is those where frayed relations between and among groups are at the greatest risk for renewed violence. It is easy to romanticize postviolence peace, particularly in divided societies with identity based conflicts. The killing stops, the terror on a daily basis ceases, and the hate-filled noise begins to quiet. If you are at a distance, it is easy to forget. Peace means at least the cessation of violence, but long-term peacebuilding does not take place in silence and on calm waters. Usually, it’s the first years of a transition when a country is most fragile. This is when a well-thought-out, comprehensive plan for peace, security, and stability really matters, one that reaches into every sector, including education. Unfortunately, this practice is rare. Negotiation takes place among political actors and in the heat of violent conflict. Sometimes efforts are

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made to redress human rights violations and repair society, but few are long term and multi-generational. Sometimes it is the new political dispensation that does not want to address what came before because of a negotiated settlement or because perhaps their legitimacy does not allow them to look back. Sometimes it’s the people themselves who fear rocking the boat once the violence has ended. In these cases, it’s often the victims who bear the burden of demanding acknowledgment and redress. As the authors of Peacebuilding 2.0 have argued, peacebuilding is a multifaceted enterprise (Greenberg, Mallozzi, and Cechvala 2012). It can occur throughout society, from the work of building a school, to writing a constitution, to creating a clean water supply. But in all cases, it requires intention. Peacebuilding must be a conscious effort. This is where the education sector can play a transformative role and why its neglect is alarming. Education is often a driver of conflict. Schools can act as sites of violence, spaces where inequalities are enacted and reinforced, and where myth and misinformation are passed as fact. Education can act as a primary divider in a divided society. With this in mind, educational reforms are necessary not just to undo the negative work of the previous regime, but to utilize the sector’s capacity for strengthening and nurturing civil society. But education cannot do this work alone, and that is one of the most important takeaways from our chapter. The education sector is essential for peacebuilding. Neglecting educational reforms means potentially destabilizing other interventions. However, without a wider framework committed to peace and social justice, the redress of human rights violations, and the repair of society, without a conscious vision articulated by leaders and implemented through institutions, educational reforms alone are fragile. Acting outside of a wider, supportive context potentially puts teachers and students at risk as they struggle to have conversations about particular topics that are considered controversial or sensitive or behave in ways that are antithetical to society at large. Also, not all teachers, or perhaps even most, began careers in education to become peacebuilders. Some find this role outside the scope of their specific job and even education as a whole. This chapter will focus on two cases, Northern Ireland and South Africa, which reveal, particularly in relationship to each other, some of the opportunities and limitations of educational interventions in countries with identity-based conflicts. We begin with a discussion of Facing History and Ourselves, the educational and professional development non-governmental organization that brings the authors together and the program upon which the partner programs in South Africa and Northern Ireland are based. Following descriptions of the wider political and transitional contexts of both countries, we explore the particular educational reforms each country has taken with attention to confronting the violent past through curricular reforms and educator professional development. Though too often neglected or limited in scope, in societies with identity-based

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conflicts, interactive work with teachers that explicitly addresses the role of identity is crucial as the role of the educator is a powerful one and the impact they can have on students should not be underestimated. Working in education provides another opportunity. That is, it’s not just the first generation in the wake of mass violence that needs to be invested in peacebuilding. Subsequent generations need to develop the skills, dispositions and behaviors that support and sustain civil society and that nurture newly established human rights and other protections. Subsequent generations also need a robust knowledge of the past and its legacies as well as the efforts made to repair and reconstruct their society.

About Facing History Facing History’s goal is to develop ethical, active, and informed global citizens. We do this through education, primarily through work with teachers, providing intensive professional development and long-term follow-up support. Facing History’s intellectual and pedagogical framework is built upon a synthesis of history and ethics. Its core learning principles embrace intellectual rigor, ethical reflection, emotional engagement, and civic agency. Its teaching parameters engage the methods of the humanities: enquiry, critical analysis, interpretation, empathetic understanding, and judgment. Facing History teachers employ a carefully structured methodology to provoke thinking about complex questions of citizenship and human behavior. We refer to this as a “scope and sequence.” Teachers begin with an exploration of the multifaceted nature of human identity. This is followed by an analysis of questions of membership and belonging, in which students explore the human tendency for creating an “other.” They develop the ability to think historically, hypothetically, and imaginatively about why people in the past acted as they did, the choices available to them, and the possibility that other choices might have been taken. The Facing History approach goes on to explore difficult questions of judgment, memory, and legacy, and the necessity for responsible civic participation to prevent injustice and protect democracy in the present and future.

Facing History in South Africa and Northern Ireland In 2003 Facing History developed a collaboration in South Africa with Shikaya, a non-governmental organization (NGO), and the Western Cape Education Department called “Facing the Past—Transforming Our Future” (Murphy,

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Sleeper, and Strom, 2011). In 2003, we also began working in Northern Ireland (Murphy and Gallagher 2009). In 2009, we partnered with an NGO there called the Corrymeela Community to create “Facing Our History, Shaping the Future.” In both South Africa and Northern Ireland, our partnerships focus on teachers and primarily, though not exclusively, history education. We provide in-depth professional development, individual and group follow-up support, access to resources locally and through Facing History’s international network, and access to ongoing engagement, including online courses and workshops, opportunities to apply for small grants for innovative practice, and participation in community events and other cross-communal activities. We also work with preservice teachers through partnerships with universities, and in South Africa and Northern Ireland, we work directly with young people. In South Africa, Dylan Wray has developed a student leadership program through Shikaya, and, in Northern Ireland, Sean Pettis offers in-school workshops and cross-communal residential programs as part of Facing Our History. Both Facing the Past and Facing Our History enjoy participation in a wider network of scholars, policy makers, community leaders, and cultural producers. They are also part of formal educational interventions that are part of their country’s respective transitions. Importantly, in both countries, as in the other places we work, the training and curricular approach is guided by Facing History’s scope and sequence referred to above. This sequence of study while designed with adolescents in mind also provides significant opportunities for adult learners—in this case, teachers—to grapple with the history they are confronting and its implications for themselves as citizens and as people who were, in some way, a part of that history and the conflict.

The Cessation of Mass Violence, Negotiating a Future Both Northern Ireland and South Africa transitioned toward peace in the early 1990s. In April of 1994, for the first time, all South Africans of voting age participated in a democratic election, a culminating event of a multi-year peace process which included the negotiations of CODESA (the Convention for a Democratic South Africa) of an interim constitution and the wide participation of community leaders and civil society organizations who represented the National Peace Accord which helped to facilitate South Africa’s transition. In this period South Africa also enjoyed extraordinary leadership by individuals from multiple political parties and identity groups. Despite the many differences among the leaders who negotiated South Africa’s transition, they managed to articulate a national, inclusive vision of South Africa’s future. They focused not

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on the destruction of South Africa’s institutions, but on their transformation (see USIP 2014). And, they appealed to all South Africans to find a way to imagine themselves as part of a “rainbow nation.” While largely mythic, as so many national imaginings are, South African leaders found ways to bring their people along and participate in their newly (re)constructed state, to find confidence in it, their leaders, and in themselves, even as they stepped into the unknown. The transitional justice measures used in South Africa, including the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC), were consistent with and extended this foundation, one that put the past squarely in the center of the country’s history. The TRC brought the stories of some of the major abuses of apartheid into South Africans’ homes daily, simultaneously putting forth and reinforcing a narrative regarding the role of the past as an essential touchstone for navigating the present and future. In August of 1994, the Irish Republican Army (IRA) declared a ceasefire in Northern Ireland. Nationalists celebrated this event, while Loyalists and Unionists reacted with skepticism. Still, it was a watershed moment in Northern Ireland and one that inspired poet Michael Longley (2006) to write “Ceasefire,” a poem published on the front page of The Irish Times days after the IRA declaration. It is a poem that imagines the challenges facing the Northern Irish using Homer’s The Iliad and the reconciliation of Priam and Achilles for inspiration. When they had eaten together, it pleased them both To stare at each other’s beauty as lovers might, Achilles built like a god, Priam good-looking still And full of conversation, who earlier had sighed: I get down on my knees and do what must be done And kiss Achilles’ hand, the killer of my son. (2006) Two months later, the three main Loyalist paramilitary groups declared a ceasefire. While the cessation of violence only lasted seventeen months, it created the foundation for a political process and for bringing Sinn Fein, the Nationalist/Republican political entity, into negotiations for a peaceful settlement. Like South Africa, Northern Ireland had community leaders and civil society organizations dedicated to working cross-communally and working toward peace. It did not, however, enjoy many of the factors that made South Africa’s transition a more stable one. Unlike South Africa where a minority oppressed a majority, Northern Ireland’s divided society is more evenly balanced between Catholic and Protestant, with demographic shifts presenting an ongoing source of conflict. In addition, whereas the state was a site of social cohesion for South Africans in a national process of transformation, the

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state has served as a point of conflict for Northern Ireland. What Northern Ireland will be (whether part of the Republic of Ireland, part of Great Britain, its own entity?), what it is called (the North of Ireland, Ulster?), and what citizenship looks like, all remain in dispute. And these disagreements are bound up in a fundamentally divided view of the past, one in which both Catholics (Nationalists/Republicans) and Protestants (Loyalists/Unionists) see themselves as victims and the other community as responsible. This disagreement over the past is not only about history. It’s also about how Northern Ireland imagines itself in the present and the future; it’s about how people will live together in light of what happened … and how they interpret those past events. South Africa articulated an official narrative with apartheid at its center through multiple processes and institutions, including political speeches, cultural productions, the Constitution itself and the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. Within this context, facing the violent past was part of what South Africa was doing; it was not an aberrant activity. In Northern Ireland, despite the work of civil society organizations and a negotiated political settlement in the form of the Multi-Party Belfast Agreement in 1998, the past remains contested. Historical commissions, commissions of enquiry and other efforts have not been woven into a wider framework. Instead, these have occurred as discrete, autonomous efforts, each ultimately contested by one group or another. Unlike South Africa’s transition which inspired confidence in a shared future that had roots in a difficult past, Northern Ireland’s has been ambivalent at best. As one can imagine, these issues have a profound effect on education, specifically history education.

South Africa As South Africa emerged from the end of apartheid, building peace was at the forefront of the new government’s agenda. South Africa was a country divided, battered, and broke. Not only had apartheid brought with it years of repression and violence, the years between the formal dismantling of apartheid that began in 1990 with the release of Nelson Mandela and the first democratic elections in 1994, were the most violent South Africa had faced. The new government had to ensure not only a smooth peaceful transition of power but an ongoing peaceful coexistence among South Africans. The formal structures and systems of apartheid, the schooling system being a fundamental one, needed to be abolished or transformed, and South Africans themselves needed to learn what it meant to live together as democratic citizens and jointly create a better, stronger country.

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Education for Peacebuilding in South Africa Education was recognized as one of the ways to build this post-apartheid, peaceful, and stable South Africa. In attempts to transform the education system from one that benefited and upheld a minority to one that benefited all the country’s citizens, three major curricular revisions have been implemented since 1994—Curriculum 2005, the National Curriculum Statement, and the Curriculum Assessment Policy Statements (CAPS). For the purposes of this case-study, we will look at the second revision rather than its preceding and post revisions. This second revision, the National Curriculum Statement, is worthy of particular attention because it most clearly articulates the attempts to harness education for peacebuilding and the entrenchment of the values needed to uphold democracy. In 1999, Professor Kadar Asmal was appointed Minister of Education. He immediately introduced a number of investigations into the education system and the first post-apartheid curriculum revision. Two investigations are of particular relevance—the first focused on the place of history in schools, and the second on the potential for values to be infused across the subjects in the curriculum. The first, commissioned in 2000, resulted in the release of the Report of the History and Archeology Panel. This report identified History as a key subject in peace and nation building. According to the Report, the study of history: MM

is important not only in itself, but also because a knowledge of the past is crucial to an understanding of the present. Unless one knows something of the past, then one has no informed criteria by which to assess and to judge the present. In other words, contemporary problems and complexities, like the workings of race, class and gender, have to be seen within the context of their development in time.

MM

encourages civic responsibility and critical thinking, which are key values in a democratic society. The study of how to analyse sources and evidence and the study of differing interpretations and divergent opinion and voices, is a central means of imparting the ability to think in a rigorous manner and to think critically about society. (Ministry of Education South Africa 2000a)

The Report of the History and Archeology Panel was used to guide the writing of the History within the National Curriculum Statement. This meant that the History curriculum was being used to do more than just teach the facts of the past.

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Minister Asmal also initiated a working group to explore how the development of values could be incorporated more specifically into the curriculum revision process. The Report of the Working Group on Values in Education, released in 2000, underpinned the writing of the National Curriculum Statement and again demonstrates how education was to be used to promote peace, reconciliation, and nation-building. The report aimed to begin “a national debate on the appropriate values South Africa ought to embrace in its primary and secondary educational institutions” (Department of Education South Africa 2000). It recognized that South Africa was still a country in transition that required deliberate efforts to promote reconciliation and healing: [It] would be foolish to expect that the severe corrosion of our human dignity [during apartheid] would heal quickly and without purposeful effort, active reconciliation and focused attention to developing the values necessary to underpin our democracy. (Ministry of Education South Africa 2000b) The Report also reaffirmed the role that History as a discipline in schools could play in peace-building and reconciliation: More than any other discipline, good history put to good use taught by imaginative teachers can promote reconciliation and reciprocal respect of a meaningful kind, because it encourages a knowledge of the other, the unknown and the different. (Ministry of Education South Africa 2000) But it is in the opening lines of the National Curriculum Statement (NCS), which began to be rolled out in schools across the country during 2003, that the use of education for peacebuilding was most clearly articulated. It reads The National Curriculum Statement Grades 10–12 (General) seeks to promote human rights, inclusivity, environmental and social justice. All newly-developed Subject Statements are infused with the principles and practices of social and environmental justice and human rights as defined in the Constitution of the Republic of South Africa … … The kind of learner that is envisaged is one who will be imbued with the values and act in the interests of a society based on respect for democracy, equality, human dignity and social justice as promoted in the Constitution. (Ministry of Education South Africa 2000b) Once the curriculum had been written, teachers across the country began to be trained. Ultimately, as explained below, this is where the peacebuilding efforts in education fell short and where the project, Facing the Past— Transforming our Future, fills an important gap.

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While teachers were trained to teach the new National Curriculum Statement and while the Statement made it very clear how issues of human rights, democracy, and values were to be infused in all subjects, the focus of this training was never specifically around supporting the curriculum’s larger aim of peacebuilding. Given financial and time constraints, department officials tasked with training teachers focused their energies around those elements that were needed for teachers to teach the content and skills. Values were not a priority. So South Africa was left with (and we would argue has still been left with) very good principles and visions for the schooling system on paper, but in practice, nationally, the teachers in the system have not been supported around peacebuilding. It was in this absence of consistent, thoughtful, and ongoing support for teachers in realizing the peacebuilding and democracy aims of the curriculum that Facing the Past was formed. Before looking at the Facing the Past project in more detail, it is worth briefly looking at why, in a country like South Africa that has emerged from the apartheid history of identity conflict, teachers, and specifically History teachers, need a reflective, engaging, supportive, and ongoing professional development if they are to be able to use their classroom space to promote values, human rights, democracy, and peace. Apartheid damaged South Africans. It damaged teachers of all races. And this shapes how they teach this history. For many, the act of teaching the history of apartheid brings stories, memories and emotions into their classrooms (similar to Zembylas’ arguments about educating in post-traumatic contexts in Chapter 1 of this volume). Janine is a history teacher. She describes what happens when she teaches a history she experienced. I think every time that I teach Apartheid it’s always like a first time. When you talk about many of the very bad things, well, Apartheid was bad, but when you really talk about a lot of the bad things … There are many times when you actually stop, when you’re teaching and you realize you just said something, not something wrong, but you think about what you just said. Then, I actually stop to think over that again. So if I can just make an example … there was an incident in Athlone in the 1980s which was called the Trojan Horse incident [the police hid inside crates on a truck and deliberately drove into an area where they knew they would be met with resistance. Once in the middle of the protest, the armed police emerged and opened fire killing three young people]. So, and this is just an example. Then, I talk about it, because I was a high school student during the time, and then when I explain what happened … I would think about this horrible incident and think over it again, and actually stop talking. So, that’s the kind of impact that it has. It doesn’t happen a lot, I mean, teachers can keep themselves together. So that’s one of the things that

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happens, that because we are witnesses and we lived through Apartheid and resistance. As teachers or as adults, it’s difficult to sum it up. (Stanton 2010: 42) In reading about Janine’s difficulties in teaching this particular history, one needs to bear in mind that every year when she repeats the syllabus to a new group of students, she revisits this pain and trauma. What kind of support does a teacher like Janine need in order to teach a past that is still very present to her and teach it in a way that can build a culture of peace in her classroom? It is with questions like this in mind that we formed Facing the Past—Transforming our Future in 2003. The program was formed to support teachers to develop a culture in schools whereby young people learn that their decisions can change the course of history. Teachers involved in the program encourage learners to link human rights violations of the past to issues and moral dilemmas that they face today. Through the scope and sequence, South African students engage with issues of personal and group identity. They explore what it means to be a South African and how issues of class, race, and gender continue to play a role in how they are seen, who they are, and the decisions they make. The students explore issues of personal choice and ethical decision-making within the context of historical case studies that are included in the official school curriculum. Crucially, they think deeply about how we remember the past and deal with issues of forgiveness and reconciliation in South Africa today. They also spend time in class grappling with what it means to be an active and caring South African citizen. A key aspect of the program is cultivating a safe space for mixed groups of teachers to work together to grapple with the impact that the past has had on them, and the impact this has on their teaching. Through many of the same resources and lessons that the teachers themselves will use in classrooms with their learners, teachers are supported in workshops to address issues such as internalized personal legacies of the past. This is a challenging process. In the excerpt below, Janine speaks about what it means to engage with these issues in a room full of other South African teachers. For context, Janine uses the term “Coloured” in reference to other South Africans. The term was used during apartheid to classify a range of South Africans that included those of mixed race, Malay in origin, and indigenous Khoisan. The term is still used today. Janine describes herself as a Coloured South African. I remember when I came to Facing The Past for the first time ... There was one teacher ... she told her story. And it was clear, and she’s still that person, she was this upper class Coloured. And she still is! She kind of separated herself from just ordinary Coloureds. And she lived that upper

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class Coloured life in her town. And she said it. She might have said it in passing, but it was also very clear. Anybody could see. And I remember at that point, feeling a lot of resentment, and actually, I couldn’t stand her, for what she represented. I resented her for living that life that she lived. And resented her for not knowing that there was so many more people like you, that were so far worse off, and you don’t even know. I resented her for that: “You don’t even know! And you still sit here, and it seems as if you don’t know.” (Stanton 2010: 48) In order for Janine to be able to use the subject she teaches to develop the habits and values of active, peaceful, tolerant, and democratic citizens in her students, Janine, like so many other teachers, needs the support and space to recognize some of the legacies she still faces, and begin to deal with them. As another Facing the Past teacher, Roy, said in an interview, “I am aware of some of the baggage I bring into the classroom; it’s the baggage I’m not aware of that’s problematic. I need to confront my own prejudices and values, because it’s only when I confront my reality that I can allow learners to confront theirs” (Stanton 2010: 9). It is this sentiment that is at the heart of Facing the Past but that, unfortunately, has lacked in the official curriculum training supplied by the Ministry of Education on a national level. Without providing the support for teachers like Janine and Roy to engage with the past in personal and reflective ways that bring them together with other South Africans, it remains unlikely the teachers will have the confidence and courage to do so on their own. For most of the 500 teachers who have been involved in Facing the Past, the program was the first opportunity to engage with the past on a deeply personal level with educators from other identity groups. If History can be a tool for peacebuilding in a still divided South Africa, then the teachers who are asked to use that tool need to be allowed the space to realize the impact of the past on them, what they believe, and how they teach. Without this, the past can be used (in most cases, unwittingly by History teachers) to reaffirm anger and fear, create prejudices, hide truths, and pass on traumas to the young people in their classrooms.

Education and Identity-based Conflict in Northern Ireland Control of education in societies with identity-based conflicts is a critical issue and Northern Ireland is no exception. Transmission of cultural norms

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and beliefs is a widely recognized function of education. What might look like a fairly benign function in a stable country, however, is more potent in a conflicted one. In the case of Northern Ireland, the contest regarding who controls education is long, stretching back to at least the 1820s, when national schooling was being established across Ireland (Wright 1996). This provides a backdrop in which it can be argued that “historically, schooling in Ireland has been shaped more by clerics than by educationalists” (Murray 2010: 190). Over time, a divided structure emerged with separate school management systems containing “maintained” (Catholic), “controlled” (de facto Protestant), and “voluntary” (which could be either Protestant or Catholic) schools enrolling approximately 93% of school-aged children by 2013 (Department of Education Northern Ireland 2013). This reproductive function of education can of course be equally countered by its reconstructive potential. Gallagher (2008) contends that there have been three broad strands of approach within education that have attempted to promote reconciliation, or perhaps more accurately, to minimize the negative influence of communal division and violence (from approximately 1969 onwards). These are curriculum interventions and textbook reforms, contact programs, and integrated education. While within these interventions there has been evidence of innovative and effective practice, their overall systemic impact has been limited as peace building work remains on the margins of schools’ priorities. During the conflict, these initiatives were operating within the context of ongoing daily violence, and with negative political and social pressure suggesting such work was manipulative and, in some extreme cases, a conspiratorial attempt to smuggle ecumenism in the “back door” (Richardson 2011). While within schools there have been committed individuals, generally teachers have been reluctant to engage in such work. This may be owing to an unsupportive environment, a lack of confidence in dealing with controversial issues, a sense that they have not been properly trained or lack the proper resources, or a feeling that such work is simply not their responsibility (Gallagher 2008). There is also a wider silence that cloaks the past. The troubles were kept out of schools as a way to keep pupils safe. But that strategy also reflects and reinforces a wider, public silence.

Curricular Reforms and Initiatives The most widespread post-Belfast Agreement reform of education has been the 2007 revised national curriculum for Northern Ireland (NIC). This includes statutory provision for “Personal Development and Mutual Understanding”

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at the Primary level (4–11 years old) and “Local and Global Citizenship” at Post Primary (11–16 years old) (Richardson 2011). The revised NIC has taken into account some of the shortcomings of previous initiatives and sought to mainstream peacebuilding themes into the curriculum. At the Post Primary level it has done this in at least two ways: first, through the mainstreaming of concepts across the curriculum, whereby all subjects have to make a contribution to key elements such as ethical awareness, moral character, and cultural diversity, and second, through discrete subjects, namely Local and Global Citizenship. In relation to mainstreaming, this has included clarification of the aims, objectives, and underpinning value base of the curriculum such as an emphasis on community spirit, openness to new ideas, tolerance, and respect (CCEA 2007). Curricular guidance also makes explicit its intentions in this regard: “The most dramatic and significant change within society in Northern Ireland recently has been the move away from violence towards a culture that supports democratic politics. Education has a responsibility to support this” (CCEA 2007: 15). Part of this responsibility is also evident in the History curriculum for Key Stage 3 (11–14 years old), at which level History is a compulsory subject. In what can be considered a radical outcomes-focused curriculum framework, all pupils should have the opportunity to “investigate the long and short term causes and consequences of the partition of Ireland and how it has influenced Northern Ireland today including key events and turning points” (HMSO 2007). The issue of ‘dealing with the past’ continues to be one of the most difficult issues—a point acknowledged by the Northern Ireland Executive in their policy for improving community relations (Northern Ireland Executive 2013). A case in point was the subsequent failure of the multi-party talks created out of that policy that sought to agree to a way forward on this very theme (“Northern Ireland: Richard Haass talks end without deal” 2013). On the one hand, there exists a strong curricular emphasis on supporting young people to understand the painful and difficult past. On the other hand, a lack of political leadership and wider societal support compounds the challenges facing educators who are tasked to do so. In addition to the NIC, in 2011 the Department of Education supplemented the curriculum with a new policy regarding community relations work. The Community Relations, Equality, and Diversity (CRED) Policy locates community relations work within a wider human rights and equality framework and recognizes the greater diversity of population in Northern Ireland since the original policy was developed twenty years previously (DENI 2011). This policy seeks to complement and reinforce the curricular interventions already mentioned and locate peacebuilding themes at the core of school business. This includes an emphasis on training educators to develop the necessary skills to undertake such work with young people. While the policy is complemented by a small grant scheme to support such initiatives, ironically the overall budget was reduced from its previous level (DENI 2010).

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From Policy to Implementation There is a gap between the intention of these policies and their actual implementation. These educational initiatives reflect the wider ambiguities around Northern Ireland’s transition to peace. For example, the Belfast Agreement includes a commitment to “facilitate and encourage integrated education” (NIO 1998), but no systemic approach to operationalize this aspect of the Agreement has been made, despite survey evidence as recent as 2014 suggesting a desire amongst the Northern Ireland populace, and, crucially young people themselves, for more integrated education (IEF 2013). Moreover, in 2014 the Department of Education was deemed by a High Court Judge to have failed in its legal duty to fulfil its statutory obligation towards promoting integrated education following a legal challenge from an Integrated school that had been refused additional funding to expand their intake despite increased demand (Black 2014). Importantly, since 2007 there has been a political and funding shift in focus from integrated education to “shared” education (Hansson, O’Connor Bones, and McCord 2013). While a variety of definitions are in use, Shared Education is a hybrid of the pre-existing model of contact programs. Schools collaborate across different sectors, sharing lessons and resources (including, potentially, staff and buildings). This shift is evidenced within the Northern Ireland Executive’s Programme for Government 2011–15 which includes a laudable commitment to “ensure all children have the opportunity to participate in shared education programmes by 2015” (Northern Ireland Executive 2011: 11). But the document makes no reference to integrated education. The point of this analysis is not to get caught in a dichotomous ‘shared’ versus ‘integrated’ argument. In an education system as divided as Northern Ireland’s, providing opportunities for young people and the adults who work with them to meet and work together is a ‘no brainer’ in educational, social and economic terms. Exploring these approaches through the lens of peacebuilding is important. Shared education may provide a bridge across divides, but it may not have the capacity to tackle structural division, with separate schools still being the norm. Another question of concern is what is the quality and nature of the contact between young people? It is possible that shared education programs may not directly tackle any of the issues that contribute to Northern Ireland’s conflict. It is the experience of both the Facing our History project and the Corrymeela Community’s almost fifty year history of reconciliation work, that unless people have the opportunity to actually discuss the issues that divide them, there is a weak foundation upon which to build new possibilities. This is also something integrated schools have to consider in the professional development offered to teachers and the courses offered to students.

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Building Peace through Facing History It is within this wider context that our project was developed and is being implemented. To be sure, we are challenged by the limitations articulated above—segregated schooling and its legacies, a reluctant teaching population, a rigid school schedule (thirty-five minute classes), and the absence of a wider framework for peacebuilding. But we also have vibrant examples of this work in civil society. Both WAVE Trauma Centre and the Corrymeela Community have drawn on Facing History’s content and methods in their respective efforts. WAVE, working with a population directly affected by conflict, offers courses in transition that draws on Facing History’s resource “Holocaust and Human Behavior” and follows the scope and sequence, guiding participants in a process that supports their ability to make connections to their own lives and social context. Corrymeela has drawn on Facing History’s content in youth programs. These are cross-communal and residential, providing young people with a sustained opportunity to spend time together and talk about challenging issues such as identity, group behavior, the conflict and its legacies in a structured, facilitated manner. In the formal education sector, there are educators who have taken this work on in serious and substantive ways. For some teachers, Holocaust and Human Behavior provides a model for historical engagement that acts as a springboard for studying the troubles. For former teacher (now principal) Julie, the Facing History training acted as a catalyst for self-examination about her own biases and then her practice as a teacher. She describes this process below: Beyond the silence, I had told myself that I didn’t have any of the prejudices that had wracked my country. I had always thought that I was a lovely liberal person. I never looked at it more closely because the feelings that I would have needed to examine were bottled up. I kept them bottled up until that first day I took the Facing History training. That was when I saw the picture of that man, that man who looked so like my uncle, and it all poured out of me. There was another woman there, and she was as moved by the picture as I was. She was a Catholic from one of those neighborhoods that I had, in my mind, imagined as the place where “The Others” lived. We left the room together sobbing, sat down and talked about our experiences and the prejudices that we both had. I had always thought that whatever “The Others” had endured in their neighborhoods, they deserved. But that day, I came to understand two things: first that those people whom I had dismissed as “The Others” had suffered just as I had, and I also understood that I, in my silence, was not blameless either. As a direct result of

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the Facing History training, I was able to recognize the common bond she and I and all of the rest of us who had grown up during the Troubles shared, and that now, we could stop being silent. The widespread implementation of this work is a long-term commitment and will require regular follow-up support. Many educators feel successful in their efforts to teach some of these courses, but struggle mightily when making connections to their own contexts. Others express fear of offending or angering parents, community members and pupils. They might attempt a few things or a “balanced approach” to historical study, one that does not invite ethical judgments about the past. We’ve found that cross-communal training, access to content, and modeling of lessons all help, but the enforcement of the curriculum, the support of the administration and wider communal support are also essential pieces.

Conclusion In divided societies with identity-based conflicts, it is more common to find efforts focused on peacebuilding where there is, or has been, violence. This approach ignores the core institutions and structures, education central among them, that facilitate what takes place in the margins. Peacebuilding has to be a cross-societal effort, not one that only targets an interface or an area where communities are in conflict. It also has to be supported through institutions and processes, and through leadership. For educational reforms to contribute meaningfully and substantively to peacebuilding, they must be integrated into a wider framework aimed at repair and reconstruction. It is difficult to imagine a stable, peaceful future for divided societies that do not integrate educational reforms into their transitions. This is myopic at best. Peace is ultimately a process, just as the development of a democracy is a long-term venture that must be nurtured and developed, one that societies must always strive for and vigilantly protect. It can never be taken for granted. As the examples of South Africa and Northern Ireland reveal, educational reforms are multi-faceted and a critical element is an investment in teacher professional development.

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3 Experimenting with Integrated Peace Education: Critical Perspectives in the Israeli Context Zvi Bekerman

Introduction Over the past three and a half decades there has been considerable growth in peace education as a field of social education that is concerned about war, conflict, and violence and how to promote peace in the world (Galtung 1969; Harris and Morrison 2003). It has evolved in multiple geographical sites, reflecting the universal character of conflict (Burns and Aspeslagh 2014; Murithi 2009). The scope of peace education has expanded in recent years and has become more inclusive of areas such as human rights education, citizenship education, multicultural education, environmental education, and social justice education (Bajaj 2008b). In Israel–Palestine, a land plagued with protracted conflict, the state of Israel initiated encounters geared towards the reduction of animosity between Jews and Palestinian citizens back in the 1980s (Helman 2002). These efforts are still sustained today with varying degrees of enthusiasm given the disparate sociopolitical conditions under which participants live. The aim of this chapter is not to review encounter efforts in their totality but to focus on the theoretical foundation supporting them, and the implementation of a rather new educational initiative, that of the integrated bilingual (Arabic– Hebrew), binational (Jewish–Palestinian) schools in Israel. In the following

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short section I offer some insights into the past and present complexities of the Palestinian–Jewish conflict in Israel and the complexities of the status of the Palestinian minority. The next two sections review issues related to the history of school integration and the development of the integrated schools in Israel. The last two sections offer a summary of main research findings and critical reflections on theoretical and methodological issues in peace education.

On the Sociohistorical Context and Minorities Israel is a Western democracy where, as in other such nation-states, the majority determines the identity and character of the state. Simultaneously, Israel is the declared homeland of the Jewish people and privileges Jews over other ethnic/religious minorities residing within its borders (Smooha 2002). Israel is also a nation ridden with conflict(s), the most notable of which is that between the Palestinians and the Jews. Jews and Palestinians1 do not represent dichotomous groups with respect to their historical developments and cultural resources. Nevertheless, because of the conflict’s duration, they have been constructed as such: their identities have been shaped in direct opposition to one another (Sharoni and Abu-Nimer 2000). That said, both groups belong to the monotheistic religious tradition, and Muslim and Christian Palestinians see their roots in the Jewish prophetic tradition. They share a Semitic origin for their corresponding languages, Hebrew and Arabic. Both groups include individuals representing a wide gamut of religious practices. The majority of Palestinians in Israel are Muslim; others are Christian (ten percent), Druze, and Bedouin (Lewin 2012). Jews include the ultra-orthodox to fully secular, and those with origins in Western, Middle Eastern, and African countries. The Palestinian–Jewish conflict can be traced to the birth of political Zionism at the end of the nineteenth century and to the development of Arab nationalism in response to the colonization in the Ottoman and the British Empires of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries (Abdo and Yuval-Davis 1995). This seemingly intractable dispute resulted from at least two dominant ideological discourses, one Jewish and one Palestinian, involving control of the land and recognition of group sovereignty. Historically, the region was never autonomous but has had a long history of colonial and imperial rule (Khalidi 1997). Two major historical events prior to the creation of the state of Israel in 1948—the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire, which controlled Palestine for four centuries, and the rise of anti-Semitism in Europe culminating with the Holocaust in World War II—serve to position the conflict in

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its wider international context. Since the 1920s, violence has afflicted the area. It became fiercer after the UN partition decision in 1947 and when Prime Minister David BenGurion declared the independence of Israel in 1948 without declaring the state borders. The 1948 war, called the War of Independence by the Jewish Israelis and the Nakba (the Catastrophe) by the Palestinians, was the first open military clash between the Zionist and Arab nationalist movements. Four major wars have erupted since then, in 1956, 1967, 1973, and 1982. The Intifada (literally “shaking off” in Arabic but connoted as “uprising” in English) broke out in 1987 and 2000, organized in the administered territories under the flag of the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO), brought about even bloodier events. Even after the Oslo agreement between Israel and the PLO in 1993 and the recent disengagement from the Gaza Strip, it is unclear whether Israel and the Palestinians will achieve peace. The 2006 second Lebanese war (known too as the Israel–Hezbollah war), the takeover of the Gaza area by Hamas, together with the 2009 and 2014 attacks on Gaza by Israel and more recent outbursts of violence, leave little room for optimism. This conflict remains the most potentially explosive in Israel, placing the Jewish majority and the Palestinian (primarily Muslim) minority at perpetual odds. Though a sharp asymmetry exists between the communities with regard to the distribution of resources, the beliefs of both sides reflect their respective claims to a monopoly on objective truth regarding the conflict and the identity of its instigator, thereby undermining possibilities for resolution (Bar-Tal 1998). According to the Central Bureau of Statistics (Israel Central Bureau of Statistics 2013), 20.7 percent (1,658,000) of the total Israeli population (8,018,000) is Palestinian, with an additional 4.0 percent (318,000) counted as “others,” referring to non-Arab Christians, members of other religions, and persons not classified by religion in the Ministry of the Interior. Palestinians in Israel have chronically suffered as a putatively hostile minority with little political representation and a debilitated social and economic infrastructure (Brender 2005). Palestinian Israelis, though officially offered full rights as citizens, had these rights negated with the institution of the Military Administration in 1948, which prevented Palestinian Israelis’ entry into the labor market. During the Military Administration period, which ended in 1966, Palestinian citizens’ rights were severely restricted in terms of their freedom of movement and economic opportunities (Shafir and Peled 2002). Not surprisingly, Palestinians in Israel experience Israel as a Jewish “ethnic” state, not a democracy (Rouhana 1998); from their perspective, Israel is a colonizing state that took their lands and curtailed their freedoms (Stasiulis and Yuval-Davis 1995). In spite of the structural differences, however, most Palestinians in Israel say they would rather stay in Israel than move to a

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Palestinian state if one were to be established (Smooha 2004). Despite their active connections with Palestinians who live in the occupied territories, they do not share their collective fate because their entitlement to basic citizenship rights gives them very tangible advantages; though the economic situation of Palestinian citizens is generally poor compared with that of Jewish Israelis, they are markedly better off than most Palestinians in the Palestinian Authority (Sa’ar 2007). Palestinians living in the State of Israel are full citizens of the State; although, as mentioned, they suffer from institutionalized discrimination and are ethnically and linguistically marginalized. Arabic as a minority language in Israel has been systematically marginalized and undermined (Ben-Rafael et al. 2006). Arabic’s status as an official language of the State is largely symbolic; in practice it is absent from the national public sphere (Amara and Mar’i 2002). The use of Arabic is stigmatized to the extent that some Hebrew speakers are suspicious when they encounter Arabic (Yitzhaki 2010). Officially, Arabic is a mandatory subject in Israeli Jewish high schools, but only twenty-five percent of the pupils actually study it because schools allow the students to learn other disciplines (Shohamy 2010). This is particularly ironic given that Arabic is spoken to varying degrees throughout the State of Israel and remains historically relevant for Jewish populations that emigrated from Arab countries as well as to Palestinian populations (Ben-Rafael et al. 2006). Jews and Palestinians study in separate school systems and though both groups consider the separation to be efficient (Swirski 1990), the question of whether separation necessarily means inequality has plagued more than one nation’s school system (Gavison 2000). In Israel, the discrimination in education against the Palestinian minority is well documented (Coursen-Neff 2004). When the two systems are compared, great discrepancies can be found in terms of physical facilities, teacher qualifications, retention rates, and levels of special services (Rouhana 1997). Palestinian children receive less funding per capita than Jewish children, and their classrooms are more crowded. In 2000–1, the public investment in the Jewish sector was more than three times greater than in the Palestinian sector (Israel Central Bureau of Statistics 2009). In spite of Israel’s declared goal of offering equal educational opportunity to all its citizens, and in spite of recent improvements, Palestinian Israelis have significantly lower levels of educational attainment and achievement than Jewish Israelis (Ministry of Education Culture and Sport Economics and Budgeting Administration 2002).

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On Schools and Integration Historically, schools that are segregated by nationality, ethnicity, or religion are the norm. An alternative educational model in conflict-ridden areas is integrated schools in which children who are customarily educated separately are deliberately educated together. Advocates of integration and cross-cultural contact believe schools have a seminal role to play in perpetuating or breaking the cycle of violence and division in conflicted societies (Davies 2004; Zembylas and Bekerman 2008). However, integrated education is not unique to societies suffering from what are considered to be intractable conflicts, such as South Africa, Northern Ireland, and Israel. Discussions on integrated schooling were initiated in the United States as a result of segregation at all levels of society, resulting in the landmark decision of Brown v. Board of Education (1954) that signaled a new era in educational policy. The Brown decision, which legally desegregated schools, changed the public’s expectations for education and its social role (Reber 2010). From then on, schools were viewed as having the potential to improve racial and ethnic relations by diversifying students’ social networks and reducing prejudice (Zirkel and Cantor 2004). It was also expected that integrated contact would lessen racist attitudes among whites and allow for more integration in other aspects of society. As it did then, the “contact hypothesis” (Allport 1954) stands today as the basis of educational efforts towards integration. The contact hypothesis suggests that intergroup contact, under conditions of status equality and cooperative interdependence while allowing for sustained interaction between participants and the potential formation of friendships, might help alleviate conflict between groups and encourage changes in negative intergroup attitudes (Allport 1954; Pettigrew and Tropp 2006). Since Allport’s initial formulation, the contact hypothesis has developed and, today, researchers have turned their attention toward how and why contact seems to work, aside from those conditions originally cited by Allport. Recent studies have critically approached the adoption of Allport’s contact hypothesis toward the improvement of intergroup relations, suggesting that researchers have failed to contend with the fact that Allport’s theoretical work is fundamentally one on prejudice and not intergroup relations (Zuma 2014). Most of the numerous studies about intergroup contact have tried to assess its effectiveness by focusing on attitudinal change determined by pre- and post- measures (Gaertner et al. 1993; Pettigrew and Tropp 2006). A meta-analysis affirmed the benefits of intergroup contact when the contact situation maximizes most, or all, of its optimal conditions (Pettigrew and Tropp 2000). However, what characterizes these encounters is that they are often

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one time, singular, two- to three-day events; they do not permit conclusions regarding the potential influence of sustained educational initiatives geared towards the alleviation of conflict. This is also true for more long-term arrangements (i.e. shared or integrated schools), for which there are no conclusive positive results, except that contact is shown to be effective in fostering positive intergroup attitudes and identities—again, only if Allport’s conditions of contact are upheld (e.g. see Dovidio, Gaertner, and Kawakami 2003; Hughes 2013). Empirical evidence from the United States shows that integrated education is positively related to school performance, cross-racial friendships, acceptance of cultural differences, and declines in racial fears and prejudices. At the same time, integrated schooling does not necessarily preclude re-segregation, and it fails to challenge the essentialization of race, class, and ethnicity (Mickelson and Nkomo 2012: 197). Nonetheless, views diverge on whether the Brown decision has fulfilled its promise. Some point out that though segregation is no longer state imposed, many school districts remain segregated by race (Guinier and Torres 2002). Even in integrated settings, students of color find themselves re-segregated through academic tracking or social interactional boundaries (Tatum 2003), or disproportionately represented in poorly-funded schools (Glickstein 1996). For students of color who make it to college, the dropout rate is much higher than for white populations (Bowen and Bok 1998). Optimists point to the tremendous growth of students of color among college graduates, and to the fact that many educational institutions have developed strategies such as affirmative action and multicultural curricula to support the development of students of color. These steps try to address racial disparities in order to attain the primary goal of Brown’s decision to offer equal access to educational opportunities (Harper and Griffin 2011). Although there is no comparable review of the research on the impact of integrated schools in conflicted societies, a general picture on “shared” or “integrated” education—mainly in Northern Ireland and Israel—is gradually emerging (Hughes 2013), showing that similar results are achieved with regard to cross-group friendships and acceptance of differences. Research on schools in Northern Ireland suggests that integrated education may have a positive effect on identity, out-group attitudes, and forgiveness, with potential to heal division and promote less sectarian perspectives (McGlynn et al. 2004). Members of conflicting communities who are educated together may develop more fluid and culturally layered identities as well as more tolerance (Hansson, O’Connor Bones, and McCord 2013; Hayes, McAllister, and Dowds 2007). Some studies suggest that Israel has had some success in mediating conflicting national narratives, creating opportunities to talk about the conflict, and recognizing ethnic, religious, and other differences (Bekerman 2012). This has also been noted in comparative studies of integrated or shared schooling

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in Cyprus and Northern Ireland (e.g. Bekerman, Zembylas, and McGlynn 2009). At the same time, numerous social, psychological, and political challenges have arisen amidst efforts to desegregate schooling (Zembylas and Bekerman 2013a). It has been shown that many integrated schools avoid addressing divisive issues such as religion and politics, and that this avoidance reinforces the psychological barriers sustaining division and group differences (Donnelly 2004; McGlynn, C. and London, T. 2013). Moreover, some researchers question the effectiveness of contact encounters in integrated schools while the rest of society is still deeply segregated (McGrellis 2011). Studies examining integrated schooling from a more critical perspective suggest that integrated schools for all children may not be a realistic option in some conflicted societies; scholars have further argued that if governments and other organizations are serious about their social cohesion goals, a more coherent and targeted approach to relationship building is needed (Hughes et al. 2013).

The Palestinian–Jewish Integrated Schools A relatively new and heterogeneous trend in Israel is the creation of schools that are dedicated to particular educational or ideological principles. These schools operate outside of the regular public framework yet are State recognized and supervised by the Ministry of Education. The relatively large number of ventures may indicate the dialectical tension that exists between the egalitarian perspective that traditionally dominated Israeli education leading to the foundation of State schools and the particularistic perspective that is evident in the demand for privatization and parental choice (Nir and Inbar 2004). It is within this primary context that the creation of the integrated schools should be understood, yet, given the sociopolitical realities of Israel, it is obvious that their creation is a particularly daring enterprise. In 1972, Fr. Bruno Hussar founded the first (and still only) intentionally mixed Palestinian–Jewish village in Israel. Its aim was to serve as an example of coexistence in practice for groups living in areas of intractable conflict (Bar-Tal 1999). Eight years after the foundation of the village, the first Jewish– Palestinian (Hebrew–Arabic) bilingual educational framework in Israel was created (Najjar 2007). Today, the Neve Shalom/Wahat al-Salam/Oasis of Peace school has 176 students from first to sixth grade and twenty teachers. Fifteen years later, unconnected to these previous developments, two friends—a Palestinian (citizen of Israel) and an American Jew (also citizen of Israel)—started what seemed like an impossible (and in the eyes of some consulted experts, undesirable) grassroots movement for the creation of integrated bilingual schools in Israel. This time the objective was to serve

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the “regular” population, not just those who already had ideological commitments towards cooperation and coexistence, like the population in Neve Shalom/Wahat al-Salam/Oasis of Peace. Their determination resulted in a non-governmental organization (NGO) called the “Center for Bilingual Education in Israel,” which became the tool through which most of the schools investigated in this study developed. In 2003, the NGO changed its official name to “The Center for Arab–Jewish Education in Israel,” emphasizing the initiative’s attempt at educational integration and multiculturalism rather than solely its bilingual goals. Today there are six Arab–Jewish bilingual schools in Israel, including the one in Neve Shalom/Wahat al-Salam/Oasis of Peace. Four of these schools were founded by the Center for Arab–Jewish Education, and one was founded by Hagar, an NGO established in 2006 by Jewish and Palestinian parents, teachers, community organizers, and other concerned residents from Beersheva. Of the four schools created by the Center for Arab–Jewish Education, two were created in 1998: the Galilee school near the town of Sachnin, serving 154 students from first to ninth grade, and the Max Rayne Hand-in-Hand school in Jerusalem, with 530 students from pre-kindergarten to twelfth grade. A third school, Bridge Over the Wadi, has 145 students and is the only bilingual school in a Palestinian town, Kfar Kara in the Wadi Ara Valley of central Israel. The newest school opened a preschool class in the fall of 2012 in Haifa, the third largest city in Israel, and will add one grade each year. The schools are recognized and supported by the Israeli Ministry of Education as non-religious schools; they use the standard curriculum of the secular State school system, which is supplemented to reflect the schools’ ideological commitment to equality and coexistence. A team of in-house teachers, aided by professionals, has drawn up additional programs for bicultural issues such as addressing historical narratives and religious/cultural studies. Most of each group’s religious festivals are recognized together with the groups’ respective national narratives. The schools have had to seek out creative solutions such as instituting extracurricular activities for the school community in cases where there was concern about the possible reaction of the Ministry of Education. As is the case with most of the ideological, State-recognized schools, funds from the Ministry of Education are inadequate to provide for the supplementary materials and additional staff that the integrated bilingual schools require. Accordingly, the schools must charge fees to families who enroll their children. This may account for the fact that the families attracted to the bilingual schools, both Jewish and Palestinian, are mainly from the middle to upper-middle classes. Since they have been in operation, the bilingual schools have had to adapt to the changing reality of their multileveled contexts. Some of these

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adaptations have been unequivocally positive, such as the fact that today, all the bilingual schools have their own buildings, funded mainly through donations from foreign governments or aid agencies and/or special allocations from municipalities. Other changes were the result of economic pressures on a new institution whose future was uncertain. For example, the coprincipal arrangement (one Jewish, one Palestinian) was abandoned because of budgetary pressures, and now each school has a principal and assistant principal, each from a different ethnic group. One of the central features of the bilingual schools, co-teaching (i.e. classes taught simultaneously in two languages by teachers representing each group), is also subject to a variety of contextual factors. The schools’ decision to implement co-teaching stemmed from the goal of promoting bilingualism, and the presence of two teachers—one Jewish, one Palestinian—in each class, was expected to further this goal. However, given the current Israeli reality wherein most Palestinian teachers are, of necessity, fluent in both Arabic and Hebrew but most Jewish teachers speak only Hebrew, it would have been difficult to find enough bilingual Jewish teachers for every class. This, coupled with the high cost of employing two teachers for every disciplinary subject, resulted in the decision to limit co-teaching to the homeroom teachers, while subjects such as science and art are taught by teachers of one or the other ethnic group. It remains to be seen whether co-teaching will be feasible in the future: the oldest integrated school in Israel abandoned co-teaching because of financial constraints. Today, this school has one homeroom teacher per class but tries to ensure that Palestinian and Jewish teachers are represented equally among the teaching staff. It should be noted that, unlike the primarily administrative role of a homeroom teacher in US high schools, the role of homeroom teachers in Israel is more central. In addition to teaching many regular subjects, homeroom teachers are responsible for organizing the class’s educational and social activities and discussions. They are expected to be acquainted with all of the students—and the students’ parents—in their homeroom class. They, more than any other staff members of the school, influence the environment of the classroom. One additional change effected recently in the bilingual schools is especially significant in that it reflects how the administration’s commitments to both the academic progress of its students, as measured by the State’s mandatory exams, and its goals of bilingualism and coexistence, require a delicate balancing act. During their first years, in keeping with their commitment to bilingualism and coexistence, the schools kept the Palestinian students and the Jewish students together for nearly all activities. However, new research about students learning in their first language raised concerns about the bilingual students’ fulfillment of basic curricular requirements. As a result,

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now the children in the bilingual schools are organized for part of the school day into mono-national classrooms so as to better facilitate their learning. Nevertheless, mixed classrooms continue to be a central aspect of school life, reflecting the schools’ commitment to strengthening group identity while encouraging tolerance and respect for pluralism. The variety of contextual factors surrounding the schools imposes unending pressures that require the administrators—indeed, all participants—to adopt an attitude of dynamic, continual assessment, balancing goals that may not always be compatible.

Main Research Findings on Integrated Schools With few exceptions, research on most encounter programs has been mainly dominated by psychological perspectives (Bekerman 2007). The research on the integrated bilingual schools, though less extensive, has introduced educational considerations and perspectives into the research scene. One of the first qualitative studies, conducted by Feuerverger (2001), illustrates some of the welcome changes this perspective brings. The analysis of the copious amounts of data highlights the complexities with which bilingual, bicultural, and binational education must contend in its attempt to respect differences, sustain dialogue, and inspire a moral vision. The schools’ efforts take place within an ever-changing political reality that constantly frustrates the participants’ efforts to reshape the boundaries that divide their existence; the explicit recognition of this reality and how it influences the education sector are valuable contributions to this field of research. Feuerverger also depicts the school as an example of a moral community evolving within conflict-ridden conditions and showing a growing awareness of the power of language (bilingualism) and the need to narrow the gap between linguistic practices and educational discourse in order to assuage the binational tensions ingrained in the wider sociopolitical context. Gavison (2000) examined one school’s approach towards Jewish and Palestinian historical narratives to see if it might serve as a model that the State could use to inculcate a common civic identity among its citizens while enabling (or encouraging) different groups to cultivate different cultural identities. Though conceding that Palestinians should be encouraged to include cultural elements in their curricula, Gavison points out that the ongoing conflict has repercussions on the question of a separate Palestinian cultural education in the schools. Israel, she believes, has the right and the duty to ensure that this autonomy is not used to weaken the civic connection of Palestinians to their country. Glazier’s (2003) ethnographic study focused on classroom activities. In particular, she examined the ability of children in one of the Jewish–Palestinian

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schools to step back and forth between cultures, a skill she calls “cultural fluency.” She also reviewed the specific practices teachers implemented for cross-cultural interaction and learning. Glazier’s study underscores that contact alone does not always promote cultural fluency; rather, individuals must engage in ongoing, meaningful shared tasks across borders. Such an engagement is facilitated through both curriculum and pedagogy, two critical components often omitted from the group contact equation. Mark (2013) investigated the assumption that it was possible to identify patterns of classroom participation and interaction that characterize and differentiate the work of Jewish and Palestinian children and teachers through routine observations of a class. Mark concluded that although distinctive classroom discourse patterns could be identified in the Jewish and Palestinian mono-national discussions (sessions in which the groups study separately), the patterns were associated not with different ethnicities but with different socioeconomic groups. Moreover, some of the school’s educational practices reified national identities rather than offering a critical perspective. The influence of language on discourse patterns and conceptions of identity was explored by Schlam-Salman and Bekerman (2011) in their examination of how students in a Palestinian–Jewish integrated school defined their identities when the topic was discussed in an advanced English-learning group. The authors showed that the students’ use of a third language enabled them to step outside of ideologies that are “culturally embedded in Arabic and Hebrew” (2011: 95), and that the discussion in English provided the students with resources that influenced the ways in which they constructed their identities. Meshulam’s (2011) study extended the research lens beyond the Israeli context. In a comparative study between a Spanish–English bilingual school in Wisconsin and a Palestinian–Jewish school in Israel, Meshulam found that the Israeli school’s attention to the binational encounter constricts its critical perspective. My own research over the past two decades (Bekerman 2003, 2004a, 2004b, 2007, 2009) offers the most comprehensive longitudinal research on Jewish–Palestinian bilingual education. I have (Bekerman 2005) examined the connection between power relations in Israeli society and the difficulties of creating a truly bilingual educational program for Jews and Palestinians in Israel (Bekerman 2005). I demonstrate how the different social realities of Jews and Palestinians influence the families’ motivation to send their children to the Jewish–Palestinian schools and how the different status of Hebrew and Arabic in Israeli society influences each group’s motivation to acquire the language of the other. The practical importance of Hebrew language acquisition is clear to Arab children and to their families. As a minority group, Palestinians need Hebrew in order to advance academically and professionally, and they

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regularly require Hebrew in order to communicate on the street. On the other hand, Jewish parents generally hope that their children will learn Arabic, but there is no apparent price that the children will pay if they fail to acquire the language. Without a practical need for the language, the Jewish pupils’ level of Arabic comes nowhere near to the Palestinians’ level of Hebrew, despite the great educational effort invested in the bilingual programs. Amara (2007) presented similar findings regarding the place of language and the challenge of Arabic language acquisition. Bourdieu (1977) seems to have gotten it right with his emphasis on no market, no competence. My research has also examined how the multicultural goals of the schools shape religious and national narratives (Bekerman 2003). The research has shown how parents and teachers see culture and religion as areas in which mutual understanding can help to bridge the gaps that separate the populations in Israel. Parents put stress on getting to know and understand the others’ culture better and believe that the schools are achieving this goal (Bekerman and Tatar 2009). Teachers emphasized similar goals, and educational activities/celebrations around these issues appear to be conducted with ease and in fruitful collaboration. These celebrations carry a strong religious emphasis. In fact, it could be said that religious aspects are disproportionately emphasized given that the majority of the Jewish parents belong to secular sectors of Israeli society, and the Muslim populations, though more traditional, are also mostly non-religious. While at times, Jewish parents expressed concerns and ambivalence about this religious emphasis, they also seemed to find solace in the religious underpinning of cultural activities given their (mostly unarticulated) fear that their children’s Jewish identity will be eroded as a result of participation in a binational program. The ethnographic data also suggest that issues of national identity have become the ultimate educational challenge for parents and educational staff alike. National issues are compartmentalized into a rather discrete period in the school year corresponding, in the Jewish Israeli calendar, to Memorial Day and Israel’s Independence Day and, in the Palestinian calendar, to the Day of the Nakba. In accordance with the policy of the Ministry of Education, all schools hold a special ceremony for the Jewish cohort on Memorial Day, which the Palestinian cohort does not attend. Depending on the schools’ (complex) relations with the surrounding community and the Ministry of Education’s supervision, a separate ceremony is conducted for the Palestinians in commemoration of the Nakba. For the Palestinian group, tensions are apparent, particularly among the teachers, who see themselves at the forefront of the struggle to safeguard the Palestinian national narrative, which remains unrecognized by the Israeli educational officialdom. For most liberal Jews, Israeli Palestinian cultural and religious expression in school is legitimate. However, national identification with the Palestinian Authority is

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not welcomed, and neither are perspectives that would, in any way, try to deny the right of Israel to be a Jewish state. Finally, the research shows school activities, at the intergroup level, to be working well. While knowing and clearly recognizing their own ethnic/ religious/national affiliation, the children seem able to create and sustain social interactional spheres where identity is not necessarily addressed. This ability of children stands in sharp contrast to the adult stakeholders’ tendency to adopt a purely categorized identity approach, based on the premise that strengthening ethnic and national identities is the path to achieving its aims. Such studies suggests that the adoption of a categorized approach needs to be critically considered and revised if the schools do not want to replicate the discourse of the reification of rigid identities, which are central to the present conflict. As the research shows, the bilingual schools initiative is comprised of multiple, overlapping facets that must be viewed in concert. Moreover, even perspectives that strive to be critical often overlook alternative explanations or crucial processes that might open doors to potentially successful educational strategies. The path towards reconciliation, tolerance, and recognition in conflict-ridden societies presents difficulties that cannot easily be overcome.

Critical Reflections The good news is that people keep believing that schools can make a difference. The bad news is that they have, for the most part, made a difference only in those sites in which schooling was used as a chief colonizing device. In the West (the cradle of modern colonization), schools have, for some time, served to reproduce societal power relations, both on the inside and the outside. Some could argue that helping shape and sustain the status quo is making a difference, and, indeed, it is. The problem is that this difference is not the one well-intentioned peace educational theorists had in mind. Though they recognize the harsh realities, they nevertheless think that something can be done to change the situation. It is this optimism that I want to highlight in this concluding section, mostly out of an appreciation for Marx’s maxim on religion as the opium of the masses (Marx 1977). A modern rendering of this maxim could sound as “optimism is the opium of the masses.” I want to give up on hope in as much as hope drives us to stay attached to our illusions regarding the conditions in which education evolves, and regain it in as much as hope allows for the search of plans to change the conditions for education not to require illusions. Critical perspectives have pointed at the lack of educational theorizing in coexistence education which, to this day—as in most of the education

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field—is being guided by functional, psychologized, and idealistic perspectives when articulating its aims (Bekerman and Zembylas 2012). Thus, guided coexistence educational initiatives echo modern white Western totalizing conceptualizations, mostly expressed in essentialized conceptions of human rights and positivistic perspectives of truth. Moreover, they identify the individual mind as the locus of the illness, which needs to be treated. The treatment, in the best positivist psychologized tradition, is to be offered to solipsistic individuals while ignoring contextual and historical factors. It is questionable whether working through the same premises, which are constituted and constitutive of the modern Western world and under which many of the conflicts that coexistence education is expected to help smooth and ultimately overcome have flourished, is the right direction for such an education to take. Peace or coexistence is set as a universal goal. Sufficient efforts would allow for violence and conflict to be erased from the face of the world; and yet, we should always remember that peaceor coexistence are revealed and are dependent on their absence. This striking duality bears remarkable similarities to the paradigmatic dichotomies set by Western epistemology (male/female; good/evil; us/them) and, as such, seems only to be able to replicate past outcomes. In as much as there is a “true” way we all need to follow, the understanding, recognition and dialogue with alterity becomes a difficult task (Biesta 2004). In the Western tradition, differences need to be first pointed out and then assimilated or destroyed; denied differences are the secret of “our” (good, right) existence. And what is more important, differences are set in the realm of meaning and not in the realm of power relations. When coexistence education is set in the ground as a universal utopia, it stops its potential productivity, for it hides, by representing its values as universally self-evident, that which stands at the basis of conflict—the multiple representations of truth, the various understandings of justice. What is even more important, it disregards the tight connections between conflict and the present capitalist order and the global division of work. In short, it disregards the social arrangements that institutionalize inequality and injustice. Avoiding the problematization of questions such as who “we” are, what perceptions of justice do we hold to, what dialogue do we want to sustain, and under which conditions, cannot be a good formula to encourage peaceful accommodation. If indeed coexistence education is serious about the verbiage that sustains it—the affirmation, recognition, and rehabilitation of that which is “other”—it needs to start by critically approaching the epistemological and metaphysical certainties of Western modernity (Bekerman 2007). Within this context, three related issues come to mind. The first relates to the complex historical processes that have brought the West, the colonial powers of old, to successfully replace the force of arms not only by the

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coercion of currency and consumerism, but especially by the chronic social proneness to create or construct the “other” through word and deed in a way that inevitably leads to the demonization of those who are not like us, who do not comply with the hegemonic standards of Western white males. The second points at the nation state as the definite product of modernity, a modernity that has produced a distinct social form, radically different from that of the traditional order of the past. This modernity is characterized by very specific forms of territoriality and surveillance capabilities that monopolize effective control over social relations across definite time–space distances and over the means of violence. The nation state can be viewed as a political socioeconomic phenomenon that seeks to exercise its control over the populations comprising it by establishing a culture that is at once homogeneous, anonymous (all the members of the polity, irrespective of their personal sub-group affiliations, are called upon to uphold this culture), and universally literate (all members share the culture the State has canonized). Reflecting modern psychologized epistemologies upon which it builds its power, the nation state creates a direct and unobstructed relationship between itself and all its “individual” citizens: neither tribe, ethnic group, family, nor church is allowed to stand between the citizen and the State. The third and last issue is the logical corollary of the first and the second. As Mann (2004) has forcefully suggested, murderous cleansing is not only modern but is also the dark side of democracy. Ethnic cleansing has indeed been known in previous times but its frequency and deadliness are modern in essence. Ethnic cleansing does not belong to the primitive but to the modern Western inclination to confound into one “ethnos” and “demos,” the two concepts inherited from classical Greece as the pillars of its democratic states. To “demos,” the rule of the people, modernity has added “ethnos,” the group that shares a common sense of heritage, thus allowing for “the people” to rule democratically but also “tyrannically” any minority in its midst. Similarly Dumont (1966) has argued that racism is a correlate of liberal democracies, for if, as its credo goes, “all men are created equal,” then the evidence of inequality requires the dehumanization of the many. Equality from this perspective is a quality of man’s “nature,” not of the context within which he evolves. When these elements are not accounted for in coexistence educational efforts, they risk consolidating that same reality they intended to overcome. Coexistence education is in urgent need of reviewing its paradigmatic foundations while problematizing the political structures that sustain the conflicts it tries to overcome.

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Conclusion We should not expect peace or coexistence educational initiatives to be able to offer solutions to long-standing and bloody conflicts that are rooted in the very unequal allocation of resources. Unfortunately, many times societies/ governments find it easier to support such initiatives rather than work hard towards structural change. Hoping that this is not the situation in the society under study, the question then becomes what we can realistically expect from such initiatives in Israel. Salomon (2004) rings partially true when affirming that, though peace education cannot resolve intractable conflicts, it can prepare the ground for desirable political change. What needs to be clarified is what type of educational interventions can prepare the ground. Peace education needs to look beyond dominant curricula and the reproduction of existing knowledge, and problematize the politics of identity around issues of justice and coexistence. Pedagogies that wish to disrupt the normalizing politics of identity must teach critical resistance and not sustain it or repress it. Critical practices that work towards the subversion of dichotomies around identity/culture are crucial to pedagogies that wish to disrupt fear, hatred and resentment (Bekerman and Zembylas 2014). Bekerman, Zembylas, and McGlynn (2009) suggest that goals such as peace and coexistence education may be better achieved if the emphasis on separate identity and culture is somewhat relaxed. Relaxing this emphasis means working against present hegemonic national powers. This might not be easy but any other choice just might not work. Lastly, we should remember that change cannot be reached by decree, especially if it runs counter to hegemonic interests. We are in need of realistic and modest aspirations as well as a profound understanding of complexity, and even more so a deep understanding of the paradox suggested when applying Darwinian understandings to the possibility of change; for in his evolutionary view Darwin suggested that it is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent that survives, but the one that is the most adaptable to change. Freeing the imagination to take new educational paths and/or research approaches might imply adopting the old Hypocritical adagio “cura te ipsum” (take care of yourself first) while struggling to confront our paradigmatic perspectives so as to expose and try to overcome the structures and practices that have established the present conflict. Even if this is done it would be good to remember that the long-standing and bloody conflicts that peace or coexistence educational initiatives hope to remedy are grounded in, and sustained by, the very material unequal allocation of resources more than in the heads of troubled individuals.

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Note 1

The use of the ethno-national categories of Jews and Palestinians is made because it is the most common way to describe the groups involved in the conflict. Yet a main argument in our present work points at these categories as reflections of epistemological and metaphysical certainties of Western modernity which need to be critically approached.

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PART TWO

National Landscapes for Peacebuilding and Education

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4 Peace Education and Peacebuildingacross the Conflict Continuum: Insights from Lebanon Zeena Zakharia

Introduction Violent conflict has topped global policy priorities in recent years (cf. International Dialogue on Peacebuilding and Statebuilding 2011; UNESCO 2011; UNGA/ UNSC 2009; World Bank 2011) with increased recognition that over one billion children under the age of 18 live in countries affected by political or criminal violence (World Bank 2011). Violence has been a major obstacle to meeting the Millennium Development Goals (World Bank 2011) and Education for All targets set for 2015 (UNESCO 2011). The post-2015 United Nations development agenda, which aims at establishing a “road to dignity” by 2030, notes that particular attention is required for countries in situations of fragility and conflict (UNGA 2014). Among its goals are to “ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all” in line with safeguarding the right to education as part of one universal and transformative agenda for sustainable development (UNGA 2014, Goal 4). The UN Peacebuilding Architecture was established in 2005 to respond to the imperatives of countries in situations of fragility and conflict. Comprising the Peacebuilding Commission (PBC), the Peacebuilding Support Office (PBSO), and the Peacebuilding Fund (PBF), this structure aims to prevent relapses into violent conflict by coordinating support for countries in the

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immediate aftermath of conflict, generally defined as “the first two years after large-scale violence ends” (PBSO n.d.). Launched through resolutions by the UN General Assembly (A/RES/60/180 [UNGA 2005]) and Security Council (S/ RES/1645 [UNSC 2005]), the PBC serves as an intergovernmental advisory organ whose mandate is to “marshal resources and to advise on and propose integrated strategies for post-conflict peacebuilding and recovery” (2). Introduced by Johan Galtung (1976), and reinvigorated by UN SecretaryGeneral Boutros Boutros Ghali’s (1992) publication of ‘An Agenda for Peace,’ the concept of peacebuilding has generated renewed attention within the international community with the establishment of the UN Peacebuilding Architecture. The UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s (UNGA/UNSC 2009) report on peacebuilding describes peacebuilding as a system wide, multidimensional range of processes and interventions aimed at solidifying peace and preventing the relapse into conflict. According to the report, these can take place prior to the outbreak of violence, during conflict, or after hostilities have ended. The report establishes five priority areas for peacebuilding: (1) basic safety and security; (2) political processes; (3) basic services; (4) core governmental functions; and (5) economic revitalization. To date, provision has mainly gone to political, governance, security, and macroeconomic reforms; social programming, including education, generally has not been integrated into peacebuilding plans, despite its relevance to these priorities and its broad recognition as an important peace dividend (Smith et al. 2011). The peace education literature suggests that education is inextricably linked to peacebuilding in terms of its potential to address both direct and structural forms of violence (Galtung 1969; Reardon 1988). It is also widely cited by educators as a means for working towards peace within and among communities divided by conflict. As content, pedagogy, and structure, peace education offers a myriad of means toward transformational processes within broader education efforts. However, an extensive review of programmatic literature on international peacebuilding projects in conflict-affected contexts found that education did not feature strongly on international peacebuilding agendas, which emphasize a security-first approach (Smith et al. 2011). Furthermore, a review of the programmatic literature suggests that much education programming in post-conflict contexts has not been explicitly planned from a peacebuilding perspective, engaging conflict analysis, or stating an explicit theory of change. Thus, program literature on education, or on peacebuilding, reflects a thin evidence base about the impact or role of education in peacebuilding processes. As peacebuilding is increasingly employed as a framework for humanitarian and developmental assistance, debates about the role of education within peacebuilding strategy have surfaced, along with questions about the appropriate timing and sequencing of peacebuilding activities across the

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“conflict continuum” (Novelli and Smith 2011). This case study explores some of the key assumptions about the timing and sequencing of education and peacebuilding in conflict-affected contexts, including linear conceptualizations of peacebuilding efforts, from emergency to post-conflict transformation. Within this schema, it is widely assumed that security must come first, before other peacebuilding strategies, and that security is part and parcel of an enabling environment or set of preconditions for peace that need to be identified and put into place before broader social programming, such as education, can take place. Drawing on data collected through field research in Lebanon during 2011, including interviews, observations, document analysis, and consultations with a range of actors representing international and national, governmental and civil society organizations and schools, this chapter highlights the linkages that have been forged between education and peacebuilding during and after violent political conflict in Lebanon since the end of the fifteen-year civil war in 1990. In examining these efforts, this paper argues that transformational approaches to education and peacebuilding can play a significant role across the conflict continuum, not just after security has been established. Lebanon’s long history of formal and non-formal education, which has weathered decades of regional, national, and localized armed conflicts, offers a rich context for the study of education and peacebuilding. As a country categorized among the “middle income” group and one of the first to become eligible for the PBF, Lebanon also provides an important case for understanding the emerging role of the PBF, to which Lebanon was incorporated in 2010.1 Over the past twenty years, international, national, and various civil society actors have been actively engaged in education and peacebuilding activities in Lebanon, whether explicitly in name or by design. Their efforts have been varied, multimodal, and fragmented. This paper pays particular attention to one illustrative program. Initiated during the height of civil war violence, the peace education program was widely cited twenty years later as being the transformative moment in youth participants’ lives, both those directly engaged in the program and those who learned from them. The paper concludes by considering the limitations of staged approaches to questions of timing and the implications of conceptualization for the development of programs with transformative potential.

Lebanon’s Geographies of Conflict Lebanon’s long history of civil strife is inextricably linked to a broader history of regional, cross-border, national, and localized armed conflicts, whose legacies continue to be felt by Lebanese, Palestinians, Armenians, Kurds,

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and, more recently, Iraqis and Syrians, as well as other peoples who have been marginalized by war, displacement, and structural violence, and who have made Lebanon their permanent or temporary home (Zakharia 2011). Some of these conflicts predate the state, shaping the sociopolitical features from which sectarianism2 would come to pervade societal institutions and to underpin the mobilization for major episodes of armed conflict, both internal and regional, since Lebanon’s independence from France in 1943. In addition, sectarianism would underpin various forms of structural violence, including the institutionalization of various forms of discrimination and inequitable access to resources and development, resulting in growing internal regional disparities and class–income inequalities. Inequitable development in education has been just one manifestation of these inequalities. Following the end of the fifteen-year civil war (1975–90), the allocation of public expenditure in the areas of education, health, and infrastructure has been based on religious sect, rather than an equity or needs-based disbursement informed by regional poverty indices (Salti and Chaaban 2010). Thus regional and sectarian disparities in education that pre-dated the civil war have been largely maintained (Tfaily, Diab, and Kulczycki 2013) or widened (UNDP 2007). The historical drivers of conflict have evolved within a matrix of regional, national, and localized conflicts. The inadequacies of a confessional–consociational3 power-sharing formula and the influence of regional actors both in armed conflict and in the peace formula outlined in the 1989 Ta’if Accord, have also served to reinscribe unresolved political, social, and economic grievances, including inequalities in power and resources, among confessional communities and among geographic regions. Furthermore, Lebanon’s delicate role in the Arab–Israeli conflict, and the legacy of this conflict for generations of Palestinians in Lebanon, serves to perpetuate discriminatory laws and regulations, which deny them equal enjoyment of rights. It also serves to fuel insecurity for both Lebanese and Palestinian populations. In addition, more recent Iraqi and Syrian refugees and other migrants face related challenges and social exclusion. Conflict analysis captures these age-old considerations alongside their contemporary manifestations and demonstrates that the contours of conflict and post-conflict situations are fluid; in Lebanon, different phases of conflict coexist, reflecting the limitations of linear conceptualizations of progression from emergency to post-conflict peacebuilding that are prominent in discourses of international development and humanitarian aid. An examination of the timing and location of armed conflict and localized episodes of political violence clearly demonstrates that violence and insecurity have, and continue to, differentially impact communities across various geographies in Lebanon (see Figure 4.1). Conflict, early reconstruction, and post-conflict

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Year

Key event

Main geography of conflict South Lebanon

1975–90

75

Beirut

North Lebanon

Bekaa

Lebanese Civil War

1990–2000 Israeli occupation/incursions 2004–08

Political assassinations, terror targeting

2006

July War (Hezbollah–Israel)

2006–07

Sit-ins, protests, riots

2007

Nahr el Bared crisis

2008

Sectarian clashes

Since 2011

Influx of Syrian refugees, sectarian clashes, terror targeting

FIGURE 4.1  Conflict and “Post-Conflict” Lebanon phases overlap in time and space, depending on the populations and regions, calling into question the notion of “post-conflict.” These multiple and uneven trajectories of conflict are a significant feature of Lebanon’s recent history, warranting a dynamic view of conflict that is sensitive to longer term, deeply entrenched and persistent structural grievances, alongside newer forms of political, economic, and social factors. Differentiated geographies of conflict also have serious implications for how the progression from emergency to post-conflict peacebuilding is conceptualized, suggesting that a dynamic, rather than linear, view of conflict is needed. The notion of varied geographies of conflict also has implications for using a staged approach to programming in conflict-affected contexts. In a 2008 report on strategic approaches to peacebuilding, Kraft et al. (2008) identified five structural challenges to peacebuilding in Lebanon: (1) conflicting concepts of national identity; (2) the involvement in major regional and international conflicts; (3) the consociational political system; (4) an inequitable economic system; and (5) the patriarchal value system. These structural challenges, they argue, manifest themselves in core political, economic, and social problems and impede the ability to manage contradictory interests in a peaceful manner. The deepening crisis of political polarization since 2006 is rooted in new manifestations of age-old issues, both internal and external. These include the relative weight of the different sects within the

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power-sharing system; their position regarding regional conflicts (Arab–Israeli, US–Iran, Sunni–Shi’a); and the personal interests of political elites within the system to increase their own power base. These issues are interconnected and point to historical issues related to the structure of the consociational democracy. While Article 95 of the Lebanese Constitution, drawn up as part of the 1989 post-civil war Ta’if Accord, calls for the “abolishment of confessionalism,” there has been no effort to detail the path. Another challenge to peacebuilding in Lebanon is that grievances from various violent events remain unresolved. No official channels were established for reconciliation after the civil war or the ensuing episodes of violence. As a result, there have been no formal outlets for grievances, no notable public dialogue, or mechanisms for transitional justice. In 1991 civil war crimes received amnesty and, today, many of the wartime elite hold public office. Thus by some accounts, peacebuilding has not been on the table in any real sense, except as reflected in security measures (interviews, UN senior staff person; Lebanese civil society organization [CSO] representative). This creates a disconnection for individuals and groups working on peacebuilding in more localized capacities, between their initiatives and the larger reality. Their sense that the system is unchangeable is one of the primary reasons given for why peacebuilding activities in education have largely focused on individual transformation. However, such a focus, when funded by UN organizations, is also perceived by beneficiaries, who have grievances, as hypocritical for not addressing what they perceive to be the root causes of conflict at the national or international level (interviews, Lebanese CSO representative; Palestinian CSO representative).

Concepts and Frameworks The theoretical literature in peace education draws a distinction between negative peace, or the absence of direct violence associated with security, and positive peace, or the structural changes that serve to address institutionalized forms of social injustice (structural violence) (e.g. Reardon 1988). Like peace education, peacebuilding theory emphasizes the need for both positive and negative peace for a comprehensive or sustainable peace (Galtung 1969). As a “dynamic social construct” peacebuilding involves transforming relationships (Lederach 1997: 20). Peacebuilding theory also highlights the need for transformational processes in the areas of security, political institutions, economic structures, and social development in societies emerging from conflict. Education has a role to play in each of these areas, with peace education identified as the content and form of education within broader

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peacebuilding efforts in education, which may also include improving access and service delivery of formal and nonformal education. A review of the theoretical and programmatic literature on education and peacebuilding (Smith et al. 2011) suggests that conceptual differences exist across the different literatures about the role of education in postconflict peacebuilding. While program literature places greater emphasis on “protection” and “reconstruction,” academic literature stresses “transformation” processes, which require a longer-term commitment to political, economic, and social change. Thus, from a peacebuilding perspective, a distinction can be drawn between shorter-term humanitarian and security approaches to protecting children and ensuring access to schooling, and longer-term strategies and programs to support peacebuilding through education in ways that address social transformation. Further, it is argued that social transformation should be addressed alongside education sector reform, aligning shorter-term programming with longer-term development, in order to attend to structural violence. Various definitions of peacebuilding emerge from the UN literature itself.4 In 2007, the UN Secretary General’s Policy Committee described peacebuilding activities as involving: A range of measures targeted to reduce the risk of lapsing or relapsing into conflict by strengthening national capacities at all levels for conflict management, and to lay the foundations for sustainable peace and development. Peacebuilding strategies must be coherent and tailored to specific needs of the country concerned, based on national ownership, and should comprise a carefully prioritized, sequenced, and therefore relatively narrow set of activities aimed at achieving the above objectives. (Decisions of the Secretary-General, May 2007 Policy Committee Meeting, as cited in PBSO 2010: 5) In a similar vein, the OECD/DAC (2005) Preventing Conflict and Building Peace manual states that: Peace-building covers a broad range of measures implemented in the context of emerging, current or post-conflict situations and which are explicitly guided and motivated by a primary commitment to the prevention of violent conflict and the promotion of a lasting and sustainable peace. Although they do not make explicit reference to eliminating structural violence, these definitions incorporate the notions of negative and positive peace as components of a sustainable peace. For the purposes of this case study, they also provide a conceptual framework for considering the role

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and contributions of education towards peacebuilding in Lebanon. Notably, they suggest that a sequence of activities is necessary within peacebuilding processes.

Tensions in Meanings The notion of peacebuilding in Lebanon is fraught with tension, an issue that emerged early and repeatedly throughout the field research period. Participants, representing both international and national organizations, at various levels, expressed wariness of the concept as being “politically loaded.” As a result, they either (1) did not see a connection between their work and peacebuilding; or (2) wished to distance their work from the notion of peacebuilding, or what they perceived as political agendas that did not reflect their personal positioning, or their perception of their institution’s positioning. The meaning and use of the word peacebuilding also emerged as an issue for participants involved in a number of contemporary UN peacebuilding programs. From one perspective, peace implied compromise, or “settling for less,” or “giving something up” to those perceived to have greater power. From another, it implied an imposed peace. Commonly, this was framed in terms of making peace with Israel. Indeed, interviews and consultation meetings with representatives from government and national civil society organizations suggest that participants were more likely to voice a concern that “peacebuilding” implied making peace with Israel when projects involved international organizations. Their sense that “peace” could be used in both a coercive and normalizing way elicited skepticism regarding the intention of such programs, particularly where peace writ large remained elusive for participants who observed a lack of political will on the part of international donors to bring about a just peace in any real sense.5 Representatives of civil society organizations and government entities suggested that such terminology is “parachuted in” on them, even where they have repeatedly shown that these terms are “not suitable” for the context. They questioned why local terminologies are not utilized instead, offering the more widely accepted notion of “civil peace,” implying intercommunal peace or social solidarity, encompassing the notion of citizenship. Where organizations had developed their own understanding of the term peacebuilding, they still experienced pushback from the participants they sought to serve. CSO representatives described various instances in which participants in programs and workshops resisted or boycotted sessions that came under the banner of peacebuilding. Similarly, UNESCO reported that,

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at a 2009 conference on Inclusion in the Early Years, participants boycotted the session that was explicitly on peacebuilding. UNESCO subsequently replaced the term “peacebuilding” with “character building” in later projects to encourage participation. Other UN and national CSOs described similar concerns and have opted to operationalize their work under such terms as “consensus building” and “civil peace” (Akar 2011). Thus organizations have responded to these tensions in meanings by changing terminology on project titles in order to have them accepted by participants: We don’t put “peacebuilding”; we put “conflict management” [on the program], because you cannot resolve the conflict […] it’s not within your power […] Because it’s highly political, because it’s on an international level most of the time [...] We’re influenced by every single situation in the region […] Some of the people laugh at us [when we talk about] peacebuilding. [We are asked]: “Who are you to talk about peacebuilding?” (Interview, UN national staff) This illustrative quote from a UN national staff person demonstrates some of the tension related to operationalizing the term in Lebanon. Beyond suspicion of, and resistance to, the use and intention of the term, a tension arises from the perception that actors cannot influence the political situation, because the locus of power—or the decision to “end” the conflict—resides “elsewhere,” often implicating the UN in the process. The perception that “UN action is politicized,” and its agencies are therefore not in a good position to “talk about peacebuilding,” is highly relative and dynamic among groups of Lebanese, Palestinians, and others living in Lebanon. This perception creates tensions for peacebuilding initiatives conducted by UN entities and their implementing partners. Related is the notion that “we need to be very realistic in Lebanon about what we want to achieve” (interview, UN senior international staff person). Participants at multiple levels of command expressed this caveat about tempering expectation and the sense that there are limitations to what is possible in terms of peacebuilding and, by implication, education’s contributions to peacebuilding. Finally, there was a sense that peacebuilding had expanded as a term for programmatic purposes: It turns out that anyone can interpret it how they want, and you have less consensus on what to do. Because it’s “peace writ large,” not just to stop the likelihood of conflict […] so it’s hard for the UN and its various components to agree […] Part of the problem is in the concept. (Interview, UN senior international staff person)

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The sense that peacebuilding could be interpreted as an all-encompassing notion on the one hand, or as a narrow and limited construct on the other, illustrates the ways in which peacebuilding is contested in post-conflict contexts. Further, the security, or negative peace, orientation of the UN has been increasingly felt since 2006, which has contributed to political polarization in Lebanon, and tensions between those who work on the humanitarian–development side versus the political–military side of the UN in Lebanon (interview, UN senior international staff person 2011). Thus we see a disconnect between the peacebuilding rhetoric of UN/international partners and those of local/ national partners—often about the very same projects—whereby UN/international partners articulate goals in terms of security (or negative peace), and local/national partners express their approach to education and peacebuilding in terms of transformational (or positive peace) orientations. Understanding the source of these tensions in relation to the positionality of the UN and global politics more generally is critical to identifying potential strategies and the role of education in peacebuilding.

Education and Peacebuilding In 2010, Lebanon became one of the first countries in the Middle East to become eligible for the Peacebuilding Fund (PBF), under the Peacebuilding and Recovery Facility, which “supports a structured peacebuilding process driven by national actors based on a joint analysis of needs with the international community” (UNDP 2011). The peace and development agenda of the Lebanon UN Country Team (UNCT) included four thematic priorities that constituted dimensions of Lebanon’s PBF Priority Plan: (1) The issue of Palestinians; (2) Social disparities; (3) Human rights; and (4) Governance reform (personal communication, UN senior international staff person). At the time of the study, the PBF Priority Plan had not yet been approved (UNDP 2011); however, a US$7 million portfolio had been initiated, with US$3 million approved by the time of this study. Coordination and discussions regarding UN peacebuilding in Lebanon were therefore in their nascence. Planned activities included multi-pronged approaches to locating economic and legislative alternatives to mobilization for Palestinian youth, and working with the Lebanese Army on community outreach, with an integrated human rights training component (interview, UN staff). Education was not explicitly cited among these activities. Thus, security has been the priority area of the UN in Lebanon, reflecting broader UN peacebuilding policy, which has narrowly framed its strategy around negative peace, or ensuring the absence of violence, rather than a

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transformational peace that addresses structural change. Within this securityfirst approach, education has been on the margins of UN peacebuilding in Lebanon. Yet, a number of entry points to peacebuilding exist within Lebanon’s education sector (see Table 4.1). Indeed, much educational activity has been underway in Lebanon (see Table 4.2), with a burgeoning of CSOs to “capture the funds” that have been allocated to peacebuilding (interview, CSO representative). Notably, these educational activities have focused largely on individual and interpersonal transformation as means for transformation within larger society, articulating a positive peace orientation to peacebuilding. Thus the work of CSOs has largely reflected a different orientation to broader peacebuilding efforts than UN and development partners, which have focused on security. Despite this disconnection, this work has done much to create opportunities for children and youth to engage with dialogue and contact groups. However, these efforts have been fragmented, and they have largely addressed the non-formal sector through short-term training and projects whose longerterm impact and sustainability is not clear. In the formal sector, education has largely served to reinscribe social divisions through an inequitable system

Table 4.1  Entry Points to Peacebuilding from the Education Sector in Lebanon Entry Points for Service Delivery

Formal schooling Non-formal schooling Curricular development (public and private) Whole-school approaches Equity approaches Protection and psychosocial approaches

Entry Points for Education Sector Governance and Policy Reform

Ministry of Education and Higher Education capacity building Sector finance and planning Monitoring and evaluation of impact Advocacy

Entry Points for Education and Post-conflict Transformation within Broader Society

Advocacy and awareness-raising campaigns through media Conflict resolution and violence prevention training Citizenship education Dialogue and reconciliation initiatives Environmental awareness Poverty alleviation Psychosocial support Women and youth programming

Source: Zakharia (2011: 53).

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Table 4.2  Types of Education and Peacebuilding Programs Identified in Lebanon (pre-1990 to present) Efforts led by:

Formal education sector

Non-formal education sector

Civil society

Whole-school models: Quaker school Affirmative action/integrative schools University/certificate programs, e.g. nonviolent conflict resolution Curricular efforts: History, civics, citizenship education Human rights and human dignity education in schools

Education in nonviolent strategy Interfaith dialogue Conflict-resolution education Youth dialogue Human rights education Arts and theater programs (psychosocial support and peacebuilding) Youth media programs Youth leadership programs

UN/International partners

Whole-school models: Child-friendly schools Curricular efforts: National curricular reform support

Radio and TV programs Education for Peace Global education Conflict-resolution education Life skills Psychosocial support training Human rights, child rights Conflict prevention and peacebuilding Advocacy programs/media campaigns Training curricula on citizenship Youth engagement, leadership training Establishing student councils; election education Peace Clubs Landmine awareness University summer institutes on nonviolence, conflict resolution, interfaith dialogue Values education Youth entrepreneurship education and employment skills training

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that perpetuates a hierarchy between private and public schools and that exacerbates regional disparities in the quality and accessibility of schooling. In doing so, the formal sector has missed the opportunity to address structural violence, or institutionalized forms of discrimination that contribute to conflict. A significant finding in mapping educational interventions is that the types of programming and phases of “conflict” do not clearly support a “staged approach” to education and peacebuilding. Rather, some of the most significant transformational programming took place in the midst of war. This finding is illustrated by UNICEF’s Education for Peace program (ca. 1988–93), for example, which was introduced during the most brutal final years of the Lebanese civil war. In interviews, the program was the most widely cited across stakeholders as a peacebuilding initiative that had a profound impact on learners. In fact, many of UNICEF Lebanon’s staff, CSO leaders, and activists appeared to have been personally impacted by this program, as learners.

UNICEF’s Education for Peace During the course of the study, I interviewed and spoke informally with a number of civil society actors, asking about the programs that they organized and the theories of change underpinning their work. Over and over again, participants cited the UNICEF Education for Peace program in which they were either directly involved, or had a sibling or neighbor who was a youth participant over twenty years ago. Initiated in the late 1980s, during the height of civil war violence and its immediate aftermath, UNICEF’s Education for Peace program directly trained over 600 youth participants, eighteen years or older, through workshops and month-long retreats conducted in shelters and camps. Over a six-year period, the program brought together youth from different parts of the country to engage in dialogue and peacebuilding activities. Over twenty years later this program was widely cited by civil society leaders as being the transformative moment in their lives. The impact of Education for Peace was so profoundly felt that, in interviews, former participants talked about how it transformed their personal and professional paths. One current civil society actor and former participant said: On a personal level, all that exposure to all those people who were not part of my community, especially after the civil war, [was the first step to changing my professional path]. It was the first time I [experienced] that feeling of “Why is all of that [violence] happening when these are the kinds of people on ‘the other side’?” [The Education for Peace camp] captured all these questions and broke a lot of [my] prejudgment. (Interview 2011)

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She went on to explain that after the camp, she engaged in leading similar programs for children from her own community. From this experience, “you realize that there is something that you can disseminate—give back […]: values” (interview 2011). The camps provided “that kind of space [for personal development] parallel to the [formal school] system” (interview 2011). This participant traced her current professional work as a civil society activist to this experience. She noted that the sustainability of such programs is ultimately “through the persons themselves, not the program” (interview 2011), transforming individuals and relationships. What struck me most in these interviews is that many of those who talked about their experience were not direct participants in the Education for Peace program; often, they were younger siblings who were not allowed to participate because of their age, but who learned the songs and benefited indirectly. In speaking about the program, one civil society leader said: Last year we were four in a car; it was me, a friend currently [living] in [Washington,] DC, her friend who lives in Paris, and a Syrian friend who was on vacation in Lebanon. And we were in the car chatting and talking […] and we were bringing in [songs from our] childhood […]. It was very funny that even the Syrian friend knew the songs [from the Education for Peace program] and that brought up conversations about the UN and peace education. (Interview 2011) This participant was too young to directly participate in the Education for Peace camps, but she had been allowed to assist in the logistical aspects and observed the training as a fourteen-year-old girl. According to her account, the program had a profound impact on her and her family: In my father’s family, I was probably the first person [to participate in the Education for Peace camps]. Then my sisters and cousins […] all went too, so it brought seven or eight kids […] into that cycle. That was the first time that my conservative aunts allowed it in the family. It brought in that dynamic. (Interview 2011) The dynamic she refers to is an “opening up” to the Other and a sense of “social activism.” Another participant and head of a CSO engaged in citizenship activism noted: “Everything I learned about peacebuilding I learned from those camps with Anna Mansour.” I asked: “So you participated in the program?” “No,” he replied, “but I got to work with someone who did and I learned from him, like many others. Look around all of the NGOs [non-governmental organizations] in Lebanon, and you will find that they all go back to those camps” (Interview

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2011). What he and others told me, in turn, is that the Education for Peace camps were transformative to their thinking in various ways, and that tracing the lineage of current activists would eventually take me back to those 600 trainees in the first year of the Education for Peace program.6 I sought to track down Anna Mansour, the UNICEF national staff person who created and ran the program, and who was widely regarded as synonymous with Education for Peace, and I spent an afternoon with her in her garden. Mansour told me that the curriculum for the program was put together by the “seat of their pants” and with limited funding. According to her, the first year was critical, because it was part of a movement. Then they just “ran with it”: The main idea behind this curriculum was to start bringing people [together] and open their windows and doors, and we had a lot of role-play, of games, of interactive material whereby young people [from different backgrounds and regions] were confronted to really get to know more each other. At the same time, they were told to take care of children. The idea [was] to have a youth-to-youth approach and a youth-to-children approach. So these young people were prepared to monitor children’s vacations. They were taught how to handle children and to take care and animate sessions but with special songs, special stories, special games. So we had two tracks: training and handling young people to overcome their preconceived ideas, of being scared from the Other, and frightened by many, many things; and at the same time, learning to bring Education for Peace to children. (Interview 2011) Thus the program was designed to have a multiplier effect among youth. In asking Mansour what made the program successful, under the circumstances of “emergency” and whether that might be recaptured in today’s context, she replied: What was successful in a period of war will never be the same in the period of peace, or I will not call it peace, but not-war. […] The concern was different, the priority was different, and the energy was different. […] It was about survival. So the timing is very important. Education for Peace is much better when there is a felt need from the people. Mansour’s comment suggests that the success of the Education for Peace program of the late 1980s stemmed from a sense of urgency and an articulated need. The transformational experience described by participants does not support the assumptions of a “security first” strategy. Rather, transformational approaches appear to have a role in the heightened phases of

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violent conflict and across the conflict continuum, and early engagement may have its merits for particular contexts. It follows that the sequence of peacebuilding activities may be better expressed in terms of people’s articulated needs in a particular context. The Education for Peace program was articulated as a need during the most violent years of the Lebanese Civil War. Thus, engaging a dynamic, rather than staged, approach to peacebuilding is warranted in conflict-affected contexts.

Conclusion This case study illuminates the limitations of linear conceptions of conflict, suggesting instead that a dynamic view of conflict is warranted. This entails recognition that sub-populations are differentially impacted by local, regional, and global conflicts, with various implications for the timing and sequencing of peacebuilding activities in education. The evidence here suggests that the “security first” approach may lead to missed opportunities for educational programming with transformative potential. Rather, transformational approaches have a role in the earliest phases of conflict and across the conflict continuum; and phases may be better expressed in terms of people’s articulated needs. Education, while highly valued and perceived to play a central role in the transformation of society, has not been prioritized by the UN’s peacebuilding initiatives. However, UNICEF and other international and national civil society organizations have been active in delivering a range of programs. The success of these programs in addressing the drivers of conflict is dependent upon sound conceptualization and strategy, going forward, towards a peacebuilding agenda in education. This requires taking into account varied conceptions of peacebuilding, understanding the source of localized tensions around peacebuilding, and considering these tensions in relation to the positionality of the UN within that context. If peacebuilding entails supporting the transformative processes of society towards sustainable peace, then it needs to be recognized that this process takes generations and must also be a product of locally driven efforts. The education sector is a significant entry point for this transformative process. However, education is also a reflection of broader issues in society and the everyday challenges of transformative change. Change cannot be sustainable without local ownership. It also requires going beyond the narrow orientation of negative peace currently taken up by the UN security agenda in Lebanon. Thus UN and civil society partners have a role to play in advocating for expanded definitions, and for positioning education more clearly within these in order to address structural change.

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Notes 1

As of January 2015, twenty-six countries were eligible for the PBF. Of these, only Lebanon and Yemen are geographically located in the Middle East. For a current list of PBF eligible countries, see: http://www.unpbf.org/countries/. The general guidelines for PBF eligibility include evidence of: (1) Critical peacebuilding needs (country at risk of lapsing or relapsing into conflict, as indicated by a current conflict analysis; country is recently post-conflict, and peacebuilding gaps have been identified); (2) Critical peacebuilding opportunities (a peace agreement is in place; a window of opportunity is currently opened to make a difference; the country is at a crucial crossroads for peace); (3) Commitment of national authorities and stakeholders to the peace process and to addressing the identified conflict factors and triggers; (4) Availability of external funds to the country and potential for strategic leverage of PBF resources (the catalytic impact of the PBF); (5) The positive role that the UN can play in the country to address the peacebuilding issues (considering its mandate, capacity, perception in country, partnerships and networks) (UN PBF n.d.).

2

Makdisi (2000: 7) defines sectarianism as “the deployment of religious heritage as a primary marker of modern political identity,” which emerged as both a practice and a discourse during nineteenth century Ottoman Lebanon.

3

Consociationalism is a form of government that is meant to ensure group representation for divided societies, particularly those with no clear majority, to mitigate conflict and guarantee government stability and democracy through power-sharing. In Lebanon, this representation is based on religious sect and is often referred to as confessionalism.

4

See Lakkis (2011) for an overview of UN peacebuilding terminology and an analysis of its application to the Middle East and North Africa region.

5

See Hantzopoulos (2010) for a useful discussion of how dominant discourses and assumptions associated with the term peace might be interrogated to better understand this contestation.

6

The YMCA held similar programs during this period, and perhaps there were others, creating an unintentional network of civil society activists.

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5 Educating for Peace in Kenya: Insights and Lessons Learned from Peace Education Initiatives across the Country Mary Mendenhall and Nivedita Chopra

Introduction Peace education is “a process of developing knowledge, skills, values and attitudes that lead to behavior that promotes peace and encourages conflict prevention and minimization” (Baxter 2001: 28). As such, peace education and the role that education may play in building peace are consistently cited as critical elements of educational interventions provided by national governments or international organizations working in conflict-affected and post-conflict countries. Yet, “transforming uplifting ideals into concrete action is complicated … as is measuring the success of peace education” (Sommers 2001: 179). This chapter will examine: select peace education initiatives developed for schools in Kenya; the challenges confronted in the programs’ implementation; and, finally, how the programs have evolved since their inception. As a country impacted by both a significant refugee community and its own periodic internal conflict, Kenya provides a unique context for exploring the endogenous and exogenous processes required to sustain peace education programming that ultimately contributes to what Galtung (1964) refers to as “positive peace,” an idea that goes beyond the mere absence of violence to the “integration of human society” (Galtung 1964: 2).

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Kenyan Context Kenya hosts one of the largest populations of refugees in the world. As of January 2015, Kenya registered approximately 578,780 refugees and asylum seekers, mainly from Somalia, South Sudan, Ethiopia, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Eritrea, Burundi, and Uganda (UNHCR 2014a, 2014b, 2014c). The majority of refugees in Kenya are housed in Dadaab and Kakuma refugee camps, established in 1991 and 1992 respectively. Currently, there are more than 356,101 refugees in Dadaab (UNHCR 2014a) and approximately 172,679 refugees in Kakuma (UNHCR 2014b). A third generation of refugees is now being born in the camps given the protracted nature of conflict in Somalia and the recurrent violence in South Sudan. Another 50,000 or more refugees have fled to urban centers in Nairobi and elsewhere to seek better living conditions, livelihoods, and educational opportunities (Campbell 2006; UNHCR 2014c). In addition to the long-standing refugee situation, Kenyans also experienced their own unrest after the post-election violence in 2007–08, which sparked widespread violence across the country. The contested presidential elections and resulting violence led to 1,200 deaths and the displacement of 600,000 people (DevEd 2013). Within the educational system alone, more than 158,000 students and 1,350 teachers were displaced across the country, forty schools were burned down and sixty-five schools were vandalized (DevEd 2013). In the aftermath of the post-election violence and amidst the inherent challenges of hosting a large and diverse refugee community, the Kenyan government has enacted various policies to contribute to overall peacebuilding. The Bill of Rights within the Constitution of Kenya, which was reformed in 2010, highlights that the “purpose of recognising and protecting human rights and fundamental freedoms is to preserve the dignity of individuals and communities and to promote social justice and the realization of the potential of all human beings” (Republic of Kenya 2010: 19). The Kenya Vision 2030 (2011), “a national long-term development blue-print,” further calls for “a just and cohesive society enjoying equitable social development in a clean and secure environment.” In addition to these broader institutional frameworks, Kenya is the lead country for the Inter-Country Quality Node (ICQN) on peace education, in collaboration with the Association for the Development of Education in Africa (ADEA). The ICQN aims to bring together both post- and pre-conflict countries and strategic partners to promote dialogue and collective learning and to create space for collaborative action on education for peace (Kenya Ministry of Education n.d.). Most recently, the Government of Kenya developed its Education Sector Policy on Peace Education, which aims to “promote

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and nurture a culture of peace and appreciation for diversity in the Kenyan society through education and training” (Ministry of Education, Science and Technology 2014: 13). The policy provides “an institutional framework for coordination, management, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of peace education in the sector” and “guidelines for mainstreaming peace education into curricula at all levels of education; in teaching and learning processes and materials; in education and professional development of education personnel; and in the learning environment” (13). The Kenyan context and evolving policy and institutional framework for peace education in Kenya provide a dynamic backdrop for the cases presented below.

Case Studies The case studies presented in this chapter illustrate various efforts to implement peace education programming in Kenya, including initiatives carried out by international organizations in two refugee camps, the Kenyan government’s work in national schools, and a non-governmental organization supporting teachers in national schools. The cases draw on the literature and key informant interviews to describe in detail the scope of the different programs, the challenges faced in the programs’ implementation and the status of the programs today. The chapter concludes with a cross-case analysis of key findings relevant for future peace education programming, both in Kenya and in other settings.

Refugee-camp-based Efforts for Peace Education Although refugees are often the victims of ethnic, religious or political intolerance, they carry their own prejudices with them into exile. This … often causes conflicts within the refugee setting. As a result, conflict within a refugee community is often driven by the politics back home, and yet, when refugees are finally able to return home, they are expected to contribute directly to peace and reconciliation. (Baxter 2001: 28) In 1997, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) led the development and piloting of the Peace Education Programme (PEP) in Dadaab and Kakuma refugee camps in Kenya. The program sought “to create constructive behaviours for dealing with problems so as to minimize or eliminate conflict” (Baxter 2013: 149). The refugee camps in Kenya were

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chosen as the pilot sites given the diversity of nationalities, religions and ethnicities of the refugee population (Baxter 2013). Given the participatory nature of the project design process, through which UNHCR extensively consulted with the community about their needs, the program was ultimately carried out both in the camp schools and among the wider community as many adults and out-of-school youth expressed interest in learning the same values, attitudes, and behaviors through community-oriented workshops. According to an external evaluation conducted on the PEP, the program is described as a “skills acquisition programme” through which participants would gain or strengthen their abilities to cooperate, communicate, be empathic, assertive, self-confident, assume responsibility for their actions, control their emotions, negotiate, resolve conflicts, solve problems, and reconcile differences (Obura 2002). Given the rigidity of the curriculum in the camp schools, which was based on the formal Kenyan curriculum, the school component of the Peace Education Programme entailed a stand-alone subject offered once per week in all eight years of primary school. According to the lead consultant for UNHCR who designed the program: Ideally, peace education should not be a “stand alone” program. Most of the concept areas in peace education are concepts associated with Life Skills training and an integrated Life Skills programme would work on how to transfer skills and knowledge from the learning situation to real life. Given the context of refugee and returnee situations, however, it was felt that the Peace Education Programme needed to focus specifically on the promotion of peace rather than the wider range of concepts of Life Skills. (Baxter 2001: 30) Within this stand-alone subject, a spiral curriculum approach—“where each skill area is explored through a series of activities and then revisited in each year of schooling using different activities and discussions”—was employed to help foster behavior change (Baxter 2013: 150). The accompanying teacher training program, which focused almost exclusively on pedagogy through activity-based learning, consisted of thirty days of training, with workshops offered for ten consecutive days at three different times of year during school holidays.1 Guides consisting of twenty-eight lessons per year for eight primary grades were developed for teachers to cover one peace education lesson per week. The PEP developers took strides to ensure cultural relevance in terms of the material content of the curriculum. Sommers (2001) noted that there was a concerted focus on collective, rather than individual, concerns in the curriculum and related activities. For example, whereas many peace

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education programs might begin with the concept of self-esteem, this notion was considered invalid as it “belongs to those societies that are individualistic” (Baxter as cited in Sommers 2001: 181). There was consensus by program developers, staff, and refugees that the “Western orientation towards individuals, a common feature in peace education programming, should be sublimated to local, and therefore non-Western, cultural priorities” (Sommers 2001: 181) (see also Zvi Bekerman’s and Lindsey Horner’s chapters in this volume for interrogations about Western conceptions of the individual and peace in efforts aimed at peace education). The community workshop program for adults and out-of-school youth entailed weekly workshops facilitated over ten to twelve weeks (or, at times, a more intensive option of running over ten to twelve consecutive half-days) (Obura 2002: 3). The community component “strongly emphasize[d] outreach to the entire community to avoid the traditional (and often very limiting) idea of ‘trickle down’ where only community leaders [were] trained, on the assumption that they [would] then pass on to the communities what they [had] learned” (Baxter 2001: 29). Women, refugee youth and representatives from various ethnic groups within the camps were invited to participate in the community workshop activities. In many ways, the community workshop materials “were significantly more complex than those designed for primary school teachers and students” as facilitators were taught about “developmental psychology …, education theory, and peace and conflict theory” (Sommers 2001: 186). The community workshop facilitators also benefited from greater training and application opportunities, in comparison to teachers, as they continued to run workshops in the refugee communities and consistently had opportunities to apply their learning in the workshop settings (Sommers 2001).

Challenges The PEP continued to be well received by the refugee community; yet, programs of this magnitude inevitably confront challenges. First, and as will be seen with all of the cases presented in this chapter, there was a weak monitoring and evaluation process in place. Rather than evaluating the effectiveness of the program’s objectives and the degree to which newly acquired skills were put into practice by participants, the self-evaluation tools evaluated the course itself (Sommers 2001: 186). Despite the weaknesses in the monitoring and evaluation framework, there was evidence that the program was having an impact. One story, documented in much of the UNHCR literature and external evaluation, is worth recounting here. Several PEP participants and program managers contributed to the final draft presented here:

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Box 5.1. The Day the Fighting Stopped Two rival groups of Dinkas stood on the ridges of Kakuma camp, summoned to fight. Theirs was not to wonder why. Their role was to obey the elders, unquestionably, to fight. A variety of weapons had been collected, unearthed from their hideaways. Some of the young men had eyes flashing, spoiling for the fight. Others were more hesitant. But something strange was happening. What was it? Slowly, imperceptibly, one by one, some were drawing away from the larger groups. Silently, one by one, they just turned aside, and slowly separated from the others. More followed. One by one. They looked over to the opposite ridge. To their amazement, the same thing seemed to be happening over there, quite independently of what was happening on their own ridge. They even recognized from a distance one or two of their peace education friends walking away. …Those who remained could see the futility in standing their ground. They left, too. This day is known as the first time peacemakers ever stopped a large fight. Later, when they looked back on that day, some said: “Well, there on that ridge, I began to wonder why I always obeyed the elders and fought. I wondered why I have to put myself in danger and get hurt. I wondered why I should risk my resettlement plans which are almost through.” Another said: “And last time this happened, many of my friends were injured and several of them were left dead on the field. I began to ask myself, there on the ridge, why me? Why jeopardise everything I have been working for, and the peace that we have all been working for? I just couldn’t do it. I just couldn’t fight that time. Something inside me was saying: ‘No, don’t do it.’ So I left the ridge! I just left!” (Obura 2002)

Second, while the program benefited from widespread support from within the refugee community, the agency staff members at UNHCR and its implementing partners were less enthusiastic. According to Sommers (2001), the approach that the program developers took to instill ownership of the program and foster a culturally sensitive approach may have simultaneously hampered the participation of the humanitarian staff in the program’s development (Sommers 2001). The lack of engagement by agency staff may have ultimately carried ramifications for securing long-term support and funding for the program. While the success of the program was attributed to the endogenous process fostered during the design phase and the subsequent community ownership of the initiative, it was evident that participants in programs of this nature need more time for behavior change: “Those working in the

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programme, supervising and administering, should have the same skills, behaviours and attitudes that the programme is trying to instill” (Baxter 2001: 29). This is a key finding that will emerge again below in the lessons learned from implementing peace education across national schools in Kenya. The PEP was implemented in Dadaab and Kakuma refugee camps from 1998 to 2005; it was concurrently implemented in several refugee and returnee camps, including locations in the Democratic Republic of Congo, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Uganda, Liberia, Guinea, Sierra Leone and Côte d’Ivoire. During the apex of activity, the PEP was reaching 42,000 children each week in the refugee camps in Kenya, and more than 9,000 youth and adults graduated from the community program (Baxter 2001). Despite UNHCR’s efforts to mainstream and implement the initiative across various country programs, funding ran out in 2005. Despite the discontinued funding, the PEP provided the foundation for the peace education initiative undertaken by the Kenyan government in the post-election violence that affected the country in 2007 and 2008, the details of which are presented in the next case.

National-level Efforts for Peace Education The Government of Kenya, with support from UNICEF and UNHCR, initiated a nation-wide Peace Education Programme in response to the post-election violence that wreaked havoc in the country in 2007–08. What was initially an emergency response to the crisis evolved into a robust national effort (INEE 2012). The overall goals of the program were to “promote peaceful co-existence among learners, hence contributing to peace and national cohesion in the country” (DevEd 2013). The objectives of the Peace Education Programme entailed creating awareness among learners about the causes of conflict and conflict resolution skills and helping students to become good citizens in their local communities, the country and the larger world by respecting cultural diversity and ensuring social justice (DevEd 2013). The program consists of a comprehensive set of materials, including a training manual, teacher activity books for classes 1 to 8, a workbook, a storybook and psychosocial self-help materials. Over 8,500 teachers and education officials have been trained on peace education through a cascade training model of master trainers. Initially, peace education topics—including causes of conflict, communication, effective listening, problem solving, negotiation, reconciliation, questioning, citizenship—were to be integrated into the curriculum through carrier subjects such as life skills, social studies, religious education, history, and government. Peace education topics appear to receive the most attention when taught through the life skills curriculum, though there are additional

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challenges to these efforts, as illuminated below. The program also uses cocurricular activities, including: art, drama, and music; participatory school governance; anti-bullying interventions; and community outreach as a way to encourage the informal learning of peace education (DevEd 2013). The Kenyan government and its partners have also facilitated additional activities to complement classroom learning, including: campaigns; a peace torch (a nationwide event during which a torch traveled with the help of school children and governmental representatives through all of the counties in Kenya as a symbol of peace); county-level peace education forums; peace caravans (youth-led initiatives to foster intercommunity dialogue in areas affected by violence and inter-ethnic tension); and ongoing peace education workshops held at national, regional, and international levels (DevEd 2013). Over time, the governance structure within the Ministry has expanded to support the ongoing implementation of the peace education initiative. There is a unit within the national headquarters of the Ministry of Education that is responsible for developing a strategy in collaboration with county focal points, liaising with partners, identifying capacity gaps, and coordinating the ICQN and other activities at the national level. There is a national steering committee that serves as an entry point for partners, while county officers coordinate implementation and partnerships as well as gather data for monitoring and evaluation activities. At the school level, head teachers serve as coordinators, while another teacher at the same school is responsible for implementation (music and drama teachers also assist) (DevEd 2013).

Challenges Several challenges have emerged in the six years since the Peace Education Programme was first developed. First, despite efforts to mainstream peace education in primary and secondary school curricula, this has not been done comprehensively across all subjects. At best, peace education is taught through the life skills course, which is offered in a lesson of approximately thirty minutes once per week. “Life skills” consists of not only peace education but also issues related to HIV/AIDS awareness and gender. Since “life skills” is not an examinable subject, it is common for teachers not to teach the weekly course at all. Efforts to incorporate peace education and other life skills topics into the curriculum and learning environment are easily deprioritized in favor of “academic subjects.” While there has been considerable debate about the merits of including life skills and peace education-related topics in exams in an effort to buttress the importance of the topic, one Ministry representative noted that students’ ability to answer the questions correctly does not necessarily mean that they have internalized

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those same concepts (interview October 10, 2014). He felt that alternative measurements are needed to gauge learning in this area, including the presence and effectiveness of peace clubs at the school level. Second, despite immense efforts to reach teachers through various training mechanisms, there is still a lack of capacity among teachers to implement peace education in their classrooms. A Kenyan ministry representative attributed many of the capacity gaps to the challenges teachers face in accessing relevant materials to support their work, converting their newly found conceptual understandings into concrete lesson plans, and grasping and internalizing new concepts that they are responsible for teaching to their students (interview October 10, 2014). The findings from two Master’s theses conducted by graduate students at the University of Nairobi corroborate the challenges related to the availability of resources and teacher training (see Wainaina [2013] and Adhiambo [2014] for full studies). Both research projects, based on surveys of teachers, found that teachers have very limited to no access to peace education materials to supplement their teaching of this topic and have received little to no training on peace education and the necessary methodologies to teach the subject effectively. Elaborating on the point above about the need for teachers to internalize the content, the Ministry representative said: “You can’t teach empathy if you don’t know how to empathize. You have to work on the teachers before you take the same to the children” (interview October 10, 2014). To address some of these challenges, the Ministry of Education, with support from partner organizations, is currently piloting a new teacher training approach that utilizes the Learning to Live Together framework, a model that promotes intercultural and interfaith understanding (Sinclair 2013). Through this framework, teachers will have the opportunity to learn about participatory and experiential methodologies and then to apply them in the courses they teach on life skills. The Ministry and its partners are also working to develop detailed lesson plans that teachers can then apply in the classroom in an effort to redress the lack of materials. Third, it has been challenging to secure ongoing support for peace education and life skills-based programming when it has proven difficult to measure the effectiveness and outcomes of the program. The Ministry and its partners are attempting to remedy this challenge as they pilot new training for teachers participating in the Learning to Live Together workshop (UNESCO 2014). For this pilot program, a baseline survey will be conducted at the start of the program, and teachers will be asked to monitor themselves (through a self-monitoring tool) and their learners (through personal stories of change) throughout the duration of the program; additionally, schools will support student-initiated projects based on skills developed by the learners in the classroom at the end of the program. A Most Significant Change

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methodology,2 a participatory monitoring and evaluation technique that generates and analyzes personal accounts of change over time both at the individual and school levels, will be used (interview October 10, 2014). Finally, there appears to be a widespread realization that peace education approaches carried out through the curriculum and in the classroom are insufficient for ensuring peace. A more comprehensive approach that addresses the challenges not only in the classroom but also in the wider policy framework is required. It is evident from the new Education Sector Policy on Peace Education that the Kenyan government is complementing its ongoing work on peace education with conflict-sensitive education, a point that was reiterated by a UNICEF representative responsible for supporting its organization’s peacebuilding, education, and advocacy initiative. He stated: “The Ministry is starting to realize that having a stand-alone peace education class isn’t sufficient for peacebuilding because you aren’t addressing the rest of everything that drives conflict” (interview October 10, 2014). The UNICEF representative cited new materials by the Inter-Agency Network for Education in Emergencies (INEE), “which define conflict-sensitive education as the delivery of education programmes and policies in a way that considers the conflict context and aims to minimize negative impact (i.e. contribution to conflict) and maximize positive impact” (INEE 2013: 13), whereas, peacebuilding “is understood to mean activities that aim explicitly to address the root causes of conflict and contribute to peace at large” (INEE 2013: 13). In this vein, a Ministry representative acknowledged that conflict sensitivity goes beyond the curriculum and requires that policy makers look at the ways in which existing or new policies might contribute to or minimize conflict—e.g. how the government disburses free primary education money, manages teachers, recruits teachers for training in different communities, etc. (interview October 10, 2014). The UNICEF representative is optimistic that a conflict-sensitive approach will allow the Kenyan government to examine the curriculum more carefully in an effort to identify cases in which certain minority groups might be excluded from the curriculum or belittled in their portrayal in textbooks. A review of teacher training practices would address how teaching pedagogies might be fueling practices that exclude certain students in the classroom (interview October 10, 2014). With the dual focus on peace education and conflict-sensitive education, the Kenyan government appears to be taking strides to ensure that adequate support at all levels (national government, county offices, communities, schools, classrooms) is available for supporting peace education programs, including the need for vocal champions and advocates to motivate school personnel and teachers to stay committed to this work. The Government of Kenya has planned several additional activities to guide its work moving forward, including: maintaining emphasis on curricular mainstreaming amidst

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forthcoming curriculum reforms; implementing peace education in secondary schools; introducing e-learning in the training of teachers in peace education; and developing a more robust monitoring and evaluation framework to measure value and effectiveness of the peace education program. In addition to these activities carried out at the national level, independent peace education initiatives carried out by international organizations have also been underway. The following case provides one example of these efforts.

Project-based Efforts for Peace Education Teachers without Borders (TWB) is a US-based nonprofit organization that was established in 2000 to provide support and resources for the professional development of teachers around the world. The TWB Peace Education Program is one of their teacher programs, which has been implemented through in-person and online workshops in several countries, including Kenya. The program was first developed when TWB country representatives in Nigeria requested support after sectarian violence in 2010 affected the country (Teachers without Borders 2010). TWB defines “peace education” as that which “empowers learners with the knowledge, skills, attitudes and values necessary to end violence and injustice and promote a culture of peace.” The TWB Peace Education Program seeks to foster a democratic and open learning environment where teachers and students teach and learn from one another through “equitable dialogue.” The content of the module combines academic study of the key concepts with opportunities for practical application. The ultimate objective of the program is to promote values such as compassion, equality, interdependence, diversity, sustainability, and nonviolence (Teachers without Borders 2010). The TWB Peace Education Program Coordinator indicated that the implementation of the program “looks very different in each country” because they “rely on local facilitators to decide what the teachers need” (interview, TWB Peace Education Program Coordinator September 24, 2014). The Peace Education Program is a three-unit curriculum for the teachers, designed to provide comprehensive training in the theoretical and practical aspects of peace education in the classroom. The first unit addresses the theoretical and philosophical foundations of peace education, and encourages teachers to understand and connect the core concepts by reflecting on guiding questions, such as “What is the relationship between peace and education?” and “What peace education definition applies best to my context?” (Teachers without Borders 2011: 20). The second unit delves into the scope of peace education, covering ten themes, including disarmament education, human rights education, and

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multicultural education, and aides an understanding of their application in the classroom through sample lessons for each theme (Teachers without Borders 2011). Local partners and facilitators are encouraged to include contextually relevant themes when the materials are being adapted to a new context (interview September 24, 2014). The final unit is dedicated to the pedagogical aspects of teaching peace education, through guiding questions such as: “What is the relationship between where I teach and how I teach?” (Teachers without Borders 2011: 160). The Peace Education Program Coordinator explained that the “how” of teaching peace education is critical to its success, and integrating peace education in academic content has been found to be an effective strategy. The TWB approach to peace education emphasizes the importance of the teacher as a role model, and emphasizes that the most important attribute of peace educators is the ability to internalize the concepts of peace education and constantly reflect on, and practice, the principles they teach their students (Teachers without Borders 2011). The Education Program Coordinator, from her own experience in facilitating training programs, highlights the role of “inner peace” of the teacher as essential for the transformation towards a culture of peace. The lessons and principles of this course are flexible, and can be adapted to formal, nonformal or informal learning spaces, for all age groups (Teachers without Borders 2011). Having successfully completed these three units, teachers are required to design a peace education resource for their classrooms, which is an effort to help teachers internalize the concepts through application (Teachers without Borders 2011). This practice also reiterates that the teachers are “experts about the children in their classroom” and ensures that the program is locally relevant (interview September 24, 2014). In 2010, the Life Focus Group, a Kenyan community-based organization, reached out to Teachers Without Borders and expressed interest in a teacher professional development module to help teachers address issues related to the post-election violence in their classrooms (interview September 24, 2014). The Life Focus Group consisted primarily of teachers from a school in Nakuru, Kenya, and a Program Director who aspired to leverage their positions as teachers and members of different tribes to further peace in their community (interview October 6, 2014). According to the former TWB Program Director, TWB was “well positioned” to initiate the Peace Education Program in Kenya in 2010 (interview, former TWB Program Director November 24, 2014). They already had an in-country coordinator who had extensive experience facilitating TWB’s teacher professional development program in Kenya, and who was able to understand, adapt, and implement the Peace Education Program within the Kenyan context (interview November 24, 2014). Additionally, TWB had a wellestablished network of local partners and representatives, including their

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new implementing partner the Life Focus Group, to help them “deliver the program without big partners or the government.” As the program grew, TWB reached out to the Ministry for support. However, the lack of government collaboration ultimately proved detrimental to the program, as indicated below in the discussion about challenges (interview November 24, 2014). The Life Focus Group, in collaboration with TWB, organized two rounds of workshops between 2010 and 2011, each four to five days long, training approximately 100 teachers (interview September 24, 2014). The Life Focus Group Program Director stated that the TWB initiative was the “only [Peace Education] program available” in Kenya at that time (interview October 6, 2014). Although the national-level peace education program had been underway since 2008, as indicated in the case example above, the perception that TWB’s program was the only peace education program available underscores the early challenges that the Government of Kenya had in promoting its peace education program, training teachers, and making materials available across the country.

Challenges The challenges confronted by TWB in its efforts to implement the Peace Education Program stem from issues related to a lack of engagement with the Ministry, program design, inadequate monitoring and evaluation, and a dearth of long-term financial support. In terms of seeking endorsement by the Ministry, the former TWB Program Director shared that once TWB had established their program in Kenya, the organization was very eager to affiliate with the government’s Peace Education Programme. The TWB in-country coordinator had several meetings with Ministry officials but they did not yield any positive results. Despite this challenge, the former TWB Program Director stated that their organization was “not disappointed with the government,” because they ultimately understood “that the government was looking for big international nonprofits” as partners (interview November 24, 2014). The Life Focus Group Program Director, who also reached out to local government officials to implement the TWB Peace Education curriculum in Kenyan schools, added another perspective to understanding the government’s hesitation to collaborate with TWB. He explained that it was a challenging task to convince the Ministry of Education officials and the teachers that “a curriculum from outside” would be relevant to further peace in the Kenyan context despite the organization’s efforts to tailor and adapt the materials to the Kenyan context. He further explained that once the government officials observed the teacher trainings themselves, they approved the TWB Peace Education Program and allowed TWB to implement it in local schools.

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According to the former TWB Program Director, the second challenge was that some aspects of their program design negatively impacted the effectiveness of the program. One of their greatest challenges was the “high-touch, small-scale” feature of their program design. Undoubtedly, they believed that in-person workshops were the most effective way to train teachers in the Peace Education Program, and the small scale of their operations allowed them to reach remote areas. However, the cost of training a small number of teachers was very high and was one of the reasons why the government did not “take us very seriously.” In hindsight, the former TWB Program Director shared, they would have benefitted greatly from “a tangible component” like a published textbook, peace education resource, or an instructor’s manual, which could have been shared at a larger scale. Second, the program was designed within an “American graduate-school program” framework, involving extensive reading and reflection. Based on feedback they received from teachers and implementing partners, they understood that teachers needed more practical tools and strategies, not only for the classroom but also to help them mobilize the community (interview November 24, 2014). A third challenge, that has plagued all cases presented in this chapter, was the insufficient monitoring and evaluation of the program, in particular related to the impact of the intervention at the classroom level. In an attempt to build internal accountability and ensure that the workshops were being conducted in a peaceful manner, the headquarters in the United States sought extensive reports as well as video documentation from both the facilitators and participants (interview September 24, 2014). They also collected regular feedback from teachers on the quality and effectiveness of the training. However, plans for an extensive evaluation were disrupted when they learned that funding for the Peace Education Program would come to an end. They decided to use the remaining resources to strengthen the program before exiting (interview November 24, 2014). Therefore, TWB only has anecdotal accounts of the implementation of the Peace Education Program in classrooms in Kenya. The Life Focus Group Program Director himself implemented the program in his classroom and also observed other teachers who had been trained. He thought that the Peace Education Program “benefitted the children … [as] they began to appreciate each other [and] understand each other as global citizens” (interview October 6, 2014). The former TWB Program Director shared that teachers reported that the program also impacted their overall teaching style and pedagogy—”they became less teacher-like and more child-centered in their classroom practice.” Teachers spoke less about how the Peace Education Program affected community-level issues of violence and conflict, but expressed that they “felt very comfortable in their ability to discuss peace and violence and conflict-related issues which were usually

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taboo” (interview November 24, 2014). Although this informal, qualitative feedback was useful, it was not effective in helping them scale up, which the former TWB Program Director believed required more substantive, quantitative evidence. Finally, the Peace Education Program was not tied to a specific grant, and multiple organizational grants as well as in-kind donations were used to fund it (interview September 24, 2014). It was most active between 2010 and 2011 in Kenya and in other countries, but when TWB experienced a series of financial setbacks towards the end of 2011, the program suffered. Most of the staff members, including the Peace Education Program team, were laid off at this time as well. The Life Focus Group Program Director reiterated that had the program received local funding, “it would have gone far and wide” (interview October 6, 2014). TWB’s efforts to apply for grants were met with the difficulty of trying to fit their program into the grant requirements. The TWB Peace Education Program believed that the program would benefit most from an institutional partner that could help organize online workshops three or four times a year, and also provide institutional funding for the workshops. The former TWB Program Director suggested that they would have been more successful in mobilizing funding and support from the government and other institutional partners if, in addition to the training workshops, they had more tangible products for a wider circulation (interview November 24, 2014). Despite the lack of financial resources, many team members continue contributing to the project on a voluntary basis as a result of their own commitment to peace education (interview September 24, 2014). Today, the TWB Peace Education Program is mostly an online professional development resource which interested persons can download free of cost and implement. In 2012 the online course was offered three times in partnership with the National Peace Academy, but since they also underwent a severe financial crisis recently, it was only offered once per year in 2013 and 2014 respectively. TWB has recently partnered with Johns Hopkins University to deliver the online peace education course for a fee, which made it very challenging for teachers from Kenya and other conflict-affected countries to participate. Based on the volume of individuals and local organizations that reach out to TWB, the peace education coordinator attests to the continued need and demand for the program. She shares that although the online course is useful in bringing together teachers from different parts of the world, it does not allow for the strengthening of teacher communities in schools. The three peace education programs in Kenya presented in this chapter, including initiatives carried out by international organizations in two refugee camps, the Kenyan government’s work in national schools, and a non-governmental organization supporting teachers in national schools, portray the

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diverse types of peace education programming that exist in one particular national context. The cases presented here also shared several key challenges. The collective lessons learned from these cases, which may inform the development of existing or future peace education initiatives, are further elaborated in the next section.

Conclusion There are several key insights and lessons learned that emerged from the review of the case studies presented in this chapter. We will highlight four key lessons in this final section related to teacher training, support, and resources for long-term sustainability, and linking grassroots efforts with larger policy initiatives. To accomplish the goals set forth in the new Education Sector Policy on Peace Education—which states that “peace education will employ participatory, interactive, experiential and transformative teaching approaches that enhance the learner’s ability to internalize knowledge, values, skills and attitudes for proactive peace action” (Ministry of Education, Science and Technology 2014: 10)—teachers not only need to receive training on content and pedagogy, but they also need recurring opportunities to learn, apply, and internalize the very concepts they are hoping to instill in their students. The changes required for teachers to embrace “participatory, interactive, experiential and transformative teaching approaches” should also not be underestimated. An external evaluation of the PEP carried out in the refugee camps found that teachers “exhibited poor questioning skills” (Obura 2002: 22), an observation that was also made through more recent research on refugee education that entailed classroom observations of teachers in both camp and national schools. This research study further captures the challenges of supporting teachers to move across the teacherto student-centered continuum as lecture-based teaching practices are deeply embedded (Mendenhall et al. forthcoming). These challenges apply not only to teachers working in national schools, but also teachers in private schools and schools based in the country’s refugee camps. When it comes to developing longer-term teacher professional development in the area of peace education, it is important to look at the role of university programs in this process. According to Chelule (2014), very few public universities in Kenya offer peace education courses. Even if a peace education course is described in the course catalog, it does not necessarily mean that it is being offered. The reasons for this can be attributed to an overall lack of qualified faculty members to teach in this area, low availability of peace-education-related textbooks and training materials (and even fewer

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developed by African scholars) that faculty could use to develop their courses. There is also concern, according to Chelule (2014), that university administrators, faculty, and students may be reticent to pursue peace education given that there are limited employment opportunities for students after graduation, despite the emphasis on peace education at the national level and in the national curriculum. The in-service teacher training efforts currently underway need to be complemented by other types of training opportunities, including pre-service training, in an effort to reach more teachers across the country. Next, the focus of peace education programs on skills development and behavior change requires time and resources to allow for those changes to occur. As mentioned above, teachers need time to learn, apply, and internalize new concepts and skills for teaching peace education, as do students and administrators supporting the program. Despite the challenges inherent to measuring the effectiveness of peace education programs, efforts to assess and research changes are paramount for governments, international organizations, and schools eager to secure funds for longer-term engagement. The Ministry of Education in Kenya is in the process of drafting a clearer monitoring and evaluation framework that examines a range of areas including: integration of peace education in the curriculum, in clubs in schools, cocurricular activities, the wider school community, as well as the overall promotion of a culture of peace in school (interview October 9, 2014). Finally, the Government of Kenya’s efforts to work through both the curriculum as well as the larger policy environment speak to the microand macro-level processes required to support peace education initiatives holistically and over an extended period of time. From the Peace Education Programme carried out in the refugee camps, it was evident that buy-in at multiple levels may be important for ensuring long-term support and sustainability. As quoted from a recent review of the literature conducted by UNICEF, “[John Paul] Lederach (1997) also emphasizes the importance of working simultaneously at policy, community and grassroots levels to achieve sustainable peace. This suggests that the most effective forms of peace education go beyond interpersonal and inter-group encounters, but also address underlying causes and structural inequalities that can fuel conflict within societies” (UNICEF 2011: 31). It will be important to follow this emerging interest and focus on conflictsensitive approaches to education and peacebuilding and the ways in which these new initiatives at the global level might interact with more grassroots peace education efforts. Clearly, the Government of Kenya has been significantly influenced by UNICEF’s new peacebuilding, education, and advocacy work as the emphasis on conflict sensitivity has been mainstreamed in the government’s new peace education policy. To the extent that conflict sensitive

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approaches will enable policy makers, school leaders, and teachers to more robustly assess and respond to conflict drivers in their communities, it may allow peace education efforts carried out through curriculum and in schools to be that much more effective as structural as well as interpersonal issues are addressed.

Notes 1

Given that UNHCR calls for ten days of teacher training to be considered “trained” in refugee contexts (Dryden-Peterson 2011), this is a significant amount of time.

2

For more details about this approach, see Davies, Rick and Jess Dart (2005). The “Most Significant Change” (MSC) Technique: A Guide to Its Use.

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6 In the Gaze of Gandhi: Peace Education in Contemporary India Monisha Bajaj

Introduction Postcolonial India presents a multiplicity of educational realities and approaches to peace education. With over 1.2 billion residents and tremendous diversity across regions and states, it is not surprising that various programs and policies that resonate with peace education have emerged throughout the country. This chapter provides a sampling of the many initiatives that operate in present-day India to offer a schema of the various ideological orientations that animate peace education efforts. While not an exhaustive mapping, certain differences in approaches speak to the ways in which peace education and peace studies operate in the country. This chapter responds to two larger questions: (1) What different approaches characterize the terrain of peace education in contemporary India? And (2) what do the diverse manifestations of peace education in one nation of the global South tell us about the limits and possibilities of peace education? The sections that follow present various initiatives and policies related to peace education, arguing that efforts can be grouped into larger categories that align with different strands of peace education conceptual frameworks.1 In order to situate this chapter, it is useful to offer some background information on education and development across India. In terms of international indicators, some states in India—if disaggregated from the national whole—would be middle-income, while others would be among the poorest

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in the world. For example, on one end of the spectrum, the southern state of Kerala would rank seventy-seventh (out of nearly two hundred countries) in terms of the United Nations’ Human Development Index indicators related to health, literacy, and social development (Stanford 2010). At the other extreme, the seven North Indian states that fare the poorest in India in terms of health, education, and poverty measures, have a composite total of more of the world’s poor (over 455 million people living on less than US$1.25 a day) than any other region, including sub-Saharan Africa as a whole (United Nations 2010). In terms of education, progress has been made since Independence from Britain in 1947 when just sixteen percent of Indians could read or write; the most recent literacy figures average seventy-four percent nationally, despite calls for greater attention to the quality of education and parity between girls’ and boys’ completion rates (Bajaj 2012). The vast differences in lived experiences have resulted in distinct forms of peace education tailored to the level (primary, secondary, tertiary, non-formal), region, and local realities.

Global Peace Education The field of peace education evolved, most directly, out of the call for “peace research, peace action, and peace education” by seminal peace studies scholars who saw education as an integral component for the dismantling of structures of violence and the promotion of peace (Galtung 1973: 317). The field of peace education, originating in the post-World War II period, seeks to address direct, structural, and cultural forms of violence through the transformation of educational content, structure, and pedagogy (Galtung 1969, 2009; Harris 2004; Reardon 2000). Though the field focused originally on the elimination of direct violence, emphasizing disarmament and countering militarism (Haavelsrud 1996; Reardon, 1985), one of the core objectives of peace education has also become addressing cultural and structural violence, which are rooted in social inequalities that limit access to resources and opportunities for individuals and groups, and may be embedded in long-standing cultural practices, attitudes, or patterns (Galtung 2009). It is important to note that peace education is far from an institutionalized discipline, with courses being offered in some schools of education and “there is not one standard field but a variety of sub-fields loosely held together by a few common purposes” (Reardon 2000: 398). Nonetheless, the topics included in peace education courses, programs, and literature regularly include developing the capacity to promote social change vis-à-vis gender equity, cultural pluralism, and sustainable development, among others (Bajaj 2010).

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Recent scholarship that has articulated a “Critical Peace Education” (Bajaj 2008a, forthcoming; Brantmeier 2011) builds on earlier conceptual frameworks in peace education to offer further directions as to how learners at various levels may engage with unequal social realities in order to promote a comprehensive notion of peace. In advocating for university-level peace education to promote critical understanding and analysis, I have offered elsewhere (Bajaj 2014) the following core competencies for critical peace education: 1 Critical thinking and analysis. 2 Empathy and solidarity. 3 Individual and collective agency. 4 Participatory and democratic engagement. 5 Innovative education and communication strategies. 6 Conflict transformation skills. 7 Ongoing reflective practice.

In both peace education and its critical variant, learning spaces are seen as the site of transformative possibilities and where empathy and solidarity can be nurtured and developed. This mirrors the Freirean notion of praxis (Freire 1970), namely, learning and cognition paired with affective changes meant to inspire informed action in the face of local and global situations of injustice and violence. Particularly in the terrain of critical peace education, Paulo Freire’s education for critical consciousness greatly informs how educational efforts are conceived, structured, and analyzed (Ardizzone 2003; Bajaj 2008a; Bartlett 2008; Burns and Aspeslagh 1983; Harris 2004; Synott 2005). In Freirean theories, there is a strong argument for community engagement to be an integral component of education and for schooling to lay the groundwork for future social action and responsibility. However, the social movements towards equity and justice inspired by Gandhi in India, and his belief in education for self-reliance and moral development have, with a few exceptions (Allen 2007; Brantmeier 2007; Fields 2006; Prasad 1998), been largely absent from peace education scholarship.2 Gandhi conceptualized the child/learner as already deeply involved in society and connected to communities rather than in preparation for such involvement. This argument suggests that education must offer learners the opportunity to cultivate an understanding of social dynamics and resist pressures—be they post/colonial or the outcome of class conflict—to assimilate into dominant economic and cultural structures that often do not serve the needs of students and their communities.

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Dimensions of Violence in India Discussions of peace inherently necessitate an understanding of the vectors and dimensions of violence and conflict in a particular place. Postcolonial India, though characterized by relative political stability3 at the national level since independence in 1947, has experienced virulent and often bloody tensions based on caste, religious conflict, and entrenched gender discrimination, and is one of the most unequal societies in the world (Thornton and Thornton 2006). While peace education scholars tend to set Western industrialized countries as their silent template for analysis of themes such as multiculturalism, gender equity, and militarism, present-day India is witness to various forms of cultural and structural violence (as theorized by Galtung and discussed in Chapter 1 of this volume)—namely marked income inequality and deep-seated discrimination (based on caste, religion, gender, sexual identity, language, among others)—and direct violence in the form of communal attacks in different instances on Muslims, Dalits (formerly called “untouchables”),4 Sikhs, and Christians (Das 2008). The militarization and limiting of basic freedoms in Indian-controlled Kashmir also presents a vivid example of direct violence. India’s social realities and the roots of violence—direct, structural, and cultural—have shaped the emergence of peace education in various forms at different levels across the country.

The Many Faces of Peace Education in India Discussions of peace education have permeated the domains of policy, pedagogy, and educational practice in India. As a result of extensive discussions about peace education as part of the consultative process for the 2005 National Curriculum Framework, the National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT)—a national body that sets model curricula and policies for all of India—developed a position paper on peace education (see box 6.1). In line with this positional stance of the NCERT, for many years the Council offered in-service teachers the opportunity to participate in six weeks of training dealing with skills, attitudes, knowledge, and behavior related to peace and nonviolence (Roy 2008). A book entitled Ways to Peace: A Resource Book for Teachers (NCERT 2010) was also written by the NCERT department responsible for the summer training and disseminated widely to educators and administrators. Despite some policy movement toward incorporating peace education, most peace education exists in the actual practice of schools, non-governmental organizations, and universities. For example, UNESCO awarded the

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Box 6.1. Excerpt from Position Paper on Peace Education (NCERT) This [position] paper examines, in some detail, the major frontiers for education for peace in the Indian context. This is done with reference to the two major goals of education: namely, education for personality formation and education to foster responsible citizenship. Citizenship, not religion, is what all Indians share in common. The major frontiers of education for peace are: (a) bringing about peace-orientation in individuals through education; (b) nurturing in students the social skills and outlook needed to live together in harmony; (c) reinforcing social justice, as envisaged in the Constitution; (d) the need and duty to propagate a secular culture; (e) education as a catalyst for activating a democratic culture; (f) the scope for promoting national integration through education; and (g) education for peace as a lifestyle movement. … The paper concludes by identifying some of the basic assumptions that shape the approach to education for peace. These are: (a) schools can be nurseries for peace; (b) teachers can be social healers; (c) education for peace can humanise education as a whole; (d) the skills and orientation of peace promote life-long excellence; and (e) justice is integral to peace. (NCERT 2006)

City Montessori School in Lucknow, India the 2002 UNESCO Prize for Peace Education, citing the school’s efficacy in “promoting the values of peace, religious harmony, tolerance and coexistence among children” through the school’s curriculum and service-learning activities (UNESCO 2002: 14). As will be further discussed, in the domains presented below, three larger frameworks offer analysis of the ways in which peace educators in India make sense of what educational visions and outcomes infuse their efforts. The domains in Figure 6.1 move from individual and group level actions and analyses to societal and structural levels. In order to review the three domains and types of peace education that fall under each approach, it is useful to start at the more individual level of peace education as character and values education and work upward in the subsequent sections.

Peace Education as Character and Values Education Value education is subsumed in education for peace, but is not identical with it. Peace is a contextually appropriate and pedagogically gainful point of coherence for values. Peace concretizes the purpose of values and

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Peace Education as Critique of Structures of Violence

• Change comes from collective consciousness • Aligned with Critical Peace Education • Change comes from intergroup

Peace Education as understanding and coexistence Response to Inter- • Aims for prevention of further Group Violence violence Peace Education as Character and Values Education

• Change comes from individual peace behaviours • Rooted in psychological approach

FIGURE 6.1  Domains of Peace Education in India

motivates their internalisation. Without such a framework, the integration of values into the learning process remains a non-starter. Educating for peace is, thus, the ideal strategy for contextualising and making operative value education. Values are internalised through experience, which is woefully lacking in the classroom-centred and exclusively cognitive approach to teaching. Education for peace calls for a liberation of learning from the confines of the classroom and its transformation into a celebration of awareness enlivened with the delight of discovery. Education for peace contextualises learning. We live in an age of unprecedented violence: locally, nationally, and globally. It is a serious matter that schools, which are meant to be the nurseries of peace, become transmission points for violence. (NCERT 2010) Values and character education have a long history in India with roots in various religious traditions as well as in Gandhi’s philosophies around the purpose of education to build morality and self-reliance (Bajaj 2010). As mentioned above, discussions around peace education in India were concretized through the development of a position paper on Education for Peace that guided the 2005 National Curriculum Framework (NCF) process. Despite a holistic framing of the forms of violence as excerpted in box 6.1 above, peace education initiatives after the NCF process was completed became primarily housed in the psychology department of the National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT). Since 2005, the psychology department has infused the work in peace education with a psychological orientation and grouped it together as “value education and peace education,” the preferred term utilized by the educators

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involved. The NCERT’s psychology department for many years offered a six-week summer training course for in-service teachers, as well as shorter courses for teachers and teacher educators in peace education. According to their website, over 250 teachers have attended, but some uncertainty remains as to whether the summer six-week intensive course is continuing to be offered. One major accomplishment of the psychology department at the National Council of Educational Research and Training was the publication of a comprehensive resource book for educators entitled Ways to Peace: Resource Book for Teachers (NCERT 2010), as mentioned earlier. The resource book is full of stories and suggestions for educators that offer important insights and windows into the approach to peace education conceptualization. For example, the early sections of the book state the link between inner peace and societal conflict: Peace with the self or inner peace is a pre-condition for harmony with others but it should not be misunderstood as a state of “self-centred apathy” or “willful blindness” to others. The basic premise in understanding peace is that all of us, individually as well as collectively, contribute to peace. … A practical question that is raised is that we are not at peace because others in society or in the system do not let us be at peace. But does that mean that we are totally dependent on the choice of others? That is, if others reject peace, do we have to be peaceless too? It is important to remember that a peace-oriented person can be at peace even in the midst of a storm. That, however, does not mean that the storm will not blow away the roof of his/her house. That is why we have to mind the storm around us – and avert it, if possible, even as we develop the inner strength to stay calm. (NCERT 2010: 1–11) While the analysis offered suggests useful ways to equip students with skills for resilience and conflict resolution, it differs from some of the larger social critiques engaged in peace education, particularly in critical peace education, in other places where structures of violence are further and more comprehensively implicated. The focus on the individual’s orientation to peace resonates with strong traditions in India related to values and character education. Despite India being a secular state, many government schools have periods for moral or religious instruction and the concept of introducing good “values” through schooling has taken hold in many schools. These values often correlate with Hindu religious mandates and infuse concepts of truth, nonviolence, and righteous conduct that can be seen as compatible with peace education. However, such initiatives often also prioritize duty (which can often take on

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gendered dimensions that severely limit the space for girls and young women to challenge social norms), obedience to elders, and sometimes chauvinism to other groups if such notions are embedded in larger religious discourses of nationalism or fundamentalism. The training camps and schools run by Hindu fundamentalist groups that advocate violence towards other groups, and that have rewritten history textbooks to exclude the contributions of non-Hindu groups, represent a version of “values education” hijacked and gone far awry (Lall 2005). Another approach to character education that offers non-religious peaceoriented direction is that of peace clubs, which exist across India, in government-run and private schools. For example, in the northern Indian city of Chandigarh, dozens of peace clubs exist in secondary schools with the aim of “Controlling violence in society,” “improving the relationships between teacher and students,” and strengthening the “character of students” (Sharma 2013). Students meet every other week for a period to discuss topics related to peace, engage with speakers, write essays, and organize peace rallies. While the efficacy of such approaches has not been evaluated and are beyond the scope of this chapter to assess, the focus on individual behaviors, relationships, and values as related to peace is important to highlight in terms of the prevalence of this approach in India. The psychologized and behavioral approaches mentioned above align with what I term the “minds of men approach” referring to the preamble to UNESCO’s constitution that states that peace (and, perhaps concomitantly, peace education) begins in the “minds of men.” As a result, many of these approaches that rely on the psychology or individual conceptualization of peace seem to privilege the personal—in the case of India with strong Buddhist and Hindu traditions, the concept of inner peace resonates strongly—over collective action or community organizing strategies towards peace (Mayor 1995; Schwebel 2001). While the purely psychological and values approaches to peace education may privilege the individual, there have emerged various psychosocial oriented efforts that seek to build respect for difference and interpersonal skills to foster coexistence. As discussed in Chapter 12, the work of Sesame Workshop in India has introduced characters of different religions and backgrounds to children’s television, offering important early lessons for understanding pluralism. These build on other attempts to foster peacebuilding (e.g. see Zakharia’s chapter on Lebanon, Chapter 4 in this volume) through education, as seen in the following section.

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Peace Education as Response to and Prevention of Violence The terrain of education is therefore a deeply complex and contested territory within South Asia. A philosophy for peace education in the modern Indian context needs to both historicize … conflict and simultaneously develop a pluralistic content and the inclusive approach that is necessary to a democracy. Consequently, acknowledgements of these denials and discriminations include eliminating the shadows and silences of our history and social studies teaching and books through restoring content; the emergent peace education philosophy needs to adapt to the continued denial of access to primary education for disadvantaged sections (quantitatively) in modern-day India while qualitatively addressing the lacunae in perspective and content. The student is an active agent in this process of relearning, along with the teacher, parents, and active accomplices. (Setalvad 2010: 10–108) Similarly focused on the behaviors, attitudes and dispositions required to build peace through value or character building, this next approach links more integrally to conflict situations to build individual and collective capacities to transform conflict—interpersonal, inter-group, and societal. The second domain of peace education offers a response to direct violence and develops skills for the prevention of further violence, particularly in areas where violent conflict has erupted in different historical moments or has been endemic to the region. The following peace education initiatives offer examples of how various non-governmental efforts seek to respond to violence and build the capacities of educators and young learners to deal with conflict and difference. The initiatives below operate at school in lower or higher secondary levels, or in teacher education for those age groups. There are many examples of this type of approach to peace education in contemporary India, and two representative programs from Mumbai and Kashmir, both sites of inter-religious violence, will be discussed below. Since 1994, the non-governmental organization (NGO) and magazine Communalism Combat has operated a program in dozens of private and government-run primary schools in Mumbai called KHOJ (a Hindi term for “search” or “discover”). The focus of the educational program is to foster respect for pluralism and offer the skills to co-exist in interreligious contexts. Noting that curricula—both official textbooks and the “hidden curriculum” of biases passed down to children from parents and teachers—often reproduce stereotypes and intolerance, KHOJ’s approach is to provide in-classroom lessons that offer students in grades four through six the chance to critically

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engage with “the other.” Another key component of their program is taking students on field trips to religious or historical locations to allow them firsthand access to the contested narratives that infuse their textbooks, the media, and society at large. For example, KHOJ’s founder, social activist Teesta Setalvad, notes the types of reactions to field trips that cross religious lines and challenge preconceived notions: As we entered the two mosques, a few children had exclaimed, “But it’s so very clean!” The remark posed a challenge for the adults accompanying the children. Did the children mean that they did not expect a Mosque to be clean (an often-repeated stereotype of the Muslim is that he is “unclean,” besides being “barbaric,” quick to anger, and so forth), or was it in fact the reaction of children who are used to temples that are more often than not, not spotless? How does a teacher parse the elements of the experience and respond without implanting preconceptions of her own? (Setalvad 2010) KHOJ’s work creates openings for students and teachers to consider multiple perspectives on historical narratives and to challenge dominant ways of understanding others from different faiths and social groups. Entering its third decade of operation, KHOJ has expanded into exploring human rights issues in education, developing textbooks, as well as gathering and presenting historical accounts of peace, coexistence, and collaboration across South Asia through workshops with noted historians. History is one source of tension and violence in the conflict-ridden region of Kashmir in northern India. Since India’s independence in 1947, questions have lingered about the autonomy and status of Jammu and Kashmir. With a heavy military presence in the region as well as a resistance movement, the right to freedom has been curtailed and youth have been exposed to violence from every direction. Unlike KHOJ’s approach to take lessons straight to students in school, the Centre for Dialogue and Reconciliation (CDR) has taken teacher-training efforts in peace education to educators in the region. CDR’s teacher training efforts have reached thousands of teachers and center on key components of peace education. Utilizing a studentcentered approach, the training program focuses on five themes, namely: (1) communication, (2) differing viewpoints, (3) diversity and discrimination, (4) understanding conflict, and (5) individuals can make a difference (Srinivasan 2009). The training operates from the perspective that conflict is natural and can be a productive—rather than destructive—force in human societies. It also highlights that there are many ways to approach and transform conflict. In a survey of peace education programs in South Asia, the following interview with CDR’s Executive Director Sushobha Barve is cited:

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Barve regrets that the majority of peace education programmes get bogged down in religion-speak, and don’t help young people come to terms with difference. 
‘They all teach the students: the Gita talks about this, the Koran says this. But peace education is not just that, it is much more. It is appreciating the difference in one other, and respecting that difference. If Hinduism and Islam are different in theology, that is alright. We don’t have to constantly seek commonalities.’ 
She extends this thought to the conflict between India and Pakistan. ‘
What links Indians and Pakistanis? I’m not saying we shouldn’t seek commonalities. But after 60 years, we have grown differently as two nation states. We are neighbours; our imperative today is to learn to live with that difference.’ (Barve 2009, as cited in Srinivasan 2009: 29) While historical and present-day conflict between Hindus and Muslims, and the desire to bring peace between these groups, infuses the work of both KHOJ and the Centre for Dialogue and Reconciliation, other peace educators also work in situations of state violence and militant insurgencies. For example, Leban Serto has been working for two decades to promote peace education in India’s Northeast region where violence in various forms is rampant (Serto 2013). There are many examples that could be offered for this type of peace education in India that focuses on intergroup violence and responding to direct violence either from militant nationalists or the state and its forces. Different from the first type of peace education that focuses inward to an individual cultivation of character and values, this second category offers skills for coexistence, reframes contested narratives, and seeks to transform conflict through peace education praxis.

Peace Education and Peace Studies as Critique of Social Inequality Mahatma Gandhi was one of the first to integrate ideas of social justice with a “state of peace,” by recognising the potential dangers of poverty, inequality and discrimination. Not surprisingly, peace educators from around the world have continued to draw on his philosophy of non-violence. Surya Nath Prasad (1998) draws our attention to the impact of Gandhian thought on the initial stages of the development of peace research in India, with the establishment of several organisations, including Gandhi Shanti Prathishthan in 1959, the Gandhian Institute of Studies in 1961, the Centre for Gandhian Studies and Peace Research also in 1961, and the Peace Research Centre in 1971. In the decades since, several more organisations have been established, many at leading universities, all dedicated to

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studying and explaining the relevance of Gandhi’s ideas to generations of students. (Srinivasan 2009: 4) The third type of peace education in contemporary India is mostly found in higher education institutes and rests heavily on the field of peace studies, often labeled Gandhian studies in India. Gandhian studies, like peace studies and peace education, provides analyses of violence at individual, collective, and structural levels, and expresses a preferred vision of social justice, nonviolence, and peace (see Figure 6.1). Gandhian studies has emerged as a disciplinary field, encompassing a wide range of scholarship, including broad-based analyses of material inequalities and the specific character of India’s experience with globalization to examinations of the role of social and collective action toward peace (Prasad 1998). Scholars in the field of peace education have also drawn from Gandhi’s work, highlighting its relevance for Indian education in particular (Fields 2006; Harris 2004; Prasad 1998). While approaches vary, most initiatives that draw on Gandhi’s legacy to advance peace education are informed by the following core concepts: Nonviolence education or Gandhian studies emphasizes positive concepts of peace (rather than peace as absence of strife), the power of nonviolence, the discovery of one’s own and others’ truths, empathy, forgiveness and community, and proactive peacemaking. … For Gandhi, a spiritual emphasis grounds the acceptance and reconciliation of ideological differences. Gandhi’s thought and example offer moral and spiritual imperatives for application of our efforts to understand and achieve peace in its various manifestations. (Fields 2006: 22–23) Dozens of Indian universities have developed “Gandhian studies” departments, centers, or programs that offer degrees in the subject and emphasize various disciplines within Gandhian studies ranging from history to economics to development studies. The focus of each program or course of study ranges from Gandhian philosophy to development issues to environmental concerns to the economy, but all are rooted in Gandhi’s life as an historical example of peace, non-violence, and social justice. Universities bearing Gandhi’s name and educational philosophy have also been established, such as the Gandhigram University in Tamil Nadu and the Mahatma Gandhi University in Kerala, where Gandhi’s life and message are incorporated into the fabric of university life. Gandhigram University, for example, has been particularly active in its training of peace workers and has sought to contribute to peacemaking through higher education and training. Beginning in the 1960s, conferences

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were held at Gandhigram to train peace workers and prepare them to go to conflict areas, such as neighboring Sri Lanka (Paige 2002). The University’s founder, Gandhian philosopher Dr. G. Ramachandran, trained the first group of students in Gandhian principles of nonviolence and also initiated the Shanti Sena (University Peace Brigade) training program in Gandhigram, which is an intensive program aimed at providing a series of opportunities for the youth to promote nonviolence as a way of living. The national body charged with overseeing public higher education in India, the University Grants Commission, has supported and funded the development of Gandhian studies as a discipline. In a previous study (Bajaj 2010), I identified over fifty active departments/centers on Gandhian studies and these fall under the national educational theme of “Values Education,” a category that also includes “Buddhist Studies” and “Nehru Studies” (UGC 2004). In 2004, the University Grants Commission infused hundreds of thousands of dollars into an initiative to expand the number of Gandhian Studies Centers in institutions of higher education with an eventual goal of establishing and supporting 500 centers of Gandhian studies in Indian colleges and universities (Ramachandran 2008). The stated impetus for this expansion of Gandhian studies was reportedly due to the field’s inherent link with peace and conflict studies and its analysis of how to address social and global inequalities (Ramachandran 2008). Admission into a Masters or a PhD level degree program in Gandhian education is through a national qualifying exam, which is administered twice a year. Most universities that offer Gandhian studies have graduate coursework—Masters and Doctoral level—and many offer undergraduate or non-degree certificates in Gandhian studies as well. Many of the original programs in Gandhian studies were founded by Gandhi’s colleagues and fellow independence leaders; however, course offerings in the field continue to expand, suggesting that the field is not just about one individual and is seen, at least by some, to have contemporary relevance. Programs in Gandhian studies have also allied with various other disciplines and/or fields, such as conflict resolution, peace studies, development studies, and history. In a review of course content from peace education courses largely taught in the United States and Gandhian studies courses taught in India, a previous study (Bajaj 2010) offers comparative data on topics generally discussed (see Table 6.1). The most common topics in Gandhian studies align with larger critiques of structures of violence, patterns of inequality and historical/colonial legacies that create unequal conditions. In 2012, UNESCO and the Government of India together established a specialized educational institute—the first in the Asia–Pacific region—called the Mahatma Gandhi Institute of Education for Peace and Sustainable Development, located in India’s capital, New Delhi. As stated on UNESCO’s

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Table 6.1  Frequency of Topics in Peace Education and Gandhian Studies Courses Frequency (high to low)

Peace Education

Gandhian Studies

1

Violence/War/Militarism

2

Feminist/Gender Perspectives on Rural Development Peace

3

Nonviolence

4

Conflict Resolution/ Transformation Environment/Sustainable Development

5

Gandhi’s Life

Political Empowerment Nonviolence Social Movements Gandhian Economics/Equitable Global Economic Order Conflict Resolution/ Transformation

6

History of Peace Education

7

Disarmament

8

Religion/Spirituality/Inner Peace

9

Human Rights

10

Critical Pedagogy/Paulo Freire

11

Restorative Justice

Indian Social & Political Thought

12

United Nations/International Organizations

Religion/Morality/Coexistence

Gender Perspectives United Nations/International Organizations Environment/Sustainable Development

Originally published in Bajaj 2010.

website, the goals of the Institute include (1) “acting as a clearing house for analyzing and disseminating relevant research, case studies, and good practice”; (2) “facilitating related networks,  building partnerships,  and connecting knowledge communities”; and (3) “providing technical advice and supporting capacity-building needs of Member States within the Asia–Pacific Region” (UNESCO 2012). Despite UNESCO’s involvement in the creation of a regional center in Gandhi’s name, it is interesting to note that there is no mention of Gandhian studies in the titles of the handful of UNESCO Chairs at Indian Universities that deal with the theme of peace. For example, the UNESCO Chair in Peace and Intercultural Understanding at the Banaras Hindu University established in 2010 focuses on peace studies and makes no direct link to Gandhian studies. This suggests that, in some quarters, efforts are being made to move beyond Gandhi and into broader frameworks for peace studies and peace education in India.

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Conclusion The field of peace education has long emphasized a context-dependent (as opposed to universalistic or standards-based) epistemology encouraging variations in focus based on temporal and local factors (Harris 2004). With policy discussions incorporating peace education as a core competency for national educational endeavors, the space for localizing and contextualizing peace education is vast. In this chapter, I show how three domains of peace education in present-day India define localized approaches. Some educators and policy makers focus on the resonance between peace education and traditions of character or values education; others look to situations of conflict to use peace education as a way to mitigate communal and other forms of violence; and Gandhian studies in tertiary institutions utilize a quasi neo-Marxist questioning of globalization, socioeconomic relations, and inequality at the structural level. The vibrant diversity of how local actors make meaning of peace education offers insight into the ways in which this global education model can inform grounded praxis. Interestingly, the diverse ways that peace education operates in India also determines the alliances and conversations that each initiative engages in. For example, the efforts outlined in this chapter have little connection to each other. Instead, each domain within India speaks to colleagues and peace educators in that domain internationally through conferences, exchanges, visits and joint projects. Further research could explore transnational networks of influence and activity in peace education in places like India as they are tied to global flows of information, resources, and support; additionally, research could focus on the impact of various initiatives on the attitudes, behaviors, and orientations of students and teachers in the programs mentioned. This chapter sought to shed light on peace education practices from a vibrant corner of the global South that can lead to a broader and deeper understanding of the diverse forms and possibilities of peace education.

Notes 1

This chapter draws, in part, from information previously published in the article by Bajaj (2010) on Gandhian studies in India.

2

Allen’s (2007) work, in which he develops a “Gandhian peace education” philosophy, is a notable exception to this gap in the literature linking Gandhi to peace education.

3

Of course, the Indian state has experienced (and unfortunately too often been complicit in) brutal sectarian violence against Sikhs in the north-west state of Punjab, violence in the majority Muslim state of Kashmir for

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PEACE EDUCATION decades, and armed insurgencies in the north-eastern states, not to mention the insurrectionary Naxalite movement in rural central and eastern India at different points in the country’s post-Independence history. All these forms of violence notwithstanding, the social cohesion and legitimacy of the Indian nation-state has largely survived and in many ways remained strong.

4

Dalits (literally translated as “broken people”) constitute 15 percent of India’s population. Human Rights Watch finds that “Entrenched discrimination violates Dalits’ rights to education, health, housing, property, freedom of religion, free choice of employment, and equal treatment before the law. Dalits also suffer routine violations of their right to life and security of person through state-sponsored or -sanctioned acts of violence, including torture” (Human Rights Watch 2007: 1).

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PART THREE

Navigating Structures of Violence

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7 Uncertainty, Fluidity, and Occupying Spaces in-between: Peace Education Practices in Mindanao, the Philippines Lindsey K. Horner

Introduction Peace and security have arguably become a rallying call of the early twentyfirst century. Only a year old, the new century was shocked by one of the most ambitious terrorist attacks imagined: the coordinated attacks on the World Trade Centre, the Pentagon, and Washington, DC, now instantly recollected under the phrase “9/11.” Since its precarious beginnings, this century has seen successive wars and increased terrorist threats, which have elevated the concept of “security” to a strong watchword. In this context the concept of security has permeated and saturated public discourses, which are no less evident in the fields of development and education. Novelli (2010), in his paper “The New Geopolitics of Educational Aid: From Cold Wars to Holy Wars?” explores some of the implications of this shift in these fields. However, the apparently self-evident and important notion of security is not a neutral or value-free concept. As Duffield (2001) reveals in his book Global Governance and the New Wars, the merging of development and security in today’s complex systems of global governance has redefined security to reflect an agenda for social transformation. In this context the notion of liberal peace

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appears to be held up as the self-evident answer to insecurity and conflict, extolling state building, democracy, and free markets. However, liberal peace is not without its critics (e.g. Cooper, Turner, and Pugh 2011; Goodhand and Walton 2009; MacGinty 2007; and Pugh 2004), and its main constituents are contested and problematic notions in any context, not only in conflict-affected regions. For example, simplistic impositions of representational democracy can fuel divisions and lead to majoritarianism; free markets can exacerbate socioeconomic inequalities; and human rights, through elevating individual rights, can extol a culture of individualism and consequently suppress notions of collective rights. It is not my case that these ideas do not contain important values; however, applying them blindly without critical engagement and sufficient attention to the nuances and complexities inherent to them can cause unintended problems. The work of discourse to rework the ideology of liberal peace into a neutral, depoliticized notion and panacea renders invisible the violence of the Western political and economic interests it contains, leading to the ironic situation of “a violence that sustains our very efforts to fight violence and promote tolerance” (Žižek 2008: 1). Appeals for “security” are usually made with a sense of dire necessity, or what Žižek might call “the fake sense of urgency that pervades the left-liberal humanitarian discourse on violence” (Žižek 2008: 5). In his book Violence, Žižek describes a situation where the imperative to “do something” diminishes our time to reflect, identifying “a fundamental anti-theoretical edge to these urgent injunctions” (ibid.: 6). However, by failing to reflect and to engage theoretically and critically, our efforts to address the issues portrayed to us, in this case the issues of insecurity and conflict, risk turning into self-undermining acts. For example, the portrayed urgency with which we must tackle global insecurity denies time to reflect on the complexities and interactions between the less visible forms of cultural and structural violence (Galtung 1990), which may underpin direct violence. An anti-theoretical stance denies the opportunity to reflect on how a model of liberal peace may actually undermine peace, while simultaneously doing the work of marginalizing critics by accusing them of not caring because they do not share this urgency and can easily (and unfairly) be accused of doing nothing. The depoliticizing tendencies of our age present ideological conceptions, such as liberal peace, as natural and neutral by playing on a sense of urgency and anti-theoretical sentiments to reduce politics to mere administration. However, theory is important because it helps us to understand from different perspectives, to see the nuances of the situation, and because solutions are found in how we approach something (our theory) in the first place. In this chapter I introduce a theoretically informed practice of peace education, which takes a very broad understanding of education to include nonformal and informal activities that orientate around community organizing

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and capacity building. This broad understanding of education makes this approach relevant to not only educationalists, but also development practitioners engaged in community development in conflict-affected areas. In what follows I introduce a brief sketch of the theoretical approach “peace as an event, peace as utopia” (pepu) (Horner 2013a), describing the main influences and general implications. After broadly setting the theoretical framework, the chapter turns to the context of Mindanao, the Philippines, in order to illustrate what this might mean in the field. I offer a short introduction to the context before exploring the multiple understandings of peace present in Mindanao—the ecology of peace knowledge—and the practices that appear to strengthen peace within this ecology. The chapter will then seek to demonstrate these ideas through a case study, before concluding with the impact this has for both practitioners and researchers.

Peace as an Event, Peace as Utopia “Peace as an event, peace as utopia” (pepu) (Horner 2013a) was born out of a reaction to liberal peace discourse. I found myself troubled by current thinking around peace. Multiple encounters in the related literature with terminologies such as “peace dividends” served to tie peace up in a language of economics and instrumentality. Not only was this not how I understood peace, but also these terms served to hide the role economics can play in violence, especially when broadening the concept of violence to structural violence, for example through economic inequality, increased competitiveness, and individualism (in neo-liberal economics). Simultaneously, I found myself responding to the idea of peacekeeping troops, an image that at the time flashed across our television screens in increasing frequency, with very contradictory and uneasy feelings that played on the irony of the militarization of peace. Peace also seemed to have been conflated with security and used to legitimize intervention, either as political and social reforms or, ironically, as a justification for war. A certain discourse around peace with a technocratic framing of “the problem” had arguably consolidated itself as a strong “regime of truth” (Foucault, e.g. 1980), enacting a violence of closure that ultimately denied alternatives. In this sense, peace was betraying itself. It was from this position that I was motivated to disturb this discourse around peace in order to think about peace differently. My attempt to rethink peace was shaped by that which disturbed me, and it was the reaction against a technocratic, instrumental, and strong (legitimizing) discourse that led me to seek out the opposite: an irreducible, incalculable, and weak theory of peace, which I located in my reading of Bloch (1986) and Derrida (e.g. 1992, 2006) and scholars working around their works (for Bloch: Anderson 2006;

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Levitas 1990, 1997; Moylan 1997; for Derrida: Caputo 1997, 2006; Lather 2007) who stress both an undecided and an uncontained future that houses an ethical space “to come.” Bloch is known as the political philosopher of hope, and he develops a language of hope in The Principle of Hope (Bloch 1986), which builds a utopia orientated in real possibility—what he refers to as concrete utopia. In his theory of concrete utopia Bloch aims to redeem the idea of utopia from the critique of mere dreaming and is “adamant that wishful thinking or abstract utopia (which is a start) needs to become will-full thinking in reaching concrete utopia” (Levitas 2013: 6). Bloch builds his thesis of concrete utopia on the central idea that the world is unfinished and in process, and consequently her future remains undecided. The undecided future of the world, that which we can influence and change, Bloch calls the realm of the Not Yet. The Not Yet views an unfinished world where the future is not determined, and therefore it is possible to anticipate and affect it. This utopian function “includes both the power to define fulfilment as well as the power to resist all efforts to contain its potentially unbound hope in any hypostatized definition” (Moylan 1997: 115; emphasis in original). Front is what Bloch called the place where these possibilities exist. For Bloch even if they are not realized, these possibilities are still part of reality, but at its very edge. The utopian function, therefore, is the refusal to respect the constraints of external conditions. Through Bloch’s work on the Not Yet and Front, “the utopian is defined as an excessive movement towards something better that can be found throughout life” (Anderson 2006: 692). An aspiration for a peaceful future is the stuff of utopias, and peace education itself can be seen as a utopian function: to participate and affect the future. Derrida also informs on an unfinished and undecided understanding of peace. Through Derrida’s work on the differed promises of democracy and justice, peace can be seen as an event. An event is a differed promise that a signifier (word, name, symbol, or image) is pointing toward, for example the word “democracy” is a place holder for the event democracy which is to come, which is a promise we have not realized yet. As Caputo (2006: 2) explains “names contain events and give them a kind of temporary shelter by housing them within a relatively stable nominal unity. Events, on the other hand, are uncontainable, and they make names restless with promise and the future, with memory and past, with the result that names contain what they cannot contain.” Though Derrida does not refer to peace as an event, it conceptually resembles other events he writes about such as justice, democracy, and friendship (e.g. Derrida, 1992, 2005, 2006). The most paradigmatic example of an event is justice. For Derrida the law cannot contain justice as any attempt to institutionalize justice immediately betrays it. For example, the destruction

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of private property is injustice (illegal) until it is done in the name of justice (for example as an act of revolution). Here, justice “must conserve the law and also destroy it or suspend it enough to have to reinvent it in each case, rejustify it, at least reinvent it in the reaffirmation and the new and free confirmation of its principle” (Derrida 1992: 23). The event is therefore irreducible; it cannot be pinned down, described or captured in language. As a differed promise the space, or différance, between the event and its signifier cannot be closed, the word can never fully contain the event. The differential spacing allows for endless linkages for translating the meaning of the word peace while simultaneously resisting closure. By locating oneself in the différance a deconstructive space emerges where that which was previously considered stable and closed becomes tentative and open, offering opportunities for reconstruction. Through the theory of pepu these two ideas of utopia and event are combined, although not without difficulty as this is a messy union. Bloch understands utopia as a necessary component of Marxism, giving his theory a materialist foundation. However, as Levitas (1990: 100) reminds us, “with no other writer is the rejection of form as a defining characteristic of utopia as consistent and explicit as it is with Bloch.” It is this undecidedness that I choose to dwell on, taking a post-structural reading of Bloch, aware that he (and others) may not agree with it. By combining these two approaches and applying them to thinking about peace, peace is approached as an ongoing process which presents an ethical imperative to engage in the here and now. This requires understanding peace as it is experienced in the world. In this sense peace has meaning in a contextualized space of production, striving for new translations while resisting the totalized thinking that closes off its future (see Horner [2013a] for a more nuanced explanation).

Being Orientated by pepu By starting from the theoretical perspective of pepu, we are immediately confronted with two important considerations when approaching peace. The first is the acknowledgment and appreciation that peace is multiple, fluid, and irreducible, which leads to the related consideration of how peace is understood in context. Without a universal or fixed concept of peace to import into an ‘insecure’ or conflict-affected area, an approach to peace building informed by the theoretical orientation of pepu requires first understanding how peace is understood in context. Furthermore, because of its fluidity and irreducibility, these understandings will inevitably be incomplete and partial. De Sousa Santos’s (2004) term “an ecology of knowledges” is helpful here,

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as it depicts multiplicity and nondestructive relationships. Contrasted with a monoculture of a concrete definitive idea of peace that creates absences, it points to a complex eco-system. The ecology metaphor can be expanded further by Deleuze and Guattari’s (2004) plateaus, which are patterns of multiplicities connected to other multiplicities in such a way as to create or extend a rhizome—an ecosystem where roots and shoots connect nodes horizontally, connecting a networked system with no hierarchy, beginning, or end. By thinking of multiple understandings of peace as patterns of multiplicities, collectively referred to as plateaus, the multiple and simultaneous connections between them that create and extend the rhizome are emphasized instead of the arbitrary divisions imposed on them. The second important consideration when engaging with peace from the perspective of pepu is to consider how ecologies of peace are evident in different contexts in a way that ushers in the differed promise of the event peace, and simultaneously resist totalized thinking. This reverses a model from expert practitioner with a tool box approach of pre-developed formulas to one that requires an organic engagement with the peace already evident in that context. This reversal works to facilitate the endless linkages between the signifier and its event, and between signifier and signifier, for translating the meanings of peace (for a fuller explanation of how this informs peace education as a work of translation see Horner [2013a]). This approach forefronts an ongoing process that never ends, and refuses to objectivize peace and re-enact the violence of closure the event peace tries to resist.

The Mindanao Context Mindanao is the second largest island of the Philippine archipelago, and as well as being known for its rich resources and beautiful nature it is also notorious for the ongoing conflict between Muslim autonomous armed groups (AAGs) and the predominantly Christian Government of the Philippines. A complex history informs current religious tensions on Mindanao, arguably dating back to Spanish colonial ambitions. Muslim traders and missionaries settled in what today we consider the southern Philippines in the thirteenth century, and by the early sixteenth century Islamic influence had spread peacefully through the islands (through trade and marriage) as far north as southern Luzon (Yegar 2002). In the sixteenth century the Spanish colonized Luzon and the Visayas, however Mindanao arguably repelled their conquest, and they never succeeded in controlling Mindanao completely (Schiavo-Campo and Judd 2005). This did not stop Spain from pressing on with their ambition to expand their territory, enlisting Filipinos who had converted to Christianity to fight the Muslims of Mindanao, which arguably engendered the root

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of suspicion and separatism between them prevalent in today’s hostilities (Yegar 2002). Spain went on to cede the Philippines to the US in 1898 and also ceded Mindanao, despite challenges over whether it was Spanish territory. In 1946 when the republic of the Philippines attained independence, once again Mindanao was implicated, despite resistance from the Muslim population. The ‘Philip’ pines—the Spanish colony unified under King Philip II of Spain—arguably never included Mindanao; however, the twentieth century concept of the Philippine Nation consisted of the whole archipelago. Today, the Muslim population is perceived as waging a war of secession against the Philippines. This perspective is informed by the notion of a whole archipelago that is ethnically, historically, and geographically unified under the Philippine nation. This belief has been strengthened by the subsequent migration of Christians to Mindanao in the 1960s, under a land-titling system that allowed land not titled to be awarded to an applicant. The influx of Christians to Mindanao not only saw Muslims become a minority in the Island, it brought it more culturally in line with the administration based in Manila and created the impression that it is therefore naturally part of the Philippines. Also, the Christian occupation of (previously untitled) land permanently or seasonally occupied by the indigenous or Muslim peoples of Mindanao exacerbated suspicion between Muslims (and indigenous peoples) and Christians. My fieldwork in Mindanao took place in 2009 when hostilities between Muslim factions and the Armed Forces of the Philippines maintained a protracted low-level armed conflict, which was prone to flare up intermittently.1 During this time, I conducted ethnographic research in three areas of Mindanao (two conflict-affected areas and one relatively “peaceful” area). I worked with ethnic Muslim communities to better understand the ecology of peace in their contexts and practices that nourished this ecology through facilitating translation and evoking peace “to come.” My research took the form of a multi-sited ethnography in three ethnic Muslim communities in Mindanao and a Christian non-governmental organization (NGO) that also facilitated access to the communities. Concerning the ethnic Muslim communities, I regularly visited two of the communities and lived in one community for some time. I also lived with members of the Christian NGO at various times and locations and joined in with their meetings and activities as appropriate. I was in the field for a total of three months. The communities were small and my main points of contact were small teams that partnered with the Christian NGO, who introduced me to the wider community members, both men and women, local government leaders, local community leaders, youth, and (former and current) “activists.” In total I collected data from a sample of eighty-one community-based participants across three sites, although the data were not evenly spread between each individual, with the small teams that hosted me making up a core group

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and providing a significant proportion of the data. The Christian NGO was also a small operation; at the time of conducting my fieldwork it had eleven members. This research does not claim to be representative or systematic. Instead, the methodology aims to be true to the theoretical frame, and consequently is more concerned with evoking and translating peace. In recognition of the fluid and promissory nature of pepu it therefore prioritized the poetic: “a style and a tone, as well as a grammar and a vocabulary, all of which, collectively, like a great army on the move, is aimed at gaining some ground and making a point” (Caputo 2006: 104). Furthermore its notion of ethnography is informed by Clifford’s (1986) “True Fictions,” which, while not opposed to truth, simultaneously recognizes how truth is fashioned or made. The theoretical frame was also reflected in understandings of validity, which considered Lather’s (1993) work on a Transgressive Validity. Validity was considered as a Lyotardian Paralogy which “fosters differences and heterogeneity” (ibid.: 685–686) so that fractures and fissures in a text are expected when dealing with the irreducible, and therefore paradox and dissensus testify to the deliteralized event peace and validate the research. Derridean rigour/rhizomatic validity which “unsettles from within” in order to generate “new locally determined norms of understanding” (ibid.) was also applied.

An Ecology of Peace in Mindanao My research revealed an ecology of peace in Mindanao, with interconnected plateaus that extend to create a rhizome of peace and an understanding of peace that resonated with the theory of peace developed as pepu. I would like to be clear that I am not claiming that pepu is my participants’ understanding, only that there is resonance.

A Rhizome of Peace Understandings of peace emerged that formed patterns of multiplicities with multiple and simultaneous connections to each other that revealed leaky and porous boundaries to create an ecology of peace. These patterns of multiplicities, or plateaus, that I encountered around peace were: religion, governance, livelihood, and security. A significant number of participants reported that the authentic practice of religion was an important component of peace. It was common for participants to offer peace as the literal meaning of Islam. Livelihoods were also considered an important element of peace, and linked to this was education,

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development projects, and land reform. Education was considered important and formal schooling valued as both a gateway to employment in the formal economy and of the production of values. However, this was held in tension with criticism of the omission of Muslim culture in formal schooling and its limitations for ethnic Muslim children if they were barred from work in the formal economy because of discrimination. Regarding development projects that sought to address livelihood issues, participants reported that they were often linked to religion (Christianity), and related to peace the access to livelihoods that not only refrained from what was perceived as cultural imposition but worked to reinforce and develop their own culture, values, and identity. Farming was considered another form of livelihood, and many participants from rural communities described peaceful utopias where currently unplanted land was farmed and productive through land reform. Physical security was considered in terms not just of the armed conflict but also in terms of law and order, with variations depending on how close different communities/participants were to the armed conflict. Regarding governance, many participants attributed good governance to fairness; the equal distribution of resources, including education; and being free from corruption—this was associated with perceived Islamic values which reacted against their experiences of a secular/Christian government, where they felt they experienced discrimination and corruption.

Resonance with pepu It is important to stress at this point, again, that while in what follows I discuss some of the characteristics of pepu in Mindanao, this is my own reading of the situation and pepu was not the language or conceptual frame of my participants. However, it is my argument that there is a resonance and synergy between their understanding and pepu, and it is this resonance that I wish to bring to the fore. For many of my participants, peace had a positive character. For example, if violence came in the form of poverty, peace was not simply an absence of poverty but took on a positive character as livelihood. In the case of war, the absence of war was rarely considered peace, but, instead, participants described a richness of life which would no longer be obstructed by war. In this sense peace is something, not merely an absence of violence—it has positive attributes. This understanding of peace is that a peace not only goes beyond physical security, but also cannot be reduced to one single and simple outcome, the cessation of war. One participant described this as “big peace” and “small peace.” On the one hand, big peace is ambitious and not limited by current restrictions, resonating with a utopian “Not Yet” that also rejects

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the constraints of the present. On the other hand, small peace occurs when hope is diminished and peace becomes equated with not being evacuated, not starving. This understanding resonates with Galtung’s (1996) concept of positive and negative peace, where positive peace is marked by positive content, such as relationships and cultural and economic development, contrasting a negative peace which describes simply the absence of direct violence. Also, it is a mistake to assume that because there is armed conflict there is therefore no peace in Mindanao. Participants shared many stories about their experiences of peace, revealing the presence of an ecology of peace. I was given examples of peace from within the communities I visited, for example a community-run livelihood project or an inner religious peace. While participants talked about experiences of peace amongst violence, they did not seem to consider there to be any contradiction that needed to be resolved or that one should not cancel out the other. There is violence, an absence of peace, yet peace is found in the hope of something that has no substance, experienced fleetingly as it resists their grasp. Peace is possible, but as an experience of the impossible (irreducible). Finally, I encountered an idea of peace as being in process. The Maguindanaon (the language spoken by one of the communities) word for peace is Kalilintad: to make (ka) and peace (lintad). Participants explained it to me as a continual process, and this chimes with Bloch’s world in continual process and Derrida’s continual process of deconstruction and reconstruction.

Engaging with pepu in Mindanao Within this ecology of peace, the Christian NGO Malikha Bridge (a pseudonym) works with Muslim communities on community development projects that contribute to peace building. Through networking, this NGO appears to be engaging with peace in a unique way that facilitates the exceptional partnership between Muslims and Christians (Horner 2013b). As the word “bridge” in their name suggests, Malikha Bridge acts as a connection between Christian resources and Muslim communities, placing the productivity of the resources, including their values, directly into the hands of Muslim communities (see Horner [2013b] for a more nuanced description). Before providing an example of a peace-oriented (educational) community project, I briefly describe the practices I encountered during my ethnographic fieldwork. Again, these are written up as plateaus, and the distinctions imposed on them for the pedagogical expediency of sharing them here do not reflect their interrelated nature. Furthermore, not only do these plateaus on practice inform and speak to each other, they also combine with the

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peace rhizome, as they are informed by it. For example, in their approach to networking it is possible to see how their practice has been shaped to attempt to protect against a tradition of cultural imposition and preserve difference, a theme recurrent in the exploration of ecologies of peace. I have attributed the name “networking” to this practice; however, at the time of my fieldwork, my participants called it “Insider Movement.” The reason I have avoided the term Insider Movement is because it already has an established meaning in Christian Missionary discourses. I contend that through the particular approaches to networking employed by Malikha Bridge, it would be erroneous to assume that this practice is the same thing. Networking works by Malikha Bridge partnering with a group of volunteers or “insiders” from within a Muslim community to create a movement. This group of volunteers use Malikha Bridge to connect them to resources from Malikha Bridge’s network of Christian donors, who provide the resources to the volunteers, who, in turn, are responsible for their productivity. The production of outcomes from the resources consists of more than just the material resources, but includes the production of values, identity, and capacity (see Horner [2013b] for further reading). It is not the networking alone that gives this practice the qualities that provide the potential for evoking a different promise of peace, that affords an ongoing process that never ends, one that refuses to objectivize peace and re-enact the violence of closure peace tries to resist. Of importance for this discussion is the approach that Malikha Bridge takes to networking, which transforms it from a type of “Insider Movement” or bridging social capital into something new with the potential to usher in the “to come” and to create a peaceful Not Yet. These approaches are the plateaus of uncertainty, in-between, and fluidity.

The Plateau of Uncertainty This may seem an odd way to describe the practice of a Christian NGO. Malikha Bridge, as a Christian NGO, is motivated through a remarkable religious faith. This is not without its issues, especially in the context of a long-running conflict couched in a language of religion and where the spread of Christianity is linked with colonialism and neo-colonialism. However, it is also worth recognizing that as well as challenges this does bring opportunities given the importance of religion in the ecology of peace. The problems associated with their remarkable Christian faith can be overcome by their uncertain approach to it. Malikha Bridge appears to possess a very uncertain faith and sees faith as intrinsically uncertain. For some of the group this is evident in their bookshelves, which contain books on post-modern theology

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(e.g. Rollins [2006: 16] who writes “far from abolishing the possibility of faith, the critique of ideology in philosophy and the condemnation of idolatry in scripture only undermine a fundamentalist Christianity that would require religious certainty and lay claim to a correct interpretation of God”); for others, rather than an academic or conceptual knowledge there is a more emotional or experiential foundation to their uncertainty. The uncertainty inevitably varies across the group, with some more certain than others. If you are certain of something, then no faith is required, but faith comes from acting out of a belief you are unsure of. Religion, or more specifically its related concept of faith, therefore more appropriately occupies the space of doubt, and science has now replaced it as the temple of certainty and empiricism, as Gray (2002: 19) reminds us “science alone has the power to silence heretic … For us science is a refuge from uncertainties, promising— and sometimes delivering—the miracle of freedom from thought, while churches have become sanctuaries for doubt.” A faith as uncertainty enables an opening and this enables the movement of peace, where certainty would impose a violence of closure. I have deliberately used the term Christian NGO above because of the remarkable uncertainty of character apparent here which would be obscured by the term missionary, making it a problematic label to describe Malikha Bridge. However, during the time of my research the organization also identified as missionary. It has recently dispensed with the missionary identity, recognizing the discrepancy between the term’s implications and the practice of its members, while retaining some of its heritage, including its strong roots as a Christian organization. This move captures some of the essence of what I describe in this plateau—the move symbolizes the freeing up of Malikha Bridge from an entrenched and strong religious discourse found in some missionary cultures to experiment and journey in its own way and with its Muslim partners.

The Plateau in-between The above acknowledgment that faith can be a space of uncertainty does not, unfortunately, lead automatically to all religions celebrating doubt, as a certain type of strong religion can commit a violence of closure. Mindanao hosts many missionary organizations, and even supposedly secular government offices and projects can be saturated in Christian language and assumptions. Malikha Bridge, as a Christian NGO, occupies this space while simultaneously being trusted and welcomed into Muslim communities wholeheartedly. This is not an easy thing to do. With a faith as uncertainty Malikha Bridge is dependent on a network of churches not only to fund the projects but also

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to support its very survival. In my (by no means expert or comprehensive) personal experience, churches that support “missionaries” tend to be conservative, while theologically liberal churches are “missionary averse” and tend to raise money for Christian Aid or Amnesty International instead (see Horner [2014] for further reading on my experiences). And yet Malikha Bridge is able to occupy a space at the margins of the missionary world, which it is both inside and outside of, and may be quietly and slowly subverting and deconstructing its strong truth and violent closure from within, challenging stereotypes and creating opportunities for cross-over between Muslims and Christians.

The Plateau Fluidity Malikha Bridge employs a chaotic and conversational approach, and its work retains the flux and aspiration in the event peace. Its state of flux and propensity to constantly be deconstructing and reconstructing can be glimpsed in its reworking of the Insider Movement model in a new way— one aimed to place the productivity of values into the Muslim community’s hand rather than to convert. This fluidity can also be seen in an approach that responds to events and conversation with the communities, which means they do not set long-term five-year goals, but short-term projects which then enable them to change course and respond to the situation in the moment. All of these plateaus explore practices that relate to, and make allowances for, pepu. They make allowances for diversity through networking and mediating between contrasting groups; value the contextual through partnership; open up the future to the Not Yet and a peace “to come” through challenging the violence of closure enacted through certainty with uncertainty, and retain space for aspiration through fluid and organic dialogue and occupying the margins.

Community Organizing as Peace Education These plateaus of practice/approach unite in a community-organizing case study that I have identified as a type of peace education. Malikha Bridge facilitated many community projects and partnerships including: medical “missions”, cultural activities, the construction of a public toilet block, and a clean water project. All of these activities (networked, uncertain, in-between, and fluid) are forms of peace education because (1) they address issues that are implicated in the ecology of peace and therefore relate to peace, and (2) they include an educational component when education is broadly

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understood as something more than schooling: because Malikha Bridge is organized through the cooperation between Muslims and Christians, it both creates and facilitates the learning of new knowledge and values about what these identities mean, and includes a strong capacity-building focus. One such example is the pre-school project. I cite this example because it is the most popular project within the different communities in which Malikha Bridge works, and while each community has interpreted their need and execution of the project differently, it has been the most widely applied community-organizing project. In this discussion, I will specifically focus on one pre-school in a Muslim community in west Mindanao, in which I have most experience, rather than try to generalize across the communities. The local Muslim community identified pre-school education as a “felt need” as they perceived that their children were at a disadvantage when starting school. From this the team of local volunteers developed a proposal for the construction of a pre-school and approached Malikha Bridge for support. Malikha Bridge helped the volunteers access the building materials they needed to build the pre-school through their network of churches, and were also able to provide worker expertise and offer some basic teacher education to the volunteers who would be responsible for running the pre-school once it was built. Using a Freirean approach to teacher training, informed by the notion of conscientization (Freire [1970] 2003) which aims to raise the critical consciousness of learners to actively learn about their own conditions, the training did not simply deliver teaching approaches and educational tool kits, but explored the organizing values of the pre-school and the volunteers. Through this dialogue other “felt needs” were revealed, and it became clear that not only was a pre-school needed to facilitate equal access to schooling, but that it could address other issues such as the acknowledgment and respect of Muslim values. I witnessed the end-ofyear pre-school “recognition”—a celebration to mark the completion of pre-school—which provided a highlight in the community calendar, with local dignitaries and councillors attending and offering speeches, refreshments, and cultural entertainment. A local Muslim leader was moved to tears in his speech, reflecting on the traditional Maguindanaon dress worn by the students, the traditional Muslim dance the school children had learnt, and the Muslim songs and prayers that accompanied the recognition ceremony. This community leader thanked the volunteers for restoring their Muslim culture in the community. In this example the pre-school addresses many parts of the ecology of peace in Mindanao. It acknowledges and respects the ethnic and religious culture of Muslims, it attempts to tackle inequality by providing access to pre-school education when there was none before, and it speaks to the plateau of livelihood because it assists in access to formal education, the

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gateway to employment in the formal economy. However, through the way the pre-school has been set up and run, it does much more than this. Since livelihood is more than just shelter and transaction, and includes relationships, personal significance, and group identity (e.g. Wallman 1984), the pre-school has played an important role sustaining and nourishing the values and identities of the volunteers and wider community. In this case, Christians have surrendered their resources with “no strings,” trusting the Muslim volunteers to produce what they will with it (including values) and some power imbalances have been redressed. Through ongoing and continual teacher education, the capacity of the volunteers is developed. And, most remarkably in a context grounded in deep suspicion between Christians and Muslims, the Christian NGO Malikha Bridge and its network of donors have partnered with Muslim volunteers and the community they serve and, through doing so in an uncertain way, have opened themselves up to learning about the “other,” and maybe learning about themselves from the “other.”

Conclusion To conclude, pepu changes the way we approach peace in the first place, in many more ways than this chapter has outlined, and in many more ways than I have imagined or conceived. I would like to conclude with some initial thoughts about what my exploration has revealed this might mean for both practitioners and researchers. Approaching peace from the theoretical frame of pepu creates an ethical and political obligation to act. The irreducibility of peace does not provide an alibi for inaction but, instead, it provides a place to play. While I have stressed the uncertain nature of peace throughout (and advocated for uncertainty as a practice of peace education) I have also stressed the utopian function to anticipate and affect the future. The imperative to engage with peace in the here and now requires understanding peace as we experience it in the world. In this sense peace has meaning in a contextualized space of production. This opens up new understandings and avenues of researching and facilitating peace’s being and becoming. Research can explore the different ecologies of peace in different contexts and the practices that can enable the becoming of peace, in order to help develop theoretically informed practice to support practitioners in the field. For peace educators this means learning the practices of peace already in existence, rather than coming in as expert with a toolbox approach of pre-developed formulas. It requires learning about the knowledge and practices of peace that already exist through a conversational approach, and strengthening them and moving them forward by facilitating translation.

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There are also implications for how we, as researchers, contribute to knowledge and understanding around peace so that, in academia’s current tendency to feel the need to put forward a strong case complete with argument, counter argument, and irrefutable evidence, we do not objectivize peace and re-enact the violence of closure pepu resists. Considering methodologies that do not objectivize peace, such as through using a poetic discourse (Caputo 2006) and arts-based data (Springgay, Irwin, and Kind 2005), may help move the field in possible directions.

Note 1

At the time of writing this chapter a peace pact is in place, which has seen the cessation of armed conflict between the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) and the Philippine Armed Forces.

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8 Lingering Colonialities as Blockades to Peace Education: School Violence in Trinidad Hakim Mohandas Amani Williams

Introduction The essence of this chapter is encapsulated quite well by the following quote: violence has been constructed by and through a “tunnel vision” that only reacts to certain individualistic events or isolated circumstances. Tunnel vision … is violent in that … it occludes the making and marking of power … Thus, regimes of power perpetuate material and subjective violence at the everyday level. (McLaren, Leonardo, and Allen 1999: 145) By using data on school violence from field research in Trinidad and Tobago (TT), I argue that “in the knowledge production of ‘school violence,’ ‘school’ is subtracted as a descriptive [term], and in its place is hoisted the category of ‘youth,’ inscribed as the ‘Other,’ the predominant signifier of violence” (Williams 2013: 49). In so doing, the predominating discourse about what constitutes school violence itself, and its drivers/‘causes,’1 takes on a limiting and individualizing nature. As a result, the principal interventions that emanate from such a discourse are correspondingly narrow and therefore fail to reveal the structural violence in which “youth violence in schools” is embedded. I posit this discursive violence as a lingering coloniality, and thus, as a blockade to the implementation of sustainable peace education in TT’s schools. By

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interrogating discursive violence, I demonstrate the need for “a critical semiotics of violence [that] … consider[s] relations of power in both the discourses on violence and the violence of discourse” (McLaren, Leonardo, and Allen 1999: 147). In this chapter, I will first provide demographic context on the Caribbean and TT, followed by my conceptual framework and methodology. After a brief literature review of school and youth violence, my analysis will center on three government initiatives (safety officers in schools; the TT Violence Prevention Academy; and a same-sex pilot project) that do not address the structural violence within the educational system in TT, but instead narrowly train their gaze on the mere “symptoms” of school violence. I will then conclude with a few suggestions on how to more comprehensively address school violence. In the section on context that immediately follows, I provide many statistics regarding crime, violence and other related issues in the Caribbean. The statistical litany may strike the reader as ironic against the backdrop of my overall argument of interrogating the discursive violence around school or youth violence. I do run the risk of reinforcing pathologized narratives about the Caribbean and poor, black/brown people. However, the statistics are real and we cannot hide from them. Thus, throughout this chapter, I intend to undercut the positivistic inclination to frame statistics as the comprehensive picture, via my usage of rich, qualitative data and critical analysis.

Context The Caribbean region has one of the highest murder rates in the world (30 per 100,000 annually) (World Bank 2007), compared to the global average of 6.2 per 100,000 (UNODC 2013). Rates of youth homicides in the Caribbean (31.6 per 100,000 in 2005) are the second highest in the world (Hoffman, Knox, and Cohen 2011). Additionally, the region has the second highest HIV/AIDS rates in the world (Jules 2010), and narco-trafficking (World Bank 2007), money laundering (Goddard 2011), and global warming/climate change have become major challenges (Barker, Dodman, and McGregor 2009). In the Caribbean, TT is a leader on several fronts. Business-wise, it is a major manufacturer and exporter, and it has sizable oil and natural gas reserves. With a US$27 billion GDP, it is considered a non-OECD, high-income country (World Bank 2014). With a 0.766 rating on the Human Development Index (HDI), TT is ranked sixty-fourth out of 187 countries (UNDP 2014). Conversely, TT’s poverty rate represents 21.8 percent of the population (Trinidad Guardian 2012), and the country ranks eighty-ninth out of 162 nations on the Global Peace Index (GPI) (IEP 2014),2 with perceived criminality, violent crime, and access to weapons being noted as great concerns. TT’s homicide

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rate for 2013 was 31.2 per 100,000 (TTCrime.com n.d.), rising from a low of 7.52 in 1998. This uptick in crime and violence has been accompanied by an increase in school violence as well (Phillips 2008). Despite the outcry against crime and violence in the Caribbean and TT, there is a dearth of data and research around youth violence (Deosaran 2007; UNDP 2012).

Youth and School Violence Youth violence is not unique to TT; in fact, it is considered a “universal problem” (Plucker 2000: 2), as is school violence (Benbenishty and Astor 2008). Violence, writ large, has become an issue for the development project (World Bank 2007) and for public health (Moser and van Bronkhorst 1999). Within and beyond these domains, there has been increasing attention paid to youth, which some view as a neoliberal ploy to subsume youth into the logics of consumerism and human capital development (Giroux 2010; Sukarieh and Tannock 2015). Youth are also hemmed in by several discourses: that of “juvenile delinquency” (Sukarieh and Tannock 2008) and that of criminality (Giroux 2000). However, my research and activist focus on TT youth emanate from my desire to “expand the conceptual framework of the discourse on violence” (Spina, 2000: xix). I have narrowed my analysis to school violence because the school as research site is a nexus of global, regional, national, and local influences. Additionally, the school is a proximal context, in terms of its centrality to child development (Baker 1998) because of all the time youth spend in that socializing space. Schools can play a role as well in reinforcing or disrupting violence (Seydlitz and Jenkins 1998). School violence “is a complex social problem” (Baker 1998: 36), but it has been blighted by media sensationalism and restrictive conceptualizations. There are now undercurrents of managerialism and neoliberalism beneath contemporary global policyscapes (Atkinson 2004); this is accompanied/ impelled by an increasing fiduciary retreat of the state from educational provisions (Kumar and Hill 2008). Stringent accountability measures and privatization of public services—ideas borrowed from the business world— are just a few examples of this neo-managerialism/neo-liberalism in education. These processes, and the discourses that impel them, view education, rather reductively, as a linear system of easily traceable causal interactions (Radford 2008). Emergent from this are standardized and large-scale approaches to education and research3 that are ill-equipped to tackle social inequities, because they do not comprehensively account for complexity and diversity (Lees 2007). Similarly, these restrictive discourses and processes inform a “standardised model of healthy youth development” (Sukarieh and Tannock 2008: 306).

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Schools are complex systems and violence is a complex phenomenon; and because complex systems are constituted by a potentially unlimited array of variables (Radford 2008), researchers and practitioners are increasingly calling for ecological, multifaceted, interdisciplinary and comprehensive approaches to school violence (Baker 1998; Barbanel 2005; Henry 2009; Winslade and Williams 2012). Broadened conceptualizations thus define school violence as: any acts, relationships, or processes that use power over others, exercised by whatever means, such as structural, social, physical, emotional, or psychological, in a school or school-related setting or through the organization of schooling and that harm another person or group of people. (Henry 2009: 1253) Harber (2004: 44) insists that the use of the word “power” widens prevalent conceptualizations of violence.4 In this definition, it thus becomes almost preclusive to train the gaze solely on youth when analyzing and addressing school violence. Additionally, when a comprehensive, systems approach is employed with school violence, the interventions are necessarily broad, ranging from the micro to the meso to the macro. Different tiers/types of intervention are important because violence often has multiple “causes.” In this chapter, I will argue that the three interventions that TT’s Government employed in schools, as well as the mostly negative peace-oriented5 interventions at the one secondary school (Survivors Secondary School [SSS]) where I conducted my research, fail to comprehensively address school violence because they are myopic, anemically-conceptualized, and ill-implemented via exclusionary means; all characteristics that I posit as lingering colonialities. I use this term “lingering colonialities” not to mean that every structure or process from the colonial era is extant in TT’s schools, but to convey that it is more so an ethos—one of rigidity, hierarchy, control, docilization, and exclusion—that lingers and shapes contemporary relationships, structures, and processes.

Conceptual Framework This research is anchored within the fields of international development, peace education, and Caribbean studies. The conceptual framework that shaped my research, and this particular analysis, is constituted by postcolonial theory and critical peace education. I believe that postcolonial countries, as a result of their histories, have much to offer in terms of research; I concur with Amin-Khan’s (2012: 18) argument that the creation/formation of the European nation-state is very different to that of the postcolonial state: “from the

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colonial to the postcolonial era, Africa, Asia and Latin America have taken diametrically dissimilar trajectories of national identity, state, and societal formation compared with Europe and North America.” Postcolonial theory can facilitate historical revisitations, and help elucidate and critique discontinuities and contemporary structures and processes in former colonies, like TT. As an interrogative and generative tool, postcolonial theory can be utilized to not only expose the porosity of master discourses but also provide new or different questions/insights/directions (Jabri 2013; Tikly 1999). Critical peace education (CPE) is concerned with analyzing power dynamics and intersectionality in teasing out varied “invisibilities” (Bajaj and Brantemeier 2011); it is also attentive to localized experiences. CPE is not just focused on a cessation of direct/material violence (negative peace) but more so on the cessation of structural violence (positive peace). Postcolonial theory, combined with critical peace education to form a type of praxis, thus permits me to interrogate school violence in the context of educational inequity as postcolonial structural violence (see Williams 2013). Threaded together, these two strands form a postcolonial critical peace education research framework to analyze data from a region of the world that is generally under-studied/under-represented in the academy.

Methodology Proceeding on the premise that school violence interventions ought to be context specific (Astor et al. 2005), I conducted qualitative research in one secondary school. Research around youth violence in schools indicates that much of it occurs in urban areas (Phillips 2008), as does violence in general; I therefore selected a coed school in the capital, Port of Spain. My study resembled what Vavrus and Bartlett (2009) call a vertical case study;6 one in which you factor in multiple tiers7 to your analysis, which is especially requisite when trying to apprehend complex phenomena such as school violence. I chose a school that had many students from economicallydepressed communities because I was interested in how their communities impacted their lives; in a sense, it was a school on the margins of society with students from marginalized communities. Smith (2012) avers that conducting research on the “margins” sometimes gives great insight into the wider society; the margins, though ignored, are often dialectically constituted by both oppression and resistance. In terms of my own positionality, I grew up in a similarly marginalized/impoverished community in TT, therefore this research, which I view as partial solidarity with these students, is the type for which critical peace education calls. I spent from December 2009 to June 2010 at SSS.8 I conducted participant observations, nine focus groups/classroom discussions with eighty-four

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students and semi-structured interviews with two administrators, two safety officers, one guidance counselor, four deans, twenty teachers, and four Ministry of Education (MoE) officials.9 I returned for three weeks of observations and a follow-up in May/June 2013. I returned for another three weeks in June, 2015. This study has thus become longitudinal. SSS (in 2010) had about 850 students and the male/female ratio was about 60/40. As for my actual analysis, grounded theory (Strauss and Corbin 1990) permitted the data to percolate upward, so to speak; beads of data coagulated into themes and those became the bedrock of my analysis.

Data Many colonial apparatuses were bequeathed to postcolonial societies (Danns 2013), and educational systems were oftentimes part of this inheritance. TT’s educational system has emerged as a bifurcated system (Williams 2012): part of the system (called traditional grammar or “prestige” schools) created during the colonial era and run by various religious denominations, and part (much larger, and called new sector schools) created in the independence era to facilitate mass education (Campbell 1997). It was in 1960 that religious denominations negotiated to maintain their control of the schools under their purview. The resultant agreement, the Concordat, is still in place and assures that top academic performers, on the national exam, from primary school are funneled into these traditional grammar/“prestige” schools. SSS is one of these new sector schools built in the post-independence era (in the late 1970s). My research was guided by one simple question, with three subparts: how stakeholders at SSS conceptualized school violence, its influences/“causes,” and its interventions. Per the focus of this paper, I am most concerned with the responses to the subpart on interventions. Most participants (including students) reduced school violence to youth violence, and most conceptualizations (about 97 percent) centered on direct/ material violence. As regards my participants’ views on the influences/“causes” of school violence, I received diverse responses, but most of them were more of an individualist nature than structural; i.e. most (including students) made attributions to students’ homes, parents, and communities rather than to school, societal, or more macro-structural factors (see Williams [2012; 2013] for more on this). In terms of interventions, I divided these primarily into negative peaceoriented (i.e. those focused on the mere cessation of direct violence) and positive-peace oriented (i.e. those aimed at inculcating a culture of peace, or being more preventative, etc.; in short, those striving toward some type

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of dismantling of structural violence). Of all the interventions reported that were used at SSS, about two-thirds of them were of a negative peace orientation.10 Some of these included: corporal punishment (punches, pinches, whipping/caning), corporeal surveillance (such as uniform inspections), law enforcement, expulsion, suspension, writing lines, scolding, community service (i.e. cleaning the school grounds so as to engender embarrassment), and deprivations (time-outs, detentions). Some positive-peace-oriented interventions included: use of guidance counselor, Adolescent Development Program, Families in Action, Arts in Action, Rapport,11 student council, student awards (called testimonials), student support services, and teacher-to-student counseling. At SSS, I witnessed all of these interventions being deployed, both negative and positive-peace-oriented ones, and I saw instances where both had an impact. Nonetheless, the majority of interventions employed negativepeace approaches. I believe this is connected to an outgrowth of the narrow conceptualizations of violence itself, including the culturally ritualized traditions and histories of dealing with violence in TT. While some of the in-school interventions were positive-peace oriented, it seems that almost all of the major interventions crafted/implemented by, or via, the Ministry of Education (MoE) were simply meant to quell, rather than prevent, direct violence: (1) use of safety officers, (2) the TT Violence Prevention Academy, and (3) the same-sex pilot project. Later in the chapter, I will provide more detail on these three programs. Before my research started, however, there was an MoE Peace Promotion Programme (PPP). Its goal was to create a culture of peace—in the individual, the school, the home, the community, and the society at large. It aims to build up a defense and resilience against any tendency or inducement to violence and indiscipline … teachers are our key agents and front line “soldiers” as we “wage peace” against violence. (Ministry of Education of Trinidad and Tobago n.d.) Despite the quasi-militaristic language regarding teachers as “soldiers waging peace,” the core of this program seemed laudable in promoting positive peace. It included training in mediation, confliction resolution, parenting classes, classroom management for teachers as “alternatives for corporal punishment,” peer counseling, and stress and anger management classes for students. The MoE noted on its website that “The Ministry intends to stay the course towards the ultimate creation of a Culture of Peace in the individual, the school, the family and society at large.” However, the name of this program was changed because, as one MoE official told me in confidence, “peace implied war” and the MoE (and by extension the government) did not

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want to convey that a “war” was taking place (interview March 9, 2010). This highlighted the politicized nature of addressing violence in TT. During my seven months at SSS and my first three-week follow-up, I saw little evidence of this program in action (i.e. courses on mediation, conflict resolution, parenting classes, etc.), let alone the MoE “staying the course.” This positive-peace-oriented program, with its emphasis on multi-sectoral collaboration, may have potentially fostered impactful changes in secondary schools in TT. Whatever the reasons for its dismantling or limited implementation, the MoE did not stay the course on this intervention but, instead, pursued the three aforementioned negative peace-oriented interventions which I will detail below.

Three Examples of Governmental Negative Peace-oriented Interventions 1. Safety Officers Safety officers, as a result of an “effort between Ministry of Education and National Security to curb violence in the school system” (interview with Mr. Joseph (safety officer) March 15, 2010), were “deployed” to many schools that had a significant problem with “youth violence.” Many of these officers were former police officers; they dressed in civilian clothing and “patrolled” the school’s grounds often. They broke up fights and in some cases, meted out corporal punishment.12 A teacher, Ms. Wellers, spoke about adult-tostudent violence (a type rarely critically interrogated by the adults at SSS): “I have seen those officers in charge … the guards or safety officers … and they use equal force on the children”13 (interview May 7, 2010). This is an excerpt, from my field notes, that illustrated how one of the safety officers “manhandled” a student: It is a particularly hot day in the deans’ room and I hear Mr. Hawke’s voice booming rage. He is yelling at someone. He and a male student enter the deans’ room. He has gripped the student by his arm quite tightly. He instructs, very loudly, for the student to sit down. He yells “do you think I am an ass?” The student seems a bit fearful but is also attempting to appear “cool” and unfazed. Mr. Hawke yells “answer meh14!” and throws a chair down; the student flinches so as not to be hit by the chair. Students are passing by and peering in …. One of the deans interjects and says “ok, ok … we will take it from here.” (April 2010) At SSS, both safety officers were male, whereas all deans were female. From my observations, I believe this played a role in either sometimes pacifying

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or inciting tensions between the safety officers and students. Sometimes the safety officers were able to command respect by exerting their physical comparative advantage over the students (mostly male students), and other times, this exertion fostered opposition from male students so that they would save face in front of their peers. It would seem that, for both student and safety officer, masculine performativity was part of their in-school personas/ identities,15 and this has implications for the efficacy of this particular intervention (i.e. use of safety officers in schools). It may have, in the short term, procured obedience and “submission” on the students’ part, but did it really get at the subterranean energy that fueled the issues for which the students were being reprimanded?

2. TT Violence Prevention Academy (TTVPA) There were similar themes regarding this intervention. The TTVPA was a “violence reduction program” run out of a center at Arizona State University by several criminologists,16 at the behest of the TT MoE. Twenty-five schools across the country were selected (based on levels of school violence), one of which was SSS. By the time I had begun my research, the TTVPA had already been implemented. It ran from September 2008 (with initial meetings and school visits by the VPA team) to May 2010 when the final report was due to the MoE. Its goals and premise were to equip in-school staff with the capabilities to craft school-specific, evidence-based violence prevention plans. The four-pronged approach would entail: training staff, then creating, implementing, and evaluating a school-specific plan (ASU Center for Violence Prevention and Community Safety 2010). As per official descriptions, the TTVPA seemingly featured all the hallmarks of effective violence prevention/reduction programs: “comprehensive,” “integrated,” “evidence-based,” “tailored to the specific needs of each school,” and “sustainability.” After VPA teams visited each school, they assembled small teams (of in-school staff) to carry out the programs. There weren’t any students or parents on these teams. In the final report, the VPA identified several issues that I did observe at SSS: poor, unsafe physical conditions that hindered effective classroom instruction, and teacher absenteeism which resulted in many classes being unsupervised, during which fights among students would often ensue. These were indeed factors that detracted from an ideal learning environment and much of school violence research affirms the vitality of the school climate and supportive school structures/processes in violence prevention/reduction (Baker 1998; Benbenishty and Astor 2005; Embry and Flannery 1999; Osher et al. 2004). However, the team at SSS chose gambling as the issue it wished to address.17 I posit that the VPA strategies seemed to have been of

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a negative-peace orientation, and not focused on student empowerment and disrupting/transforming structural violence (positive peace). Granted that the VPA was not a self-described peace education intervention; I argue that its design and implementation, in being primarily negative peace-oriented, may not have done much in “exposing and upending societal inequities that may undergird manifestations of youth violence” (Williams, 2015). Gambling was indeed a problem at SSS, as reported by my research participants, and fights did ensue as a result of students losing money or not wanting to pay, etc. But gambling proved to be a simulacrum of violence and revealed little about the subterranean energy that fed it. Ms. Seepersad, a teacher and administrator at SSS, addressed the diverse reasons that may have compelled students to gamble: They gamble for money, they gamble to live, they gamble for food, they gamble for taxi money, they gamble if they want a gold chain. That is their way of earning, getting money, so they started having it in school and would have fights as a result; who did not give who their money; all kind of different things. So we had a serious problem. (Interview May 19, 2010) While some of these reasons do seem obvious, such as mere entertainment or materialist desires, some students gambled to obtain money to eat or to cover transportation costs on their return journey home. At SSS, there was a government-sponsored program that provided free lunches, but some students (both male and female) were ashamed to be seen taking any;18 it therefore may have been the case where students may not have had lunch or money to buy lunch and may have refused to partake in the governmentsubsidized lunch program. Though I argue that the VPA co-opted some terminology such as “sustainable” and “comprehensive” to gain legitimacy, a closer inspection revealed other factors that may have resulted in its short-sighted approach. To be clear, I am not assigning full blame to the architects of the VPA, for the fault lines may run closer to the locally-appropriated ways of implementation which may have undercut the successes of this program. However, by not having students and parents on the team, the issue that was selected conformed with narrow conceptualizations of violence and its putative “causes.” The restricted understandings around school violence thereby limited the scope of the interventions, which is one of my central arguments. If the VPA was indeed “comprehensive,” it would have insisted on being more inclusionary.19 However, I suspect that the very epistemological roots of the VPA—criminology—viewed crime and violence in particular ways that were perhaps incongruent with the participatory ways of knowing and being for which the critical research on school violence strongly advocates.

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3. Same-sex Pilot Project A third government intervention was a same-sex pilot project. While I was wrapping up research in June 2010, an MoE representative visited a staff meeting and announced that, as of that September, SSS would slowly transition from a coed to an all-male school (starting with an all-male student cohort). Prior to this visit, teachers and students were already of the belief that male students were the source of most school violence; this decision from the MoE merely exacerbated their concerns. The MoE representative said that the decision was based primarily on three reasons: (1) that research showed that students in same-sex schools were not as distracted and thus tended to do better academically, (2) without the distractions of the “girls,” the boys may have focused more on their school-work and not have gotten into as much trouble, and (3) that the top-performing schools in TT were single-sex. The MoE was thus projecting this pilot as having a potential impact on school violence. After this announcement, teachers and students believed that direct violence would have increased at SSS. In a focus group discussion, some boys voiced their thoughts on the impending single-sex change: Researcher: … eventually it’s going to turn into all boys … What you think about all boys [being here]? Steven: That is madness because all boys … boys are just violence. (Student Focus Group with 2bSG June 17, 2010) One teacher/administrator, Ms. Seepersad, felt demotivated by this change. She essentially agreed with the students’ forecast: “what you [are] really doing is putting all the gangs into one school … What I see is just more work for us [and] more stress” (interview May 19, 2010). As an affirmation, during my May/June 2013 follow-up (three years after the pilot’s implementation), teachers informed me that violence did indeed increase. One teacher, Ms. Lockby, told me that the three-year pilot was difficult and that they (the teachers) were simply trying to “keep the peace” instead of focusing on teaching (brief informal conversation June 2013). The pilot project that began in 2010 was ended under a different government and Minister of Education. There wasn’t any comprehensive evaluation conducted that involved seeking the perspectives of varied stakeholders; therefore the full impact, both strengths and limitations, of this pilot went largely unanalyzed. SSS thus resorted to a coed school again. The grounds on which the MoE supposedly made this decision to have a same-sex pilot in twenty-five schools were quite controvertible, as the research on same-sex schools has been mostly inconclusive (Lingard, Martino and Mills 2009). The MoE’s usage of the fact that the top-performing

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schools in TT are mostly same-sex to fuel its argument omitted a consideration that these schools possess considerable social capital because they were created in the colonial era. The top academic students from primary schools are funneled into these “prestige” schools (which are also allowed, under the Concordat, to keep 20 percent of their placements for whomever they wish to admit. It is most likely that these seats are assigned to those of economic/ political means in TT). These “prestige” schools thus maintain their academic dominance and the same-sex variable is but one among many that ought to be considered when analyzing the successes of these schools. Yet, this intervention was narrowly conceived because the analysis was not as inclusive and comprehensive as it should have been. It did not address the structural violence of the educational system (e.g. taking a closer look at the disequilibrium engendered by the Concordat), but instead was short term and ended prematurely.

Conclusion The examples I give in this chapter demonstrate that narrow conceptualizations of school violence thus inform ultimately ineffectual interventions; and that these interventions are shaped by lingering colonialities, some of which are: exclusionary practices and structural dispositions; rigid, unitary epistemologies; punishment as social control; and narrow hierarchies/top-down processes.20 The three government interventions represented ramped-up investments in securitization, a move that has occurred in other countries as they seek to address school violence. Lingering colonialities, by their rigidity to change, act as blockades to radical, critical alternatives aimed at dismantling structural violence. I argue that the parameters of defining school violence in TT need to be widened. Maintaining a strict definitional focus solely on youth and mostly on direct/material violence constitutes a form of discursive violence, because as such, it “symbolically inscribes student subjectivities” (McLaren, Leonardo, and Allen 2000: 68), and conceals the role of power relations (McLaren, Leonardo, and Allen 1999). By focusing on youth and direct/material violence in TT’s schools, policy makers and school actors suppress critical and sustained questions about “prestige” schools (and the influence of their social and economic capital), under-resourced schools like SSS, and culturallysanctioned violence like corporal punishment.21 While these are all seemingly disparate elements, collectively they constitute a multitiered process that functions to maintain the educational status quo in TT. I concur with Pohlandt-McCormick’s (2000) assertion that a type of discursive/rhetorical violence—beyond physical violence—does render a kind

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of psychological harm and interrupts people’s abilities to make sense of their experiences. Further, discursive violence works to gut the colonial influence from postcolonial memory so that history goes unchallenged, “thus cancelling the possibility of a radical collectivity” (McLaren, Leonardo, and Allen 1999: 160). Framed as epistemic violence, these processes can mute the voices of the marginalized (Dotson 2011). Case in point: at SSS, the principal was the sole participant who mentioned/intimated about the intersection of TT’s colonial history and contemporary school violence. This sort of discursive violence can lead to “system blindness” (Oshry 1995), where people, enmeshed in their particular context, are not able to see the whole picture because power relations are concealed from the analytic gaze. Envisioning peace processes as nonlinear, complex, and interdependent (Körppen and Ropers 2011) permits a revisitation of ill-conceived, myopic interventions. While it is understood that conflict is ubiquitous (Vallacher et al. 2013) and inevitable, violence is not necessarily inevitable (Winslade and Williams 2012). Research shows that youth violence is preventable (which I will detail a bit below) (Hoffman, Knox, and Cohen 2011). Therefore, interventions that may escalate or incite violence need to be rigorously contested; structural violence can no longer be ignored. Moreover, top-down, rigid discipline can have negative effects (Benbenishty and Astor 2008); zero tolerance policies and approaches may not equip youth with capacities to resolve conflicts (Winslade and Williams 2012); and cookiecutter or suppression-only models do not work very well (Hoffman, Knox, and Cohen 2011b). It is vital that we recognize that both negative and positive peace approaches22 are needed as a holistic framework (Harris 2000; IEP 2012), and, in line with my overall argument, there need to be multilevel initiatives to address school violence. These include: cognitive–behavioral skills training (individual level), tackling domestic violence, child abuse, and parental mental illness (family level), addressing inadequate housing conditions; police-youth mentoring programs (community level), limiting firearms; and addressing lack of economic and educational opportunities (national level) (Hoffman, Knox, and Cohen 2011). Additionally, policy makers and educators should distinguish outcomes from inputs and recognize that the drivers of violence and the drivers of peace may be very different (IEP 2012). Conflict resolution should be actively taught in schools and classroom management practices should center more on character development than behavior management (Baker 1998). School psychologists and social workers can play vital roles in providing necessary support for students (Astor et al. 2005; Baker 1998), and high-quality early childhood education/investments can be strong preventative measures (Astor et al. 2005; Hoffman, Knox, and Cohen 2011). I argue that across all levels in the education system, families and communities need

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to be involved. In sum, we need to build “humane school communities” (Noguera 2008: 110).23 To reiterate, any productive analysis of school violence has to encompass the intra- and inter-personal, wider institutional practices and the particular political economy; omitting considerations of macro inequalities and structural violence narrows the interventions and reinforces the status quo (Henry 2009). In my research, I have documented many instances and processes that demonstrate lingering colonialities; chief among which is a rigidity to alternative ways of being and seeing. In so doing, structural violence remains buffered from interrogation and that becomes a major blockade to the implementation of comprehensive critical peace education interventions. This is indeed a social justice agenda. And while we acknowledge that the social justice approach has never been dominant in education (Hytten 2006), striving to mainstream these ideas/strategies toward a sustainable peace is both very much laudable and possible. Everything in this third-world present-moment, emits familiar and unfamiliar yellows. Our eyes are jaundiced by our past, but which yellow is of yesterday, and which is of the now? Written by h.m.a.w.

Acknowledgments This research has been funded by The Advanced Consortium on Cooperation, Conflict and Complexity (Earth Institute), Diversity Research Grant from Teachers College (Columbia University), and Gettysburg College’s Research and Professional Development Funds. Thank you to the editors and the anonymous reviewer for their very helpful comments.

Notes 1

I put the word causes in quotes so as to subtly impugn the assertive and too oft-definitive tone around the causes of school violence. In this chapter, I will use the word influence alongside causes to indicate my hesitancy.

2

The GPI is generated by Vision of Humanity under the auspices of the Institute for Economics and Peace (IEP). The GPI measures three main domains: level of safety/security, extent of domestic and international conflict, and degree of militarization. The methodology is laid out more

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Lingering Colonialities as Blockades to Peace Education 155 comprehensively online at: http://www.visionofhumanity.org/#/page/ news/920. As regards TT, the country received 4/5 for perceived criminality, 5/5 for homicides, 4/5 for access to weapons, and 5/5 for violent crime (with 5 being the highest; closer to 1 is better).

3

Such restrictive standardization is enforced by positivist notions of what counts as evidence and research. Smith (2012: 58) states “research ‘through imperial eyes’ describes which assumes that Western ideas about the most fundamental things are the only ideas possible to hold, certainly the only rational ideas, and the only ideas which can make sense of the world, of reality, of social life and of human beings.”

4

A similar analytic framework is symbolic violence, as postulated by Bourdieu and Passeron (1977). Waldron (2009: 611) states “rather than focus solely on youth-created violence, symbolic violence broadens our understanding of violence to include institutionally perpetuated forms of school violence.” Some educational researchers call this “systemic violence” (Epp and Watkinson 1996).

5

In peace education, negative-peace approaches are those aimed at a cessation of direct/material violence, whereas positive-peace approaches go a step further and are focused on dismantling structural violence. The former is necessary but insufficient in the calculus of sustainable peace.

6

See Bajaj (2012) for a thorough example of a vertical case study in peace education.

7

The multiple tiers include: international proliferation of small arms and the drug trade, Caribbean regional and Trinidad national context of crime and violence, the MoE (Ministry of Education), SSS, classroom-level and individual stakeholders such as students, teachers, etc.

8

The school’s name and the participants’ names are pseudonyms. I have altered some of the school’s details to conceal its identity as much as possible.

9

SSS featured Forms 1–6 (US equivalent of Grades 6–12; Form 6 = Grades 11 and 12). Student participants were from Forms 1–5, and represented about 10 percent of all students. Focus groups were students who volunteered, and class discussions were based on recommendations by administrators and deans based on a mixture of what they perceived to be either “well-behaved” or “troublesome” classes. At SSS, there were two safety officers, one guidance counselor, about eighty teachers, and four deans. Principal and Vice Principal were the primary administrators; some teacher participants were also administrators (i.e. Heads of Department). As for MoE officials, most were high-ranking involved in research, divisional supervision, or in the leadership of National Student Services/School Discipline initiatives; I selected them because of their expertise/”bird’s eye” view.

10 I had asked all participants some variant of the question “what interventions are used here at SSS to address school violence?” or “how is school violence dealt with/addressed here at SSS?” 11 These four programs were implemented, with MoE support, by different NGOs. Each program worked with “problem youth” or “trouble” classes. The Adolescent Development Program aimed at providing students with

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PEACE EDUCATION information about teenage pregnancy, AIDS, sexuality, etc. Families in Action was focused on peer mediation/ mentorship, and leadership training. Arts in Action used arts-based programs (i.e. dance, visual arts, music) to tackle issues like bullying. Rapport was about providing education to students around issues such as AIDS and safe sex practices.

12 See Williams (2013: 57) for a description of my detailed observations of a safety officer whipping/caning a student who had been fighting with another student. 13 “Equal force” here implied that the safety officers used physical force with perhaps the same intensity reserved for adult-to-adult interaction. 14 “meh” is Trinidadian dialect for “me.” 15 See Williams (2014) for a much deeper discussion of the intersection of masculinity and school violence at SSS; in this article, I use neocolonial hegemonic masculinity as my analytic framework. 16 Waldron (2009) asserts that criminologists have dominated the field of school violence research. 17 I have discussed this choice of gambling as an evasionary tactic from tackling structural violence at SSS (see Williams 2015). 18 Students did not tell me this directly but I often overheard some students expressing to school staff or to each other that they were ashamed to be seen taking these lunches. 19 Toohey (2013: 1) argues that “one form of structural violence may be simply to exclude different voices from decision making or the construction of peace. Thus, people are denied their full potential by being kept out of problem definition.” 20 There are several other “lingering colonialities” that I observed during my data collection. Because of space constraints, I am not able to elaborate here. However, in Williams (2012, 2013), I offer rich data and analysis about uniforms, corporal punishment, steep hierarchies, and outdated pedagogies, just to name a few. 21 Since about 1999, the MoE has banned the use of corporal punishment in schools; however, its usage continues. Harris (2000, 18) argues that “physical means of disciplining children provide bad role models of conflict resolution, lower children’s self-esteem, and make it difficult for children to trust adults—all of which are counterproductive to school success.” 22 See Harris (2013; edited volume) for accounts of peace education grassroots efforts across the world. 23 I am aware that most (if not all) of the measures listed here are not based specifically on the Caribbean context. More research is needed to ascertain the cross-cultural commensurability of these measures.

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9 Teaching for Peace in Settings Affected by Urban Violence: Reflections from Guayaquil, Ecuador Maria Jose Bermeo

Introduction Urban violence adds an extra layer of challenge to teaching practice, generating specific issues that educators in cities across the world must engage. For example, the presence of an illicit drug trade in and around the school can engender situations where students are exposed to harassment or recruitment and where roles become blurred—students and family members who are also drug dealers and/or armed actors. Such situations add new facets to teacher–student relationships, school–community relations, and to decisions about school disciplinary practices. They can also add tension to peer-work and create disruptions during the school day. Frequently such dynamics are accompanied by other educational challenges related to urban inequality, such as poor nutrition, low parental literacy rates, child labor, and absenteeism. Teaching in neighborhoods affected by urban violence thus entails negotiating multiple simultaneous challenges. For critical educators concerned with teaching for peace, the task is compounded not only by the dilemmas of how to teach content well in the context of these dynamics but also how to foster transformative agency and facilitate collaborative, justice-oriented coexistence. This entails creating learning opportunities for students (and educators) to acquire the skills to analyze

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the underlying socioeconomic and political forces that generate violence, and to participate in the construction of nonviolent alternatives (Bajaj 2008b; Reardon 2000). Such critical analysis exposes urban violence as a product and mechanism of structural inequality, particularly when one recognizes that the neighborhoods most affected by violence are also the poorest (Briceño-León and Zubillaga 2002; World Bank 2011), and that criminality is often used to legitimize heavy-handed security policies that place the locus of responsibility on poor and/or minority communities and target them for harassment, incarceration, and, in extreme cases, extrajudicial killings (Alexander 2010; Jones and Rodgers 2009). Critical peace education calls for cautious unpacking of the ways that these multiple inequalities take shape within and beyond the classroom, and how educators interrupt or facilitate them. Drawing from a multi-sited case study of schools in Guayaquil, Ecuador, this chapter examines the relationship between teaching and urban violence.1 Through analysis of local practices, I aim to show the multifaceted ways that teachers respond to violence. These diverse teacher responses need to be understood in order to identify and support strategies that avoid reinforcing existing disparities. These findings demonstrate how teachers at times reinforced violent cycles by contributing to educational exclusion or permitting impunities and punishments that inadvertently assist the mechanisms through which students are recruited to criminal networks. They also demonstrate, however, the manifold ways that teachers stand between students and those forces of exclusion or recruitment by supporting them to succeed academically, preventing them from further exposure to drugs and violence, or actively trying to redirect or protect them when they are already involved in such situations. By showing the range of responses adopted by teachers in this context, the chapter illustrates the complex terrain of education’s role in building peace in urban settings and underscores the relevance of critical peace education as a framework of analysis through which to uncover the ways that education may inadvertently reproduce patterns of violence.

Critical Peace Education and Urban Violence The field of peace education encompasses educational theory and practice that aims to respond to violence at all levels of society. In recent years, peace education scholars have called for a renewed focus on the “critical” in the field (see for example: Bajaj and Brantmeier 2011; Diaz-Soto 2005; Zembylas and Bekerman 2013). Drawing from critical social theory, such an approach entails a commitment to reexamine accepted concepts, to analyze the multiplicity of dominance in social interaction, situating local experiences within broader systemic realities, and to take positions in the pursuit of social

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justice, aligning oneself in solidarity with those marginalized or excluded by the social system in place. A critical peace education approach assumes the task of uncovering the multiple direct, cultural, and structural layers of violence as they relate to education theory and practice, and acknowledges the “multiplicity, contingency and complexity” of peace education efforts (Zembylas and Bekerman 2013b: 200). At the same time, it embraces the commitment to social change implicit in the advent of the field, orienting the scholar to the analysis of multiple forms of violence, but also to the possibility of their redress. The call to critically analyze the complex roots and implications of violence is highly pertinent today given the entrenched militarization and securitization of state-based responses to perceived threats. Militarized discourses of security mask an unexamined acceptance of the state, rather than the individual, as the beneficiary of security. Critical scholars have pushed to broaden the concept of security to include political, economic, societal, and ecological elements, and view individual humans as the “irreducible base units” for security (Buzan 1983). They describe the “securitization” of political issues as the use of a rhetoric of existential threat to justify extraordinary actions, and point to the employ of claimed threats to national security in order to legitimize the use of force, the mobilization of resources, and the exercise of special powers that undermine freedoms (Buzan, Waever, and Wilde 1998). Analysis of such securitization processes is particularly relevant in the context of urban violence and the war on drugs, as both have been used to shape security agendas that sidestep civic rights and de-prioritize other aspects of security, such as food security and infrastructure, ignoring underlying structural inequalities. Uneven urbanization and the capturing of political power by urban elites often produce an unequal distribution of the impacts of urban violence. The management of space frequently overtakes efforts to root out the sources of insecurity. Instead, what can be found in many cities across the world is a form of “spatial governance”—exemplified by fortified enclaves and pockets of insecurity—that favors the urban elite and reinforces socioeconomic inequalities and injustices (Caldeira 2000; Rodgers 2004). Similarly, the implementation of sanctions and punishments is differentially meted out across groups, as has been poignantly described in research about the disproportionate arrest and incarceration of racial minorities in the United States (Alexander 2010) and of favela (urban slum) inhabitants in Brazil (Perlman 2011). A critical approach to the study of urban violence must thus include careful attention to the cultural, political, and material forces—often rooted in historical and colonial relations, as Hakim Williams in Chapter 8 discusses—that engender it in specific places and times and with specific groups of people.

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In correlation with the uneven distribution of resources across cities and the compounding of diverse effects of inequality, schools in contexts most affected by urban violence frequently also experience other educational challenges associated with poverty and discrimination, and often do so with limited resources. This stacking of hurdles represents a structural condition that limits the possibilities of advancement for children born into a low socioeconomic status, thus contributing to reproducing the asymmetries of the existing social system. In this sense, the infrastructure of education, namely the material and human resources that schools count on, is one variable that determines the extent to which education is able to play a role in interrupting cycles of poverty, exclusion, and violence. Additionally, scholars have demonstrated that pedagogical approaches, relational dynamics, and patterns of behavior can serve to reinforce existing societal stratifications (see for example, Freire 1970, Bourdieu and Passeron 1990; Delpit 1995). Accordingly, education does not only entail the distribution of resources but is also a relational encounter through which patterns of interrelation are shaped. The role of schools in interrupting violence and exclusion is therefore also determined by social and cultural elements of teaching. A poignant example can be found in scholarship examining the “school-toprison-pipeline” in the United States, which has shown how disciplinary and pedagogical practices can converge to usher students from certain groups (in this case, young black males) into the criminal justice system (Bahena et al. 2012). In contrast, in other settings special programming to support young people who are growing up affected by urban violence have served not only to keep them in school but also to continue on to higher education and participate in efforts to transform the challenges their communities face (Hunter-Bowman 2011). Concluding this discussion, two central propositions remain. First, that urban violence is a phenomenon tied to deeper structural inequalities that propagate the exclusion and undermining of the life chances of particular groups in society, and, second, that education carries the potential to further reinforce those inequities or to play a part in interrupting and transforming these cycles of violence. A critical peace education analysis thus underscores the relevance of critical research on the intersection of urban violence and education to better understand mechanisms of exclusion and possibilities for transformation, and to shape proposals for praxis that aim to build comprehensive peace with communities hindered by these combined oppressions. The subsequent sections of this chapter take up this task by exploring teacher responses to student involvement in urban violence in Guayaquil, demonstrating both the risks of exclusion embedded in these practices and the opportunities for transformation that they carry.

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Context and Methods of the Study Background In recent years, micro-trafficking in and around schools in Ecuador has become an issue of concern for the country.2 As a strategic point of transit for the transnational drug trade, Ecuador faces the presence of an increasingly important domestic drug market, particularly for cocaine.3 In parts of the country, micro-traffickers target urban schools as potential markets and draw children and adolescents in as consumers and distributors of drugs such as perica and hache (derivatives of cocaine and heroin). To date, the Ecuadorian educational system has undertaken a variety of strategies to respond to the issue of micro-trafficking. These have included short-term targeted interventions, such as requiring schools to produce security plans, a series of police inspections of school grounds and student property with sniffer dogs, and drug prevention workshops for educators. They have also included several ongoing initiatives, such as an Anti-Narcotics Police program offering drug-prevention talks in schools, a National Drugs Council drug-prevention program, a Ministry of Education circular prohibiting the presence of drugs in schools, and a collaborative government effort to generate a comprehensive national drug prevention policy. Simultaneously, Ecuador has undergone drug policy reform similar to several other countries in the region. In February 2014, the National Assembly approved the reform of the country’s Penal Code, decriminalizing the possession of drugs considered for personal use and reducing sentences for small traffickers. These legal reforms make effective the reframing of drug policy put forth in the 2008 constitution, which treats drug use as a public health issue and prioritizes the prosecution of large traffickers rather than drug mules and other small traffickers. They also open the door to an increased emphasis on harm reduction strategies. Despite the policy shift, selling drugs such as cocaine remains an illegal enterprise controlled by criminal networks, thus student involvement in drug use and distribution exposes them to a variety of physical, psychosocial, and legal risks beyond the health risks associated with substance use. Such risks connected to illegality are more pronounced for children and adolescents for whom other vulnerabilities (such as poverty, racial discrimination, etc.) are also present. In this way, micro-trafficking remains connected to broader urban violence while also intersecting with issues of inequality and discrimination; student involvement in it is thus an issue that concerns critical peace educators.

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Research Methods This chapter draws on data from a twelve-month qualitative study conducted in 2013–14 in Guayaquil, Ecuador. The study aimed to explore how teachers understand and respond to student involvement in urban violence, and what social, cultural and material factors influence their practice. The target population was government schoolteachers working with students in eighth to tenth grade (eleven to fifteen years old), in schools where the presence of micro-trafficking, youth gangs, and illegal activities were identified as problems. The study focused primarily on micro-trafficking as the predominant manifestation of urban violence and paid special attention to how teachers addressed student drug use and involvement in drug sales. Data were collected through focus groups with teachers and school psychologists, formal and informal interviews with teachers and principals, and classroom- and school-based observation. Ninety educators from nineteen schools participated in an initial round of focus groups and interviews, and subsequently, drawing from this pool of participants, ten focal teachers were shadowed at three schools for a period of four months. Interviews were also carried out with government representatives and civil society actors. Owing to design constraints, the study was limited to examining teacher perspectives. Students were not interviewed, but their presence cross-sects the data both in the teachers’ use of examples and through the observations in the school settings.

Findings: Teacher Responsiveness to Student Involvement in Urban Violence “Ohh, we had a day yesterday,” Rodrigo says when he sees me.4 The day before, an eighth-grade student had reported a tablet missing and the inspectors searched student bags during recess, finding the tablet and accusing Jhonny, a tenth grader, of the theft.5 Rodrigo explains to me that Jhonny was the student who had been arrested earlier in the year for bringing drugs into the school, and that when they accused him of being responsible for this incident, he had retorted, “You going to send me to jail again? I’ll have to get out eventually, and then I’ll come looking for you.” Rodrigo says he handled the situation carefully, “con tino.” He explains that there is a group of students involved in thefts at the school. While we are talking, a few other teachers join our conversation. “These students don’t want to study, they don’t come here to study, solo para el negocio (just for the business),” says one teacher. Another directs her frustration toward me, “You office people

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come here, but you don’t understand, we’re threatened, and what support does the government give us? Is our life not worth anything?” El negocio was widespread at this school. Youths associated with microtrafficking and street gangs (some of them dropouts from the school itself) would regularly hang about near the school gate or on the nearby pedestrian bridge overlooking the school grounds. Students were frequently caught carrying hache in school, admitted to dependence on the substance, and reported intimidation from the distributors. The students’ involvement in drug use and distribution impacted teaching and learning—students who consumed or sold drugs during school hours missed out on instructional time; had conflicts with teachers, administrators, and peers; and experienced disruptions related to the legal, physical, and sexual risks associated with their involvement in criminal activities. Teachers complained about challenging classroom management dynamics and loss of instructional and planning time. These conditions contributed to low teacher morale. Teachers also expressed concerns of possible retaliations if they became involved in stopping the drug trade or offended specific students. Concerned by the pervasiveness of micro-trafficking among students, the principal and a group of teachers took it upon themselves to try to identify the main drug distributors and users in the school. They aimed to rid the school of distributors and help the users by referring them for treatment. Their investigation took place mostly through student informants—talking with students with whom rapport had been built or who were caught carrying drugs at school or for some other infringement of school rules. They also frequently carried out requisas (physical searches, or pat-downs). Rodrigo, the head inspector, prepared a file on the students identified as distributors and submitted it to the district with a request for support. None came. Simultaneously, noting that students (and their guardians) referred to rehabilitation centers were not following through, he and the principal personally took students to receive treatment at a nearby health center. Not all the teachers at the school supported these efforts. Most opted not to get involved; as one active teacher explained once, “Somos pocos los que controlamos. Los otros no hacen nada, y los estudiantes hacen fiesta” (It’s only a few of us that keep watch, the others don’t do anything, and the students do what they want). By the end of the school year, though several of the main distributors had been pushed out, there were few notable changes with regard the prevalence of hache at the school, and an exhausted Rodrigo told me that he feared it would only worsen the following year. This brief description of one of the three focal schools in the study offers an introduction to the complex ways that urban violence and teaching intersect—where criminal networks infiltrated the daily life of the school, certain students were labeled as threats, and teachers responded in a variety

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of ways. In order to better understand the opportunities and limitations for teachers to contribute to peace under such conditions, it is useful to further unpack the diverse ways in which teachers responded to their students’ involvement with drugs and violence. As this example portrays, student involvement in micro-trafficking permeated the daily experience of teachers in Guayaquil directly and indirectly. Teacher actions in relation to this situation were likewise direct and indirect. At times teachers were faced with a specific and explicit situation (such as a student caught selling drugs on school grounds). Other times the notion of student involvement in drug use or street gangs was blurred together with the challenges of chaotic classroom settings, frequent absenteeism, or low academic performance, and accordingly, responses reflected an attempt to address the complex interweaving of urban violence with other contextual factors generating challenging teaching conditions. With these overlaps in mind, I group the forms of response that teachers in the study exhibited into three categories: (1) nonintervention, (2) reactive intervention, and (3) proactive intervention. I use these categories as a means to examine the extent to which teachers became engaged in interrupting student involvement in urban violence and the ways that such engagement takes form; however, it is important to note that the lines between the three categories are not clearly drawn, and most of the educators in the study exhibited all three forms of responsiveness to the presenting situations.

Nonintervention The first category of response encompassed the choice to not intervene in addressing student involvement in urban violence. Nonintervention occurred in three ways: direct avoidance, tacit compliance, and passive neglect. Direct avoidance took place when teachers opted not to intervene in an explicit drugs- or violence-related event, as exemplified in the following excerpt from my field notes. I was in the teacher room with Miriam and Maria Isabel, chatting about the upcoming school beauty pageant. Miriam was talking when suddenly she gestured to Maria Isabel to look out through the door (the upper half of the door was glass), “Mira, se lo va a pasar” (look, she’s going to pass it to him). “Mira, mira, así hacen el intercambio” (look, look, that’s how they make the exchange). The three of us watched as a female student handed off something to another student. We were all sure it was drugs given what we knew already. After the handover ended, we went back to chatting about the upcoming event. (Field-notes, January 24, 2013)

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In this situation, two teachers observed the activity that they suspected was a drug transaction on school grounds and took no action to intervene in the moment, or to report this event to any other teachers or school authorities. In another example of direct avoidance, teachers described that when they noted that a student was under the influence of drugs in class, they sometimes opted to ignore the situation and leave them to sleep it off at the back of the classroom, or to superficially participate in activities. Tacit compliance occurred when teachers gave in to threats. In one example, a teacher described feeling threatened when a student stopped her in the street on her way home, and admitted to subsequently giving him the passing grade that he wanted rather than risk retaliations. As she explained, “and if they threaten me? No, not for a student, I can’t leave [my family]. If he wants the seven, I give it to him.” Several teachers also explained that they did not participate in interrupting student drug use because they feared the dealers would come after them, thus enacting another form of submitting to threats. Nonintervention also occurred in less direct ways, through ongoing patterns of not acknowledging infringements of school norms or involvement in drugs and violence. This constituted passive neglect. One example was the unaddressed presence of student graffiti on desks or walls. In one school, I noted several marker inscriptions on walls that read “Rey del Narcotrafico” (the king of narcotrafficking) that, despite prominent visibility, were not removed during the months that I was present at the school.

Reactive Intervention The second category of teacher response occurred when teachers were faced with an emergent situation related to student involvement in urban violence and they opted to address it in the moment. Generally, these interventions occurred in three ways: shielding students from immediate physical violence, intercepting illicit transactions, and addressing students’ concerns. Throughout the study there were multiple examples of teachers physically shielding their students from immediate threats of harm. In one example, a teacher described stepping into a fight between two rival gangs taking place near the school in order to protect her student from getting beaten. She was able to de-escalate the conflict long enough for police to arrive and disperse the group. In another example, two teachers stayed late after school with a student who had been threatened by a street gang and was afraid he would be attacked on the way home. The teachers stayed with the student until the youths that threatened him left the area. Other examples included stepping in between fighting students during school, walking or driving students to a

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given location, and blocking students from leaving school grounds if there was a fight taking place outside the school. Another form of reactive intervention occurred when teachers intercepted drug transactions and other specific situations related to urban violence (e.g. thefts, planned physical violence, etc.). These situations were largely treated as behavior management issues and reverted to broader school disciplinary practices. In the school sites I observed, these disciplinary practices were administered inconsistently and unevenly. Though a specific Ministry of Education procedure exists for addressing cases in which students are identified as involved in drugs or other illicit activities on school grounds—which establishes that teachers or school authorities should notify the students’ legal guardians, write a report, and, if evidence was found, call the Ecuadorian National Police Specialized in Children and Adolescents—in practice how such situations were handled in the moment varied greatly. For example, in cases where the teacher did not have physical evidence (e.g. the drugs and/or stolen item), teachers would sometimes speak to and advise the student in question, other times they would call guardians, send the student to the principal or school psychologists’ office (if these were available), kick them out of class, or scold them. In situations where teachers found evidence in the moment, they would generally call the guardians to the school, and, if significant quantities were uncovered, they would call the police. In at least one case, despite finding drugs on the student, a teacher opted only to counsel him rather than involve his parents or police because he felt this was more constructive for the student. Though schools cannot expel students according to the Ley Orgánica de Educación Intercultural (Ecuador’s education law), during the study I noted several instances where teachers and/or school authorities suggested to parents/ guardians that the best strategy could be to remove their son or daughter from school, which in some cases did lead to the withdrawal of the student from the school. Finally, a third form of reactive intervention occurred when teachers offered support to a student who showed signs of concern or who directly asked the teacher for support. For example, teachers described that when students exhibited or reported physical symptoms related to drug use (such as thirst, pallor, fear, or feeling faint), they sat with them, offered them something to eat or drink, and sometimes involved parents and/or took students to nearby medical facilities. Other examples occurred when teachers noticed that a student looked troubled or upset, or exhibited signs of involvement in drugs, and opted to respond. In such cases, responses included pulling the student aside to talk, inquiring from another student about the circumstances of the student in question, or asking someone else to talk to the student. In several cases, students also approached their teachers to talk about issues that

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they were worried about. In such cases teachers listened and advised the students.

Proactive Intervention The third group of teacher responses comprised the proactive interventions taken to address student involvement in urban violence. These include the strategies that teachers devised to set up a preventive school environment and offer support to at-risk students. Types of responses within this category included: seguimiento (monitoring or following-up), investigation, ordermaintenance monitoring, and awareness-raising. The practice of seguimiento consists of monitoring students’ academic, social and emotional well-being and mentoring and supporting students on an ongoing basis. This relies on building strong teacher–student relationships as a means to support students to cope with the challenging realities of their environment, to reorient them away from risks, and to encourage them to succeed academically. Throughout my observations, I saw many examples of teachers supporting their students in these ways. Most teachers mentioned seguimiento when they talked about what they do to address student involvement in drug- or violence-related situations. They described this as a process of observing and talking with the student to make sure they were staying on track with their schoolwork, staying out of trouble, and/or keeping up with treatment, as portrayed by the following quote. [My] first objective is that they leave safe and sound every day, that they go as safe and sound as they arrived, because there’s too much danger, that they not get involved in drugs, that they at least follow through with their [school work]. … I get so involved that sometimes I seem more like the mother than their tutor,6 and I’m aware of who did not submit their homework and I’m picking up the homework, I’m pleading with the teachers, I’m checking if they are hanging out with someone who is not appropriate, because the chico (kid) is in drugs or in something, then I’m on that student’s back to keep away, to look for other friends. (Interview transcript February 10, 2014) In contrast to seguimiento, another form of proactive intervention that teachers undertook was investigation, which entails the identification of students’ participation in illicit activities through gradual accumulation of evidence. This is exemplified in the description of the focal school above, where a group of educators took it upon themselves to address the problem of micro-trafficking at the school through deliberate efforts to root out

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the distributors and users. In that example, teachers gathered evidence about student involvement in micro-trafficking through observation, requisas (pat-downs, bag searches), and student informants. Subsequently, students who were identified as users were referred (and even accompanied by teachers) for treatment, while students who were identified as dealers were referred up to the District, reported on to the police, and ultimately pushed out. Another approach used to generate a preventive environment in the school was order-maintenance monitoring, which consisted of monitoring student activity in designated areas of the school at designated times (e.g. during recess) in order to deter infringements and reinforce student adherence to schools rules. Teacher monitoring turns were established by distributing the school areas (e.g. entrance, inner courtyard, hallways, patio, etc.) among teachers who would then be responsible for monitoring student activity in their designated area during recess and during the arrival and departure of students from the school premises. This was intended to deter drug transactions and fights, but also other offences such as non-compliance with uniforms, physical displays of affection, and roughhousing. According to teachers, this approach permitted greater control of the school and safety for the students. In some school sites, teachers were diligent about their monitoring obligations, while in others only some teachers followed through with this responsibility, thus leading to areas left unmonitored and conflicts among teachers. Finally, another form of proactive intervention was the use of awarenessraising campaigns, which consisted of providing students with information about drugs and violence. Examples of awareness-raising methods used in the schools included plays, posters, movies, and the introduction of drugrelated material to the subject curriculum. Many campaigns were specifically focused on warning students against the use of drugs, as portrayed in the following quote. We carried out a series of actions, like a proclamation saying “No to Drugs!” … [We used] skits, flyers … in other words we did a ton of things to put in the minds of the kids “no to drug use”, “no to drug use”, that was the theme. (Interview transcript July 31, 2013) However, in some cases the campaigns generated opportunities for students to express and reflect on their concerns and realities through dialogue and arts-based methods such as drama.

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Discussion: Teachers as Agents of Peace in Urban Settings The spectrum of teacher responses to urban violence described above highlights a broad range of actions and offers insight into the potential role of teachers as agents of peace in urban settings. This close examination of school-based practices in neighborhoods affected by urban violence offers a ground-level view of the types of situations in which educators carry influence over student involvement in cycles of violence. It also sheds light on the complexity and contingency of this role. If intended as such, each type of action described above could be used to further peace-related goals, but it also carries the potential to reinforce violence. For example, a teacher might opt for direct avoidance in order to avoid a confrontation that might not permit teaching to take place or that might damage an important mentoring relationship with a student, but in so doing he or she might also contribute to a culture of impunity or reinforce the use of force and intimidation as strategies to achieve goals. In another example, awareness-raising campaigns might create opportunities for reflection, but could also alienate students already caught up in drug-related situations if not facilitated thoughtfully. Teachers interested in contributing to peace must therefore carefully negotiate the given set of circumstances to assess how best to respond to their students and the broader context. This process is wrought with tensions and dilemmas. In this section, I explore a few of the difficult issues that shape the potential role of teachers as agents of peace.

Tensions and Dilemmas Student or Criminal? The blurred role of students as micro-traffickers or armed actors was one of the central tensions that teachers faced when the illicit drug trade entered the school. The presence of micro-traffickers and physical intimidation in school generated risks for other students and, at the same time, those students involved in trafficking or armed gangs were themselves caught up in a violent situation and needed alternatives. As the example of investigation as a response demonstrates, in the attempt to interrupt student involvement in micro-trafficking teachers often make choices about whose well-being to prioritize. Rodrigo once explained to me how he made this decision, Sincerely, with this drug situation, I see that many students are the victims of the drugs. So, I say, practically, the ones who consume are

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not culpable, but rather the one’s that sell are, because before this school didn’t consume, then these ones arrived, started to give [the drug] away, give it away until they create addicts and then they start to sell it. They are victims too, yes … [pauses] But here the one that is more to blame is the one that sells, so I have always gone against the one that sells, tried to sacar (take out of school) the ones that sell, because if we get them out [of the school], then maybe we can [work] with ones that consume it. (Interview transcript February 10, 2014) Despite this strategic distinction, I observed Rodrigo wrestle with how to draw the boundary between victim and perpetrator on several occasions. A deeply caring man who worked hard to address the issues his school was facing, he oscillated between strategizing how to “clean” the school of drugs by removing the distributors, and finding ways to reorient students from the path they were on. Rodrigo’s ongoing dilemma exemplified the tension between viewing students involved in distributing drugs as criminals or viewing them as young people in need of support. Several teachers in the study were not as ambivalent as Rodrigo, and argued instead that those students involved in drug distribution or gangs “did not want to study” (a phrase I heard frequently), and should not be given a spot in school. Ultimately, identification as a micro-trafficker often translated into educational exclusion, either directly when teachers and school authorities encouraged parents to withdraw their students from school, or indirectly, when teachers distanced themselves from students.

Personal Risk It is important to take into account the context of insecurity and personal risk that teachers in the study experienced. Several teachers reported direct threats to their own well-being or the safety of their loved ones. In one example, a teacher was threatened several times after an incident in which she caught a student with drugs at school and called the police. She interpreted these threats as an attempt to discourage her from involving the police in future or from interrupting drug sales. While at first she was afraid, particularly for the safety of her young children, she ultimately told me that she was not going to let anyone get in the way of her doing what was best for her students. In another example, a teacher described to me how a student had told him that “one of these [days] Professor Bryan (another teacher at the school) lo van a encontrar muerto (is going to wind up dead)” (interview transcript February 10, 2014). Other teachers, while not directly threatened, described that they felt vulnerable to possible harm by violent actors outside the school, and they expressed that directly involving oneself

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in interrupting the drug trade was akin to confronting the drug-traffickers, thus increasing their personal risk. Though none of the teachers at the school sites were physically harmed during the study and some actors downplayed the likelihood of harm, this atmosphere of perceived risk was pervasive, and several teachers admitted that it kept them from getting involved, or offered fear as explanation for why other teachers opted not to intervene.

Acting Alone The perspective that they were acting alone was a common aspect of teacher experiences in the study. Teachers expressed that they felt alone in efforts to address issues related to drugs and violence, and that this was discouraging. This sense of isolation came across within schools, when teachers talked about how only a few of them were intervening. It also came up when teachers talked about the broader education system, including the district offices and Ministry of Education; they described feeling that the district and other education authorities did not pay attention to school-based realities. Teachers also argued that parents did not participate enough, thus leaving the teacher alone in the task of intervening when a student was getting involved in drugs or street gangs. Finally, the feeling of isolation also came up when teachers described their perceived insecurity and risk, as they frequently asserted that they had no protection if drug traffickers (or other armed actors) wanted to do them harm. Despite the many ways that teachers talked about feeling alone in the struggle to interrupt student involvement in drugs and violence, they also described some examples of teaming up with a few of their peers or with parents to tackle a particular case, and many teachers in the study said that they felt they could walk safely in the neighborhoods where they worked because the communities knew they worked at the school. While the sense of being alone in responding to students was emphasized more in interviews, these examples show that possibilities for collaboration do exist. Regardless, the notion that they are alone in the battle to prevent student involvement in violence limited teachers’ perspectives of the possible pathways for change that they might engage. When asked about how to address youth getting involved in micro-trafficking, teachers often responded that the issue was bigger than them, conveying both an awareness of the systemic nature of the problem but also conveying a sense of disempowerment. This issue cannot be addressed alone, “so, what can we do?” they frequently asked. This sense of isolation was one of the underlying elements guiding teachers’ limited and inconsistent interventions.

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Teachers as Agents of Peace Analysis of how teachers in Guayaquil responded to student involvement in urban violence and the tensions they faced in the process demonstrates both the possibilities and risks inherent in their potential role as agents of peace. Teachers in the study showed they were capable of enacting both positive and negative roles. On the one hand, there were several ways in which teachers reinforced violent cycles. By not intervening, or intervening inconsistently or ineffectively, teachers contributed to a culture of impunity and created opportunities for ongoing student exposure to violence. By giving in to direct and indirect threats, they reinforced the validity of violence as a strategy that delivers. By prioritizing the protection of some students over others, they further contributed to the exclusion of young people already caught up in criminal networks and violent cycles. On the other hand, through relationship building and mentoring teachers offered their students care, support, and space for reflection. Through arts-based activities and dialogue they generated opportunities for students to devise their own interpretations and representations of their realities. At risk of personal harm, they physically protected students from situations of direct violence. By holding students accountable for their actions, they contributed to combating impunity and often found ways to turn adverse situations into learning opportunities. These few examples show the multifaceted nature of teachers’ roles in settings affected by urban violence. If educators in such settings aim to participate in peace building, they need to critically assess the multiple context-driven potential effects of their decisions and negotiate the tensions and dilemmas inherent to their role.

Conclusion This chapter described the varied and inconsistent nature of teacher responsiveness to student involvement in urban violence in Guayaquil, and brought to light ways in which educators both hindered and facilitated the forces of exclusion, criminality, and violence to which their students were exposed. It analyzed when and how teachers intervened in drugs- and violencerelated situations, identifying three categories of action: nonintervention, reactive intervention and proactive intervention. The exercise of unpacking teacher responses generates several questions for critical peace educators to consider: If the aim is to generate a school culture that reflects social justice and coexistence, when should educators intervene and in what ways? What forms of intervention are consistent with a peace-oriented approach rather

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than a practice of securitization? What does it entail for teachers to respond collectively to the needs of all their students? This case study offers insight to the challenges of teacher practice in relation to urban violence—often undertaken with limited support and accompanied by personal risk—and surfaced the trade-offs and dilemmas that may contribute to reproducing patterns of exclusion, particularly with regard to those young people already caught up in cycles of violence. These insights highlight the importance of contextualizing teacher responses and recognizing the inherent tensions these carry, reaffirming the “multiplicity, contingency and complexity” of efforts to contribute to peace (Zembylas and Bekerman 2013b, 200). The study also drew attention to a trend of teacher disempowerment and isolation, perhaps one of the greatest obstacles to the possibility of teaching for peace in settings affected by urban violence.

Notes 1

The research presented in this chapter was made possible thanks to the support of a grant from the Drugs, Security and Democracy Program administered by the Social Science Research Council in partnership with the Universidad de los Andes and Centro de Investigación y Docencias Económicas and with funds provided by the Open Society Foundations and the International Development Research Centre, Ottawa, Canada; and the support of the Education Policy Dissertation Research Fellowship of the Department of Policy and Social Analysis at Teachers College, Columbia University.

2

Micro-trafficking is a term that refers to domestic drug markets (in contrast to the transnational drug trade) and entails the illegal sale of drugs at a micro level.

3

It should be noted that, while the drug trade in Ecuador carries security implications (particularly for certain urban neighborhoods as this study indicates), Ecuador is not a country with high levels of violence.

4

In order to maintain the confidentiality of participants, all names used in this chapter are pseudonyms.

5

The role of inspector is similar to the role of dean in the United States and other parts of the world. Usually, inspectors are responsible for monitoring student attendance and handling discipline-related matters.

6

In Ecuador, the tutor (in Spanish tutor or dirigente) is in charge of monitoring the progress of a designated group of students. This is similar to advisory or homeroom teachers in the United States and elsewhere, or form teachers in the United Kingdom and other countries.

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PART FOUR

Peace by Piece: Approaches and Models for Peace Education

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10 Beyond American Exceptionalism: Centering Critical Peace Education in US School Reform Maria Hantzopoulos

Introduction The contemporary US educational landscape is often dominated by policies that emphasize accountability, punitive action, and, ultimately, the privatization of public space. Mandates that rely solely on test scores to measure success and promote narrow conceptions of learning and discipline often overlook the importance of overall school climate and culture, despite studies that show how attention to this may in fact improve schools and address inequities in schooling. Subsequently, the humanizing and democratizing pedagogical practices and structures that may resocialize students academically, and equip them with the tools to succeed in school and in life, are often left out of these policy equations. Given this context, I raise the following questions: How might a comprehensive approach to critical peace education in public schools bridge this gap? How might this approach work more effectively than status quo policies to both redress the structural violence and enduring inequities that persist in US schools, and reframe schools to be more humanizing and transformative spaces? Since “critical” peace education (Bajaj 2008b; Bajaj and Brantmeier 2011; Diaz-Soto 2005) is attentive to participant realities and agency, this chapter considers how schools can be partial sites of inclusion

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and transformation, particularly for those most marginalized by schooling in the US. As such, this chapter presents an alternate view to the dominant discourses that both demonize public schools and suggest reform must come by way of increased testing, privatization, and disciplinary control. Instead, I consider ways that public schools may be sites of possibility and urge policy makers to examine authentic strategies, such as holistic approaches to critical peace education to redress systemic and structural injustices that have been harmful to the lives of many young people. My analysis is based on sixteen months of ethnographic research conducted between 2006 and 2008 at Humanities Preparatory Academy (HPA or “Prep”), a small public high school in New York City. Despite serving a population that is often described as “at risk,” the school maintains very high graduation and college acceptance rates, and extremely low dropout rates. The data collection process included participant observation at the school; interviews with former and current students, teachers, and administrators; and anecdotal surveys. The research, which foregrounds youth experiences at the school, suggests that their contextual approach to critical peace education not only promotes democratization, critical consciousness, and an obligation to social change, but also confronts institutional forms of structural violence by academically resocializing youth that have been disaffected by school. Consequently, I challenge the prevailing notion that peace education in the US context is superfluous; instead, I assert that critical peace education must drive the efforts at US school reform so that schools can be sites that truly pursue equity and social justice.

Educational Reform in the United States In the past two decades, public discourse in the United States about “failing” public schools has permeated the urban educational landscape, paving the way for macro-level policy reforms ostensibly designed to improve schools. Tied to accountability strategies that intend to increase student achievement, these initiatives, such as No Child Left Behind, Race to the Top, and the Common Core Standards, not only measure student progress through their performance on high-stakes standardized tests but also rank and valuate teachers, schools, and districts based on these very same indicators. While these policies have always been met with criticism and controversy, their proliferation on national, state, and local levels seems to be unstoppable. Shaped by rhetoric that demonizes public schools, their teachers, and their students, these policies are often seen as the “common sense” approach to remediating failure in the public eye (Apple, 2005; Bartlett et al, 2002; Hantzopoulos and Shirazi, 2014; Kumashiro, 2008).

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Implicit in the discourses surrounding these policies is that public schools are presently incapable of preparing and educating children. Consequently, those most active in shaping policy these days are rarely educators; they are often business folk, politicians, or self-proclaimed reformers who have made their careers in education by spending little time in schools and classrooms. Often citing statistics that point to the under-preparedness of US youth, these reformers push policies that seemingly raise standards through benchmarks, test scores, and an overall discourse of accountability. Embedded with neoliberal free-market principles, these policies also rest their faith in the idea that competition, innovation, and accountability will drive students and schools to perform better (Apple, 2005; Hantzopoulos and Shirazi, 2014; Hursh, 2007). Overwhelming evidence, however, points to how these reforms, in reality, have been the real failure (Berliner and Biddle 1995; Berliner, Glass, and Associates 2014; D’Agastino 2012; McCarty 2010; Ravitch 2011, 2014). By placing primacy on test scores and school performance above all other educational matters, these initiatives create pressure on teachers and schools to prepare students solely for the tests at the expense of other empirically sound effective pedagogies. This emphasis on “accountability” through high-stakes testing on these exams has only exacerbated existing inequities, particularly with those who have been historically marginalized from schooling, including students of color, multilingual students, and those with diagnosed disabilities (Amrein and Berliner 2003; Arbuthnot 2011; Furtrell and Rotberg 2002; Hayward 2002; Horn 2003; Katsiyannis et al. 2007; MacNeil et al. 2011; Marchant 2004; Menken 2008; Vazquez-Heilig and Darling-Hammond 2008). While these scholars cite a variety of factors that affect students’ performance on these tests (including cultural biases, language ability, access to supplementary resources, etc.), these studies have also repeatedly shown that these populations are more vulnerable to dropping out of school than their White and wealthier counterparts, and the gap has only widened with increased testing policies (Bridgeland, Dilulio, and Balfanz 2009; Bridgeland, Dilulio, and Morrison 2006; MacNeil et al. 2011). Studies have also shown how this emphasis on testing has risen alongside the proliferation of demoralizing punitive school climates, including zerotolerance policies that immediately punish students for sometimes minor infractions, that contribute to pushing students out of school. For instance, research shows that students with a history of suspension have a 78 percent higher likelihood of dropping out (Lee et al. 2011; Suh and Suh 2007). While student behavior certainly can contribute to disciplinary measures like suspension, research also shows that a harsh school climate, culture, and policies also contribute to suspension rates that may otherwise be unnecessary. Moreover, scholars like Bowditch (1993), Fine (1991), and Fergusen

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(2001) have ethnographically shown the ways in which students, particularly young people of color, are in fact criminalized in their school environments and constructed as “trouble.” As studies repeatedly show that schools with excessively punitive disciplinary policies and high suspension rates have higher drop-out rates than those that do not have such draconian policies (Christle, Jolivette, and Nelson 2007; Suh and Suh 2007), many scholars and youth advocates prefer the term “push out” to describe the phenomenon of students leaving school. Several studies and reports also show how school climate contributes to pushing students out of school. For instance, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU 2010), the New York Civil Liberties Union, Make the Road, and Annenberg Institute of School Reform (2009) and the National Economic and Social Rights Initiative (Sullivan 2007), have all published reports that reveal the disproportionate ways in which New York City students were subject to degrading treatment in the classroom, unfair disciplinary policies, and a threatening police and security presence. Rather than creating safer schools, these punitive measures have only created hostile learning environments. As several studies indicate, students who are frequently disciplined or suspended from school are much more likely not to complete high school. Moreover, these “zero tolerance” discipline policies often work in tandem with high-stakes testing as the former criminalizes students for minor infractions of school rules, and the latter forces administrators to push out low-performing students to improve their schools’ overall test scores’ (Advancement Project et al. 2011). While research also shows that individual, social, cultural, psychological, and economic variables contribute to the drop-out patterns (Rumberger 2004), these studies articulate the importance of school culture on the attainment rate of students in school. Consequently, schools (and students) have felt the repercussions of this reform, since failure to meet specific achievement targets may result in administrative and curricular changes, and/or loss of school funding (Karp 2006). In fact, many schools and districts manipulate results to mask the realities of their students’ achievements on these tests. Moreover, these policies have also polarized debates surrounding the future of public education in the United States, and, many argue, are linked to attempts to privatize public education. For instance, in urban centers like New York City, Philadelphia, New Orleans, and Chicago, many schools that do not produce enough students at achievement level are deemed failing and have been slated for closure or complete takeover. Often, this paves the way for the creation of charter and specialized schools in these spaces, which many suggest are a covert attempt to, in fact, dismantle public education. While charters have not been proven to be any more successful than public schools,

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their proliferation in the past several years has been astounding, particularly as public discourse frames them as a panacea for school reform (Fabricant and Fine 2012). Overall, the fabrication of “failure” and crisis that catalyzes these reforms in fact produces and generates more failure. Several scholars have been documenting the ways that these processes work together to both erode the public good and bolster private industry, and, in recent years, growing opposition has been mounting from a broad-based grassroots level (Fabricant and Fine 2012; Hagopian 2014; Ravitch 2014; Schneidewind and Sapon-Shevin 2012; Watkins 2012). Yet, despite this documentation, over-testing, over-policing and privatization in schools still permeate the broader school reform agenda in the United States. Given this context, youth advocacy organizations have clamored for schools that adopt more humanistic and dignified educational processes for children that are also committed to the public good (Independent Commission on Public Education 2012; Sullivan 2007). It is herein that the enactment of critical peace education in US public schools can provide an approach that might reframe the current policies in schools to make them more humanizing and transformative spaces.

Critical Peace Education The field of peace education has evolved in its own right over the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, although philosophical and religious traditions rooted in peace and nonviolence have always existed and have been passed on to younger generations (Harris 2008). Though peace education has developed in haphazard and myriad ways over geographical space and time, it is generally unified by some fundamental principles that ground the field and bind its diverse influences theoretically. In general, scholars and practitioners mostly agree that peace is only achieved through the realization of both positive and negative peace, approaching a state in which all forms of violence (direct, structural, cultural, etc.) are eradicated (Harris and Morrison 2003; Reardon, 2001). Peace education, therefore, provides the means by which to develop the requisite skills and knowledge to move towards this idealized state of peace, and necessitates comprehensive attention to policymaking, planning, pedagogy, and practice (Bajaj 2008; Galtung 1969; Harris 2008; Reardon 1988; Toh 2006). The calls for critical peace education specifically respond to the poststructural and postcolonial critiques that find the field (and the concept of peace) both too normative and decontextualized in its foundation (Zembylas and Bekerman [2013b] and in this volume, Chapters 1 and 3; Gur-Ze’ev

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[2001]; Hantzopoulos [2010]). Critical peace education, therefore, brings forth the importance of integrating empirical research into the theoretical foundations of peace education, so that the complex and varied meanings that local actors bring to the concept and enactment of peace can bring more nuance and perspective to the field (Bajaj and Brantmeier 2011). Thus, rather than conceptualizing peace education in generalized and totalizing ways, critical peace education hones in on context-specific structural inequities to illuminate how localized experiences may shape perceptions of peace. By magnifying the role of critical pedagogy in this process, participants in these programs ostensibly have more room to cultivate a sense of transformative agency specific to their localized contexts (Bajaj and Brantmeier 2011; Diaz-Soto 2005). In a school setting, this translates to more democratized pedagogies and processes that both reflect horizontal relationships and a broader collective commitment to social change (Freire 2003 [1970]). Moreover, critical peace education, when enacted, recognizes the multipronged and nonlinear processes that intersect to give holistic attention to form, content, and structure in its application (Galtung 2008; Haavelsrud 2008). The high school where the research study discussed in this chapter took place, Prep, was not necessarily conceived under the rubric of critical peace education; however, the principles that undergird critical peace education are intentionally incorporated into many of the school’s structures. In turn, elements that embody critical peace education are interwoven though the policies, practices, and stated beliefs of the school. The remainder of this chapter emphasizes how the school enacts critical peace education in the context of New York City, both to provide a rationale for this type of education and to provide a model of its praxis in schools. While I have written elsewhere about how Prep operationalizes critical peace education through specific school participatory structures, this paper takes a broader look at three aspects of school culture that contribute to this process; these three areas are a Culture of Care, a Culture of Participation, and Social Change. Because the school operationalizes critical peace education in a holistic manner, I contend that it has created a fertile ground for learning and achievement, especially for those most disillusioned with school. As a result, I demonstrate the importance of centering critical peace education in US school reform and argue that is not supplemental or auxiliary but, rather, something that needs to be essential in efforts to make schools academically responsive and accountable to the students that they serve.

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Structuring Critical Peace Education: The Case of Humanities Preparatory Academy Originally designed as a school for students at risk for “dropping out,” Humanities Preparatory Academy (HPA or Prep) is also a college-preparatory school that, according to its mission, is not only “a haven for students who have previously experienced school as unresponsive to their needs as individuals” but also a place that welcomes students with diverse educational backgrounds. By constructing an alternative educational environment rooted in values like peace, justice, and democracy, this school presents itself as one that provides a transformative experience for its students within and beyond the sphere of the schooling. According to the mission, it endeavors to uphold these core values and create a space for students to “find their voices” and “speak knowledgeably and thoughtfully on issues that concern their school, their world.” The school serves a population that spans the socioeconomic, racial, and ethnic spectra of the city. At the time of my original research in 2005–8, the racial background of the student body was as follows: 40 percent Latino, 38 percent Black, 12 percent White, 6 percent Asian, and 4 percent Other; 12 percent were enrolled in special education; and 62 percent of the population qualified for free or reduced-price lunch. In 2013, the demographics of the school were as follows: 57 percent Latino, 28 percent Black, 7 percent White, 4 percent Asian. Eleven percent were enrolled in special education, and 73 percent qualified for free lunch (from insideschools.org). Prep is considered a successful school, because its graduation and college acceptance rates are well above average for a New York City public school. For example, Prep has averaged 91 to 100 percent college acceptance rates since it opened as a school in 1997 through the time of my fieldwork, while the citywide rate did not rise above 62 percent during that same period (New York Performance Based Standards Consortium 2008). The drop-out rate remains under 4 percent, as compared to the city rate of 19.9 percent despite the fact that Prep accepts many students who have been pushed-out of other schools and turn to Prep as a last resort. These figures demonstrate the schools’ commitment to addressing larger structural racial and economic inequalities embedded within the education system in New York City. Prep’s success, however, is based on its radically reconceptualized approach to schooling. By rethinking the form, content, and structure of traditional schooling, HPA endeavors to move toward a more libratory space for its students. From its inception, Prep has remained steadfast in its commitment to student-centered education, critical pedagogy, and the school’s core values of peace, justice, democracy, and respect for humanity,

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intellect, truth, and diversity. According to teachers interviewed, these aspects undergird classroom and school community practices. One way this happens is through the flattened hierarchy of school governance in which staff, parents, and students are invited to create and shape school policy and practices. While there is a school principal and teacher codirector, there are rotating leadership positions, student advisory councils, and consensusbased decision-making. With less than 200 students, the school remains relatively small for a New York City public high school. The reason for this size, according to the principal, is to provide more personalized instruction, closer adult/student mentorships, and an environment in which everyone is known (interview March 12, 2006). The school has also reframed how students are grouped academically to interrupt how traditional tracking in schools perpetuates inequalities and structural violence (Galtung 2008; Haavelsrud 2008; Oakes 2005); therefore classes are de-tracked, mixed-age, and heterogeneously grouped. There are no prerequisites based on grade levels, prior achievement, or ability for students to take most classes. Students therefore choose classes based on interest and meet with an advisor to ensure that their choices fulfill both the state distribution requirements and student-set academic goals. Prep is also unique in that it has a waiver from the Regents exams, the state subject standardized high-stakes testing used to graduate students. Instead, they use a form of assessment known as performance-based assessment (PBA), which resembles the college or graduate-level thesis system (Foote 2012; Hantzopoulos 2009). This type of assessment has allowed for the creation of thematic courses, building on students’ interests and questions they have about the world. As such, classes often reflect enduring themes in peace and social justice education. Finally, Prep has many non-academic participatory structures that support learning, critical dialogue, and democratic engagement. These include Advisory, Town Meeting and Quads, and the Fairness Committee, all of which are part of the school day and built into the overall schedule. Advisory is a daily class period, capped at fifteen students, in which students not only discuss issues that are often expanded upon in Town Meeting but also receive academic support, develop leadership skills, and build community with the other members of their group. Common issues include those affecting students’ personal spheres, ranging from college readiness, female athletes, and gang violence to relationship abuse. Town Meeting, which is a weekly whole-school gathering where students and teachers discuss a myriad of personal, community, school-wide, national, and global issues, is also an integral space for discussion and debate. Students determine Town Meeting topics in their advisories and each week a different Advisory facilitates the discussion or debate around the selected issue. Topics for

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discussion vary and include items like school policies, police brutality, metal detectors in schools, environmental racism, the military industrial complex, and local and national elections. Prep is also one of a few schools in New York City that actively uses a form of restorative justice, known as The Fairness Committee (“Fairness”), as a means to address and discuss infractions in the community (Hantzopoulos 2011a, 2013). While there are other schools starting to adopt restorative justice models in New York City, namely though the work of the Dignity In Schools Campaign and Teachers Unite, Prep has had the Fairness Committee since its inception as a school program. A mechanism through which students can discuss with one another and with teachers violations of the community core values, Fairness involves students in the process of brainstorming alternatives and solutions to these dilemmas. Examples include inappropriate language, missing class, vandalism, etc. It is often in these spaces that students can influence and implement school-wide policy through a direct democratic model and emphasis on critical dialogue and healthy debate.

Critical Peace Education in Action: Establishing a Culture of Care, Participation, and Social Change There are several ways that Prep builds a school culture that maintains and creates a humanizing and dignified environment for young people, as it intentionally aligns with the processes and goals of critical peace education. The approach is not secondary to other educational initiatives; instead, it is interwoven into all aspects of curriculum and school life. Overall, the data show promise in enacting this type of education in a public school setting when school structures collectively support its dissemination, and that critical peace education may be a vehicle for reinvigorating public school reform in the US.

Culture of Care While I have written elsewhere about the ways that the school intentionally builds a culture of care, namely through transformed student–teacher relationships (Hantzopoulos 2012, forthcoming), I give primacy here to the ways students conceptualize caring and, specifically, how they viewed this as integral to their academic success and experience at school. This builds off other scholars who show how instrumental care is in creating a supportive environment for youth (Bartlett and Koyama 2012; De Jesús 2012), and,

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particularly, how reimagined caring student–teacher relationships are the groundwork for enacting critical pedagogy. Students often talked about the egalitarian nature of student–teacher relationships, and cited this repeatedly as one of the foundations of building a caring, and ultimately transformative, school culture. For instance, it was typical for students to say something that Franz, an alumnus, said when reflecting on the school, “The teacher/student boundaries were blurred, and the teachers learned as much from the students as the students did from them.” This statement, which suggests genuine reciprocity, evokes the vision of Freire (2003), in which traditional student–teacher hierarchies are made horizontal and knowledge is ultimately co-constructed and shared. Moreover, students repeatedly suggest that the ability to call teachers by their first names contributed to these more reciprocal relationships. Though many students were initially unaccustomed to this, most spoke very fondly of this practice and acknowledged that it helped build a more supportive and trusting environment. For example, when Jessie, a senior, was asked what she liked best about the school, she stated: I also love [that at] Prep, we don’t call our teachers by their last names. It’s more personal … Once you call teachers by their last name you feel like it’s an authority figure and you feel like there’s a barrier between you and the teacher. That is just somebody who’s telling you what to do and when to do it. (Focus Group May 2, 2007) By simply using first names, Jessie intimates that the initial ice is broken toward more transformative relationships. While many students acknowledged that this was a new cultural practice for them, they overwhelmingly felt that it helped them feel closer and more trusting of their teachers. Students also repeatedly suggested that their teachers went beyond their pedagogical duties and checked in with students. For instance, Jonathan, a junior who actually left Prep for a semester and then came back, stated: I felt that the school was not really my thing. And then I realized that it was … a home away from home. And the reason I say that is because the teachers just concern [themselves with] everything around you. Everything that you do is their business and that’s a good thing … if you do something wrong, they don’t look over you for it. And they’re just going to make sure it’s all right. You know, to make sure that you’re doing fine and they check in with you every step of the way to make sure you’re doing okay. (Focus Group May 11, 2007) The way in which Jonathan describes how teachers cared is evocative of a “critical care” approach as teachers take interest in students’ lives, but

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also hold students accountable for their actions, in supportive ways (AntropGonzalez and de Jesús 2005). Sometimes students even evoked the use of the word family, or at the very least used familial descriptors (i.e. second home, parent, sister, etc.) when describing how they felt about the adults in the school. For instance, Lisa, an alumnus, explains the dissolution of the student–teacher binary through the family-like relationships: It’s hard to find teachers in other high schools that are like Prep because they’re very focused on you as an individual, they really want you to excel and it’s more of like … the relationship, yeah to some extent it is teacher– student, but it’s more of a family and they really genuinely care about the students. (Interview March 27, 2007) As mentioned in other data, the level of personalization contributes to a type of “genuine” care, and for Lisa, much like she would expect from her family. This resonates with how Valenzuela (1999), in her study of Mexican–American youth, conceptualizes authentic caring relationships between students and teachers, particularly when their notions of care are aligned with each other. In turn, students trust that their teachers have their best interests at heart. Overall, these strong student–teacher relationships are not simply about having conversations and being comfortable with teachers, but are also about feeling like an “equal partner” in the conversation. As noted earlier when discussing “first-name basis” relationships, students appreciate these horizontal relationships with teachers, suggesting there is a degree of symmetry in the dynamics of the relationship. While some students seek advice from their teachers, which may connote a more traditional, hierarchical relationship, the ways that students describe their teachers suggest that there are genuine attempts to engender an inter-generational, authentic dialogue among all the school actors, reflecting the “democratizing and humanizing” environment that Prep seeks to cultivate in its mission.

Culture of Participation The culture of care that is fostered at Prep influences the ways that students engage in other arenas of school life. For instance, another aspect of school culture that students noted as instrumental to their emotional, academic, and social well-being and success in the school was the emphasis on participation. Since Prep has many structures in the school, like Town Meeting, Advisory, and Fairness, that intentionally foster student participation (Hantzopoulos 2011a, b), many of the students felt that they were

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encouraged and expected to have a say and cultivate their “voice.” For instance, Deena shared “Prep helped me become a better person and to find my voice and know that I have the right to share that. It has had an amazing impact on my life and has been by far the best school choice” (December 20, 2006). One way this manifested in the school was the way that teachers were amenable to student input in creating the classes or even changing the direction of them. For example, Vivian, a senior, describes this when asked what she liked best about the school. I love how the classes are designed. And I love how you can put your input in classes … and how teachers actually do like you. “Hey what do you like about that class? What do you not like? What do you think should be changed?” Like, when I was in a class with Mark, I was in his Dystopia class. And no one really liked [the book] 1984 or part of the class didn’t like it. So, we told him that and … after that, he gave us choices of books and that showed me that he was really listening. (May 23, 2007) Later in the interview, when she described what she tells others about Prep, she explains how this level of input leads her to feel “happy.” In this sense, she depicted how her contributions to her own learning made her feel better about school, which ultimately led to a higher level of engagement. Many students and alumni repeatedly brought up the emphasis on discussion in their classes, and cited this as motivation for learning. For instance, Jenkins, an alumnus, reflects on what his Prep classes were like: I would describe them as kind of what I hoped college would be like. You know always conversing, always discussing a lot of things, always debating about stuff. And what I did like was we never had textbooks … It was always, like, sheets of paper. Put it in your binder, you do this sheet, you know, come next day, we’ll discuss it, and then you can elaborate on it in class. (March 15, 2007) Though Jenkins described a more discussion-based classroom, he also references how this level of participation is what he imagines college to be like. In this sense, the ways that his ideas were valued not only encourages his participation, but also helps him view himself as intellectual in that he equates his Prep-life with college-life. Alumni and students felt very positively about the school structures that were “nonacademic” that encouraged participation and often cited these are critical spaces for dialogue and growth. For instance, Sebastien recognizes the many places where he feels his voice is cultivated:

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I’ve grown academically and just as a person being in Humanities Prep … I’ve always been a person that would talk, … but like this school has given me like the courage to just speak up whenever I feel it’s needed and not like hold my breath for anybody. And especially like when I feel something needs to be said, I’ll do it now because I’ve learned to go into the quads, classes, and even after school, like we’ll have in-depth conversations with students and teachers. The topic will come up from any student in the school and we will just sit there for hours just going at it. (Focus Group May 2, 2007) Here Sebastien references how the informal spaces in which he had been able to engage with students and teachers intersected with more formal spaces to help him develop “a voice” to be able to participate in more structured spheres (like quads and classes). For many, the cultivation of voice was also linked to an increased sense of tolerance and open-mindedness. In this way, the culture of participation was not only about the validation of student knowledge, but also about contestation, which ultimately is an integral part of participation. For instance Deena, an alumna who described herself as someone that came from a “very liberal and open-minded family,” said that Prep taught her to be even more open to people who did not have the same ideas and perspective as her: Prep gave me the opportunity, through places like Town Meeting, and quad, and Advisory, to be a little bit more understanding towards views that were a little bit different from my own … It taught me to be able to view things from someone else’s perspective, to not get so frustrated because it is important to not get so frustrated and to understand where they are coming from. It also taught me that there is more than one truth in the world. And it taught me to be more … open-minded (laughing) even though I am from the most open-minded family! (Interview December 20, 2006) Thus, the Culture of Participation allowed students not only to express their opinions, but also to learn how to express these opinions in ways that were constructive for life beyond the school, as well as listen more attentively to others.

Social Change While not necessarily a linear process, many students also felt that the culture of participation facilitated ways that students could become leaders

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for change in their communities within and beyond the school. For instance, Katerina, an alumna, explicitly made the connection with the advocacy work she was doing as a doula (birth assistant) at the time of her interview: at Prep I was able to speak how I felt. And doing the quads that we used to do when I was here was very inspiring. We were taught how to get up and speak in front of a group or community. When I was at [School X] or even when I was in junior high, they didn’t teach us that … It [has been] easier for me to organize other doulas because I was comfortable speaking in front of large crowds, like we did at Prep. (Interview March 22, 2007) Further, while students articulated positive relationships with teachers in classes, as well as hands-on and participatory pedagogy, another aspect of critical peace education is to presumably raise critical consciousness. Many current students and alumni described how their classes, the curriculum, and the overall school culture and structures either made them aware of things that they were not necessarily aware of before or provided a venue in which they could explore issues more deeply. One way in which they described this was that some of the classes made them interested in “politics” and more aware of political movements. According to Queenia, learning about politics, or anything else, was not simply about content but also about a way of thinking and analyzing. For example, she explained, “I think I learned to be … interested in politics. I learned to definitely question things more, definitely to analyze things more” (interview May 6, 2007). This was truly a common theme that many students and alumni shared. For example, as one alumnus, Alek, shared, “This might come off poorly, but I don’t think I learned all that much at Prep. More importantly though, I learned how to learn and think at Prep” (interview March 9, 2007). Overall, students and alumni expressed that the type of content and the type of critical pedagogy contributed to a sense of “learning about the world.” For instance, when Magdalena, a senior at the time, was asked what she liked most about the school, she responded, “Well, the discussions we would have in class … the teachers just exposing us to how … the problems and issues going on in the world. We learn things we are not supposed to” (interview March 21, 2007). While most high schools are mandated to teach “about the world” through their alignment with state standards, students like Magdalena describe it as if it were unique. She may have also been reflecting on the fact that at the time she was interviewed, she was also taking a Global Economics and Human Rights class. She talked about preparing for an in-depth “re-negotiation” of the NAFTA treaty that they simulate in class, in which she was playing the role of a factory worker in Detroit. While each student had different roles that supported various positions of NAFTA, her

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comment may have referred to the fact that these multiple perspectives allowed her to look at many sides of free trade and not just the status quo option. Some students and alumni also said that their classes had an activism component that engaged them to effect change in their communities. They suggest that this process went beyond awareness and analysis, and catalyzed them to be activists. For example, Luis, who is quoted above, described how his experiences at Prep contributed to his desire to effect change: “Prep changed my life. It made me see the world in a different light. It allowed me to ask what I can do for others rather than what they can do for me.” In some ways, he described how he believes he went from being a self-centered individual to being an agent of change for society at large. Luis expressed a new imperative: I think I’m matured … throughout my four years … I started to see that … I can influence the world just as much as people influence me … I didn’t think that when I first came here. I thought, I’m just an ant in a colony playing a role. … but I now know that … I can actually do stuff now to influence other people and to make life better for others. (Interview March 13, 2007) In fact, Luis later recounts that the school compelled him to go into teaching as an act of social change and he went on to study education at Hunter College. In this sense, students and alumni often felt hope in transforming their society. There were specific ways that alumni and students were attempting an active role in transforming society. For example, Abigail, an alumna who, at the time of this research, was studying at Friends World in Costa Rica on migrant rights, specifically credited Prep in a survey for making “me a more socially and politically conscious person and drive me to want to be an active participant in the global community.” Moreover, she similarly credited the community at Prep with helping to catalyze her interest in effecting change. Overall, many students felt that they could have a stake in their communities, and in some cases, they felt that they were taking steps to influence positive social change, both locally and globally.

Conclusion While most peace education initiatives are often framed and enacted in postconflict settings, I contend that peace education in the US is necessary to create a climate of dignity for young people who have been subject to the

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injustices of American schooling. Overwhelmingly, students at Prep describe the profound impact that this form of critical peace education had on their lives, stating how the school cared for them, engaged them as participatory actors in the curriculum, and helped them strategize about individual and societal change. However, in the case of Prep, critical peace also confronts institutional forms of structural violence by academically resocializing youth who have been disaffected by school. Consequently, despite popular discourse, American exceptionalism in this case absolutely does not apply and peace education in the US context is not superfluous. As shown through the eyes of youth, critical peace education made a material difference in their lives. Critical peace education can drive the efforts at US school reform so that schools can be sites that slowly dismantle the layers of structural violence that have fueled US society in the pursuit of equity and social justice.

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11 Nurturing and Growing the “Ceeds” of Peace: A Peacebuilding Model for Educators Maya Soetoro-Ng and Kerrie Urosevich

Introduction Any student of history or lover of literature has a storied and strong understanding of the depths of human rage and folly, but also courage and brilliance. Though we study war, genocide, and violence in their many forms, we are not pessimistic about human nature. Indeed, we are frequently moved by the courage, commitment, and creativity displayed by some in our species and we wonder: what do the engineers of powerful and enduring, political, and humanitarian changes have in common? In the Ceeds program, we, the founders, decided that the accomplishments of such people were not accidental. We surmise that they all had skills in resilient and creative peacebuilding. Moreover, we decided that peacebuilding could be learned and needs to be taught. The requisite critical thinking, conflict resolution, and collaboration skills should be nourished in every arena of life, and a sense of compassion for others and community connection can be grown through intentional action. We know that the way we often teach content as a list of facts to be mastered and memorized has long been exposed as inadequate and not particularly meaningful, but this methodology persists stubbornly. What the Humanities, Language Arts, Science, and even Math classrooms should

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reveal are the pathways by which architects of social, political, and humanitarian justice travel. While the current paradigm of peace education tends to be reactive, centering on conflict resolution and bullying, we maintain that effective peace education requires a proactive approach to building a culture of dialogue, collaboration, mindfulness, and action. This is in accordance with a positive peace approach. In this chapter, we will summarize the Ceeds of Peace program and discuss tools, resources, and activities that can be used to plant the Ceeds in any subject throughout curricula and in the school community (“Ceeds” is a play on “seeds” to connote the skills and values—many that begin with the letter “c”—related to building peace, as will be discussed later in this chapter). We will discuss the action plan approach that is instrumental in empowering teachers and administrators to move students toward leadership and civic engagement at school and in their communities. Our methods are designed to meet state and federal standards in the US and allow for integration at home, school, or in the community at large.

The Importance of Peacebuilding in Education We often hear the words “peacemaking,” “peacekeeping” and “peacebuilding” being used interchangeably, but what is the distinction? In our definition, peacemaking includes diplomatic processes to resolve conflicts and is used as an intervention tool. Peacekeeping is also an intervention tool but refers to the use of military forces to stabilize an area to prevent additional violence from breaking out. We define peacebuilding, on the other hand, as a more systemic, long-term approach to resolving conflicts, focused on sustainable resolutions. Peacebuilding often involves a set of economic, social, and educational initiatives addressing structural barriers to peace, is collaborative and strategic in nature, and works to transform relationships between people and within communities. Of the three, peacebuilding is the most essential, the most difficult, but also the most sustainable. Peacemaking and peacekeeping have no long-term or lasting effects as long as the peacebuilding factor is missing. Peacebuilding is about preparing our students to apply the knowledge they learn in class in ways that positively advance society. For instance, helping young children build self-esteem, set and honor boundaries, and establish constructive communication and collaboration skills are all foundational Ceeds that can prevent conflict and even violence as children get older. Teachers can explore what lesson units could be incorporated, what school assemblies might be needed, and what extended learning opportunities exist that would create spaces for having safe and honest conversations for students.

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Ceeds of Peace endeavors to embed peacebuilding and character development in all parts of the school curricula rather than relegated as a separate program. We argue that while academic achievement goals are important, they are insufficient; peace education and character development should be prioritized to prepare children to be life-ready. This includes teaching children how to have healthy relationships, skills to find and maintain employment, and tools to address the complex issues that hold our communities back, such as homelessness, climate change, corruption, gender-based violence, and child abuse. Additionally, Ceeds of Peace incorporates a ground-up planning component for sustainability. Workshop participants are taught how to conduct listening tours to identify barriers to peace, how to build consensus and commitment to find solutions, and how to create a sustainable infrastructure for peacebuilding. The solutions they identify are tailored to their unique classroom and school environments. Our overall approach to peace education is rooted in the work of Robert Ricigliano, the Director of the Institute of World Affairs at the University of Wisconsin. Ricigliano has a rich history of working to resolve conflicts and build sustainable peace in Cambodia, Russia, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Afghanistan, Georgia, Colombia, South Africa, Iraq and elsewhere. Borrowed from Ricigliano (2012, 16) we define peace as: fundamentally about how people work together (a process measure) to meet the basic needs of a population and how well they are meeting those needs (a substantive measure). Peace is not just a snapshot in time. It is about substantive indicators of human development measured at any one moment (e.g. a snapshot of good governance, rule of law and respect for human rights, security, economic vitality, social capital, etc.) and peace is also about how the society deals with problems or issues on an ongoing basis. Ricigliano’s approach to peacebuilding supports Johan Galtung’s (1969: 168)1 classifications of violence such as direct, structural, and cultural. Galtung argues that, with a more nuanced notion of violence, we can correspondingly develop a more nuanced and more realistic understanding of peace. If, for example, we achieve the absence of direct violence in society but still have systems in place that prohibit people from reaching their full potential, Galtung suggests we are actually still living in a state of unsustainable peace. Galtung and Ricigliano approach peace and conflict from a system’s perspective, acknowledging its complexity and processes needed to adequately prepare for and achieve true peacebuilding. In our multiday Ceeds of Peace workshops, we explore and reflect upon readings and activities on global nonviolence, children’s literature of war and peace, negotiation, and mediation. We examine current events, online

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resources, and peacebuilding organizations to discover ways to encourage empathy, critical evaluation, and multifaceted visions of the truth of history. Ceeds of Peace participants attend a four-part workshop series. Professional development credit is offered for Social Studies, Health, and English Language Arts teachers. All participants receive support in between workshops from Ceeds facilitators. Peace is still considered the utopic end goal, the unachievable. Our high school and university students have said things like, “Before this class, I viewed peace as strumming my ukulele under a tree. Actually, this is really hard work!”2 To be sure, peace does incorporate the elements of equanimity, nature, music, and tranquility, but what these kinds of impressions reveal is that we have failed to do the important work of rebranding “peace” to be understood as a necessary action, a necessary curriculum, a necessary skill set, a necessary way of being in order to overcome humanity’s greatest challenges. Peacebuilding has to be loud and seen as pragmatic, daily, and ongoing for us to see sustainable improvements in human development.

What Are the Ceeds of Peace? Peace is a daily, a weekly, a monthly process, gradually changing opinions, slowly eroding old barriers, quietly building new structures. Thomas Kempis The Ceeds of Peace framework is not about designing new curricula but sharing existing methods, programs, and resources that can help build a young person’s leadership and peacebuilding skills. The goal is to support educators in teaching children how to be systems thinkers, find the intersections between social, political, and economic structures where peace is possible, and have the critical thinking skills to collaborate effectively. In 2011, as an Association for Conflict Resolution Hawai`i Chapter Board Member, Dr. Urosevich was asked to organize a community-based workshop, focused on how adults can build conflict resolution skills in children. The workshop was titled, “Raising Peacebuilders 360” and focused on bringing teachers, families and community members together to strengthen their skills in supporting children to be effective problem solvers. Dr. Soetoro-Ng was a panelist for the workshop, along with five other community peacebuilders. Approximately fifty people attended and, soon after the workshop, participants started asking when the next one would be held. Based on the demand from college student evaluations and further demand from the first community workshop, we decided to partner and develop the Ceeds of Peace program in partnership with the Department of Education and other community organizations.

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In order to create a Ceeds of Peace framework, we examined the attributes of our well-known local, national, and international peacebuilders, such as Hina Jalani, Jackie Ogega, John Paul Lederach, Desmond Tutu, Kealoha, Louise Freschette, Dorothy Day, Eleanor Roosevelt, Jimmy Carter, Robert Ricigliano, Mohandas Gandhi, Martin Luther King Jr., Oscar Arias Sanchez, Malala Yousafzai, Jane Addams, Thich Nhat Hanh, Robbie Alm, Betty Bigombe, Elie Weisel, Tenzin Gyatso (14th Dalai Lama), Dr. Wangari Muta Maathai, Harriet Tubman, Gro Harlem Brundtland, Ramsay Taum, and Linda Colburn; we found that the most important skills they employed began with the letter C. These include seven key attributes with supporting Cs: 1 Critical Thinking (Creativity) 2 Courage (Confidence) 3 Conflict Resolution (Careful Listening, Calm Reactions) 4 Collaboration (Communication) 5 Compassion (Curiosity) 6 Commitment (Care) 7 Community (Civic Engagement, Conservation)

BETWEEN 3. Conflict Resolution 4. Collaboration 5. Compassion

WITHIN 1. Critical Thinking 2. Courage

Resilient Peacebuilders

IN-SERVICE 6. Commitment 7. Community

FIGURE 11.1  Ceeds of Peace Framework Source: TEDxMaui Ceeds of Peace presentation

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We classified these as “Ceeds” and divided them into three categories: Ceeds Within, Ceeds Between and Ceeds In-Service. These skills and categories are shown in Figure 11.1. At the foundation of this approach is the conviction that peacebuilding starts from within. The Ceeds need to be planted by the adults around children so that these Ceeds within each child can grow. While we work on growing our children’s “Ceeds Within,” they have daily opportunities to learn how to plant and practice the “Ceeds Between.” These are the skills to interact successfully with friends, family members, strangers and community members. Then to make a collective, long-term impact, we need to develop the “Ceeds In-Service” in our children. The work of developing the Ceeds In-Service is about knowing how to get the right people with the right skill sets together with the right intention to create transformative solutions. Teachers plant many of these Ceeds daily. However, we hope to provide a more intentional and rigorous framework for raising peacebuilders and community-driven leaders. It is in the constellation of the Ceeds that peacebuilding occurs. And the constellation is critical. For example, one could be a critical thinker but not have the courage to make an impact. Someone skilled in compassion but without critical thinking skills may not know how to put their compassion into action. A critical thinker without conflict resolution skills may have difficulty working with others. We strive to plant all the Ceeds in each child, but we acknowledge that people have different strengths, and it is in the mosaic of strengths where change can occur. Scarlett Lewis, who lost her six-year old son Jesse in the Sandyhook Elementary School shooting, shared on the panel: “How can we keep this from happening again? … The answer lies within the Ceeds of Peace … We have the power, in this room, to prevent this from happening again.” Ceeds of Peace’s focus on leadership is closely aligned to Jim Kouzes and Barry Posner’s (2012) leadership development research. In their book, The Leadership Challenge, Kouzes and Posner document over 30 years of leadership research from across the globe. They identified “The Five Practices of Exemplary Leadership,” which include: 1 Model the Way through words and action (Kouzes and Posner

2012: 16–17). Workshop participants learn to model the Ceeds of compassion, community and courage. Robert Epstein’s (2010) research has shown that children do as they see much more frequently than what they are told through words. 2 Inspire a Shared Vision is about reaching consensus on what we

are all working towards and getting people excited to commit to that vision. In Ceeds of Peace workshops, participants learn skills in

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collaboration, critical thinking, community mobilization, commitment, and creativity. 3 Challenge the Process involves a change in the status quo when

needed. Being courageous enough to challenge existing paradigms, assumptions and processes is a critical component of achieving safe and peaceful environments. Ceeds of Peace introduces tools that build the skills of courage, critical thinking, conflict resolution, and creativity. 4 Enable Others to Act is about forming a viable team. Peacebuilding

can be inspired by one, but cannot be achieved by one. The Ceeds of Peace Action Plans require participants to build a team and learn strategies for growing courage, collaboration, communication, community mobilization, and commitment. 5 Encourage the Heart involves ensuring people are recognized for

good work and successes are celebrated. Peacebuilding leadership is tireless, and a sense of resilience, grit, and formidable determination is needed. “Encouraging the Heart” of partners, staff, legislators, and community is critical to maintain commitment and to be successful. Participants in our Ceeds of Peace workshops learn how to grow compassion, commitment, and a sense of community with the children in their lives. Our jobs as educators are foundational to planting these leadership skills in the young people we work with on a daily basis. Having sound knowledge of math, language arts, history, science, etc. is important, but if our students cannot successfully participate, work with others, demonstrate fortitude, and critically think through challenges, they will experience difficulties in their workplaces and even in their homes. These leadership skills are foundational to the healthy development of any child, and Ceeds of Peace strives to plant those Ceeds as early as possible.

Why 360°? No one can whistle a symphony. It takes a whole orchestra to play it. H. E. Luccock The Ceeds of Peace program focuses on a 360° approach to raising peacebuilders. We feel that this is critical because children are influenced by a variety of adults in their families, schools, and communities. If we only develop peacebuilding skills in one context and not in others, children receive

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contradictory messages. Violence and small-mindedness call for vigilance from all directions. If, in school, a child is taught to respect and celebrate diversity and show compassion to others, and at home, bigotry towards immigrant neighbors is dismissed as funny, he or she may not learn the lesson of compassion. In peacebuilding, educators must also strive to build connections between a child’s various social worlds so that caretakers, community members, and educators can support one another in the difficult task of raising courageous and kind children. Certainly, it seems intuitive that strong connections between children and parents, or between children and peers, teachers, or counselors, would lead to more peaceful conduct in school or home, and better emotional adjustment in children. We add to that the belief that better connection and collaboration between schools, families, and other community members can lead to greater leadership capacity and less bigotry or aggression in young people. We endeavor to address the need for a 360° approach by inviting representatives from home, school, and community to sit on panels at Ceeds workshops to share their ideas and engage in dialogue with participants. In the afternoons, participants work on their action plans. A parent group might create a set of refrigerator magnets featuring community activities or resources, or perhaps a “Recipes for Peace” booklet/website that highlights family discussion rituals and tools (like discussion balls, talking sticks, or a community bowl). A teacher group might create a learning segment that includes critical thinking around controversial issues in the community using high standards of peaceful discourse and ways to engage students in meaningful and important community problem solving. Community members might form a diversified team to combat rape in their community, leveraging men, women, advocacy groups, judges, legislators, and the police department.

Ceeds of Peace Toolkit There is no trust more sacred than the one the world holds with children. There is no duty more important than ensuring that their rights are respected, that their welfare is protected, that their lives are free from fear, and that they grow up in peace. Kofi Annan How do we create lessons in math, social studies, language arts, history, and science that help our students begin to break through the barriers to peace? Tools in our Ceeds of Peace toolkit offer some innovative and creative options that can be integrated into almost any course, and at home as well.

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Peacebuilding cannot happen if we do not intentionally model and teach the skills to our children. In “Toward a Positive Perspective on Violence Prevention in Schools: Building Connections,” Douglas C. Smith and Daya S. Sandhu (2004) argue that, while serious violence is somewhat rare in schools, there has been an increase in “low level” aggression and antisocial behavior such as teasing, name calling, ridiculing, threatening, harassment, and pushing fights. Rather than punitive measures, metal detectors, suspensions and other means of addressing the behaviors after they happen, the authors argue for a positive and proactive approach that focuses on emotional resilience, emotional literacy, self-esteem and high degrees of connectedness between students and their families, peers, schools, and communities (this is similar to the reciprocal relationships discussed by Hantzopoulos in Chapter 10). It is critical that adults are simultaneously modeling and teaching these skills. Such a positive and proactive approach requires that we possess tools that can be used every day to plant the Ceeds of Peace in the children around us. Here are some peacebuilding ideas that can be used to plant the Ceeds Within, Between, and In-Service.

Planting Ceeds Within Marketplace of Rights Students are buyers and sellers in a marketplace activity where human rights are the only commodity. The educator could introduce the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights as a document that frames the conditions for peace. In buying particular human rights, and in designating the value of each category of human rights, the aim is to get students to reflect on the importance of each human right before promoting or selling them. At home or school, we can study international and local current events to identify the rights that individuals or groups are fighting for at any given time. Children can then critically evaluate if a particular movement or method is likely to succeed or endure, and understand the connections between themselves and distant others as they examine the courage needed to be a change agent. Even at the elementary level, children can talk about the rights that they have as students in school, and as siblings and sons/daughters in the home. They learn to understand how to make good use of the choices they have; they develop voice and agency. Students can create elementary-level chore charts outlining responsibilities as well as rights, deepening reflection, and critical thinking.

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The Doubting, Believing, and Sharing Game Pick a controversial topic or perspective and get everybody “believing” they are right about one side of the problem by supporting and defending this perspective. Then get everyone together “doubting” that same problem and challenging, criticizing, and deconstructing the same perspective. Then do the sharing game, requiring that you develop your own well-articulated position that draws from both perspectives, or find the shared spaces and points of intersection between the doubters and the believers. For example, when discussing a topic like the use of genetically modified organisms (GMO), a hot topic discussed in schools in Hawai’i, a teacher could ask all the children to research and write down why GMO crops are important. Then all the students research and write down why they may be harmful. A facilitated discussion can happen after children have looked at the issue thoroughly.

Conflict Study In exploring conflict, students commit to trying on different perspectives in a conflict. They pull out of a bowl a particular role with an attached explanation. They play that role in teams of four or five, expressing their beliefs. Debriefing with the whole class, young people understand different perspectives in time, gender, geography, economy, and ethnicity. They evaluate the roles and perspectives in terms of how they might be different owing to lack of access to diverse perspectives, assumptions about the nature of violence, etc.

Ethnomathematics This is math that is used to help students understand the role of poverty and war, making them more complex thinkers later when seeking to resolve or transform conflicts. This is math that helps them grasp the challenges of economic equality and make them better able to build strong communities. Children can study the effects of an economy dependent on tourism, for example. Or they can walk through the steps it would take for someone living in a shelter to find a stable job, housing, and quality of life. Introducing children to the economic disparities around the globe is critical, asking the question, “How would you spend your one dollar every day?” At home and at school at any age, we can use math to develop critical thinking skills and empathy for other families as a whole. Children of any age become interested and engaged in their own financial future as a means for understanding the role they play in the well-being of the community as a whole and the choices that they make as consumers.

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The Silk Road The Silk Roads carried trade from cultures embracing numerous religions and worldviews. Stretching from Italy to Japan, the Silk Road runs through Buddhist, Confucian, Christian, Hindu, Muslim, Jewish, Shinto, and Taoist cultures. Students reflect on similarities and differences between belief systems. Using quotations from philosophical and religious texts, students are asked to organize quotations into broad thematic categories of concern. The quotations are posted on a Silk Road map as reminders of how culture and philosophy interact.

Planting Ceeds Between Pohaku Bowl At home or in the classroom, we place a community bowl around which everyone has his/her own pohaku (stone). If someone has an issue they need to discuss, they put their stone in the bowl. Teachers, parents, and co-workers then know there is an issue to discuss and they can follow-up with the individual. Or it can be discussed at the next meeting either anonymously or publicly. The pohaku bowl allows children to develop a respectful and safe way to voice issues and opinions.

Peace Flower This is a strategy for children to problem solve themselves. They pass the flower back and forth. The child with the rose is the one who is speaking while the other child listens fully. The children use “I” statements to express how they are feeling, active listening is practiced, and apologies made when conflicts arise and relationships need to be restored. The rose serves as an intangible object that mediates who is sharing, and reinforcing respectful listening.

Cast the Net This activity is used to ensure broad participation by casting the largest net possible in order to gather stakeholders and understand all those impacted by a conflict. Students of any age can do this historically or in present time, to analyze what happened and discuss who might have been missing, and in real time when understanding current events, gathering people to problem solve, or create, a community solution. After reading a lesson on the civil rights movement, for instance, it is important to examine the event through

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different lenses: the limitations women faced, the role children played, the effects the movement had on other countries’ laws, how the civil rights movement still plays out today, etc. This is an important tool to build collaboration, commitment, and community through problem solving because rarely is a conflict strictly between two people. The effects of a conflict that ripple out to friends, family, and community are studied. For example, when a child is getting picked on at school, the conversation should expand beyond just the child who is getting bullied and the perpetrators.

Media Study In social studies, there is nowadays no reason that we should teach and learn current events from a single source; instead we can look at English language newspapers from all over the world and learn much from simply observing the differences in story placement from country to country, or reflecting on the reasons for changes in tone and substance. Students can examine what is emphasized or de-emphasized and learn not only journalistic standards and language but also to reconceive and complicate the truth. Even younger students, with the help of parents, can learn to build multifaceted perspectives and deepen feelings of community by developing strong habits of awareness about the surrounding world.

Land Management The Mauka (mountain side) to Makai (ocean side) management exercise requires teams to draw an ahupua‘a (land division normally stretching from the uplands to the sea) and then to share different interpretations of land division. The teams discuss how responsibilities are shared. Children evaluate how land management structures of the past compare to those of the present. They can consider community responsibilities in antiquity and compare expectations of the past to their classroom or neighborhood community responsibilities in the present. Teachers and parents can deepen this activity with a field trip to understand responsibilities to one another having to do with land and sharing, or scarcity of resources and climate change. Discussions in the home allow children to further understand how their own personal living space (their bedroom) compares to the family’s shared living spaces and shared responsibilities for the caring and upkeep of each (chores).

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Planting Ceeds In-service Leadership Lessons Leadership is an oft cited, but rarely understood concept. Definitions of leadership vary from those that emphasize intangible qualities like charisma and magnetism to those that stress character traits like persistence and courage to those that highlight tangible skills like facilitation and team-building. Similarly, scholarship around leadership brings a variety of approaches to understanding why and how individuals lead, and explores leadership through an array of different lenses. How do leaders lead? What do they do? What do they need to know to be successful? This activity assumes that leadership can be learned through the practice of skills, through guided reflection and discussion, and through observation and analysis of everyday leaders in everyday situations. Students explore their own leadership strengths through carefully designed interactive activities, guided reflection, and discussion; observe leaders in action and conduct interviews with current leaders in the field to test theories of leadership against real-world examples; and build skills in teamwork, teambuilding, effective communication, and leadership strategies by completing a carefully guided team project.

Connections Map This is a problem-solving tool that can be used in elementary or secondary classrooms, or at home. Students draw a connections map that identifies relationships people have with each other. From that map, they identify key decision makers and people that might be missing or underrepresented. In an effort to more completely and deeply understand history, current events, or literature, children can bring the perspectives of people who have been invisible or in the margins into the center of their maps.

Connect–Challenge–Serve After exploring some of the many facets of representative democracy, including voting, representation, free speech, assembly, etc., students identify ways to: (1) participate and connect with other voices and citizens in the community; (2) challenge our democracy to grow in terms of equality, fairness, and social justice; and (3) serve others in their community (however community is defined) in order to make it healthier and stronger.

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Once and Future Leader In this activity, students examine what leadership made Kamehameha3 and other leaders effective. In addition to the warfare and weaponry he wielded expertly, did Kamehameha use diplomatic or nonviolent tools for effective leadership? How might the leaders of the Hawai’ian Kingdom rule differently in today’s world? What are the leadership qualities that are most likely to be needed in the future? Because of the change in both homes and schools away from corporal punishment and more towards peaceful leadership, children can have an active voice in their opinion of the skills and qualities that a leader, namely parent/guardian, can use to be an effective household leader.

Paint and Post the Future In this activity, a family, a classroom, a school, or a community gets together to envision the future they desire. They collectively paint the future and have it posted in a shared place for a constant reminder. In the classroom, students can have posted on the wall a mural of their desired classroom with shared values identified. Families can post the same somewhere central in their home. The picture should include all members of classroom/family and the role they play in their desired spaces together. We did this exercise with youth groups that weren’t getting along in their high school. The students painted together the school that they desired and it was referenced at every school assembly and posted throughout the campus.

Ceeds of Peace Action Plans It isn’t enough to talk about peace. One must believe in it. And it isn’t enough to believe in it. One must work at it. Eleanor Roosevelt Ceeds of Peace is about intentionally connecting peacebuilding to our daily lives and putting peacebuilding into action. After workshop participants learn and practice the Ceeds of Peace tools, they incorporate the tools into their Peace Action Plans. Action plans are built from the ground up, elicitive, versus prescriptive and therefore culturally responsive and tailored to participants’ unique contexts. Ceeds of Peace facilitators work closely with participants to help them step through the process. Helpful tools are provided for each step that supports planting the Ceeds. Participants are taught the basic skills of intake, inquiry,

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Prepare the Soil – intake, inquiry and identifying barriers Envision the Harvest – creating a shared future Plant the Ceeds – for successful prevention, intervention and resolution Nurture to Sustain – ensuring long-term success

FIGURE 11.2  Steps for Ceeds of Peace Action Plans Source: Ceeds of Peace Workshop Materials

barrier identification, creation of shared futures, conflict prevention and resolution, and system design. These steps are shown in Figure 11.2. Although participants might be attending the workshop as individuals, they are highly encouraged to create a team of peacebuilders to help implement the plan. To prepare for their Action Plans, participants are sent a “Reflections” exercise to begin the process of “Preparing the Soil.” During the workshops, they are provided Action Plan templates with guided questions, facilitative support, and Action Plan examples to help them begin designing. In between workshops, participants work with their teams and Ceeds of Peace facilitators as needed to step through their unique plan. Following the second workshop, participants begin implementing their plans and return to get support and share successes and challenges in late spring during the share-out. Plans may include Civic Action Plans, Family Plans, School Plans, Classroom Plans, Family–School Partnership Plans or Integrated Curriculum Plans. Action plans take many forms but are expected to have clear outcome goals. Teachers learn transformative unit planning that is standards-based (Common Core Standards, Hawai`i Content and Performance Standards III, and General Learning Outcomes), interdisciplinary, and multicultural. Families and community members learn creative peacebuilding solutions that can be institutionalized and used daily with their children. Examples include: 1 Peace Projects: Teachers asked secondary students to develop Peace

Projects, selecting a conflict, recent or current, and evaluating the role of national, local, and grassroots leadership, diplomacy, economy, religion, art, education, and media. Students shared their nuanced understanding of these issues through a portfolio of exhibit pieces. Then students were asked to write a peace or reconciliation plan that offered informed solutions that promoted acts of service, however aspirational, and led to action and service in the local community.

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2 Pathway to Middle Ground: A middle-school teacher worked with

her school team and counselor to create the time and processes needed for the students to have an opportunity to solve their problems together. Faculty facilitators and students were trained at the beginning of the year in the basics of conflict resolution. As issues came up for students and teachers, they would fill out a form and put it into a pohaku bowl. Each student had their own stone and when the student had an issue that needed to be addressed, the student put his or her stone in the bowl. In this particular school, a form was also included, describing what was happening and requesting two mediators from the class. Homeroom time was spent working through the mediation, and if the issue could not be handled, the counselor would secure time that same week to continue the mediation. This process built capacity for all students to be mediators/ conflict resolvers, built compassion and community, and established sacred time for problem solving. Often, the mediation occurred in front of the entire class, which expanded the circle of learning beyond just those involved in the conflict. 3 Multiple Perspectives through Dialogue and Debate: An

elementary-school team created collaborative processes for decisionmaking that the students could use when issues arose in classrooms or school. Time was allocated each week to work through the exercise with their classes. Students identified the topic and then every student participated by first writing out their position on the topic with supporting evidence, then partnering up and tweaking their positions based on what they heard from their partner. They came together as a class and two students facilitated the conversation, using white paper/boards, markers, etc. to document the different ideas. The class collaboratively weighed the different positions and interests, and developed a set of solutions. The process has become so respected that the elementary school principal will bring issues to the class to get their feedback in making his own decisions.   One of the issues they were trying to resolve was whether or not the healthy meal policy within the school should be applied to home lunches. There were many families and students upset by the policy affecting the food they brought from home. Once the class came up with their proposed solutions, they were introduced to the principal and then families were brought together to discuss them. Students presented their solutions to the families and a decision was made. The school decided to have a more flexible policy for home lunches, while still maintaining their commitment to healthy eating. The skills

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in collaborative problem solving, critical thinking, communicating, and building community are critical for the students to become adult leaders in their workplaces, families and communities. 4 All Aboard! Family Meetings: A participant developed a family action

plan to address communication and anger challenges her family faced when trying to solve problems together. Communication quickly shut down because family members had such a difficult time responding when they became angry. It was particularly important at this time because they were working through issues involving a grandmother’s care and property needs. Weekly family meetings were scheduled. At first only a few family members showed up but as weeks went on and word got out that the meetings were organized, structured, and actually fun, more and more family members attended. The workshop participant facilitated each meeting and incorporated different tools to connect the family and build skills. She used the “Paint and Post the Future” technique, to represent the history the family shared and the future they wanted to see together. A picture book was created that documented the past twenty-five years of the family’s story, which was used in every family meeting as a way to connect.   The facilitator conducted conflict-resolution role-plays the family enjoyed (which added a lot of humor) and the family chose ho`oponopono as the consensus building tool it would use for decision-making, relationship building and forgiveness. Ho`oponopono is a traditional Hawai’ian process of bringing family together to resolve conflicts. Ho’oponopono means to make right with ancestors and those with whom you have relationships. It is a structured process that is not time bound, meaning that problems are resolved when the group is ready. Because it was culturally relevant and built on the strength of the kupuna (elders) in the family, everyone bought into the process. They were able to identify family roles that they rotated to care for their grandmother and necessary decisions to successfully manage her property. Effective communication took approximately six months but the relationships that were built and the processes identified created a foundation the family could rely on for ongoing discussion and decisions. The tools identified for this family action plan could be adapted in any classroom and/or school. Participants have found the action planning process to be transformative. A teacher shared “As an educator, Ceeds of Peace workshops have connected me to people, ideas, and experiences that are extremely valuable both in the classroom and out in the community. These phenomenal workshops have

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helped me self-reflect on my responsibility as an early educator and take action as a peaceful global citizen through my action plan.” Another participant reflected “While implementing my action plan, I quickly became more cognizant about what kind of role model I am to my son and my students.”

Peacebuilding and Systems Design The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, but in ourselves, that we are underlings. Cassius, Julius Caesar (I, ii, 14–141) As individuals, we all operate within a “system.” We define and design those systems as we engage with them whether they be family systems, school systems, organizational systems, or community systems. Teaching our children how to successfully navigate, shape, and lead these systems is critical to the health and well-being of our communities. The above leadership skills coupled with a strong foundation in peacebuilding and systems’ design will help our students be the leaders we need in the future. When people understand the larger system within which they exist, they can make more strategic decisions that not only advance their own organization, agency, and company, but ultimately improve our communities at large. The sooner children can see themselves as critical members of their family, school, and community “systems” and are modeled and taught the positive ways to shape those systems, the better prepared they will be academically, professionally, and socially. Ricigliano (2012, 105) asks the question “What factors drive a social system’s level of peace?” It is this question we want all of our students to be able to answer for their classrooms and ultimately their workplaces and families in the future. He introduces a framework he uses with adults across the globe that validates the Ceeds of Peace framework. It is called the SAT Framework, standing for Structural, Attitudinal, and Transactional peacebuilding, defined in the Table 11.1 below. Ricigliano’s framework is an inverse of the Ceeds of Peace framework, more simply stated as Peace Within, Peace Between, and Peace In-Service. Without success in Attitudinal and Transactional peacebuilding, it is difficult to attain Structural peacebuilding. Similarly, without Peace Within and Peace Between, abilities to achieve Peace In-Service (to address structural barriers) are dramatically hindered. The SAT model maintains that enduring systemic change requires change in all three of these domains. Similarly, Ceeds of Peace acknowledges that

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Table 11.1 Type of peacebuilding

Ricigliano’s definition

Structural

“This refers to systems and institutions designed to meet people’s basic needs. Structural peacebuilding tools include governance assistance, economic reconstruction programs, rule of law programs, security sector reform and so forth.”

Attitudinal

“This refers to shared norms, beliefs, social capital, and intergroup relationships that affect the level of cooperation between groups or people. Attitudinal peacebuilding tools include truth-and-reconciliation commissions, trauma-healing initiatives, communitydialogue programs, “peace camps” for youth from divided communities, multiethnic media programs and so forth.”

Transactional

“This refers to processes and skills used by key people to peacefully manage conflict, build interpersonal relationships, solve problems collaboratively and turn ideas into action. Transactional peacebuilding tools include formal mediation initiatives between leaders of combatant parties, cease-fires, negotiation training for representatives of combatants, local development councils, back channel dialogues among leaders, confidence-building measures and so forth.”

Ricigliano (2012, 35)

change needs to happen in all three of our domains; Ceeds Within, Ceeds Between, and Ceeds In-Service for sustainable change to occur. Ricigliano (2012, 28) uses the example that if one adopts individual change theory, which says peace is a product of changing individual attitudes, then one has done nothing about establishing stable/reliable social institutions that guarantee democracy, equity, justice, and fair allocation of resources, which are necessary for building peace under institutional development theory. Ceeds of Peace works toward that end by raising peacebuilding through intentional curricula, creating positive school environments, healthy families, and efforts focused on justice, equity, and violence prevention.

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Committing Forward I speak not for myself but for those without voice … those who have fought for their rights … their right to live in peace, their right to be treated with dignity, their right to equality of opportunity, their right to be educated. Malala Yousafzai In his complex work around the globe, Ricigliano (2012: 18) reminds us how important peacebuilding is to our social, economic, and political systems, and the importance of defining peacebuilding as an initiative that contributes to building sustainable levels of human development, which is a key first step toward making peace last. Peace will not last, though, without our children actively learning the necessary skill sets to sustain and nourish a culture of peace. Education is not only a right but is the most critical investment our leaders can make to prepare our children to be positive contributors and problem solvers in our communities. Our hope is to see a large-scale commitment to peacebuilding and a cultural shift in social norms from the ground up through teachers, their students, and families as well as a global reallocation of resources away from the military-industrial complex and into education to support our efforts. Reading, writing, arithmetic, science, and peacebuilding is a formidable set of skills. It is imperative that peacebuilding be seen as an essential component of that set, and a necessary part of what makes education matter. Our task is to help educators and families think creatively and courageously about their roles with children. All the activities, methods, and attitudes we promote with our children should prevent intellectual rigidity, encourage open-mindedness, and instigate action. The Ceeds of Peace are born from the knowledge that every interaction, every decision, every lesson, every day matters. “We” means parents, families, caregivers, teachers, administrators, coaches, and anyone else who interacts with our children. It is this 360° approach that is acutely essential to ensure that we are raising peacebuilders who will be taking care of all of us and building a stronger, safer world. The Honorable Dalai Lama (2011: 187) expressed, My hope and wish is that one day, formal education will pay attention to what I call “education of the heart.” Just as we take for granted the need to acquire proficiency in the basic academic subjects, I am hopeful that a time will come when we can take it for granted that children will learn, as part of the curriculum, the indispensability of inner values: love, compassion, justice, and forgiveness.

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Ceeds of Peace builds upon “educating the heart” by including core inner values, educating on leadership, systems’ design, collaboration, and planning to make peace last. This is a call to all teachers to help us rebrand “peace” to be understood as a necessary curriculum, a necessary action, a necessary process, a necessary way of being in order to overcome humanity’s greatest challenges. What combination of Ceeds will you plant with the children around you?

Notes 1

Johan Galtung is internationally referred to as the “father of peace studies,” responsible for institutionalizing peace studies throughout higher education institutions worldwide.

2

Introduction to Peace and Conflict Studies and Conflict Management for Educators course evaluations, University of Hawai’i, Manoa.

3

Native Hawai’ian chief from the island of Hawai‘i (known commonly as the Big Island). Conquered the Hawai’ian Islands, establishing the Kingdom of Hawai‘i.

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12 Promoting Peace through Children’s Media: The Case of Sesame Workshop Mathangi Subramanian, June H. Lee, Lilith K. Dollard, and Zainab Kabba

Introduction Scholars have often criticized mass media for reproducing oppression through the dissemination of images reflecting cultural, structural, and direct violence (Harris and Morrison, 2003). In recent years, however, activists, artists, and others have harnessed media to create content designed to empower viewers to enact social change (Bandura 2001; Cole, Labin, and Galarza 2008; de Block 2012; Gesser-Edelsburg and Singhal 2013; Singhal 2013). Particularly in conflict and post-conflict zones, educational entertainment is increasingly used to change attitudes and behaviors, especially among children.

Sesame Workshop’s Approach to Peace Education Sesame Workshop produces the American children’s television show Sesame Street and over thirty locally created coproductions around the world. Much of Sesame Workshop’s programming emphasizes school readiness and basic skills, a focus motivated by studies showing that interventions in the

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early years produce long-term positive outcomes, including better grades, improved classroom behavior, and lower probabilities of incarceration (Levine 2005; Nores and Barnett 2010; RAND 2005). Unfortunately research also indicates that young children are susceptible to messaging encouraging them to fear and exclude others based on identity categories such as gender, faith, class, and ethnic group (Bekerman, Zembylas, and McGlynn 2009). For example, research with preschoolers in Northern Ireland suggests that children as young as five years old identified with a specific community, were aware of and showed preference for specific cultural symbols, and made sectarian statements (Connolly, Smith, and Kelly 2002; and see also Chapters 2 and 3 in this volume). Similarly, Rhodes (2012) found that children as young as three years old exhibited preferences for individuals defined as in-group and showed suspicion of those associated with out-groups. Consequently, as Cole et al. (2008) have argued, early childhood is a key time for exposing children to peace education content that Sesame Workshop calls “mutual respect and understanding.” The goal of Sesame Workshop’s peace education programming is to empower children between the ages of three and eight years old with the skills, attitudes, and behaviors necessary to promote nonviolence (Brantmeier and Bajaj 2013; Hantzopoulos 2011b). The term “peace education” encompasses a variety of topics supported in Sesame Workshop’s programming, including human rights, women’s (and girls’) rights, emotional regulation, respect for differences, multicultural education, and environmental conservation (Harris and Morrison 2003; Reardon 2000; Zembylas and Bekerman 2013b). Keeping in mind that preschoolers show basic political and cultural awareness—and thus, prejudice—that, if left unchecked, can continue throughout a lifetime, Sesame Workshop has also honed a developmentally appropriate approach to reconciliation, defined by Vrasidas et al. (2007: 133) as helping students critically evaluate negative feelings toward a population they have been “taught to hate.” Although the examples in this paper focus on conflict-affected zones, including Afghanistan, Israel, Palestine, and Northern Ireland, almost all coproductions include a curricular area called “mutual respect and understanding”: after all, children do not have to live in war zones to come face to face with hate.

Developing the Curriculum One of the defining characteristics of Sesame Workshop’s content development model is the creation and continued use of a Statement of Educational Objectives, or curriculum, for each coproduction (Sesame Workshop 2014). Most curricula are based on the same whole-child framework, with a range

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World Broader social context (country) Family and friends, community

217

Mutual respect and understanding • Familiarity with other languages, cultural traditions, lifestyles • Appreciation of diversity • Gender equity Social skills • Appreciating similarities and differences • Friendship • Cooperation, sharing, turn-taking • Conflict resolution

The Child

Core emotional skills • Identify and express emotions • Self-confidence • Self-control • Empathy • Problem solving

FIGURE 12.1  The Sesame Workshop Approach to Building Tolerance and

Respect1

of educational objectives related to children’s academic success, critical thinking, physical and emotional health, and social skills (see Figure 12.1 for an example of how this framework is actualized for peace education). In addition to this foundation, local advisors and teams often choose to focus different seasons of production, and sometimes the entire project itself, on specific content areas, including those related to peace education. At the onset of a new coproduction, Sesame Workshop typically collaborates with educational specialists from the local partner organization to plan and convene a Content Seminar (Fisch and Truglio 2001). The Content Seminar is an advisory meeting with: experts from government ministries; educators and teachers from government and private institutions; academics with expertise in education, health, and other child-related fields; non-governmental organizations working with young children and their families; and media organizations. Discussions with advisors provide the New York-based Sesame Workshop and locally-based coproduction team with essential information on the educational, health, and socioemotional status of children; highlight critical issues that may be of special importance; and identify those educational objectives that can be best addressed through

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a Sesame Street program. Additionally, advisors recommend culturally acceptable approaches to sensitive topics. Next, the coproduction’s educational specialists, in collaboration with Sesame Workshop New York, draft the curriculum using feedback received at the Content Seminar. Teams typically revise the curriculum every season, incorporating the latest research and the changing needs of children in the country. This revision is facilitated either through another Content Seminar or through correspondence and meetings with select advisors.

Educational Objectives Many coproductions, especially those in countries emerging from conflict and/ or with highly diverse populations, prioritize educational objectives encompassing the knowledge and skills necessary to nurture peaceful attitudes. Given Sesame Workshop’s holistic, child-centered approach, this is usually reflected in educational objectives designed to address children’s socioemotional health, build critical thinking, nurture pro-social attitudes and skills, and break down harmful stereotypes by exposing viewers to positive images of the other (see Figure 12.1). Some of these objectives are shared across almost all Sesame Street curricula, while others are more specific to post-conflict or sectarian societies. The latter can be divided into two core areas. The first consists of objectives promoting resilience and the ability to positively interact with others. The second consists of those designed to transform children’s attitudes by enabling them to question forms of structural and cultural violence, including the oppression of marginalized groups like women, ethnic and religious minorities, or people stigmatized by conditions such as living with HIV/AIDS. Zembylas and Bekerman (2013b) argue that definitions of peace are contextually determined and culturally rooted (see also Chapters 1 and 3 in this volume). In the following sections, we elucidate how coproductions adapt peace education objectives so that they fit with local ideas about peace, justice, and childhood.

Coping with Living in a Violent Context Coproduction curricula almost universally include objectives focused on socioemotional development: examples include identifying and expressing emotions, managing emotions (e.g. anger, frustration, and disappointment), developing self-confidence, and optimism. Local educational teams have honed and reframed these “universal” objectives to address challenges posed by the specific political instability and violence affecting a given society, and to promote locally determined definitions of peace.

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The Afghan coproduction Baghch-e-Simsim, for example, emphasizes children’s ability to express emotions within home and school settings. This objective was developed based on the local team’s recommendation to combat the marginalization of children’s voices within family contexts by promoting positive interaction between generations. The team also wanted to focus on task persistence and optimism. While in other coproductions these objectives might be related to school readiness, in the Afghan coproduction they are an effort to nurture resilience, a critical quality for young children facing insecurity and violence (UNICEF 2012). These objectives are presented through child-friendly examples such as tying shoelaces or flying kites, relatable scenarios that empower children to connect with, and peacefully express, complex and intense emotions. The objectives also speak to aspirations, exploring possible professions and positive roles within the community that, at times, trouble entrenched gender roles. Additionally, coproduction curricula usually include a range of objectives related to children’s perceptions of, and interactions with, others. Skills like developing and expressing empathy, appreciating similarities and differences, resolving conflict peacefully, cooperation, turn-taking, and sharing are reframed in the service of developing the core pro-social skills that children need in specific contexts. The coproductions in Israel, Palestine, and Northern Ireland, among others, have focused on these objectives to provide children with models for conflict resolution that are different from those they may see around them. These objectives reflect a proactive conception of peace education, wherein the aim is to help children learn behaviors and strategies that they can employ in challenging situations, thereby moving toward “education for co-existence” (Bekerman, Zembylas, and McGlynn 2009: 215), as well as echoing Zembylas and Bekerman’s (2013b) call for peace education focused on action. Furthermore, these pro-social objectives teach children to value similarities and differences related to identity categories, thereby fostering abilities to critique negative stereotypes and maintain tolerant attitudes toward individuals outside their identity group.

Combating Cultural Violence Brantmeier and Bajaj (2013: 141) describe Galtung’s (1990) concept of cultural violence as informal structures and beliefs, including “in-group norms,” that make space for other types of violence to occur. Keeping in mind that media can be a powerful tool for changing attitudes, Sesame Workshop’s curricula couple objectives that promote pro-social interaction with objectives designed to counter negative stereotypes and foster beliefs in equity. Since attitudes toward nonviolence and reconciliation are rooted in local contexts

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(Zembylas and Bekerman 2013), many teams debate how to promote reconciliation and “push the envelope” without erasing structural inequalities and power asymmetries that often characterize intergroup conflicts. Curricular approaches to social inclusion build on goals that promote positive interactions between individuals, such as entering social groups, conflict resolution, and appreciating similarities and differences (e.g. my friend and I like different things, or my neighbor’s family speaks a different language than mine, but we all like to play together). Teams then layer objectives related to identity groups that may be marginalized. For example, in South Africa, the Takalani Sesame program focused on de-stigmatization as part of their HIV/AIDS curriculum, sending the message that children living with HIV/AIDS deserve respect and friendship. The Bangladeshi coproduction Sisimpur devoted a section of the curriculum to building understanding and respect between people with different physical or cognitive abilities to combat severe discrimination against people with disabilities. Some coproductions use an approach to reconciliation that explicitly acknowledges identifying factors of groups in conflict. For example, a past season’s curriculum for Rechov Sumsum in Israel focused on “mutual respect and cooperative living values” (Walden et al. 2009). The curriculum states that the program must include Arabic, Russian, and Amharic languages in addition to Hebrew. In other countries, it is not possible to name the conflict or any specific involved group. In Afghanistan, for example, doing so might create dissonance among stakeholders whose support is necessary for the program’s survival. Instead, the Afghan coproduction team chose to focus on cultural diversity, heritage, and national identity as a means toward reconciliation and social inclusion. As a result, the Baghch-e-Simsim curriculum explores traditions and lifestyles of different identity groups and depicts the everyday lives of children. Though the marginalized groups are not explicitly stated in the curriculum, the team strives to create content that features ethnic, religious, linguistic, and socioeconomic diversity to strengthen messaging for these objectives. While the curriculum outlines a coproduction’s approach to peace education and guides content creation, these objectives are ultimately given meaning through narratives. The curriculum represents the foundation but not the limits of what can be achieved.

The Scriptwriting Process Sesame Workshop’s coproductions harness the power of stories to challenge dominant narratives of hate and to imagine a more peaceful world. Sesame Workshop’s scripts include live-action films (LAFs), or documentary-style

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pieces; animations produced locally or dubbed from other coproductions; and street stories featuring Muppets and human cast members.

Characters Characters are designed in anticipation of potential stories. Human characters are useful for challenging culturally violent narratives that erase and otherize (Brantmeier and Bajaj 2013). Examples include Jugadoo, a wheelchair-bound mechanic on Galli Galli Sim Sim (India); and Salim, a Muslim neighbor on the Israeli coproduction Rechov Sumsum. Muppets have more flexibility in terms of identity, and are therefore useful for discussing difficult or taboo topics, a process Solinger, Fox, and Irani (2008: 7) call rendering stories “speakable.” Muppets can be marked with certain identities that allow them to disrupt stereotypes, such as those associated with gender. From Haneen in Shara’a Simsim (Palestine) to Hilda the Hare in Sesame Tree (Northern Ireland), coproductions feature female characters that are smart, feisty, and educated. Similarly, male characters like Googly on Galli Galli Sim Sim (India) and Kareem on Shara’a Simsim (Palestine) enjoy solitude, love to read, and are nonaggressive, thereby troubling entrenched ideas about masculinity. Perhaps the most famous example of a Muppet designed to challenge stereotypes is Kami, the South African Muppet who is openly HIV positive (Segal, Cole, and Fuld 2002). Kami was carefully designed to be a racially and ethnically ambiguous girl so as to avoid reinforcing ideas that certain classes, races, ethnicities, or genders are more prone to the disease than others. Kami’s character (who is now also featured in other African coproductions) has opened discussions about loss, inclusion, and disease prevention (Health and Development Africa 2005).

Narratives Sesame Workshop’s characters are the backbone of the most important elements of television programming: the stories themselves. Peace education scripts are designed to empower children to “redesign” their realities (Zembylas and Bekerman 2013b: 207), a process that involves reimagining worlds and acting on alternative visions. For LAFs, this means exposing children to different ways of life. For example, an LAF in the multicountry, multimedia project Panwapa told the story of a Guatemalan student at a well-resourced private school who started an educational program for working-class laborers’ children after they formed a friendship playing soccer. These narratives challenge the divisions and limitations children encounter, encouraging them to consider more prosocial possibilities.

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LAFs are key elements of coproductions in countries experiencing conflict or its immediate aftermath, where security concerns and inadequate infrastructure make it impossible to hire studios, build sets, or even hold regular writers’ meetings. The coproductions in Kosovo and Afghanistan, for example, are almost entirely supported by live-action films where producers feature children from backgrounds that are linguistically, ethnically, and religiously diverse, carefully balancing perspectives from all sides of conflict. In Kosovo, LAFs featured children from formerly warring faiths and ethnicities celebrating traditional holidays in their homes, exposing viewers who live in segregated neighborhoods to alternative views of their supposed enemies. Simply humanizing the invisible enemy went far to challenge children’s attitudes. Whether LAFs or street stories, Sesame Workshop’s programming provides children a window into alternative possibilities for peaceful interaction. Some of Sesame Workshop’s most successful peace education street stories (meaning those that have most clearly imparted their meaning and have spurred children to reflection and action), tend to have three elements: (1) they are child centered; (2) they feature actionable steps; and (3) they involve children solving problems themselves. Peace education scripts address educational goals like conflict resolution, valuing diversity, questioning stereotypes, and coping with difficult and complex emotions through conflicts that occur in child-friendly settings such as schools, playgrounds, and homes. In the episode “Share Necessities,” for example, Hilda and Potto of Sesame Tree (Northern Ireland) argue when Potto finishes the grapes Hilda was waiting to eat. The Muppets fight, drawing a line across the middle of the room dividing their space and resources. In the end, they realize life is much more fun when they share. The episode models forgiveness and questions segregation, all issues tied to the political realities of reconciliation in Northern Ireland (as Chapter 2 in this volume also discusses). Situating the conflict in children’s worlds—focusing on a conflict about grapes rather than disputed territory—renders abstract concepts tangible. The second characteristic of peace education scripts is an actionable conclusion. In several episodes of Shara’a Simsim (Palestine), for example, children face fear, loss, and anger, all of which tempt them to engage in the same type of direct violence that surrounds them. The show models coping strategies ranging from talking to an adult to expressing feelings through the arts to releasing kites to symbolically “let go” of pain. Rather than ignoring the difficulties of living in a war zone, these scripts acknowledge children’s realities, and provide them with concrete ways to break cycles of violence. Finally, in successful peace education scripts, children solve problems without adult intervention. Such modeling positions children as empowered change makers, a comforting possibility for viewers who may often feel out

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of control. For example, in the Takalani Sesame (South Africa) script “The Train Game,” Kami is sad because her classmates refuse to interact with her because they believe doing so will expose them to HIV. Kami’s Muppet friends tell her that tomorrow they will accompany her to school, where they will jointly help her classmates understand that you cannot catch HIV from playing with someone. The segment ends with the characters making a train by putting their hands on each other’s shoulders, modeling the educational message that HIV is not transmitted through touch. In this segment, children (in this case, Muppets of a young age) demonstrate that they have the power to combat stigmatization. Promoting positive behaviors and attitudinal change is one of the great challenges of entertainment education (Bandura 2001; de Block 2012; Singhal 2013). Television is just one piece of a holistic program that includes opportunities for children to interact with the “text” of scripts even after they are done viewing. This is the intention of community and school engagement (also called “outreach”) initiatives that accompany the television programs, described in the next section.

Community and School Engagement Sesame Workshop’s educational outreach programming has been a consistent component of its model since the show began in 1968 (Lesser 1974; Yotive and Fisch 2001). Kress (2003) argues that transmedia messaging—or messaging that occurs across various media platforms—improves children’s academic outcomes and communication skills. Furthermore, while the penetration of radio and television is generally high, it often remains inaccessible to the neediest children. Even when available, programming is frequently in languages or dialects that may be unfamiliar to children in rural areas and situated in contexts that do not resonate with their experiences. To this end, Sesame Workshop’s outreach content reinforces educational messages from the programs in developmentally appropriate and engaging ways; targets neglected, at-risk populations (such as orphans and vulnerable children); draws adults to co-engage in and reinforce the media experience; and localizes to fit the country context. The producers of outreach materials consider both the availability of various media platforms and the human agents that directly or indirectly mediate children’s educational experiences. Outreach materials are designed to be tactile, appropriate for distribution in formal and informal environments (including areas where families congregate, such as schools, community centers, libraries, or health clinics), and accessible to caregivers whose literacy levels may be relatively low.

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Designed with these principles in mind, Sesame’s outreach initiatives extend the reach of coproductions through community-based activities; classroom educational materials; and teacher development/instructional guides.

Community-based Activities Community-based activities are intended to incorporate caregivers as agents of change and active participants in children’s learning. They are implemented through collaborations forged with local partners whose missions are similar to Sesame Workshop’s and whose talents and resources are complementary to the Workshop’s programming. Promotional events—another type of community activity—inform adults about local projects. In addition to increasing viewership, these activities serve as opportunities to communicate educational messages. These activities include: MM

Awareness-building workshops, where the outreach team engages with communities to promote the importance of early childhood education (which unfortunately remains marginalized on most education agendas) and raise awareness about the day and time of the local coproduction’s airing.

MM

Public Service Announcements (PSAs), which are short, concise messages delivered through TV or radio about specific topics, such as road safety or malaria prevention. PSAs are also produced during crises and emergencies. For example, the team at Plaza Sésamo (Latin America) created and aired PSAs about recovery and emergency preparedness after the Chilean earthquake in 2010.

MM

Billboards, or images, erected in selected high-traffic areas designed to reinforce content and drive viewership.

Community-based outreach is also designed to encourage co-viewing, in which caregivers watch and discuss episodes of the show with children, thereby developing a shared understanding of the content. Community viewings provide audiences who do not have access to the broadcast television program exposure to the show. Relying on local volunteers, government and NGO partners, and support from community leaders, teams use inventive methods to enable these viewings, ranging from attaching televisions to rickshaws in India and Bangladesh, to organizing screenings on portable projectors in Nigeria, to staging regular showings in relief camps in post-earthquake Haiti. Trained facilitators conduct pre-viewing

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activities that are designed to prepare children for the show, pausing the video during an episode to reinforce specific messages, and engaging children in multiple activities post-viewing ranging from simple questions to arts and crafts activities aligned with themes from the episode.

In the Classroom Although primarily focused on mass media, the Workshop also produces classroom materials that reinforce programmatic messaging and combat cultural violence in institutional settings like schools. Sesame Workshop’s high-quality print materials visually, pedagogically, and qualitatively enliven and improve under-resourced classrooms. Materials like posters, activity books, flash cards, educational games, and story books, feature characters and, at times, storylines from television episodes and contain images reflective of children’s communities. These are coupled with letters, words, or numbers that extend learning and provide children with extra content to supplement their television experience. Sesame Workshop has worked extensively with local partners to develop classroom materials fostering mutual respect and understanding, and addressing direct and cultural violence through educational themes such as cooperation, conflict resolution, and appreciating diversity. Like the television shows, outreach materials encourage children and their caregivers to celebrate diversity while simultaneously recognizing commonalities. In Northern Ireland, for example, the education team worked closely with local teachers and members of the Education and Library Boards to create two educational outreach kits, one on “Emotions” and another on “Diversity and Inclusion,” aimed at preprimary and primary school students. Both kits were aligned with the statutory curriculum and could be used by teachers to fulfill curricular requirements related to socioemotional skills. Each Emotions kit included a set of durable flash cards that presented children with an opportunity to explore their feelings and celebrate the similarities and differences of their classmates. Ranging from “surprised” to “lonely,” each card provided a pictorial representation of a feeling on the front and child-centered scenarios, discussion points, activities, and useful outside resources for teachers on the back. Similarly, the Diversity and Inclusion materials included flash cards with different behaviors designed to foster empathy and acceptance. Recognizing educators as essential mediators of children’s development, Sesame Workshop has developed a series of teacher-training video modules and print guides—most notably in Ghana, Indonesia, and India—to help adults improve their pedagogical practices. Using teachers or actors playing teachers

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and aided by a Muppet, video modules are short segments that introduce materials, highlight educational aims, and model how the material can be used in a classroom setting. These resources both ensure that outreach materials are delivered effectively, and contribute to the improvement of formal and informal educational systems. Particularly in unstable political situations or in the wake of environmental disaster, the distribution of these materials poses serious challenges. Materials are designed to be lightweight and evergreen, so as to be easily portable and durable in trying conditions. At a nascent stage, decisions are made regarding the size, paper weight, packaging, and storage of materials. In Bangladesh, for example, materials have been waterproofed so they can survive flooding. When the political situation in Gaza made it impossible to deliver storybooks and posters, they were converted into compressed files that could be printed locally. As these situations demonstrate, partnerships are vital to outreach.

Strong Partnerships The success of the outreach activities and materials lies not only in their quality and cultural relevance, but also in the global and local partnerships created for distribution. Consequently, Sesame Workshop begins every coproduction process by building relationships with the ministries that administer early-childhood care and education. Because working with children involves a degree of trust from parents and caregivers, teams cultivate a bond with public and private organizations, governmental and non-governmental organizations, to understand the local context and values of families and public systems. Additionally, teams identify like-minded foundations, corporations, individuals, and government agencies as potential partners for community activities and material delivery, and advocates for systemic change. Long-term partnerships foster the sustainability of projects beyond the course of a grant, the scaling up of outreach programs, and continued research, development and distribution of education programming across multiple platforms. Because proof of Sesame Workshop’s efficacy is important to these stakeholders and the development community, our approach to research is described in the next section.

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Measuring the Effects of Peace Education Efforts with Young Children Sesame Street’s impact on fostering positive perceptions of the “other” and reducing prejudice was documented as early as its second season in the United States, when researchers found that African-American and White children who watched the series expressed more positive attitudes toward African-American and Latino children than those who did not (Bogatz and Ball 1971). (This is similar to the stated outcomes of Gordon Allport’s (1954) contact hypothesis about intergroup encounters reducing prejudice as discussed by Zvi Bekerman in Chapter 3 of this book; in the Sesame Street case, though, no actual human contact between groups takes place and yet similar positive outcomes are found through exposure to this type of educational media.) Since then, Sesame Workshop has collaborated with researchers around the world to evaluate projects in regions that have experienced protracted conflict and focused on promoting mutual respect and understanding, including Israel, Palestine, Jordan, Kosovo, and Northern Ireland. While some normed measures assess children’s cognitive or academic skills across the globe, we do not know of any standardized measures that specifically focus on the knowledge and skills necessary for effective peace education among young children. Unlike tools that assess how many letters or words a child can identify, for example, evaluations of children’s understanding of concepts such as prejudice, inclusion, exclusion, and respect are more complex (Cole and Lee 2014). Researchers most often use structured interviews prompted by vignettes or scenarios (accompanied by illustrations or photos) to investigate young children’s knowledge and attitudes—a method that is well established for measuring children’s social and moral reasoning (Brenick et al. 2007). Consequently, researchers evaluating the impact of coproductions have created assessments that build on prior studies while simultaneously reflecting the specific educational objectives of each project. A study evaluating Rruga Sesam/Ulica Sezam (Kosovo) examined children’s receptiveness to those who are different from them in various respects: a child who is foreign (of Asian descent), a Roma child, a child who does not speak the same language, and a child who speaks Albanian (for Serbianspeaking children) or Serbian (for Albanian-speaking children). In these cases, researchers asked participants to respond to pictorial prompts of individual or groups of children, providing them with a narrative background explaining specific aspects of the imaginary characters’ identities. Researchers also assessed different degrees of receptiveness, including whether children would want to meet the child in the picture, play with him/her, befriend him/

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her, have him/her come to the child’s house, and go to his/her house (Fluent Research 2008). (For these questions, children typically respond to a picture of a same-gender child so that gender does not confound children’s answers.) Researchers in Northern Ireland have employed a similar approach (Connolly et al. 2008; Larkin, Connolly, and Kehoe, 2009a, 2009b), asking children to imagine that the child had started his/her first day in their school; researchers asked children whether they would go up and say hello, let him/her play with their friends at lunchtime, share things with him/her in class, invite him/her to their house to play after school, and share a secret with him/her. In addition to focusing on differences, evaluations also address whether children recognize that they share many similarities with children who may look different from them. For example, in the Kosovo study (Fluent Research 2008), children saw a picture of a same-gender African-American child and responded to a series of questions about whether the African-American child likes to play and have fun, likes to spend time with family, and tries to be good and do the right thing. The degree to which children thought that the African-American child did these things indicated whether children thought a child who looked different from them could still have similar preferences and behaviors—an important educational objective in the project. Other sets of questions focused on scenarios that closely reflect the projects’ educational objectives, such as helping, sharing, empathy, and cooperation. In studies in Israel (Fisch and Oppenheimer 2012) and Palestine (Fluent Research 2011), for example, children saw illustrations of scenarios that were similar to conflicts or social dilemmas that they encounter in childhood (e.g. sharing a toy, helping others) and were asked what the characters should do and why. In one scenario, a child refuses to share a balloon with a second child and teases the second child about it. The first child then falls and gets hurt and asks the second child for help. Researchers asked if the second child should help the first child and why (Fisch and Oppenheimer 2012). Children were assessed on both their decision and the sophistication of the rationale provided. Similarly, others have examined the impact of Sesame Street projects in the Middle East (Rechov Sumsum/Shara’a Simsim, an Israeli–Palestinian coproduction; and Sesame Stories, a coproduction that included Israeli, Palestinian, and Jordanian partners) from the perspective of children’s moral reasoning, looking in detail at the justifications that children provide for their social judgments in vignettes (Brenick et al. 2007; Cole et al. 2003). In these cases, researchers examined whether children offered explanations based on cultural membership, selfish motives (e.g. avoiding punishment), fairness (e.g. appealing to moral principles of fairness, turn taking, etc.), rules and conventions, maintenance of friendship, prosocial reasons, and others (Cole et al. 2003).

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While these approaches generated important findings about the effectiveness of media interventions such as Sesame Street coproductions in inculcating respect and understanding in young children, they most often rely on children’s ability to verbalize their responses—an exercise that can be difficult for the younger children in the target audience (three to four years old), for children who are less skilled in this type of communication, or for children who may simply be shy, especially in a novel situation where they are being interviewed by a strange adult. In addition, these interviews tend to measure the underlying knowledge and attitudes that are important for successful peace education, but do not effectively assess whether these attitudes translate into real-world behaviors, and how or whether these attitudes or behaviors endure over time. The extent to which a child’s environment impinges on these effects is also poorly understood (Brenick et al. 2007). Researchers sometimes uncover ceiling effects in the studies, where almost all children provide the “correct”/pro-social response even before exposure to the program and there is therefore no room for improvement (e.g. Fisch and Oppenheimer 2012). Without further information, it is difficult to tell whether this is a reflection of children’s attitudes or because children simply provide what they know to be the socially desirable, “correct” answer. Therefore, it is important to continue to build on this research and develop multiple methods that triangulate sources of information such as parent or teacher reports of children’s behaviors, observations, and other qualitative or ethnographic approaches.

The Impact of Sesame Street’s Coproductions Despite these challenges, a body of research affirms Sesame Workshop’s approach to peace education in many conflict affected countries. Compared to those who did not, children who watched coproductions were: 1 more likely to demonstrate positive attitudes toward other children

from a different background (in Kosovo; Fluent Research 2008); 2 more likely to take someone else’s perspective (in Israel; Fisch and

Oppenheimer 2012); 3 more likely to express the need for sharing, cooperation, and helping

others (in Palestine; Fluent Research 2011); 4 more likely to say they will use dialogue or discussion to solve a

problem rather than turn to an adult for help (in Israel; Walden et al. 2009);

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5 more likely to use pro-social reasoning to resolve peer conflicts (in

Israel, Palestine, and Jordan); and 6 more willing to be inclusive of those from a different background

and be more interested in participating in cultural events associated with their own and the other community (in Northern Ireland; Larkin, Connolly, and Kehoe 2009a). Studies also found that watching Sesame Street coproductions contributes to empathizing with those who have often been stigmatized in society. Viewers held less stigmatized attitudes toward those with HIV/AIDS (in South Africa; Khulisa Management Services 2005) and showed a greater appreciation of the abilities of people in wheelchairs (Fisch and Oppenheimer 2012). Effects were also evident in outreach projects. In Northern Ireland, children who were exposed to outreach kits in their schools were more able to recognize emotions, more willing to be inclusive of others, and more interested in participating in cultural events than those not exposed (Larkin, Connolly, and Kehoe 2009b). These results, however, can be complex and nuanced. A study that investigated the impact of Rechov Sumsum/Shara’a Simsim in Israel and Palestine revealed that Palestinian–Israeli and Jewish–Israeli children had more positive perceptions of the “other” following exposure to the series, but Palestinian children living in Palestine did not show analogous gains (Cole et al. 2003). The authors suggested that this could be due to differences in versions of the series viewed: the Israeli version (Rechov Sumsum) was longer (thirty minutes per episode), contained more episodes, and contained more Palestinian content, whereas the Palestinian version (Shara’a Simsim) was shorter (fifteen minutes per episode), had fewer episodes, and contained only minimal Israeli content (Cole et al. 2003; Cole, Labin, and Galarza 2008). In addition, the findings suggest that the contexts in which children lived may have impinged on the success of peace education efforts. Palestinian children lived in segregated areas more directly impacted by inter-group conflict and with less exposure to the “other;” whereas the reverse is true for Israeli children (Brenick et al. 2007). Therefore, children’s personal experience of conflict (either direct or indirect) and their exposure to diversity in their peer relationships may have influenced their understanding and reception of peace education messages. Nonetheless, researchers concluded that Sesame Workshop’s peace education programming did, in fact, successfully promote mutual respect and understanding, a trend Brenick et al. (2007) attribute to the strength of the shows’ educational objectives. From the curriculum seminar to the assessment phase, each element of the Sesame Workshop process works towards the same goal: the empowerment of children to cope with and, ultimately, end cycles of violence.

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Conclusion Sesame Workshop’s approach to peace education is rooted in the belief that the world’s youngest children are capable of critically analyzing their contexts and becoming change makers. As Zembylas and Bekerman (2013b: 204) recommend, Sesame Workshop encourages coproductions to focus on changing how children “act” by modeling alternative ways of approaching conflict and violence. This is reflected in the expectation that children will take what they learn from the shows and apply it to their daily lives. While it is difficult to confirm whether children are, in fact, transformed to the point that they take action after viewing peace education programming, results indicate that it moves viewers in this direction. The awareness of dialogue as a tool for peacefully resolving conflict, the ability to critically evaluate (and, eventually, reject) othering and stereotyping, and the capacity to recognize the need for pro-social behaviors all suggest that coproductions are helping young children develop the skills and attitudes necessary to be agents of nonviolent change. As media platforms, as well as viewing and listening habits, rapidly change, so too must our approach to producing and distributing pro-social programming. One thing, though, we hope will not change: our faith in children to develop the skills and attitudes necessary to resist and undo violence perpetrated by adults and, in time, to build a more peaceful world.2

Notes 1

Developed based on Bronfenbrenner’s (1994) ecological framework for human development.

2

Thanks to Dr. Lewis Bernstein for his comments on drafts of this chapter.

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Conclusion: Critical Directions for Peace Education Maria Hantzopoulos and Monisha Bajaj

I

n tying together the chapters of this book and bringing it to a close, we begin to see a dynamic genealogy of peace education efforts that have taken root across the globe. As discussed in the introduction, peace education has emerged as an acknowledged and legitimate field of scholarship and practice over the past four decades; these chapters have provided a glimpse into the myriad ways that peace education is presently discussed and promoted globally. Whether through efforts of the United Nations and international civil society networks, or through national and/or regional policy initiatives, or through sui generis and localized practices engaged by diverse grassroots educators, peace education is defined and enacted through content, processes, and educational structures that seek to dismantle violence in its various forms. Given the proliferation of peace education globally, we set out to explore the possibilities, challenges, and limitations of implementing programs. We wanted to uncover the successes and struggles in creating and operationalizing programs that intend to interrupt the transmission of direct, structural, and cultural forms of violent practices and ideologies in schools and in other educative spaces. Throughout the volume, the chapters speak to these issues. The authors have critically engaged the theoretical underpinnings that often define the field of peace education to illuminate the ways that participants in related programs make meaning of their experiences in these efforts. Drawing from localized qualitative research in each geographic context, the chapters examined multiple ideologies, forces, and institutions that not only shape peace-related programming, but also influence participant engagement with teaching and learning in their respective contexts. In the introduction to the volume, we discuss the themes that emerge from the chapters, and, as a reminder, put forth the arguments that are ultimately threaded across the book. These are:

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MM

The nature and process of peace education is relational, contextual, and situational, and not limited to the delineated roles of learner and teacher. Learning can be mutual, reciprocal, and occur in unintended places, or the spaces “in-between.”

MM

Normative and Eurocentric frameworks for understanding peace and peace education must be interrogated and challenged across local and regional contexts.

MM

Intentions and outcomes must be integrated in peace education; however, these concepts should be critically reflected upon before, during, and after implementation.

MM

Complex analyses of violence must undergird peace education efforts.

MM

Examples of effective peace education can inspire other action in other places.

MM

Individuals and organizations can serve as “peace entrepreneurs” that give rise to programs, policies, and efforts that provide transformative educational spaces.

MM

The diversity of local meanings of peace and peace education are its strength. One-size-fits-all approaches are not conducive to effective peace education.

Related to these arguments, there are several salient considerations within and beyond the scope of this book that will help thrust the field in new critical directions. Specifically, as peace education becomes a more widely accepted and mainstreamed field, it is increasingly vital for scholars and practitioners to negotiate the micro-experiences and the macro-structures in the conceptualizing and enactment of programming. This involves a commitment to interrogating how localized experiences engage with, shape, and challenge totalizing and universalizing assumptions, discourses, and practices that frame the field, and consider the ways in which this examination might move peace education forward so that it is compatible with its intentions. This requires scholars and practitioners to actively engage in reflective questioning to regularly unpack key ideas often associated with peace education research, scholarship, and praxis. It also mandates a level of self-reflection of one’s own bias, assumptions, motivations, and positionality, regardless of whether he or she is considered an “insider” or an “outsider” (or, in actuality, some hybrid of both, as neither category can ever fully be complete, whole, or pure). Accordingly, we pose three overarching reflective questions that provide a critical lens from which to understand and probe the complex processes that are at play when enacting peace education.

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1. How do participants’ perspectives, identities, knowledge(s), experiences, and contexts contribute to the ways in which peace educational programs are designed and conceptualized? While peace education is framed by critical and feminist theories in education, scholars and practitioners who embrace these views still need to be attentive to ways that their research and programs might reproduce the very same inequities they seek to interrupt. As referred to earlier, dominant voices and narratives often sideline and trump the experiences and voices of marginalized groups in both scholarship and practice (resulting in further silencing and marginalization). This book seeks to confront this dilemma in several ways, including enlisting not just scholars but also researchers, youth workers, and practitioners from diverse places to write chapters for the book; featuring examples that transcend geographic spaces; and considering the interplay of the local, the regional, and the national in defining programming. We see this in almost every chapter of the book. Nonetheless, we must ask for critical reflection about the “who, what, where, when, and how” of peace education research and practice to deeply interrogate processes of valorization, delegitimization, and even outright dismissal and neglect. As scholars, practitioners, and participants are often tokenized based on rigid identity markers in an attempt to recognize their work and experiences, we need to rethink the very constructs of identity to open meaningful space for subjugated knowledge, experiences, and voices to arise. For instance, instead of simply including perspectives from the Global South, we might reconceptualize the Global North/Global South binary to critically consider processes and outcomes of marginalization and domination in both locations. This involves a more attentive look at the role of intersectionality in the amplification of participants’ perspectives, identities, knowledge(s), experiences, and contexts. In this case, a scholar might very well be from the Global South, albeit from an elite background. On the flip side, participants from the Global North may occupy spaces of privilege in a transnational context; yet, they may also present experiences and views from their location that are more akin to a subaltern perspective. These considerations of intersectional experience complicate fixed notions of identity and place, and can enrich both programming and scholarship in the field. Such debates abound in fields like Gender and Women’s Studies, Ethnic Studies, Anthropology, Sociology, and other sub-fields of Education, and these questions need to be central to, and made plain for, an engaged peace education praxis. While efforts to center localized experiences are being made through critical peace education scholarship and practice (see Bajaj and Brantmeier 2011; Hantzopoulos 2010; Zembylas and Bekerman 2013b), we pose this larger question as one that further complicates the complex meanings that are in fact embedded in the terms local and/or global.

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2. How do the macro cultural, political, and economic forces and institutions that shape quotidian existence inform (or how are they omitted from) the ways that peace education programs are contextually conceptualized? As peace education is concerned with the root causes of structural, cultural, interpersonal, and direct violence, this question may seem an obvious one to continually address. Throughout the volume, there are myriad examples that show how participants in peace education programs negotiate their agency amidst these larger structures (see Chapters 4, 5, 7, 8, 9, and 10 in particular for insight into this). Moreover, as shifts in larger power structures happen over time and in different places, peace education programming must consider these changes and continually re-evaluate its goals to open up possibilities for engagement in new ways. This includes instances when there is national or global political upheaval and change, or when changes in policy ostensibly alter relationships among groups or nations. For instance, how do peace education efforts look different (or similar) in Egypt before, during, and after the Arab Uprisings? This might involve challenging some of the temporal, linear markers that define “before, during, and after” much like Zakharia’s chapter on the conflict continuum in this volume does, as well as considering what larger structural forces contribute to change, or lack thereof. Another example might look at the discursive changes in US–Cuba policy and relations, and consider the impact of those shifts on peace education programming. The crises in the Eurozone might also be a point of departure to closely examine the roles of people’s movements in redefining the political landscapes, and the implications of these burgeoning forces on eradicating and dismantling structural violence. In this sense, peace education programming is viewed as contextually and historically bound, nested within larger social and political forces, and its efficacy is often premised on the recognition of its situational nature amidst these processes. Accordingly, the enactment of peace education must continually take into account this intricate negotiation between participants’ experiences and the larger structural realities that frame them. Further, we must also illuminate the multifaceted nature of these forces that transcend demarcated international, national, regional, and local levels of violence, to more fully understand the complex interplay among them and their subsequent bearing on peace education programming, research, and scholarship. This process ponders how emerging phenomena that cut across and through these boundaries, like market-based reforms or transnational and global migration, impact communities that are seeking and struggling for just peace. For instance, one might consider the following general questions in relation to specific contexts: How do neo-liberal reforms contribute to the linguistic genocide of one particular speech community that has historically suffered state sanctioned violence?

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How does the influx of political and or economic refugees contribute to or destabilize peace processes and programming in a fragile or post-conflict state? Such types of interrogation consider forces beyond state-sanctioned violence that may or may not contribute to the pursuit of just peace. In turn, peace educationl programming and research can then illuminate sites and possibilities of negotiation, re-creation, and resistance in such contexts. 3. How might scholars and practitioners rethink their efforts to engage in peace education research and praxis by resisting the totalizing and universalizing aspects of the field and considering the primacy of localized realities? While the previous question considers the macro, it is framed in such a way to shed light on the local plight, to unearth the subjective and lived experiences of those who are most affected by violence in order to move towards more humane and just peace. In truth, this is the heart of peace education. As demonstrated in many chapters of this book, the scholarship from the field has been increasingly attentive to the experiences of those who are both creating and participating in peace education programs. These new directions are promising. As discussed in relation to the first question for consideration, increased attention on communities that are often left out of peace education discourse and dialogue provides crucial insight into the creation of just peace. Thus, this is also a space for theorists and scholars to reconsider what defines traditional peace education and, in turn, help to document examples of social movements that ultimately engage all three questions in the pursuit of a world free from all forms of violence. In this volume, we intentionally sought to feature empirical examples, and, in this vein, we urge more critical research and scholarship that documents such efforts. For instance, in light of the recent Ferguson and the Black Lives Matter movements in the US that have resonated internationally, there has been a proliferation of scholarship and projects meant to raise consciousness, interrupt, resist, and dismantle forms of direct and structural violence in the United States. The efforts can also be framed as peace education initiatives, and can be shining examples of engaged critical peace educational praxis (see also Bajaj 2014). There needs to be more peace education scholarship that is committed to documenting and amplifying these social movements. We look forward, for instance, to seeing more scholarship produced about initiatives like the Truth Telling Project initiated by peace education scholar and activist David Ragland, a model that is inspired by truth and reconciliation processes. Seeking to address the murders of Black men and women by American police, the goals of this project take into account the racialized structural violence that permeates the US landscape, and uses transformative dialogue as a means to move towards a more just, humane, and peaceful society.

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It is equally urgent that researchers and practitioners undertaking such projects think deeply about their relationships to these programs and/or their participants. Giving primacy to local realities is crucial, and, in order to rethink engagement, we also need to genuinely consider the ways in which we are implicated in structures of violence, based on our own social and geographical locations. This requires critical self-reflection on why we choose to do the work that we do and, in pursuing this work, we must not only ruminate about what the unintended consequences of those actions might be but also deliberate how our roles function to perpetuate or mitigate violent structures that persist. Related to this, peace education programs and scholarship can also benefit from applying and using participatory methods like participatory action research, participatory evaluation, and youth involvement in the program design. In this sense, those who are most involved and receiving the programs are equally involved in the design and the evaluation. While this approach does not inherently solve all of the issues that arise when enacting and researching peace education, it does center the experiences and realities of those who are most involved and, ostensibly, it could lead to better and more realistic programming. By engaging these larger questions, we reconsider the conceptual, theoretical, and methodological premises that ground the field to shed light on the ways that other disciplines and ideologies might inform, engage with, and transform it. We opened the volume with a passage from Freire and now we come full circle as we close. Freire (2003: [1970] 65) always maintained that this type of critical engagement for social change “cannot be purely intellectual but most also involve action; nor can it be limited to mere activism, but must also include serious reflection: only then will it be praxis.” While there are by no means simple or finite answers to these questions, the commitment to reflection and thinking about them opens up space for this type of praxis-oriented research and practice in peace education; in turn, this continual reconsideration is one that can ultimately move the field forward toward its goals of a more complete peace and justice.

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Further Reading List Andrzejewski, Julie, Marta Baltodano, and Linda Symcos (2009), Social Justice, Peace, and Environmental Education: Transformative Standards, New York: Routledge. Written for researchers and educators, this book explores the linkages among social justice, peace education, and environmental education with several provocative essays that explore the concepts and practices of transformative education. Editors and authors discuss the standards movement to critique power, domination, and oppression; they envision liberation and the right for all humans, species, and ecosystems on the planet to live and prosper. Inspired by the Alaska Standards for Culturally Responsive Schools, chapters include examination of indigenous cultural standards, human rights education, environmental education, and social justice education through the framework of transformative standards. Bajaj, Monisha (ed.) (2008), Encyclopedia of Peace Education, Charlotte, NC: Information Age Publishing. The Encyclopedia of Peace Education emerged from a desire to create a living and democratic space for those involved in peace education from across the globe to contribute. As such, there are currently fifty entries that comprise the online Encyclopedia, available at http://www.tc.columbia.edu/ centers/epe/. In 2008, the editor decided to publish some of the entries as a classroom resource for peace education courses and the book includes guiding discussion questions, a glossary as well as an introduction. The edited book seeks to serve as a “peace education primer” for college- and graduate-level students to understand the historical emergence, philosophical underpinnings, foundational concepts, and new directions in the field. The book seeks to answer the question, “What is peace education?” in accessible yet not simplistic terms. The online Encyclopedia offers free download of existing entries. Bekerman, Zvi and Michalinos Zembylas (2012), Teaching Contested Narratives: Identity, Memory and Reconciliation in Peace Education and Beyond, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. In this book, the authors consider the influence of identity and memory on

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classroom practices and contexts. They critique the construction of Western psychologized notions of peace and reconciliation and how these have permeated the field of peace education by romanticizing notions of peace rather than understanding its complexities and multiplicity of understandings. The authors trouble concepts of culture, reconciliation, and collective memory, exploring how classroom practices exist amidst contested narratives that are often imparted in non-dialogical ways. Bekerman and Zembylas explore how power and the “politics of emotion” (p. 115) are ingrained in teaching contested narratives, creating differential pulls toward individual emotions and collective belonging. The authors argue for reconciliation pedagogies that acknowledge power asymmetries, resist the pull toward closure, and delink (to the extent possible) from nationalist discourses. Bekerman and Zembylas conclude with a recommendation for teachers and students to become “critical design experts” in schools, (1) considering the importance of context, (2) “disrupting taken for granted assumptions about peace education” (p. 189), and (3) “recognizing the power of emotion” (p. 191). Bey, Theresa and Gwendolyn Turner (1996), Making School a Place of Peace, Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press. Written for teachers at all levels, this book aims to combat the increasing levels of violence found in schools with a peace-oriented pedagogy. Emphasizing conflict resolution, social problem solving, and peacemaking skills, the authors suggest the ways in which teachers can encourage productive social skills in students and promote a more peaceful school environment. The authors further outline the ways in which peace education can be best incorporated in curriculum, relationships with parents/families, as well as school-community partnerships. In terms of curriculum, the authors heavily emphasize the need for multicultural peace education to further establish understanding and tolerance necessary for peaceful conflict resolution. Brantmeier, Edward, Lin Jing, and John Miller (2011), Spirituality, Religion, and Peace Education, Charlotte, NC: Information Age Publishing. Written for educators, students, and researchers, this book explores education for inner and interpersonal peace through various religious and wisdom traditions: Confucianism; Judaism; Islam/Sufism; Christianity; Quakerism; Hinduism; Tibetan Buddhism; and indigenous spirituality. It also explores wisdom traditions rooted in inner exploration, the development of skills, and contemplative practices in Part II of the book. A range of topics are explored: Daoism and narrative inquiry; 12-Step Programs for Peace; Gandhi, deep ecology, and multicultural teacher education; and wisdom-based learning in teacher education. Cultural awareness and understanding are fostered

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through an exploration by authors who are typically practitioners of the various traditions they write about. Burns, Robin and Robert Aspeslagh (1996), Three Decades of Peace Education Around the World, New York, NY: Garland Publishing. Drawing from the rich and dynamic discussion among peace educators of the Peace Education Commission of the International Peace Research Association, this anthology synthesizes the decades of peace education from international and comparative perspectives. Included chapters cover topics such as: peace education in the context of war and peace; the role of peace education in global development; peace education as a form of resistance; complicated peace research ethics; and many more. Case studies are drawn from a wide range of international locales, from Europe to Asia to Africa. Cabezudo, Alicia and Betty Reardon (2002), Learning to Abolish War: Teaching Toward a Culture of Peace, New York, NY: Hague Appeal for Peace. A peace education resource packet written for teachers, researchers, and activists at all levels, Learning to Abolish War is a comprehensive three-book anthology of peace education resources. The first book in the collection is on rationale for and approaches to peace education, outlining the central theoretical tenets of peace education as well as the key pedagogy for effective peace education. The second book consists of sample learning units concerning topics such as the roots of war / culture of peace, international human rights / institutions, conflict studies, and human security for students at all levels, from elementary to secondary. The third book includes tools and resources to sustain peace education activism, offering networking tools for organizations and online resources for educators. Cannon, Susan Gelber (2011), Think, Care, Act: Teaching for a Peaceful Future, Charlotte, NC: Information Age Publishing. Written for educators, this book blends theory and practice to establish usable peace education praxis for educators. The central argument of this reflective book is that teachers should advance the causes of peace education in their classrooms to promote a more secure world based on justice and human rights through consciousness raising, caring, and engaging in action toward change. The author utilizes an empowerment model and provides ample practical ideas for teaching peace at the primary, middle, and secondary levels. Chapter topics include: critical thinking; media literacy; critical imagining; school safety; literature for empathy development; creating local and global caring communities; engaged citizenship projects; student governance; debate; Model UN; and other social action projects. Chapters

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contain a plethora of photographs that illustrate concepts and practices in action. The book includes a very helpful appendix that includes an annotated bibliography of resources for both teachers and students. There is also a list of picture books for peace and global awareness. Carter, Candace (ed.) (2010), Conflict Resolution and Peace Education: Transformations across Disciplines, New York: Palgrave Macmillan This edited volume explores interdisciplinary approaches to conflict transformation and offers in-depth case studies of how individuals are seeking to implement strategies in diverse locales. It emphasizes practice—exploring models in law, psychology, sociology, and education from the United States, the Philippines, India, and elsewhere. The book offers a diversity of perspectives, critiques of Western assumptions, and utilizes conflict analysis in examining structural violence in addition to direct violence. Cole, Elizabeth (ed.) (1999), Teaching the Violent Past: History Education and Reconciliation, Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield. A collection of nine case studies using history education to promote tolerance and reconciliation, Teaching the Violent Past unites critical peace education perspectives from all over the world, ranging from Japan to Ireland. The edited volume is divided up into three parts. The first concerns the challenges of long-term reconciliation in history education, drawing from case studies in post-conflict areas such as Germany, Japan, and Canada. The second is about reconciliation in process, where teaching conflict and tolerance in history is an ongoing process, drawing from Northern Ireland, Spain, and Guatemala. The third section is about peace education efforts that are challenged and/or jeopardized in Russia, Korea, and India/Pakistan. Eisler, Riane and Ron Miller (eds.) (2004), Educating for a Culture of Peace, New York: Heineman. In this edited volume concerning peace education, Eisler and Miller collected a variety of essays highlighting best practices in incorporating peaceful language, emphasizing social justice, and developing students’ visions of peace. The authors argue that to counter the dominant culture of violence, educators everywhere must provide their students with the tools to transform their relationships and environments through compassion, tolerance, and comfort in diversity. Through the essays, the authors provide a strong rationale for such a peace-oriented education and grounded approaches of incorporating peace-minded practices in everyday pedagogy and lesson plans. Finley, Laura (2011), Building a Peaceful Society: Creative Integration of Peace Education, Charlotte, NC: Information Age Publishing.

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Written for educators who work outside the classroom in the US criminal justice system, social services, or others social institutions, this book fundamentally critiques models that are rampant in these arenas. The central argument is that peace education must address both structural and institutional violence by questioning models and transforming them into partnership models governed by creativity, collaboration, and cooperation. The book is arranged as a critique and a call to action. Fisch, Shalom and Rosemarie Truglio (eds.) (2000), G is for Growing: Thirty Years of Research on Children and Sesame Street, New York: Routledge. This book contains a broad synthesis of the research that has been done on Sesame Street since the 1970s. Editors have included reviews of studies of the impact of Sesame Street on children, the influence Sesame Street has had in pop culture and media, the impact of educational media projects on child development, as well as the proliferation of Sesame Street in cross-cultural contexts. Furthermore, this volume contains guidelines and suggestions for academics and researchers when studying and researching work that fuses educational media projects, early childhood education, and child development. Galtung, Johan and S. P. Udayakumar (2011), More than a Curriculum: Education for Peace and Development, Charlotte, NC: Information Age Publishing. Using critical case studies of alternative peace education schools and projects, Galtung and Udayakumar explore how to best incorporate peace education in schooling practices. The authors examine structural practices that discourage or facilitate peace education through a study of successful and unsuccessful peace education efforts. Instead of an emphasis on peace education as a form of curriculum, the authors emphasize the necessity of educators “embodying peace” to truly produce a transformative peaceoriented educational experience. Education for peace and tolerance for the authors is “more than a curriculum”; rather, it is a lifelong process, both at the individual and collective levels. Gevinson, Steven, David Hammond, and Phil Thompson (2006), Increase the Peace: A Program for Ending School Violence, Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann Press. Written for middle- and high-school educators, this book and accompanying videos provide practical lessons to walk students through the tangled emotional responses and potential for positive change encountered in conflict situations in schools. Student and community member interviews and realworld role-playing scenarios invite teachers to engage their students in skill

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development that hopefully will end and prevent various forms of violence prevalent in US schools today. Harris, Ian (2013), Peace Education from the Grassroots, Charlotte, NC: Information Age Publishing. This book presents voices of everyday peace educators from around the globe working to improve the lives of children and families. “Peace Education from the Grassroots tells the stories of concerned citizens, teachers, and grassroots peace activists who have struggled to counteract high levels of violence by teaching about the sources for violence and strategies for peace” (Information Age Publishing n.d.). Chapters come from different countries— Belgium, Canada, El Salvador, Germany, India, Jamaica, Japan, Mexico, the Philippines, South Korea, Spain, Uganda, and the United States. This book offers a cross-section of peace education practice on the ground. Harris, Ian and Mary Lee Morrison (2012), Peace Education, 3rd edn, Jefferson, NC: McFarland. This classic book in peace education, first published in 1988, deals with historical and religious trends/events that have shaped our understanding of peace, applications of peace education in the classroom, and implications of the use of peace education for students, schools, and communities. The book provides an in-depth overview of the constantly changing conceptualization of peace and best practices in peace education curriculum and pedagogy (in schools, churches, and other community spaces). Harris, I. and A. Shuster (eds.) (2006), Global Directory of Peace Studies and Conflict Resolution Programs, 6th edn., San Francisco, CA: Peace and Justice Studies Association. This compilation features perhaps the most comprehensive annotated guide to peace studies and conflict resolution programs at colleges and universities worldwide. The directory features programs at undergraduate, Masters, and Doctoral levels in over forty countries and thirty-eight states in the US. Within the volume, the programs are described through their philosophy and goals, contact information, location, religious affiliation, and type of degree. Journals that publish peace and conflict studies material are also part of the volume. Hicks, David and Cathie Holden (eds.) (2007), Teaching the Global Dimension: Key Principles and Effective Practice, London: Routledge. Written for educators, this book provides important insights into the theory and practice of global education. The edited volume is grounded in the positions of teachers and students in the classroom pertaining

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to global issues. It explores key concepts in global education such as conflict resolution, social justice, values and perceptions, sustainable development, interdependence, human rights, diversity, and global citizenship. The book also provides case studies of best practice at both the primary and secondary level. Hicks and Holden provide educators everywhere a straightforward overview of global education through such a collection of essays and perspectives. Howlett, Charles and Ian Harris (2010), Books, not Bombs: Teaching Peace since the Dawn of the Republic, Charlotte, NC: Information Age Publishing. Written for educators, researchers, and students, Books, not Bombs aims to explore the origins and evolution of peace education both inside and outside the classroom. Howlett and Harris are different from other scholars in the ways in which they attempt to study peace education in the context of opposing war and promoting social justice, instead of conflict resolution and peace pedagogy. In essence, this book provides a historical perspective of the development of peace education from the eighteenth century to the current day. Howlett, Charles and Robbie Lieberman (2008), For the People: A Documentary History of the Struggle for Peace and Justice in the United States, Charlotte, NC: Information Age Publishing. A historical docu-text, For the People provides secondary school students a comprehensive understanding of peace politics and activism from the eighteenth through twenty-first centuries. Through a historical perspective, Howlett and Lieberman weave in the story of the peace movement, its linkages to wider social justice movements, and its transformation from an advocacy for an absence of war to a push for equality for all. This book includes primary source documents, photographs, analyses, questions, and a list of references for students to conduct research of their own departing from this book. For the People is supposed to act as a supplementary guide to A History of the American Peace Movement from Colonial Times to the Present, written by the same authors. Iram, Yaacov, Hillel Wahrman, and Zehavit Gross (eds.) (2006), Educating Toward a Culture of Peace, Charlotte, NC: Information Age Press. This book was produced as a result of an international conference held in 2003 at Bar Ilan University in Israel. Many international perspectives are included, including those from Canada, Chile, Croatia, Germany, Mauritius, the Netherlands, the U.S., Palestine, Israel, Australia, India, Jordan, and Morocco. This book tackles the critical issue of developing educational

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practices for a culture of peace. Major sections include peace education paradigms, globalization and peace, culture of peace perceptions, religiosity and culture of peace, and peace education initiatives. King, Edith (2006), Meeting the challenges of teaching in an era of terrorism, New York: Thompson Publishers. Written for peace educators and researchers, this book provides a call for peaceful and equitable education in the context of terrorism. Drawing from women peace advocates, such as Elise Boulding and Margaret Mead, King lays out the challenges of teaching in an era of terrorism. According to King, the rise of terrorism coincides with increased claims of ethnicity and selfidentity. Therefore, in schools, educators must address the intersectional forms of identity, including race, gender, religion, class, etc. to promote a culture of peace, tolerance, and understanding. Throughout the book, King introduces multiple stories of the role of peace education in classrooms that are plagued by unequal social forces and shadows of terrorism and violence. These stories take place all over the world, from the United States to Saudi Arabia. King frames each story with an educational sociological approach. Lantieri, Linda and Janet Patti (1996), Waging peace in our schools, Boston: Beacon Press. Written for educators, this book provides a foundation for a new vision of education based on teaching peace and creating peaceable classrooms. Focused on teaching conflict resolution skills and creative inclusive schooling environments that value diversity and cultural competence, chapters explore the possibilities of peace pedagogy, mediation in schools, and peace in our communities. This book is hopeful and provides some needed approaches to promoting positive peace in schools. Lin, Jing, Edward Brantmeier, and Christa Bruhn (eds.) (2008), Transforming Education for Peace, Charlotte, NC: Information Age Publishing. In this edited volume, Lin, Brantmeier, and Bruhn bring together a myriad of voices and perspectives on peace education across national and social contexts. Case studies range from the study of actual classrooms to websites, from the US Midwest to Israel–Palestine, India, and Costa Rica. The authors attempt to (re)define and (re)conceptualize peace education in its own space. The book aims to use its diverse range of case studies to build a framework through which peace education can be a major educational paradigm. Written for educators and researchers at all levels, the book aims to be a resource through which effective peace education can be implemented effectively and studied/researched in more depth.

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McCarthy, C. (2002), I’d Rather Teach Peace, Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books. In this book, McCarthy, a longtime Washington Post columnist, chronicles one semester teaching peace at six schools. These schools varied from higher education institutions to public high schools to youth centers. In his curriculum, he employs tenets of peace education, such as nonviolence, pacifism/tolerance, and conflict management, and introduces key figures in peace activism, such as Mahatma Gandhi, Cesar Chavez, and Martin Luther King Jr. The book aims to outline the ways in which McCarthy motivates students to explore issues related to peace, drawing from his teaching experiences in vastly different contexts. Bekerman, Zvi and Claire McGlynn (eds.) (2007), Addressing Ethnic Conflict through Peace Education: International Perspectives, New York: Palgrave Macmillan. McGlynn, Claire, Zvi Bekerman, Michalinos Zembylas, and Tony Gallagher (eds.) (2009), Peace Education in Conflict and Post-Conflict Societies: Comparative Perspectives, New York: Palgrave Macmillan. McGlynn, Claire, Michalinos Zembylas, and Zvi Bekerman (2013), Integrated Education in Conflicted Societies, New York: Palgrave Macmillan. These three volumes bring together comparative perspectives on peace education in conflict settings across the globe. Drawing lessons from distinct contexts, the volumes examine coexistence camps, integrated schools, and university-level peace initiatives from diverse locales such as Israel, Cyprus, Northern Ireland, the Balkans, the Dominican Republic, Burundi, and South Africa. Taken together, the volumes offer insights into the challenges to, and possibilities for, peace education programs and policies that seek to mitigate ethnic tensions and promote reconciliation in post-conflict settings. Taken individually, each book hones in on specific aspects of comparative work and the understandings they generate across contexts of the limits and possibilities of peace education in conflict settings. The editors of these books have advanced theoretical understandings of the dynamic role of peace education amidst contested histories and protracted conflict. Mirra, Carl (2008), United States Foreign Policy and the Prospects for Peace Education, New York: McFarland. Carl Mirra explores the correlation between militarism in US foreign policy and peace education. The author situates peace education practices amid larger narratives and constructions of peace and war amid patriotism and international relations. Mirra looks at US foreign policy in historical perspective, critiquing the Cold War policies of free-market expansion through multinational corporations at the cost of a genuine concern for human security. He argues for nonviolence as an ethic that should underpin US foreign policy. Mirra discusses

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the International Criminal Court as peace educator in that it holds the promise for a democratic and universal standard-bearer despite the United States’ unwillingness to adhere to its jurisdiction. The author ultimately argues for nonviolence as a core value and “suggests that a holistic cosmology of humility and empathy can refashion the United States’ role in the world” (138). Noddings, Nel (2011), Peace Education: How We Come to Love and Hate War, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. In this book, well-known educational philosopher Nel Noddings, recognized most for her theories on caring in schools, offers perspectives on how education can combat cultures of violence. Her primary focus is on “direct violence,” such as aggression, war, and militarism, and little of the book is devoted to analyses of structural or cultural forms of violence. Nonetheless, the book offers a depth of perspectives on the psychology of war and the historical and cultural glorification of masculinity. Focusing on the United States, Noddings further discusses the differences between patriotism and cosmopolitanism, arguing that the former can lead to educational systems fostering hatred in times of war. She also discusses pacifism, war, and peace movements, arguing that women’s experiences and values need to contribute to larger visions and conceptions of peace. Page, James (2008), Peace Education: Exploring Ethical and Philosophical Foundations, Charlotte, NC: Information Age Publishing. The philosophical foundations of peace education have long been assumed and left unquestioned. In this book, Page attempts to investigate the various ethico-philosophical approaches to peace education. He argues that the philosophical underpinnings of peace education include: (1) virtue ethics, where peace may be interpreted as a virtue and/or vice; (2) consequentialist ethics, whereby peace education may be interpreted as education regarding the consequences of our action and inaction; (3) conservative political ethics, whereby peace education emphasizes the importance of the evolution of social institutions and the importance of ordered and lawful social change; (4) aesthetic ethics, whereby peace is understood as beautiful and valuable in itself; and (5) the ethics of care, whereby peace education emphasizes the value of trust and engagement with others. Throughout his book, Page addresses the history of these traditions, their strengths and the weaknesses, and the ways in which these traditions support peace education. Reardon, Betty and Dale Snauwaert (2014), Betty A. Reardon: A Pioneer in Education for Peace and Human Rights, New York: Springer. This book reviews and highlights the contributions of Betty Reardon to the field of peace education. The book compiles her reflections, excerpts from

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her seminal scholarship in the field and covers five decades of her contributions. Divided into three generations, the authors provide essays from Betty Reardon’s long career that highlight her substantive contributions and shaping of the field of peace education in distinct periods. The third generation examines contemporary thinking and reflection on the political dimensions of peace education and propositions for current and future peace educators. Reardon argues, “human rights are the ethical core of peace education” and offers several insights into alignment between the fields of critical pedagogy, Freirean education, human rights education, and peace education (147). Salomon, Gavriel and Ed Cairns (eds.) (2010), Handbook on Peace Education, New York, NY: Taylor & Francis. Peace education is in many ways an applied subject grounded in several different disciplines, ranging from philosophy to psychology, sociology, and political science. For that reason, Solomon and Cairns brought together researchers and academics from various disciplines to speak on peace education in practice, research on peace education, and evaluation of peace education. To best address such issues, the editors split up the volume into first, the context of peace education, then the contribution of underlying disciplines, and finally, approaches to peace education. The “approaches to peace education” section includes chapters on promoting a culture of peace, storytelling, peace-oriented history teaching, effective program development, and more. Case studies’ geopolitical contexts include regions entrenched in conflict, such as Israel, and post-conflict regions, such as Bosnia and Herzegovina, Northern Ireland, and Germany. Salomon, Gavriel and Baruch Nevo (eds.) (2003), Peace Education: The Concept, Principles, and Practices Around the World, Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum. Written for scholars, students, and researchers interested in peace and conflict resolution in higher education, volunteer, and public organizations, this book provides a comprehensive overview of the history of peace education, its context in relation to other academic disciplines, the main psychological and pedagogical principles of peace education, and case studies from all over the world, such as Croatia, Northern Ireland, Israel, South Africa, Rwanda, and the United States. Therefore, the book is divided into four parts: (1) concepts of peace education; (2) underlying principles of peace education; (3) case studies of peace education; and (4) research and evaluation of peace education. Tawil, Sobhi and Alexandra Harley (eds.) (2004), Education, Conflict, and Social Cohesion, Geneva: UNESCO, International Bureau of Education. In Education, Conflict, and Social Cohesion, Tawil and Harley brought together

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their collaborators around two central questions: (1) “Are schools complicit in producing identity-based conflict?” and (2) “How can schools contribute to social and civic reconstruction?” Throughout case studies from BosniaHerzegovina, Guatemala, Lebanon, Mozambique, Northern Ireland, Rwanda, and Sri Lanka, the authors weave through a common analytical framework grounded in the dynamic understandings of social cohesion as reflected in curriculum and education policy reform. In this way, the authors examined the ways in which curriculum policy is linked to national identity and citizenship. Issues such as what languages are taught in schools in a multicultural and multilingual society and contested interpretations of national history featured in curriculum are common themes throughout the various essays. Editors conclude that in order for peace education to be truly effective, researchers and educators must better understand the nuanced relationships between schooling and conflict, with particular regard to the ways in which schools shape national identity and citizenship. Timpson, William, Edward Brantmeier, Nathalie Kees, Tom Cavanagh, Claire McGlynn, and Elavie Ndura-Ouédraogo (2009), 147 Tips for Teaching Peace and Reconciliation, Madison, WI: Atwood Publishing. Written for educators, this book attempts to provide practical, usable teaching strategies for people working toward peace and reconciliation in schools and community-based contexts. “Tips” attempt to build bridges among peace educators, peace scholars, and peace activists; each tip is rooted in the theoretical and conceptual world of peace and reconciliation education. Short, pithy, and rich with personal example, the following topics and more are explored through 147 useable teaching strategies: understanding the field of peace education; seeing the connections between culture and biodiversity; understanding types and forms of conflict and restorative practices aimed at individual and communal harmony; developing emotional intelligence; building positive climates and trust; promoting creative engagement in peace and reconciliation processes; building curriculum; and understanding change for the purpose of promoting peace and reconciliation.1

Note 1

We are extremely thankful to Eunice Roh for assisting in the compilation and review of these resources for further reading.

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Index activism 1, 30, 83–5, 116, 131, 143, 191, 215, 237–8 agency 4, 22–4, 30, 37, 109, 115, 157, 169–72, 177, 182, 236 Apartheid 23–5, 39–45 bilingualism 9, 11, 51, 57–63 see also Education, bilingual care 172, 182, 185–7, 192, 197, 209 Ceeds of Peace 9, 15, 193–213 citizenship global 37, 47, 102, 210 local 30, 47, 78, 95, 205 national 37–8, 40–5, 51–7, 60, 65, 81–4, 111 civil society 36–40, 49, 73, 76, 78, 82–6, 162, 233 coexistence 4, 9, 11, 13, 40, 57–9, 63–6, 111–17, 120, 157, 172 colonialism 3, 13, 52, 64, 107–10, 119, 130, 135, 141–56, 159 conflict continuum 71–86, 236 cross-cultural encounters 55, 61 Cyprus 4, 10, 19–33, 57 democracy 20, 26, 37–47, 50–3, 65, 76, 115, 126, 128, 205, 211 Derrida, Jacques 127–34 dignity 15, 42, 71, 82, 90, 185, 191, 212 Ecuador 13–14, 157–73 education bilingual 51, 57–63 character 47, 79, 111–21, 153, 195, 205 conflict-sensitive 98 critical peace 4, 7, 14–15, 19–33, 109–12, 144–5,

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154, 158–61, 172, 177–92, 135, 237 democratic 14–15, 99, 109, 111, 177–87, 195 early childhood 153, 215–31 girls’ 103, 151–2, 216 history 35–50 human rights 45, 51, 82, 99 integrated peace 8, 11, 46, 48, 50, 51–67 moral 20, 44, 47, 60, 109, 112–20, 227–8 multicultural 51, 100, 216 post-conflict 11, 16, 72–81, 218 values 82, 111–21 education reform 36, 46, 50, 77, 82, 99, 177–92 emotion 19–33, 37, 43, 92, 136, 144, 187, 200–1, 216–22, 230 empathy 10, 21, 28, 30–7, 92, 97, 109, 118, 196, 202, 217, 219, 225, 228, 230 ethnicity/ethnic identity 29, 55–6, 202 Facing History and Ourselves 10–11, 32, 35–50 Freire, Paulo 2, 4, 22, 30, 109, 120, 138, 160, 182, 186, 238 Galtung, Johan 2–5, 10, 51, 72, 76, 89, 108, 110, 126, 134, 195, 213, 219 Gandhi, Mahatma 13, 107–22, 197 Gandhian studies 13, 107–22 gender 4, 25–6, 41, 44, 96, 108, 110, 114, 120, 195, 202, 216–28, 235 genocide 22, 25, 193, 236 global South 13, 107, 121, 235 Greece 65, 19–21

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Hawai’i 7–9, 14–15, 193–213 Holocaust 20–1, 49, 52 human rights 4–6, 9, 19, 36–7, 42–7, 51, 64, 80, 82, 90, 99, 116, 120, 126, 190, 195, 201 identity-based conflict (ethnic, religious) 9–11, 13, 35–50, 56, 65, 91–6, 131–8, 183, 202, 250 India 8–13, 107–22, 221, 224–5 international development 5, 71, 74, 144 Israeli–Palestinian conflict 4, 7–11, 29, 51–67, 74–8, 216–21, 227–30 Israel 4, 7–11, 29, 51–67, 74–8, 216–21, 227–30 Palestine 4, 7–11, 29, 51–67, 74–8, 216–21, 227–30 Kenya 8, 11, 12, 89–106 Lebanon 8, 11–12, 71–87, 114 media 20–1, 81–2, 116, 143, 215–31 children’s 215–31 mediation 56, 137, 147–8, 156, 195, 203, 208, 211 memory 10, 37, 128, 153 New York City 8, 14–15, 177–92, 217–18 Northern Ireland 2, 4, 8, 10, 11, 29, 35–50, 55–7, 216, 219, 221–30 peace negative 3, 14, 76, 80, 6, 134, 144–55, 181 positive 3, 14, 76–7, 80, 81, 89, 134, 145–55, 194 studies 2, 3, 13, 108, 117–20, 213 peacebuilding 11, 13, 30, 35–50, 71–87, 90, 98, 105, 114, 193–213 peacekeeping 127, 194 peacemaking 13, 118, 194 pedagogy critical 4, 10, 19–33, 120, 182–6, 190 participatory 3, 96–7, 104, 109, 190, 238

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Philippines 13, 125–40 pluralism 60, 108, 114–15 post-apartheid 23, 41 post-colonialism 4, 107–10, 141–56, 181 post-structuralism 4, 7, 129 racism 3–4, 8, 23–6, 41, 44, 56, 65, 185, 221 reconciliation 5, 10–11, 23, 28–32, 29, 40–8, 63, 76, 81, 91, 95, 116–19, 207, 211, 216–22, 238 refugees 12, 19, 74–5, 90–3, 237 restorative justice 120, 185 Ricigliano, Robert 195–7, 210–12 school climate 149, 177–80, 191 sectarianism 56, 74–5, 87, 99, 216–18 Sesame Street 15, 215–31 social justice 5, 15–16, 36, 42, 51, 90, 95, 111, 117–18, 154, 172, 178, 184, 192, 205 social movements 109, 120, 237 South Africa 4, 8, 10–11, 23, 35–50, 55, 195, 220–3, 230 sustainability/environment 71, 108, 120, 142, 195, 204 teachers education/training 1, 5, 12, 92, 97–106, 116, 138, 225 professional development 11, 36–8, 43, 48, 50, 91, 99–104, 154, 196 Teachers Without Borders 99–100 television 2, 15, 114, 127, 215–31 tolerance 47, 56, 60, 63, 91, 111, 115, 126, 189, 217 transformative learning/education 4, 12, 14, 22, 29, 36, 86, 104, 157, 177–81, 209, 234 trauma 6, 10, 11, 19–33, 43, 49, 211 Trinidad 13–14, 141–56 troubled knowledge 10, 22–31 Truth and Reconciliation Commissions 39–40, 211, 237 Turkey 19–20

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Index United Nations 1, 12, 71, 91, 108, 120, 201, 233 Children’s Fund (UNICEF) 1, 83–6, 95–105 High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) 90–5, 106 Peacebuilding Architecture 71–2 utopia 64, 127–39 violence cultural 3, 218–25 direct 3, 76, 108, 110, 115, 117, 126, 134, 146–51, 172, 195, 215, 222, 236 discursive 141–2, 152–3 indirect 3

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mass 35–8 post-election 90, 95, 100 prevention of 81, 115, 142–9, 201, 211 school 14, 141–56, 157–73 structural 4, 14–15, 74–7, 83, 108, 110, 126–7, 141–55, 177–8, 184, 192, 236–7 urban 14, 157–73 youth 1, 8, 11, 13, 15, 49, 73, 80–5, 92–6, 116, 119, 131, 141–55, 157–73, 178–92, 206, 211, 235, 238 Zionism 52

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