Peace Education, Its Aim, Importance and Role in Life
Peace education encircles the basic principles of peace and education. Though it sounds similar, its aim is quite different from the conventional way of teaching. The writers always divide peace into two types. One is negative peace and the other one is positive peace. The concept of negative peace is the presence of war and physical violence. Positive peace means the lack of the possibility of war and social injustice.
The concept of peace education is rather vast and indeed positive. The need and importance of peace education become both unavoidable and noticeable as it aims to teach every individual to live in peace with each other. It discourages violence and promotes equality. Continue reading to understand the need and importance of peace education.
What is Peace Education?
What is Peacemaking?
If you are wondering what peace education is, then here your answer. Peace education is a teaching process that helps to build peace between people. It teaches people to settle their differences with words and not by using any weapon.
Education is in the second position on the Institute for Economics and Peace’s Positive Peace Index, making it one of the most significant contributors to peace. You can define peace education as an area of education that intends to teach about peace and its importance. So, it promotes tolerance, social justice and nonviolence.
Importance of Peace Education
If you know what is peace education? You might understand its intention. However, the importance of peace education comes into the picture when the concept of peace building comes into existence. The concept of peace education focuses on the global recognition of peace. It encourages building a sense of brotherhood and mutual respect. There are three ways to achieve peace: Peacekeeping, Peacemaking, and Peacebuilding.
Peacekeeping, the first type, involves assigning police or special military forces to go to the place of battle and achieve peace with or without strength.
Peacemaking is a diplomatic process. It does not need any cooperation from military sources. All it needs is perfect communication skills to resolve the ongoing conflict. Whether it is a conflict between two countries or something internal, a good and eloquent speaker can solve the problem and keep it under control. But unfortunately, both types mentioned above take place when any violence happens.
Peacebuilding is the most fruitful way to teach peace. It makes people realise the importance of peace education. Peacebuilding develops comprehensive programmes to teach people how to interact with people and teach them to avoid aggression.
Moreover, it can be said that the need of peace education has increased in today’s time, particularly for the children who are working to build their identity.
Aim of Peace Education
There are many objectives of building peace education. Some are discussed as follows:
The first motive of peace education is to promote peace. Studying Arts gives people the proper concept of peace. Literature, painting, photography, music, dance forms, and fine arts provide ample opportunities to learn about peace education and appreciate its importance.
One of the aims and objectives of peace education is to make the students understand the national security systems. They need to understand the alternatives to war. Peace education also helps them understand international politics, the prison industrial complex, the arms race, etc.
Developing intercultural understanding is one of the most important aspects of peacebuilding. The 'us vs them' attitude has been destroying the mutual understanding and respect between countries. It had done so in the past. Promoting peace education works when everybody starts respecting other cultures and builds a clear understanding and respect for each other.
Encouraging students to build values and skills is one of the aims and objectives of peace education. It is important so that students get to live a satisfactory life.
Role of Education for Peaceful Living
Importance of Peacemaking
The basic nature of peace education is to spread self-belief and peace worldwide. And knowing the aims of peace education is the key. It can shape the mind, mend it and recreate. So, here are the roles of education in maintaining peace in life.
Education builds confidence and faith. Knowing something gives people a sense of accomplishment. It helps people to voice out their thoughts and reshape their thinking process. They can promote new ideas and optimism around the world. The more students get educated, the more they become accustomed to ‘peace’. It helps them to work to maintain peace.
Education builds independent thinking. It lets them build new ideas and make perfect sense of the world. Other than following something blindly, educated minds ask questions and try to find the answer to the unknown. In the end, they become leaders to promote positivity and hope.
As we have discussed before, communication skill is important for peacemaking. By going to school, students meet different students of their age. They share opinions, work on various projects, and resolve their conflicts. That is how they build communication skills. Building the power to talk is the nature of peace education.
Now, education fulfils the most important need of a person’s life. It gives people food and helps them get rid of poverty. A malnourished, hungry person tends to become angry, and it is just a matter of time before he becomes aggressive. So, education helps people to earn money and make an identification for them.
The biggest scope of peace education is that it encourages problem-solving capability. Education not only teaches how to solve a Maths problem, but also teaches students how to think logically. Analysing different literature supports independent thinking. Education also helps to know a lot of unknown things. This knowledge gives people the idea of solving problems in a non-violent way.
Conclusion
Education is the best way to earn a living and live a satisfactory life. However, it also has another motive. Peace education goes beyond the concept of making a living. It teaches the students how to maintain harmony and peace in the world and have critical and logical thinking. The main concept of peace education is to make people aware of the importance of peacemaking and to develop a positive environment.
