Science and Education

Peace education and education for reconciliation instead of military intervention – that is the motto of German international missions in areas of conflict. Whether such “soft-power” measures like these actually have the desired effect has up to now remained pure speculation. Now however an evaluation study carried out by the Institute of Educational Science at the University of Heidelberg has come up with some positive results. An interview with project manager, Volker Lenhart.

Herr Professor Lenhart, let's begin with a question on what we are to understand by peace education measures – Could you explain briefly what they mean?

It is the attempt to promote peace in conflict areas with the help of education and to contribute towards reconciling the hostile parties. The measures range from organising the joint sponsoring of schools by the conflicting parties to activities like “Sport for Peace” in which football is played; not just between teams from each conflict group, but between mixed teams containing players from both sides, who are to learn how to stick to the rules or deal with defeat. It is not just children and teenagers on the teams, but also adults and older ex-combatants.

Why and by whom are these measures organised and what is hoped to be gained from them?

They are organised either during a conflict or afterwards, some of them even as a preventive measure to stop a situation escalating. The agencies responsible are international organisations like UNICEF, the United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund, but also by non-governmental organisations and national as well as local projects, partly with international backing. Various German organisations are involved, for example, the Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (the German Association for International Cooperation).

What prompted you to take a more academic, in-depth look at the effectiveness of these peace education measures?

International literature has numerous descriptions of individual projects and a whole range of evaluations of individual projects. What was needed was a systematic “general survey” comprising contexts, means and effects, as well as the answer to the question – just how effective is something like this?

In my professional career I have devoted quite a lot of time and effort to education in the Third World. Both this and the tradition of communication-oriented educational science at Heidelberg motivated me to focus on this subject. And I really had to fight for it for quite a long time – and to get it financed, too. In the end it was the Deutsche Stiftung Friedensforschung (the German Foundation for Peace Research) that provided the backing.

A toolkit for successful peace education

What approach did you adopt for your study?

We carried out a total of two surveys. We investigated what was actually going on in ten conflict countries ranging from A for Afghanistan to S for Sudan – in Europe we took a look at Bosnia-Herzegovina and Northern Ireland. In the course of our Internet research - and I can say this in all conscience - we got very close to achieving a complete overall survey of all the measures mentioned on the Net between 2002 until 2006 and we established contact with the organisations responsible.

We bundled the plethora of over 80 individual activities into 25 “measure types” that ranged from curriculum design for peace education and methodological-didactic training to art or sport for peace projects. This helped us to produce a “toolkit” for all those people involved in the planning of such measures. We furthermore descriptively and statistically examined what measures and combinations were already in force and which ones were the most common. It is interesting, for example, that the emphasis is not so much on school measures, but more on extra-curricular measures, known as “non-formal educational measures”. This is apparently due to the fact that the organising agencies have greater difficulty in accessing the school systems.

The second survey adopted what was known as an “Experimental/Control Group” approach. For this we used two questionnaires to assess the attitudes of the people taking part in such measures and then compared them with those of others in the same social situation. In addition we also asked the people running the projects for their evaluations in order to compare them.

A big budget does not necessarily mean a big success

And what results did you arrive at?

Peace education projects, including those of a more socio-educational nature, have definite positive effects on the attitudes of the participants when it comes to their capacity for peace. This was the result of a survey in which 1,585 people in seven countries were questioned – in Somalia the survey could not be carried out due to risk of life and limb for the organisers, in two other countries it was cancelled due to organisational difficulties. This really is a clear sign of encouragement to back peace education in crisis zones and conflict areas!

As was expected the effects were less positive among older participants than among younger ones; more interestingly there was more resentment towards the conflict group among women that there was among men, although women are usually more inclined towards the peaceful solving of conflicts. It might well be a disappointment for educators that there was no relation between a person's educational level and a person's capacity for peace – concerning Israel and Palestine the opposite is even the case. Formal, i.e. school, projects and non-formal projects have better prospects of success than mixed ones. A large budget and long duration do not necessarily increase the chances of success. In the case of "local ownership" projects the chances of success are significantly diminished due to lack of distance and external guidance.

Are these findings relevant for future practice?

Formal and non-formal projects ought to be carried out separately and fewer mixed projects should be planned. Attention should be paid to the educational level of the people responsible for the project, because the higher the level, the better the chances of success. It should also be ensured that there is adequate financing and that the duration of the project is geared to its aims, although smaller and more short-term projects should still be taken on as their chances of success are good.

Volker Lenhart, born in 1939, studied educational science, evangelical theology and Latin in Bonn and Heidelberg. From 1973 onwards he lectured at the University of Heidelberg as a professor of educational science with the emphasis on school pedagogics. It was there in 1983 that he took over the research unit for comparative educational science, which he has also presided over since his retirement in 2008. He is furthermore active as an honorary professor at the Humboldt University in Berlin.