How has education been addressed in peace agreements? This paper from the Conflict Resolution Quarterly aims to fill a gap in research by providing a systematic overview of the way education has been included in peace agreements and its role as a peacemaking strategy. The way in which education is addressed varies significantly in terms of what it entails, how it will be provided and to whom. Education should be considered an important element both of peace agreements and peace-building processes.
This article examines the ways in which education has been addressed and incorporated in peace agreements between 1989 and 2005. It argues that not only is education negatively affected by armed conflict, it can also play a contributory role in the outbreak of conflict. The article thus seeks to develop understanding of the relationships among education, conflict, and peace. It concludes by providing suggestions for further research to help improve understanding of the added value of including education in peace agreements.
In total, 57 out of 103 peace agreements (55 percent) signed between 1989 and 2005 mentioned education in some form. Education is largely viewed within peace agreements in four ways: as a security issue, a protection issue, an economic issue and a socio-political issue.
- Education is viewed as a necessary component of economic development and reconstruction and as a means to achieve self-reliance and alleviate poverty
- Mandates for education system reform are also mandates for social and political reform since they require a restructuring of social and political hierarchies
- Education is viewed as a security and protection issue since reforms address the integration of ex-combatants and returned refugees and internally displaced persons into the education system
- Educational provision is almost universally viewed as a public service that the state is responsible for delivering
- When education is not included in peace agreements it is often because education is viewed as a developmental rather than a humanitarian issue.
Addressing education in peace agreements can have a number of beneficial impacts. For example, it can:
- Increase the likelihood that education will remain a focus post-conflict and that the role education may have played in the outbreak of conflict will be addressed
- Demonstrate a commitment by the state to peacebuilding and transforming the roots of conflict
- Help to diffuse dissent
- Significantly contribute to building long-term, positive and sustainable peace; it can potentially transform the roots of conflict
- Provide an incentive to the laying down of arms, particularly where educational exclusion is a motivation to fight
- Be an important step towards building peace through renegotiation of the social contract.
