Peace and Conflict Studies - Spring 2014

Peace and Conflict Studies Volume 21, Number 1 26 perspectives in a divided society where structural education reform is not yet a politically viable option. It also raises a number of critical questions regarding the politics of multiple youth representation and the strength of genuine commitment to peacebuilding in terms of conflict transformation. Education, Conflict and Peacebuilding The field of education and conflict emerged as a topic of concern due to its significance for the achievement of the education-related Millennium Development Goals. Over the course of the past two decades academics and donors have explored the ‘two faces’ of education and its role in both fuelling and mitigating conflict. An important study by Bush and Saltarelli (2000) drew on a number of international examples to highlight different forms of violence in education: “The negative face shows itself in the uneven distribution of education to create or preserve privilege, the use of education as a weapon of cultural repression, and the production or doctoring of textbooks to promote intolerance” (2000, p. 7). Subsequent studies have discussed the multiple ways that schools systems might reproduce social and gender inequalities that may be a catalyst for war (Davies, 2004). On the other hand, academics have examined the ways in which education can contribute positively to peace. Perhaps the most obvious way in which education may do this is through peace education programs. These programs have a wide variety of goals ranging from what Marc Ross (2000) has called ‘good enough conflict management’, in other words some level of mutual understanding and reduction in violence, through to programs that aim to attain the legitimization of the other side's perspective (Salomon, 2007). In a review of quasi-experimental studies carried out with Israeli-Jewish and Palestinian youth Salomon argues that peace education can produce more views of peace, better ability to see the other side's perspective, and greater willingness for contact. Perhaps most interestingly he also finds that in the context of protracted conflict these programs can play a preventative role in blocking the further deterioration of inter-group relations following adverse events outside the confines of the program. More recently there has also been a shift towards examining the role education can play in explicitly contributing to processes of peacebuilding and conflict transformation. The concept of peacebuilding originated in the field of peace studies in the work of Johan Galtung (1976) who argued that peacebuilding “has a structure different from, perhaps over and above, peacekeeping and ad hoc peacemaking” (1976, p. 297). In particular, he introduced the distinction between negative peace (the absence of violence) and positive peace (the