Does peace education really make a difference?

Abstract

An inconsistency is pointed out between formidable and thus discouraging hurdles facing peace education in the context of intractable conflicts and actual, encouraging research findings of such programs. It is suggested that the hurdles pertain to the most deep-seated and thus unchangeable convictions constituting the backbone of a group's collective narrative. On the other hand, the change-objects affected by peace education programs pertain to more peripheral attitudes and beliefs, which are more easily changeable, more weakly associated with behaviors, and thus less consequential. This hypothetical possibility is briefly examined from both a theoretical and practical perspective, leading to three clusters of research questions: (a) Is the proposed distinction between central and peripheral attitudes and beliefs applicable to peace education programs?, (b) How stable are changes of peripheral attitudes in the absence of changes of the more central ones?, and (c) To what extent can only long-term, social...