Whiteness, patriarchy, and peacebuilding in UN higher education: some theoretical and pedagogical implications from one case institution

Abstract

Peace in and through education has become an important educational development agenda. It has been included in human rights frameworks since 1948, and is emphasized in the 2030 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Yet, there are few studies examining how Peace and Conflict Studies (PACS) scholars, and by extension the institutions they embody, translate this agenda into the classroom. This paper then critically examines how PACS scholars from one United Nations higher education peace institution understand, practice and experience the challenges and contradictions of teaching for peace in the twenty-first century. In the study, data were collected through semi-structured interviews, participant observations, and document analysis with 25 PACS lecturers and 108 postgraduate students. Findings suggest that despite aspirations toward the liberal peace ideals of international understanding, equity and democratic peacebuilding as expressed by scholars and in peace studies literature, the practice of higher education peace pedagogy is instead imbued with ethnic, cultural, and gendered inequities. Some scholars articulated awareness of this while many others were more optimistic of the positive social change proclaimed through peace studies. Theoretical implications and two pedagogic strategies for peace are discussed.