Research-Led Peace Education as Crisis Prevention in Central Africa

Peace education has the potential to fashion novel ways for children to cope with violent conflict. Rwanda has pioneered the incorporation of Peace and Values Education (PVE) into the national high school curriculum. However, research by Rwandan scholars suggests that across the country teachers are struggling to enable students to discuss contentious social issues concerning mass violence. This project will draw on humanities and social science research by Rwandan scholars to analyse the impact of this PVE intervention, exploring how teaching materials can enable critical discussions and its value for similar PVE interventions in the Central African Republic, where a violent crisis is ongoing. Building on a long-term collaboration among the Aegis Trust, King’s College London and SOAS, this work will contribute to understanding how peace education can form part of a crisis prevention approach to ongoing, protracted and structurally embedded violence.