Teaching Peace?

I’ve been wondering lately about that one, about whether it is possible (it better be possible, or what would I have studied for and be working for and be dreaming for? Yeah, it better be, but is it?). Don’t get me wrong—I do believe that children can be encouraged to look at conflicts positively, encouraged to empathize more and judge less, given the tools to resolve the conflicts they face non-violently, and above all, helped to grow into happy, healthy adults who feel no need for violence. Yes, I do believe all of that.

But it’s a blind, hopeful kind of belief. Do I believe it because I have seen its results, or do I believe it simply because I want to? A little of both, I think. I have seen its results on a personal level, so I believe it. But at the societal level? There, I think it’s more that I really want to believe or else I would lose all hope, so I believe it. I guess we haven’t had enough, conscious peace education for there to be empirical evidence of its success. Or if there is some, I just haven’t come across it yet.

Ironically, the book that most convinces me that education for peace is possible is one called “Education for death.” A book about the Nazi system of education, going all the way through school and college, beginning right from the maternity homes where single, pregnant women who could certify that their child was “Pure Aryan” lived under the government’s care (what we now call “illegitimate” children were then known as “children of the State” and treated accordingly). This book is a scary read, yet very hard to put down. I read it cover-to-cover in one day, and I had nightmares that night.

But they were strange nightmares. While I was asleep, I didn’t even realize that it was a nightmare; that realization came only when I awoke. The dream, in brief was this: I am standing by the roadside, watching people around me getting killed, and I feel nothing. No fear, no sympathy, no emotion. Nothing. That’s what I mean when I say it wasn’t a nightmare while asleep, only when I woke up did I realize just what a horrible nightmare it was, this feeling nothing.

The book was published in 1942, at the height of Hitler’s power. The author was an American educator who had somehow managed access to Nazi schools before the war began. Throughout the book, and especially in the epilogue, the author’s panic is obvious. One sentence from that book has stayed with me: “They say that nationalism can’t be taught; well, Hitler is teaching it. He is creating fanatics, can we at least create believers?” Of course, this book itself talks in the context of the 2nd world war era, and the author is looking for ways to teach “democracy and freedom,” apart from nationalism, to American students. But it isn’t the specific value that interests me in the light of my work; it is the belief in the sheer power of education.

Hitler successfully used education (amongst other forms of propaganda) to teach war and hatred. Super-systematically, too; I remember examples of Math questions like “If there are currently X number of Germans and Y number of Jews in Germany, and if the Jews are multiplying at the rate of Z, how many years before the Jews take over Germany?”. It doesn’t matter what those figures are like or whether they are accurate—the point is that it’s an utterly twisted but pretty brilliant form of persuasion. Again, Hitler could teach war so effectively; we should be able to teach peace at least as effectively. He does, at least, attest to the power of a well thought out educational system… I can’t believe I think there’s anything to be learned from Nazi education, but it does reassure me that education is very powerful. What we do with that power, then, is where the battle lies.

So, Hitler created fanatics for his cause; can we at least create believers for ours?