NORTHERN ILLINOIS UNIVERSITY PEACE EDUCATION: HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVES, 1828-1983 (BOULDING, MONTESSORI)

Education for peace has centered around the shaping of a global world order characterized by peace and social justice. This historical study of peace education examined the interrelationships of concepts, culture, and curricula in America from 1828 to 1983 through analysis of primary source materials and the writings of educators. Major factors emerged: (1) Journals of the peace societies in the nineteenth century revealed an awareness of the potential for peace education. Separate societies for students and then women were organized. (2) Educators believed that peace education could bring about a transformation in the individual and society. Special focus was on an organization, the American School Peace League (1909-1916), which included the publication of curriculum guides. (3) Peace education included an international strand, launched as world citizenship or international friendship in the thirties and forties, refined as world affairs in the sixties, and expanded into global or world order education in the seventies and eighties. (4) Concern for law and order in the international arena was a primary motive for peace educators in the nineteenth century, especially Lucia and Edwin Mead. In the twentieth century, nonviolence as a process shaped world order education. (5) Concern for the child in the writings of educators such as Maria Montessori and Elise Boulding provided a rationale for peace education, the child and his future as a cornerstone for peace. (6) Peace education in the eighties included community education, nulcear war or disarmament education, and global education. (7) Quaker education as a persistent force in peace education was recognized.;The following recommendations were made: (1) the development of a long-range plan with a commission of representatives from private, public, and religious organizations to study methods for integration into the public school curriculum; (2) the development of a curriculum balanced between a peace-through-strength defense policy and nuclear disarmament; (3) the integration of the principles of peace education into social studies and history textbooks; and (4) the inclusion of the writings of peace educators in children's literature and language arts textbooks.