International seminar on 'Teacher Education for Peace and Harmony'

INTERNATIONAL SEMINAR

Teacher Education for Peace and Harmony

INTRODUCTION

Recently world has seen nuclear catastrophe during Tsunami in Japan, political Tsunami in Middle East and Africa; racial & ethnic conflicts in Sri Lanka, east Asia and middle-east; terrorist and fundamentalist attacks in India, Pakistan, Iraq, Afghanistan  and other countries as well as Maoist Violence in south Asia. This shows the expression of intolerance, manifestations of racial and ethnic hatred, the perpetuation of violence, terrorism and wars with discrimination, inequality and the growing disparities between the rich and the poor. If civilizations aren't tuned to the reality of human existence, they conserve the worst of human behavior and free themselves from any responsibility of co-existential relations. Eventually, they become corrupt and self-destructing. All civilizations that misalign reality with bad decisions, wrong education, moronic people and parasitic leaders, first destroy their surrounding and finally destroy themselves.

Teachings and practices of Peace and Harmony are always relevant and significant for ensuring mutual cooperation, fundamental freedom, peace, humane conduct and co-existence.  The educated human being is then a fundamental unit of analysis for the study of mankind, existence and its order for purposeful ends. People found advantages in participating and cooperating with order of nature and society to achieve peace and harmony. Across the world, as well as in the Asian counties peace, values, morals, character and ethical education are gaining popularity, as nation-states, international organizations, global corporations and civil society organizations increasingly recognize the importance of such education.

In the changing global scenario the main aim of teacher education will be to help people to develop themselves as global and local responsible citizens who shall make with conscientious efforts for building a humane world with peace and harmony. The focus of teacher education would be the values of peace and harmony, based on the human mindset, human rights, mutual respect, mutual trust, cooperation and respect for life, social justice, open-mindedness and co-existence. Keeping this in view it is necessary to reorient and restructure the teacher education programme to include education for peace and harmony. Teacher education for peace and harmony intertwine with the concept of peace, which in turn is intrinsically linked to the understanding of global world orders and commonalities of socio-political-economic and legal systems. Content of teacher education curricula and teaching methodologies for moral, ethical, value, peace and harmony education for the development of human values need to be designed and strengthened.

The  urgency  and  necessity  of such  education  was  recognized  by  the  member  states  of  UNESCO  in  1974 and  reaffirmed  in  the  Integrated  framework  of  action  on  education  for  peace, human rights, and democracy in 1994. UNESCO is committed to promote universal values of peace and non-violence, human rights and social justice with intercultural dialogue and mutual understanding. The approach of UNESCO in educating for peace is multidimensional, for that it links education with a range of activities to address the root causes of violence and to create an atmosphere of peaceful co-existence and sustainable development.