This book assesses the role of human rights education (HRE) in the peacebuilding field. Today, most governments, international organisations and non-governmental organisations recognise the importance of human rights in peace- and democracy-building activities in post-conflict regions. However, compared with other components of peacebuilding, little attention and funding have been given to the cultivation of human rights knowledge and skills within these populations. Almost nothing has been committed to understanding how HRE is best accomplished in such difficult circumstances. Human Rights Education and Peacebuilding demonstrates the promise of HRE programs to help bring about peace within challenging post-conflict contexts. Each chapter of this book (a) identifies the short and medium term impacts of seven different HRE programs on their respective target groups, and (b) provides an analysis of the peculiar local contextual factors that influenced each program's rationale for human rights education. More specifically, each chapter addresses these critical questions: - How are communities around the world using HRE to help rebuild their lives in the aftermath of an armed conflict? - How does HRE respond local problems and needs? How similar are the human rights impacts in the different projects? - How can we understand the promise and challenges associated with HRE as a component of community peace-building? This book will be of much interest to students of peacebuilding, conflict resolution, human rights, education studies and IR in general.

Africa today suffers from too much political unrest and violent conflict. The contributors to this edited collection recognize a missing link in efforts to foster democracy, and with it political stability and peace, in Africa's developing countries: Democracy can be sustained only where effective means for resolving citizens' disputes exist both within and outside the formal legal system. The writers whose articles appear here scholars, practitioners, and peace advocates present their varied knowledge of conflict and war in Africa and strategies for introducing and implementing mediation, from Sierra Leone to South Africa. This volume is a model exchange of insights and ideas in the important field of conflict resolution as applied to Africa."

This book assesses the role of human rights education (HRE) in the peacebuilding field. Today, most governments, international organisations and non-governmental organisations recognise the importance of human rights in peace- and democracy-building activities in post-conflict regions. However, compared with other components of peacebuilding, little attention and funding have been given to the cultivation of human rights knowledge and skills within these populations. Almost nothing has been committed to understanding how HRE is best accomplished in such difficult circumstances. Human Rights Education and Peacebuilding demonstrates the promise of HRE programs to help bring about peace within challenging post-conflict contexts. Each chapter of this book (a) identifies the short and medium term impacts of seven different HRE programs on their respective target groups, and (b) provides an analysis of the peculiar local contextual factors that influenced each program's rationale for human rights education. More specifically, each chapter addresses these critical questions: - How are communities around the world using HRE to help rebuild their lives in the aftermath of an armed conflict? - How does HRE respond local problems and needs? How similar are the human rights impacts in the different projects? - How can we understand the promise and challenges associated with HRE as a component of community peace-building? This book will be of much interest to students of peacebuilding, conflict resolution, human rights, education studies and IR in general.