|
There is no doubt that those who
promote human rights education are striving to do good work. It seems
that human rights educators are trying to stop people doing bad things
to, and hurting, other people. However, my initial impression is that
their aims are so unclear, and efforts so unfocussed that there will
be limited success. It also seems that what human rights education is
trying to achieve could be achieved by other educations such as peace
education, sex education and citizenship education.
As a starting point for more
study I’ve listed some definitions and statements offered by three
human rights education organisations and added some questions. Perhaps
raising questions is a good thing because it promotes further
learning.
Human Rights Education Associates
According to HERA human rights
education is quality education and training to promote
understanding, attitudes and actions to protect human rights, and to
foster the development of peaceable, free and just communities.
However, one must ask what are
these human rights that have to be protected? What does one have to do
to protect human rights? Answers to these questions are difficult to
find n on the site. Human rights education, to be effective, needs
those question answered. I notice that HREA also trains activists. One
would have to check to see how this training is conducted and what
activists are instructed to do before allowing Human Rights Educations
Associates into schools.
The fact that HREA offers more
“educations” such as tolerance education, education for social
responsibility, human rights studies and civic education indicates
that human rights education can be done under the auspices of others
educations. One could also ask what the difference is between human
rights studies and human rights educations?
Asia-Pacific regional Resource Center
for Human Rights Education (ARRC HRE)
Their definition of human rights
education is a participative process which contains deliberately
designed sets of learning activities using human rights knowledge,
values, and skills as content aimed at the general public to enable
them to understand their experiences and take control of their lives.
What are these values and does
this mean that human rights education could be done in a values
education class? What is the purpose of enabling people to understand
their experiences and take control of their lives? Surely education
entails some kind of behaviour change for the better, not just
understanding. Also its seems as if their human rights education is
aimed at those who are or could suffer human rights abuses. This is
different from other educations that focus on people who are or could
be the perpetrators.
Again
ARRC seems to avoid what I would see as a major purpose of human
rights education – the change of behaviour for the betterment of all.
All they say is that it should enable people to comprehend their
personal and social experiences so that they may transform these
experiences into something more desirable for them. If I am dirt poor,
robbing a bank could be a way of making my life more desirable.
ARRC
confirms that human rights education duplicates what is already being
done by peace education, gender education, environmental education,
and others – but as long as the content of these education
movements would liberate people from oppressive and exploitative
social realities. So again, it seems the primary focus is on the
behaviours of the ones suffering not the potential or actual
criminals.
Democracy and Human Rights
Education In Europe (DARE)
DARE, funded by the European Union, is
a network of 37 organisations from 26 countries and sees its role as
raising the profile of the twin fields of human rights education and
education for democratic citizenship, promoting transcultural and
transnational cooperation, and enhancing the quality of education within
these fields. Yet again no definition of human rights education is
given. I wondered why they used “education for democratic
citizenship” instead of democratic citizenship education”. I also
wondered why only two educations are singled out for twinning and what
is the reason for human rights education and education for democratic
citizenship being seen as twins.
The closes it dares comes to a definition of
human rights education is a list of core elements:
* the universal character of human rights * the respect for democracy,
human rights and fundamental freedoms * empowerment of the individual
citizen and groups to make full use of their democratic rights * the
combat against discrimination, racism, xenophobia and related
intolerance * gender equality * inclusion of persons with
disabilities * active citizenship
Of course each one of these
bullets needs further explanation. It is disappointing that there is
no direct mention of getting people to reflect on values for their own
well-being and the well-being of others. DARE lists a wealth of
learning materials, presentations, and reports from its members.
However, these are spread over so many diverse topics that it is
difficult to distil how they are related to human rights education.
Some conclusions for human rights education
The morass of unclear terminology
indicates that much more thoughts must be given to the aims of human
rights education. This is substantiated by the wide range of topics
from democracy to genocide and child labour to war crimes. I’m not the
only one confused. The Austrian Federal Ministry for Education, Arts
and Culture found that Austrian teachers are aware of the importance
of human rights education in the school system, but that there is some
uncertainty about its core content due to the lack of a clear line of
demarcation vis-ŕ-vis neighbouring disciplines.
A judge, Lord Denning sitting in
the Court of Human Rights said about the European Convention on human
rights ... "We will do our best to see that our decisions are in
conformity with it. But it is drawn in such vague terms that it can be
used for all sorts of unreasonable claims and provoke all sorts of
litigation. As so often happens with high-sounding principles, they
have to be brought down to earth. They have to be applied in a
work-a-day world."
In the next few years a large part of this effort and
expenditure should go into getting clear what human rights educators
are supposed to be doing.
There is
tremendous scope for research projects in human rights education. Dr
Bill would be delighted to advise
postgraduate
students (with the agreement of their university or college)
interested in this fascinating field. Contact him on
bill@valueseducation.co.uk
Copyright © 2008 Values Education Ltd
Note to editors. Feel free to use this article as long as the
following details are retained. “A values education article from CAVE
www.valueseducation.co.uk
”
|
