‘Are we doing Cátedra de Paz?’ Teacher perspectives on enacting peace education in Bogotá, Colombia

ABSTRACT

In 2015, the Colombian Ministry of Education introduced the Cátedra de Paz (CdP), a national policy that seeks to contribute to human rights, citizenship, violence prevention, and peaceful conflict resolution. In the context of a decentralized education system, schools have significant autonomy to adapt the policy to local contexts. Relatively little research to date has documented the enactment, evaluation, or impact of the CdP. This study aims to understand how educators have interpreted this national mandate, and the extent to which the policy has prompted and expanded teaching and learning opportunities about conflict, peace, and justice. We explore the perspectives of 46 teachers working in public schools across 19 of Bogotá’s 20 localities, several years into the creation of the CdP and in the midst of a contentious national peace process. The paper shows a range of enactment formats and uneven impact on teachers’ existing commitments to peace education. We conclude that the CdP has had a contradictory effect on school-based practices, legitimizing the importance of peace education as a national imperative, while marginalizing efforts within schools as individualized and bound to the social sciences subject.

KEYWORDS:

• Colombia
• peace education
• educational policy
• war/postwar
• teachers

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. The full survey question appeared as follows: ¿En tu colegio se enseña la Cátedra de la Paz? ¿Cómo? ¿Qué piensas de ella?/ Is Cátedra de Paz taught in your school? How? What do you think about it?

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Spencer Foundation University of Michigan Weiser Center for Emerging Democracies provided additional support. [201900112].

Notes on contributors

Michelle J. Bellino

Michelle Bellino is an Associate Professor of Educational Studies at the University of Michigan, where she studies youth citizenship in contexts impacted by conflict and displacement.

Marcela Ortiz-Guerrero

Marcela Ortiz-Guerrero, from Chile, is a doctoral student in the same department, studying the integration of displaced Venezuelans students in the Colombian education system.

Julia Paulson

Julia Paulson is a Professor of Education, Peace, and Conflict at University of Bristol School of Education.

Angie Paola Ariza Porras

Angie Paola Ariza Porras, from Colombia, is a doctoral student in Arts and Education at University of Granada.

Ibeth Danelly Cortes

Ibeth Danelly Cortes Rommero, from Colombia, has a MA in plastic and visual arts from National University La Plata.

Sebastian Ritschard

Sebastian Ritschard, from Colombia, is an anthropologist and applied ethicist with a MA from Utrecht University.

Ariel Sánchez Meertens

Ariel Sánchez Meertens is Advisor to the Executive Secretary of the Special Jurisdiction for Peace on Restorative Justice (JEP).