Peace Education: How We Come to Love and Hate War

by Nel Noddings

There is a huge volume of work on war and its causes, most of which treats its political and economic roots. In Loving and Hating War: An Approach to Peace Education, Nel Noddings explores the psychological factors that support war: nationalism, hatred, delight in spectacles, masculinity, religious extremism, and the search for existential meaning. She argues that while schools can do little to reduce the economic and political causes, they can do much to moderate the psychological factors that promote violence by helping students understand the forces that manipulate them.

Genres: Education

190 pages, Hardcover

First published November 14, 2011

About the author

Nel Noddings is an American feminist, educationalist, and philosopher best known for her work in philosophy of education, educational theory, and ethics of care.

Noddings received a bachelors degree in mathematics and physical science from Montclair State College in New Jersey, a masters degree in mathematics from Rutgers University, and a Ph.D. in education from the Stanford University School of Education.

Nel Noddings worked in many areas of the education system. She spent seventeen years as an elementary and high school mathematics teacher and school administrator, before earning her PhD and beginning work as an academic in the fields of philosophy of education, theory of education and ethics, specifically moral education and ethics of care. She became a member of the Stanford faculty in 1977, and was the Jacks Professor of Child Education from 1992 until 1998. While at Stanford University she received awards for teaching excellence in 1981, 1982 and 1997, and was the associate dean or acting dean of the School of Education for four years. After leaving Stanford University, she held positions at Columbia University and Colgate University. She is past president of the Philosophy of Education Society and the John Dewey Society. In 2002-2003 she held the John W. Porter Chair in Urban Education at Eastern Michigan University. She has been Lee L. Jacks Professor of Education, Emerita, at Stanford University since she retired in 1998.

Nel Noddings has 10 children and in 2009 had been married for 60 years. She has described her early educational experiences and her close relationships as key in her development of her philosophical position.

Reviews

[Ruxandra · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a light reading. The author explores the psychological factors that support war: nationalism, hatred, delight in spectacles, masculinity, religious extremism, and the search for existential meaning.

“But mourning the dead of one war becomes training for cadets who will fight the next.”

Peace should not be defined solely as the cessation of war; very often the cessation of official war is followed by continuing violence. A positive sense of social justice should also be involved in the process.

[Nayuna · Rating 5 out of 5]

The best non-fiction book I've read in a very long time. Nel Noddings dives deeply into psychology, history, and scientific research to explain the complicated outer (culture, social, political) and inner (psychological) forces that play into our love and hate for war.

"the dread of losing one's original source of meaning should make us hate war and violence passionately. But, paradoxically, when we are threatened with that loss, we may endure war as the courageous war to prevent it"

"It is perhaps too easy--seeing ourselves as 'city on a hill'--to forget the harm and destruction we caused in Cuba, Philippines, Korea, Vietnam, Central American, and our own American West. Without descending into self-loathing (which triggers further violence), we might participate in global dialogue aimed at understanding, not blame finding."

"the philosophy of the classroom in one generation will be the philosophy of the government in the next"

[Ietrio · Rating 1 out of 5]

A weak mind and an inflated ego: Noddings barely understands the theme, but is ready to offer general truths. Noddings does not grasp the ideas and turns them into gods / abstractions. This way War and Democracy, as entities, become easier to move around as in a madman's game of chess. For example Democracy is the will of the many and if the many ask for sacrificing the vulnerable to rob the wealth of the neighbor, than Democracy has asked for War. War, a word invented to make a disgusting act lawful if not noble, for Noddings is some sort of ogre who magically pops up when invoked by the magic spell of some politician.

[Andrews · Rating 5 out of 5]

Llibre bastant interessant per començar a entendre que significa la guerra a nivell més social, i com podem aplicar l’educació no per evitar-la sino per treballar-la. No obstant es bassa molt a nivell dels estats units on la cultura militar és més elevada que a nivell europeu, però s’entén perque l’autora es americana. El recomano. Està xuli.

[Amanda Kingston]

"If the well-being of my loved place depends on the well-being of Earth, I have a good reason for supporting the well-being of your loved place."
•••
I have enjoyed reading Noddings's work before, but I just did not get a lot of this text. The emphasis is primarily on Western understandings of peace and exemplars, and while Noddings talks about women/men and peace/violence, it reinforces gender binaries without doing work to look at gender being constructed by violence (and mutually constructing other structural violences). (This is a common theme in peace education and it's just so disappointing.)