Nonviolencein education

Étienne Godinot

Translation : Claudia McKenny Engström

17.04.2015

Precision

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*The author was largely inspired by Jean-Marie Muller’s brochure on Nonviolence in Education (Ed. UNESCO and IRNC, 2002)

as well as Elisabeth Mathieu’s article “Sanction, contrainte et non-violence”, published in the Review Aletrnatives Non-violentes, Nr. 125, Winter 2003.

Nonviolence in education

Contents

- The duty to educate to nonviolence- The Law and the Rule- Authority- Transgression- Corporal punishments- Educational sanction- Educating to constructive resolution of conflicts, to democracy and citizenship

The duty to educate to nonviolence

“ Civilisation essentially consists in reducing violence ” Karl Popper

Education should aim at a person’s wellbeing, an ethic of respect and dignity of all Man, to freedom, justice and peace.

Law and rule : their function

A law (or rule) has a political function: it translates politically the values universally accepted as balancing general interest and individual freedoms.

Its social function is to organise and formalise distances, links and statuses to prevent power be taken over savagely.

Its psychological function is to help a person’s structuring and escape from an omnipotent desire.

Democratic laws, spoken laws, laws that forbid, laws said, explained, carry a meaning.

Authority

Authority is necessary in families, schools, in a company, in civil society.

A child builds his or her personality in confrontation with his or her parents’, educators’ authority.

Authority

Authoritarianism is domination of a person on another.

Authority serves the public good, it seeks consent.

An educator must always value constantly the link between:

- law and justice,

- a rule and the “living together”,

- individual constraint and the common good.

Guaranteeing laws and rules in constraint

Communication and sanction give laws and rules their meaning.

Communication explains, reassures, solidifies values and limits.

Sanction, such as transgression, is the action that allows acceptance, repair and reinsertion.

Transgression is often a combination of three elements

Fact Meaning Reaction

Damage (to a person) Engages the author’s civil responsibility

Real or symbolic compensation

Transgression of a law or rule

Engages his/her penal responsibility

Momentary withdrawal of a right within the group

Message engaging the author’s responsibility on

his/her own life

Why this act ? To answer what needs ?

Put words on the intentions, motives, unrest that led to this behaviour

Mistreatment / Abuse

Child abuse is still widespread in our societies.

It has heavy consequences on an adult’s behaviour, a person having suffered from child abuse being likely to treat others as it was treated.

Smacking ?

A smack (when given in anger or after warning) is of course less serious than hitting or wounding, and is better than ignoring,

but other educative measures must be sought for as often as possible : short exclusion from a group and under surveillance (ex.: from the classroom, forbidding television, etc.)

Educational sanctions

Impunity encourages a child to continue transgressing rules.

Educational sanctions will help him or her to become aware of his or her responsibility and to bring back together him/her with him/herself and with the group.

To sanction is to make one responsible, give a person a chance and opportunity to repair.

Restorative sanctions

- restore a relationship between the author and the victim

- restore a relation between the author and the group

- restore self confidence in the author

Learning civil responsibility

Learning penal responsibility

Learning responsibility over one’s own life

The educator exercises a constraint

ReparationControl

Withdrawal of a rightWork on rules

Questioning

Allow reflection

The educator accompanies

Suggest mediation Understand the meaning of the rule

ListenSuggest help

The interested party explains him/herself

Mediation accepted, withdrawalDo together

New contract or new choice

Taking care of the problemAsk for help

The group is implicated

Spaces of regulation

Reaffirming or readjusting the rule

SolidarityHelpAssistance

Transgression : answer in 3 acts and 4 steps

Education

Genuine civic education must contribute to children’s :

- autonomy rather than submission,

- critical thinking rather than passive obedience,

- responsibility rather than discipline,

- emulation and cooperation rather than competition,

- creativity rather than reproduction of models,

- solidarity rather than rivalry.

Fighting against exclusive ideologies

Education must destroy ideologies based on exclusion and discriminations against others, against those who are different :

- nationalism

- racism

- xenophobia

- religious fundamentalism

- economic liberalism grounded on the sole profit-goal and material well-being, etc.

Education for a constructive resolution of conflicts

- Teaching children (young people, adults) to live through a conflict, to not flee it, but to manage it constructively

- Implicate the different actors and group (students, team, etc.) in looking for a solution.

Education for a constructive resolution of conflicts

- Re-centre the conflict on the object that is the cause of it in order to avoid it degenerating into rivalry between people

- Break the silence, refuse to be a victim, being picked on by others

Encourage and promote mediation

Mediation consists in asking for a third person’s intervention in order to help the ones in conflict to :

- talk to each other

- remove misunderstandings

- understand each other

- find a compromise that will open to reconciliation

Encourage and promote mediation

The idea is to switch from a binary logic of confrontation to a three party cooperation,

for everyone to take a step back

- from oneself

- from the other

- from the conflict

Encourage and promote mediation

It isn’t enough to establish an objective truth on the facts.

It is more important to understand the subjective truth of those involved with regard to their feelings, desires, resentments and sufferance.

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