Higher education and peacebuilding – a bridge between communities

Bibliographic Data

ID12876182
AuthorsRebeen Abdulrahman Rasheed (University of Duhok), Alexander Navarrete Muñoz (New York University, corresponding author)
Year2016
Volume13
Issue2
Pages172-185
Publication date2016-05-03
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueJournal of Peace Education (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1740-0201 • E-ISSN: 1740-021X
PublisherTaylor & Francis (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/17400201.2016.1205003
OpenAlexW2461400193
LanguageEN
Citations received12
References cited7

As the Syrian civil war enters its fifth year, with over four million refugees and no solution in the near future, the international community must better consider long-term planning in regards to the plight of refugees and services to support them, not just short-term emergency responses. Critically, higher education is all too often ignored when addressing refugee crises, pushed aside in favor of primary education, and effectively disempowering those best suited to eventually rebuild and reconstruct after war’s end. This paper examines the often less considered aspect of refugee access to higher education, using Duhok, located in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq, as a case study, and hypothesizing that refugees’ inclusion in Duhok’s local higher education system can serve as an invaluable peacebuilding tool, bridging host and refugee communities, while empowering refugees to promote peacebuilding and development. We chose to focus on higher education because we agree with the idea espoused by Watenpaugh, Fricke, and Siegel that ‘university graduates ... include Syria’s brightest and most ambitious young people ... the human capital that will be critical to the rebuilding of Syrian society after the conflict has ended’. This study investigates Duhok area residents’ perceptions of the Syrian refugee crisis and the refugee population, refugees’ attitudes toward the host community and higher education, and personal views regarding intergroup relationships and the role of higher education, drawing primarily on field research conducted in 2013. Approached as a qualitative study, field research was conducted by a two-person team, with members representing the University of Duhok and New York University, and with the aim of actively working with research participants in the hopes of generating policy-related and practical recommendations

Economic growth · Focus group · Higher education · Inclusion (mineral · Peacebuilding · Political science · Population · Refugee · Sociology · Asian Geopolitics and Ethnography · Education and experiences of immigrants and refugees · Gender Studies · Law · Peacebuilding and International Security · Public Administration

Tools

Open DOISci-Hub