holistic education as education for peace

It seems to me that there might be a basic reason for so many seemingly anomalous situations which cause a great deal of confusion, violence and suffering in a culture which extols the individual right of freedom to pursue so-called ‘happiness’. Can the reason be found in analysis of emotional forces which emanate from the fact that the internal logic of the Constitution is based on a false premise... that human nature is characterized by ego-centric self-interest?. It is this fallacious view of human nature which underlies the dualistic philosophy of balanced government as the means to control people's freedom for the pursuit of their so-called 'happiness'. This may be a stumbling block to the creation of a culture of peace and the implications are far-reaching. We would need to modify our understanding of human nature as a peaceful and compassionate nature on one condition… that human development must be complete. The nature or (‘character’) of each individual depends on the level of human psychological and moral (or ‘spiritual’) development which they have reached. Violence is evidence of frustration of complete development. Consequently a culture of peace depends on education which aims for complete individual development... moral as well as intellectual. Complete human development is the aim of the ‘right education’ for the individual as a whole i.e. ‘holistic education’. Holistic education is also known as ‘peace education’. Peace education would have to become a priority concern for the new Department of Peace.


"From a humanistic standpoint there is a serious dilemma in the philosophy of the Fathers, which derives from their conception of man. They thought man was a creature of rapacious self-interest, and yet they wanted him to be free - free in essence, to contend, to engage in an umpired strife, to use property to get property. They accepted the mercantile image of life as an eternal battleground, and assumed the Hobbesian war of each against all; they did not propose to put an end to this war, but merely to stabilize it and make it less murderous. They had no hope and they offered none for any ultimate organic change in the way men conduct themselves. The result was that while they thought self-interest the most dangerous and unbrookable quality of man, they necessarily underwrote it in trying to control it. They succeeded in both respects: under the competitive capitalism of the nineteenth century America continued to be an arena for various grasping and contending interests, and the federal government continued to provide a stable and acceptable medium within which they could contend; further it usually showed the wholesome bias on behalf of property which the Fathers expected. But no man who is as well abreast of modern science as the Fathers were of eighteenth science, believes any longer in unchanging human nature. Modern humanistic thinkers who seek for a means by which society may transcend eternal conflict and rigid adherence to property rights as its integrating principles can expect no answer in the philosophy of balanced governmment as it was set down by the Constitution-makers of 1787". (Richard Hofstadter 'The Founding Fathers: An Age of Realism' in Horowitz, R.H. (Ed) The Moral Foundations of the American Republic. Charlottesville, VA: University Press of Oceania 1986 p. 73)