Peace Studies as Experiential Education

Abstract

This article argues that peace education and good peace studies at the university level must include peace action as well. Despite general agreement in the peace studies field that such inclusion of peace action is important, few colleges or universities have successfully incorporated an experiential component into their academic programs. Using the Peace and Global Studies Program at Earlham College as a model, this article attempts to show how peace action, in the form of on-campus cocurricular experiences, off-campus internships, and foreign study, gives new meaning to the study that precedes it but also is modified by further course work. When constructed on a developmental basis, good peace studies programs are able to offer students a way both to “think [their] way into... acting” and to “act [their] way into... thinking.”