Evidence from Further Post-conflict Countries

Abstract

This chapter provides short summaries or accounts of formal education in ‘developing’ countries that have not been discussed so far in the more thematic chapters of the book but which are part of a UNESCO list of post-conflict 30 countries (provided at the beginning of the book). For these countries, there is a less substantial research literature in English but, for the sake of completeness, it is important to establish the likelihood—or not—of post-conflict educational transformation having taken place. This chapter is therefore the final evidence-based chapter and continues and completes the argument that there is very little empirical evidence to support the optimistic view that education can and is being radically changed in post-conflict, developing countries. Thus, the chapter provides evidence from Angola, the Central African Republic, Chad, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Guinea, Ivory Coast, Myanmar, Palestine and Somalia in turn. The chapter concludes by stating that it is hard to be optimistic about the realistic possibilities of transforming the authoritarian and often violent nature of schools in post-conflict, developing countries in a more peacebuilding direction as the traditional model of schooling still seems too firmly entrenched in the minds—and perhaps vested interests—of key actors locally and internationally. However, there is a need to explain why this is the case and why the myth of building back better is perpetuated.