Year 2000 is proclaimed by the United Nations General Assembly as "the International Year for the Culture of Peace."

"Culture of Peace" is the general theme of our project. As the term indicates, peace and culture are connected. Psychologists say that cultural ignorance and ethnocentrism are the major catalysts of war. In other words, knowledge of different cultures and customs is important to establish peace. Our notion of "Culture of Peace" is based on this.

However we find it difficult to make an exact definition of the term. To specify it a bit we’ve defined the term "culture" and the term "peace" separately. Then we’ve listed some key words that we think are related to the term "culture of peace" as a whole.
 
 

Peace

Culture

Definition:The customs, arts, social institutions, etc. of a particular group or nation. ("Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary"-1999 )
 
 

A Culture of Peace

Associations:

-Liberty

-Non violent ways to resolve conflicts

-Reconciliation

-Justice

-Cultural diversity

-Tolerance

-Mutual understanding

-Respect

-Solidarity

-Dialogue

-Education ( teaching about different cultures to understand each other and to soften prejudices)

-Democracy

-Development

-Global co-operation

-Human rights