Paper Title;

Evaluating the Strengths and Limitations of Peace Museums

as Capacity Building Resources for Peace Education and
Reconciliation 2010

Helen Tanner LLB PgDip DTH

No part of this paper may be re-produced without the permission of the author

Introduction
There are approximately 100 peace museums worldwide.1 A Peace Museum
collects and maintains artifacts, exhibits, and educates2, with an overarching
theme of peace. Peace museums can be a resource for peace activists and
a place of memory for those who have struggled for peace over the
generations. They can also educate young people and adults on a range of
peace issues and topics.... Most significantly, they can give people hope that
violence in all its forms can not only be reduced, but eliminated.3
This essay will assess the strengths and limitations of Peace Museums in
terms of peace education and reconciliation. We will first look at a brief
history of how peace museums have come to exist. We will then look into
what peace education and reconciliation is, and how they can be supported
via peace museums.

Brief Evolution of Peace Museums

Peace museums have evolved over the last 100 years or so. The first was
The International Museum of War and Peace in Switzerland, opening in
1902. It was conceived by Jean de Bloch, who wrote, campaigned and
warned the world against embarking upon the first World War. The second
museum was set up in Berlin by Ernst Friedrich. It showed photos of the
horrific nature of war, and. Again, and was a powerful statement against war.
Ironically, the museum was destroyed and the building taken over by the
Nazis prior to the second world war. It was re-established in1982 by the
grandson of its original founder.4
The dropping of the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki during World
War II, triggered the establishing of many new peace museums in Japan.
Many have an anti-nuclear theme, and document the experiences and
devastation to Japan of the bombings5. Some of the museums are state-run,
but newer ones are either independently run, or attached to Universities.
These latter museums in Japan are to some extent a response to the earlier
ones, and their somewhat singular view of showing what was done to Japan
1

Rank Carol, Envisioning Peace; Peace Education through Arts in peace Museums Worldwide pgs 15-25 in
Anzai I, Apsel J & Sikander Mehdi S; Museums for Peace; Past, Present and Future2006 The Organizing
Committee of the Sixth International Conference of Museums for Peace, Kyoto Museum for World Peace,
Ritsumeikan University Kyoto, Japan p.18
2
Murakami T; How Peace Museums can be Used for practical peace Education pgs 26-36 in Anzai I, Apsel J &
Sikander Mehdi S; Museums for Peace; Past, Present and Future2006 The Organizing Committee of the Sixth
International Conference of Museums for Peace, Kyoto Museum for World Peace, Ritsumeikan University
Kyoto, Japan P.27
3
4
5

Rank op cit p.22

To see the website of the museum see; www.anti-kriegs-museum.de

For the website of Hiroshima National Peace Memorial Hall for the Atomic Bomb Victims;
www.hiro-tsuitokinenkan.go.jp/english/index.php

i.e Japan as victim. They attempt to balance the story and show Japans role
in the war prior to the bombings, and have a wider remit of reconciliation as
well as education.As well as Japan, Germany also has several museums.
These are thought to have been created as a response to the effects of the
cold war.
Scattered around the world there are some other private museums. There is
one in the Uk, located in Bradford,6 a City of Peace, following rioting in the
1990s. Many museums have varied displays and exhibitions, but some are
dedicated to individual peacemakers, or organisations like the Peace Palace
at the Hague.7 Other museums are effectively memorials. For example, in
Flanders, where hundreds of thousands of men were lost during the WWI. 8
There is an international network dedicated to the museums,9 and their
support thereof. It has international conferences. In 2005 it broadened its
remit to include museums for peace in order to reach wider audiences in
fulfilling its aims.10

Peace education
Being educated to live peacefully happens in small ways in society every day.
The messages may be drowned out amidst many others, or fall on deaf ears,
but they are there. Peace is also taught more formally in the home, school,
the workplace, and university. It is an area of study with theories, and
practical elements.
Peace education is part of a process of promoting the knowledge, skills,
attitudes and values needed to bring about behaviour changes that will
enable children, youth and adults to prevent conflict and violence, both overt
and structural; to resolve conflict peacefully; and to create the conditions
conductive to peace, whether at an intrapersonal , interpersonal, intergroup,
national or international level. 11

Bradford Peace Museum website; www.peacemuseum.org.uk

Hague Peace Palace; www.vredespaleis.nl/default.asp?tl=1
8
For The In Flanders Fields Museum website; www.inflandersfields.be
9
International Network of Museums for Peace; www.dev.museumsforpeace.org
10
Anzai I, Definition of Peace, Peace Museum and Museum for Peace with reference to Peace-Related
Museums in Asia pgs 109-122 in Anzai I, Apsel J & Sikander Mehdi S; Museums for Peace; Past, Present and
Future2006 The Organizing Committee of the Sixth International Conference of Museums for Peace, Kyoto
Museum for World Peace, Ritsumeikan University Kyoto, Japan p.114
11
Apsel J; Peace and Human Rights Education; The UN as Museum for Peace pgs 37- 48 in in in Anzai I,
Apsel J & Sikander Mehdi S; Museums for Peace; Past, Present and Future2006 The Organizing Committee of
the Sixth International Conference of Museums for Peace, Kyoto Museum for World Peace, Ritsumeikan
University Kyoto, Japan p.37 quoting Susan Fountain; Peace Education in UNICEF, new York; Unicef Publications,
1999, p.1
7

Values such as justice, equality, tolerance and respect for human rights sit at
the core of Peace education.12 There is also a fundamental challenge implied
in the teachings to keep humanising and re-humanising the other and to
take responsibility individually and as a community to challenge
discrimination, and attitudes promoting violence in heart, word or deed.13 As
with any education, its level of teaching and focus must be adapted to the
audience to whom it serves. For example, although tis values remains
constant, peace education delivered in a society emerging from recent
conflict would have a different focus to that delivered within a relatively
peaceful society. 14 In either case though, an ability for people to be able to
envision peace and what that may look and feel like is crucial. 15
Peace education cannot just be a passing on of values, it must also be a
sharing of skills and experience16. Some of the skills it may help people to
develop include;..communication skills of active listening and assertive
speech; problem solving skills of brainstorming or consensus building; and
orientation skills of cultural awareness and empathy. 17
These values and skills cannot be learned instantaneously18 and successful
peace education programmes not only need to attract willing students in the
first place, but also need to have on-going contact with the students over
time. The attraction and maintaining of a student base implies the necessity
for adequate resources for any programmes to bring about sustainable
change in the community to which it serves.
Reconciliation
Reconciliation is a process of relationship transformation after conflict.19
There are levels to which people can and do reconcile, and these vary
according to choice, and necessity. For example, communities that have to
live together in close proximity after war are under greater pressure to
reconcile at a deeper level in order to survive, than former enemies who
never have to meet again. States, post conflict, will usually reconcile to the
12

Harris I; Conceptual Underpinnings of Peace Education pgs 15-25 in Salomon G, Neve B; Peace Education;
The Concept, Principles, and Practices Around The World 2002 Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, publishers
London p.22
13
Staub E; From Healing Past Wounds to the Development of Inclusive Caring; Contents and Processes of
Peace Education pgs 73-86 in Salomon G, Neve B; Peace Education; The Concept, Principles, and Practices
Around The World 2002 Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, publishers London p.75
14
Staub op cit p.74
15
Murakami op cit p.26
16
Bar-Tal D; The Elusive Nature of Peace Education in Salomon G, Neve B; Peace Education; The Concept,
Principles, and Practices Around The World 2002 lawrence Erlbaum Associates, publishers London p.33
17
Jones T S ; Education that makes a difference pgs 245-256 in Van Tongeren P, Brenk M, Hellema M, &
verhoeven J; People Building Peae II Successful Stories of Civil society 2005 Lynne Reiner Publishers London
p.246
18
Jones T S op cit p.248
19
Galtung J After Violence, reconstruction, Reconciliation, and Resolution Coping with Visible and Invisible effects of
war and Violence Ch 1 in Abu-Nimer M.(2001) Reconciliation, Justice and Co-existence; Theory and Practice. United
States of America. Lexington Books p.3

degree necessary for continued trade and political functioning in a global

setting.20
So, what are some of the essential elements of a reconciliation process?
One element centres around re-humanising the former enemy. In conflict
often the enemy is de-humanised21 and atrocities carried out. In order to
reconcile, re-newed respect for the other and a change of view is essential.
The ability to do this will be linked to a sense of renewed safety and reduction
in fear of the other22
Linked to this, people after conflict, have to make sense of what has
happened to them, and things they may have done themselves. We all create
stories of our world, and fit the roles we, and others play into those stories.
These stories can be fundamentally challenged by conflict, and new
information, roles, and thinking is required to create both new personal and
community stories that fit with the changed circumstances.
Reconciliation involves change over time;
Reconciliation, in essence, represents a place, the point of encounter where
concerns about both the past and the future can meet. Reconciliation-as
encounter suggests that space for the acknowledging of the past and
envisioning of the future is the necessary ingredients for reframing the
present. For this to happen, people must find ways to encounter themselves
and their enemies, their hopes and their fears. 23
How the past is addressed can support the reconciliation process or be a
major hindrance. Reducing fear of a former enemy, and being willing to turn
once again towards them can be helped considerably if they both
acknowledge their part in the conflict and acts committed.24 Failure to
acknowledge or take responsibility for ones own acts can add deeper and
continued wounding adding to the pain of the acts themselves, and reducing
the likelihood of reconciliation.25

20

Bloomfield D (2006) On Good termsClarifying Reconciliation. Bergehof report number 14 Found at www.bergehofcentre.org/uploads/download/br14e.pdf
21
Kelman H. C ; Transforming the relationship between Former Enemies; A Social-Psychological Analysis in Rothstein,
R. (ed.)(1999). After the Peace, Resistance and Reconciliation. London: Lynne Rienner p.199
22
Kelman H C op cit p.195
23
Lederach, J.P. (1997) Building Peace: Sustainable Reconciliation in Divided Societies. Washington DC: USIP Press.
p.27
24
Lederach, J.P.(1999) The Journey Toward Reconciliation. Scottdale, Pennsylvania. Herald press p.68
25
Govier G What is acknowledgement and why is it important? Ch 2 in Prager C.A.L & Gover T (2003) Dilemmas of
Reconciliation; cases and Concepts. Canada. Wilfred Laurier University press p.83

From what we know then, about peace education and reconciliation, there
are minimum requirements that must be met by peace museums if they are
to be effective as capacity building resources. These are ;
1) A Space for Peace; Creating a space for peace which people are attracted

and inspired to learn about the values and skills for peace. The Peace
Museum must have the necessary resources both to reach out to a
prospective audience, and to maintain enough contact for skills to be
imparted and change to occur.
2)Valuing Peace; Resources of a Peace museum should be able to promote

a space for enquiry where peoples values can be fostered in order to support
a more peaceful philosophy and lifestyle
3)Providing Skills for PeacefulChange; Peace museums should be
teaching practical skills to support, enable and entrench these values to
manifest in peoples peaceful behaviour back out in the outer world
4)Supporting Historical Truth and Acknowledgement for Peace; Peace
museums should provide a space for balanced historical account to be given
about conflicts, and encourage honesty and self responsibility of those
communities and Countries for the parts they played. The aim of giving
historical account is to support the aims for peace education as given
above, and to expose the human costs of war.
5)A space for Future visioning for Peace; Perhaps one of the most
important functions of a peace museum is to encourage the visioning of
peace; This means to offer a new and compelling vision of a peaceful future
for the planet which people can buy in to which is tangible and offers hope,
and supports a path of individual and community change.
Let us now turn to Peace Museums and assess their strengths and limitations
as capacity building resources.

Strengths of Peace Museums

Culture for peace
The first major strength Peace museums have in fulfilling their aims is a
groundswell movement towards a culture for peace. In 1986 a team of
international scientists and professionals from different fields met to share
knowledge on violence. The result was the Seville Statement on Violence 26.
The statement makes the case for Peace, arguing that based on evidence,
violence is neither inevitable or a necessity for our species.The statement is
further backed up by anthropological evidence.27
This evidence combined, led to a meeting at the 28th general Conference of
United Nations Education, Scientific, and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) to
move towards a culture of peace28.The Culture of Peace is a set of values,
attitudes, modes of behaviour and ways of life that reject violence and
prevent conflicts by tackling their root causes to solve problems through
dialogue and negotiation among individuals, groups and nations29

Space for Peace

The second strength that Peace Museums have is their ability to create
spaces for peace. They do this in many ways; One way is through their vast
collections of posters, banners, artworks, and artifacts that demonstrate and
bring to life the history of peace movements worldwide.30 Bradford Peace
Museum has a wonderful collection of drawings, jewellery, letters, quits,
banners, badges and many more items. These can be viewed and are also
accessible on their website31
Apart from wonderful historical artifacts Peace Museums seem to win the
support of the arts generally enabling them to create beautiful exhibitions,
displays, and films. The Gernika Peace Museum actually holds an annual
Congress on arts and peace, holding the link between the two disciplines as
essential and productive.32
26

Information on the Seville Statement on Violence can be found at; www.culture-of-peace.info

Fry D; The Human Potential for Peace An anthropological Challenge to Assumptions about war and
Violence 2006 Oxford University press Inc, Oxford p.247
28
Harris I op cit p.21
29
www3.unesco.org/iycp/uk/uk_sum_cp.htm
27

UN Resolutions A/RES/52/13 : Culture of Peace and A/RES/53/243, Declaration and Programme of Action
on a Culture of Peace
30

Rank op cit p.23

www.peacemuseums.org.uk
32
For further information see; www.museodelpaz.org
31

In Kenya, the Aembu Peace Museum creates its space around a sacred
forest in the neighbourhood called Gatitu. This is where the forefathers
conducted all the peace ceremonies.33
Peace museums are also lucky enough to have some wonderful individuals
that can be drawn of to demonstrate peace-making in action. There are many
people who have dedicated their lives to peace. One such museum that
creates its displays and space based on such an individual is The Gandhi
museum.34
In modern times, Peace museums also have the ability to use technology to
spread their messages to wide audiences, and be accessible at all times.
The In Flanders Fields Peace Museum has a beautiful website35 which plays
evocative music, and poetry as you read through historical texts about World
War 1 and the lives of those lost in the Ypres town and fields nearby.

Valuing Peace
The third strength for Peace Museums is their ability to create physical
spaces that tune in to that deepest of all human longings, the longing for
peace, in their being, in their lives, their relationships, their society and our
world. 36 In this sense they are fulfilling a need for people to be linked into
networks with others to touch peace, to feel like it could be possible, and to
find hope in their longings. They are also spaces for self reflection.
A quote taken from a visitor to the Museum of Peace and Solidarity in
Uzbekistan37 sums up the ability for the museum to remind us of important
values;"A very wonderful and inspiring peace museum. Such a collection of
efforts and energies! Places like this remind you of the circular shape of our
planet and our lives." 38

33

Gachanga T How do Africans view Peace Museums? pgs 158-169 in in Anzai I, Apsel J & Sikander Mehdi
S; Museums for Peace; Past, Present and Future2006 The Organizing Committee of the Sixth International
Conference of Museums for Peace, Kyoto Museum for World Peace, Ritsumeikan University Kyoto, Japan p.160
34
www.gandhimuseum.org
35
www.flandersfields.be
36
Barrett C; The Peacemaking Paradigms of Ritsumeikan and Rievaulx; reflections on the Sixth International
Conference of the International Netowrk of Museums for Peace P.2
37
The international Museum of Peace and Solidarity; www.friends-partners.org/CCSI/nisorgs/uzbek/peacemsm.htm
38
Quote taken from the website homepage 12/5/2010 of The international Museum of Peace and Solidarity;
www.friends-partners.org/CCSI/nisorgs/uzbek/peacemsm.htm

Providing skills for Peace

The fourth strength of peace museums is being able to draw on the expertise
and knowledge of the research that continues to happen into conflict
resolution and peace studies. There is a wealth of knowledge about how to
manage conflict gracefully and non-violently. There is also increasingly well
trained people able to offer training. The other side of the coin is that there is
a growing demand for these skills. Conflict is found in all human relationships,
and there is a growing awareness of the destructive potential if things are not
managed well, and a growing willingness to learn new skills, for example in
mediation, or non-violent communication.The Childrens Peace Center39 is a
very good example of where these skills are being taught. Skills such as
Childrens Peace Centre teambuilding, emotional literacy,anger and conflict
management are all being taught out in the community to children of all ages.

Supporting historical truth

Peace Museums have a responsibility and an ability to display balanced
accounts about war and particular conflicts. The benefits of taking a neutral
and honest standpoint can offer the space for honest dialogue both about the
human costs of war, but also about an individuals. communities or states
role in any particular conflict. 40
This displaying of historical truth is controversial and forms one of the major
limitations for peace museums as we shall discuss later. However, for the
peace museums who are independent enough and have enough resources to
do it there can be very positive effects for reconciliation efforts between
former enemies both in the present day, and in future as history may be
written accurately for future generations, hence reducing the likelihood for
seeds of future conflict taking hold. Rank describes some initiatives being
taken in Cambodia which are aiding reconciliation efforts; The
Documentation Centre (DC-Cam) for example is gathering archives on the
Khmer rouge era to be used in education of young people on the genocide,
which has until now been left out of Cambodian school textbooks. 41

A space for future visioning for peace

A final strength of Peace Museums is their ability to share a dream of a better
future.In offering a new vision of the the future they are not alone, they
actually share a platform with many other movements such as the human
39

www.childrenspeacecenter.homestead.com
Murakami op cit p.30
41
Rank op cit p.22
40

rights movement, the environmental movement, the struggle for indigenous

peoples etc. In this, they can gather momentum and strength, and again tune
in to the fact that people want to hope for something better both for
themselves and their children. Gachanga describes peace museums in Africa
as not creating a new vision as such but remembering an old one which had
been lost; In regions of largely non-literate communities, peace museums
connect people with the collective UTU memory, a precious heritage gleaned
from our oral traditions, sacred geography and material culture. When
disconnected from Utu, we lost a cognitive and emotional bond with our
history of non-violence, reconciliation traditions, compassion and humanistic
values. We lost touch with living in a socially healthy community that sustains
Utu and describes our relationship with nature, the Supreme Being, and order
of things. Ultimately this is the peace any peace museum anywhere in the
world seeks in the context of its particular situation. 42

Limitations of Peace Museums

Culture of war
Perhaps the greatest limiting pressure on the growth of peace museums,
ironically, is also their reason for being; an overarching culture of war across
the globe43. Within this culture, where war is glorified, and images of violence
and tools of violence are seen as exciting, it has been war museums that
have thrived and have seemed to benefit. In the Uk there are over 130 army
museums alone44, compared to one single peace museum, in Bradford.

A Space for Peace

A very brief comparison between one of these war museums; the Imperial
War Museum North and the Bradford Peace Museum highlights the
difference in investment and opportunities for reaching audiences and getting
messages across; The Imperial War Museum north is set in a newly built and
specially designed building on the prestigious salford Quays in Manchester. It
is an impressive and rather beautiful sight. The building has been supported
financially by over thirty large donors including the Lottery, Heritage funds
and European Social fund. It is open all but three days a year, and has a
huge main exhibition space, a smaller exhibition space, talks, tours,
performances, as well as conferences. and a large cafe.It makes full use of
42

Gachanga op cit p.167

Firer R; The Gordian knot Between peace Education and War Education pgs 55-61 in Salomon G, Neve B;
Peace Education; The Concept, Principles, and Practices Around The World 2002 Lawrence Erlbaum
Associates, publishers London p.55
44
The Army Museums Ogilby Trust www.armymuseums.org.uk found in Barret C op cit p.1
43

audio-visual shows, and holds many accessible databases. It attracts

thousands of visitors every year.
Bradford Peace museum is set up four flights of stairs, and is open for just a
few hours a week.It is staffed solely by volunteers. It would be easy to miss
the museum altogether when walking passed, as the main door is shut. A
visit to the museum for a couple of hours could be a solitary affair as it does
not attract many people. Finances are very limited, as are other key
resources.
On a most basic level, Peace museums very reason for being has to be
about reaching out to an audience, and attracting the attention of that
audience in order to affect change. Lack of an appropriate space, in an
accessible location, coupled with a lack of financial resources are major initial
stumbling blocks to a peace museum reaching any of its potential.
There has been some debate as to whether peace museums should actually
work alongside army museums to increase its audience base.45 In fact, some
war museums are now included under the museums for peace umbrella.
However, there are several potential problems of these two working together
as fundamentally their aims are often in conflict with eachother.
Another limiting factor in terms of attracting audiences to its space, concerns
the exhibitions in the peace museum. Some of its exhibitions almost
inevitably will be trying to teach of the horrors of war, and the nature of the
material on display may not be very family friendly. As Kaneykiyo points out
about Peace museum exhibits; Though it provides stories of life, humanity,
justice and hope, it cannot avoid death, horror, remorse, and sorrow. These
depressing sides frighten away visitors, especially the young ones.46

Valuing Peace
Another way in which the dominant war and violent culture in which we live
affects the peace museums, is in the values that people are surrounded with
every day. From soap operas, to the news, to video games, violence is
portrayed as the norm. The values associated with peace education are far
from the norm. Therefore, peace museums, in their teachings are challenging
dominant normative discourses.
45

Many within the International Network of Peace Museums may find military museums repulsive, yet it
remains the case that those institutions attract hundreds of thousands of visitors, and influence and educate
far more members of the public that any peace museum in the world outside Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Barrett C, Love your enemy; Working with Museums on Peace Education. 6th International Conference of
Museums for Peace, Kyoto, October 2008 p.1
46
Kanekiyo J, The Japanese Museums for Peace in Changing Times in in Anzai I, Apsel J & Sikander Mehdi S;
Museums for Peace; Past, Present and Future2006 The Organizing Committee of the Sixth International
Conference of Museums for Peace, Kyoto Museum for World Peace, Ritsumeikan University Kyoto, Japan p.87

Another limitation in terms of sharing peace values lies in some

misunderstanding in the peace museums movement about what brings about
personal and societal change. To clarify; if changing peoples behaviour to
being more peaceful were simply about showing the horrors of war then why
does there continue to be such a dominance of violence in our societies?
There is more than enough evidence available to show how terrible war is,
and the costs of it to humans and nature, and yet it still continues. Fujita
poses a valid point; Human beings have repeatedly waged wars even after
knowing about the disasters that wars bring to them. 47 Therefore, maybe
more needs to be understood and perhaps learnt from other fields in the
area of why and how people change.

Providing skills for Peaceful Change

The greatest limitations in peace museums in teaching skills for change lie in
those already mentioned in terms of attracting audiences, having adequate
spaces, and sufficient resources. In the Bradford museum, much of its
teaching relies in sending out exhibitions for schools to use. These
exhibitions are free to the schools and include worksheets for teachers.
However, the exhibitions are generally not delivered hand in hand with
experiential workshops or teachings from the peace museum. this is due
largely to lack of resources. And as we have noted before teachings of peace
need to be backed up by experiential learning and continues exposure to the
new values.

Supporting historical truth and acknowledgement for peace

One of the great strengths of Peace Museums ideology is its un-biased
representations of conflicts. The best resourced peace museums are in
Japan and are State run and financed. They reach massive audiences.
However, they have been criticised as only showing Japan as the victim and
for not illustrating their own aggression during the second world war. 48
Peace museums that are privately run and resourced, are more likely to give
a balanced account of historical truth, but they can become targets of political
backlash from both families of those serving in the armed forces, and
47

Fujita H ; The Role of Museums for Peace in Social education pgs 99-106 in Anzai I, Apsel J & Sikander
Mehdi S; Museums for Peace; Past, Present and Future2006 The Organizing Committee of the Sixth
International Conference of Museums for Peace, Kyoto Museum for World Peace, Ritsumeikan University
Kyoto, Japan p.104
48
Yamane K, The Growth of Japanese Museums for Peace from an International Perspective pgs 51-68 in in
Anzai I, Apsel J & Sikander Mehdi S; Museums for Peace; Past, Present and Future2006 The Organizing
Committee of the Sixth International Conference of Museums for Peace, Kyoto Museum for World Peace,
Ritsumeikan University Kyoto, Japan p.67

governments who do not wish to be portrayed as aggressors,49 and be

criticised for their foreign policy; Such criticism can be interpreted as
political, and in the Uk, for one, to achieve charitable status, and the
subsequent funding potential, a museum could not be seen to have political
aims. Barrett highlights the dilemma for the Uks only peace museum; Does
the Peace Museum Bradford, have a role not only in opposing todays wars
but in challenging national understanding of a glorious imperial past, even to
the point of demanding a national apology for foreign abuses committed by
the forefathers of todays armed forces/ that goes to the heart of national
consciousness of what it feels like to be British? 50

A space for future visioning for peace

The limitations on Peace Museums to act as brokers for a hopeful and
peaceful future lie in their relative isolation, and the wider limitations placed
on their very existence. Their voice of hope can be drowned out by louder
more penetrating voices of darkness and doom.

Conclusions
In this essay we have explored peace museums and their history. We have
looked at peace education and reconciliation, and how peace museums can
support these to happen. We have made an assessment of both the
strengths and limitations of various peace museums in achieving their goals.
As a conclusion, peace museums are at this time a small voice in a noisy
violent world. They are doing some wonderful work around the world, and
making use of the arts, creativity and historical legacy of wonderful
peacemakers throughout time to support their messages. It seems they are
tuning in to a human desire for peace and community, and have the backing
of UNESCO in its movement towards a culture of peace. But at this time, we
still as a human community are investing heavily into war and violence as a
means of settling disputes. Peace museums strengths lie in their ability to
reach out and find a willing audience. They are restricted in their ability to
challenge governments foreign policy if they are reliant on state funding, so
they need to find a way, which link up to wider networks in order to get their
message across. In time, no doubt, as economic and ideological systems that
have supported this culture of violence seem to falter peace museums will
have their time to shine. As Barrett points out the peace museum journey is
never-ending; it will always be part of the bigger peace journey, of oneself,
ones accomplices, the world itself. 51
49
50
51

Kaneykiyo op cit p.84

Barrett C; The Peacemaking Paradigms of Ritsumeikan and Rievaulx. op cit p.9
Barrett C; The Peacemaking Paradigms of Ritsumeikan and Rievaulx ...op cit p.1

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Websites;
In Flanders Fields Museum; www.inflandersfields.be
Struthof Site of the Former Natzweiler Concentration Camp; www.struthof.fr
Anti-Kriegs Museum Berlin; www.anti-kriegs-museum.de
Yad Vashem; www.yadvashem.org
Hiroshima national Peace Memorial Hall for the Atomic Bomb Victims
tsuitokinenkan.go.jp/english/index.php

www.hiro-

International Council of African Museums; www.africom.museum

Institute of the national Museums of Rwanda; www.museum.gov.rw
Gernika Peace Museum; www.museodelapaz.org/Indice.html
Nobel Museum; www.nobelmuseum.se/zino.aspx?Ian=en-us
Bradford Peace Museum; www.peacemuseum.org.uk
Childrens Peace Center; www.childrenspeacecenter.homestead.com
Dayton Peace Museum; www.daytonpeacemuseum.org
The Gandhi Museum; www.gandhimuseum.org
The international Museum of Peace and Solidarity; www.friendspartners.org/CCSI/nisorgs/uzbek/peacemsm.htm
Hague Peace Palace; www.vredespaleis.nl/default.asp?tl=1
International Network of Museums for Peace; www.dev.museumsforpeace.org
Seville Statement of Violence; www.culture-of-peace.info