Transfer and Rejection of Peace Education in Colombia and Germany, 1970ꟷ2017

Previous work has not yet comparatively researched the diffusion of reforms based on peace education (PE) in different national contexts and its effects on national laws and school curricula. We seek to research why the Colombian Congress established peace education as mandatory content across all educational levels in 2014, while the German Standing Conference of Ministers of Education has rejected its institutionalization since the 1980s. Regulatory frameworks, curricula and didactic traditions are compared. Whereas the German school curriculum has maintained a strong disciplinary structure that hinders the adoption of peace education, Colombia’s curriculum has been partially dismantled via standard-based reforms. Therefore, it was easier for Colombian policymakers and educators to adopt peace education at the expense of promoting moral, historical, and political thinking in connection with traditional school subjects. We conclude by reflecting on how national characteristics such as previous curricular and didactic traditions matter when global ideas are transferred.