MANY TO MANY 67

"Building the foundations for peace is as much a challenge for teachers as it is for those who sign peace treaties. Conflict-resolution and the implementation of peace settlements feature regularly in the news, but today on World Teachers' Day, we should ask ourselves how much such peace efforts would achieve without the unheralded contribution of the world's 50 million peace teachers?

Day after day and year after year, teachers build the very fabric of peace. They transmit the knowledge, values and attitudes, the skills and behaviour which ensure that peace is not just the absence of conflict but becomes a way of life for all, putting into daily practice the concept that social justice is essential to universal and lasting peace.

On this fifth World Teachers' Day, we appeal to the world community, to governments, parliamentarians, municipalities, the media, business communities, parents and community leaders to give teachers the support they need and acknowledge the essential role they play. It is often said that conflict is, at root, a problem of learning. If we invest in the process of learning and in teachers, who shape the future, then we will begin at last to invest fully in peace and in a better future for all the world's children."


Joint message of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO), International Labour Organisation (ILO), United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) , and United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) , World Teachers' Day, October 5, 1998.


Many to Many
a quarterly publication issued by
Operation Peace through Unity

Anthony Brooke and Gita Brooke, co-founders
Te Rangi, 4 Allison Street, Wanganui 5001, New Zealand
phone/fax: +64-6-345-5714 ~ e-mail:
OPTU is an accredited NGO in association with the UN Dept of Public Information
Many to Many
under the aegis of
Operation Peace Through Unity
is a communicating link between
'we, the peoples' of all nations, races, creeds and ideologies offering in the spirit of the preamble of the United Nations Charter an instrument for the furthering of better relationships based on deepening mutual understanding and the aspiration to promote unity and cooperation beyond all differences.