Education for international understanding

According to the constitution of Unesco, since wars begin in the minds of men, it is in the minds of men that the defences of peace should be constructed. Strengthening international understanding ensures that the processes of détente become irreversible. Education and information make a significant contribution to this task, since they help to form knowledge, beliefs and ideas concerning the contemporary world and to shape the principles which condition individual and collective behaviour. Although it is equally evident that education and information can be made to serve antithetical purposes and have often done so with disastrous effect.