College of Education

School of Continuing and Distance Education 2014/2015 – 2016/2017

Lecturer: Dr. Kingsley Nyarko, Department of Psychology Contact Information: knyarko@ug.edu.gh

Session Overview

At the end of the session, the student will be able to

• Explain the importance of diversity in national development.

• Examine the extent to which peace building promote healthy coexistence.

• Evaluate how patriotism and nationalism are critical in nation building.

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Session Outline

The key topics to be covered in the session are as follows:

• Peace Building.

• Diversity.

• Patriotism and Nationalism.

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Reading List

• McConochie, W. (2010). How to Promote Peace; Do's and Don'ts, based on political psychology research. Politicalpsychologyresearch.com.

• Mehryar, A.H. (1984). The role of psychology in National Development: Wishful thinking and Reality. Int. Journal of Psychology, 19, 159-167.

• Moghaddam, F.M., Bianchi, K., Daniels, K., Apter, M.J., & Harré, R. (1999). Psychology and National Development. Psychology & Developing Societies, 11, 119-141.

• Sullivan, J. L., & Transue, J. E. (1999). The psychological underpinnings of democracy: a selective review of research on political tolerance, interpersonal trust, and social capital. Annu. Rev. Psychol,. 50, 625-650.

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PEACE BUILDING Topic One

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Peace Building

• Nations are more likely to suffer development in the absence of peace. When peace permeates the fabric of societies, the citizenry has the right psychological frame of mind to be focused on their jobs, discharge their duties to the best of their abilities. In order to foster development in our country through the promotion of peace it is important to reduce threats to individuals and groups.

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Peace Building

• Groups under threat are more vulnerable to warmongering leadership, which emphasizes dangers and recruits citizens to compete against other groups. Warmongering-prone persons will be present in every group, so the greater the perceived threats to citizens, the more likely warmongering leaders will try to capitalize on this to promote conflict.

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Peace Building

• Again persons who represent the liberal and conservative worldviews are "programmed" by genetics and other forces to be who they are (McConochie, 2010). Trying to change them is not practical. Helping them understand themselves as political beings and channeling their energies in constructive, cooperative activities for the good of all concerned will be important to reduce wasteful in-fighting and conserve energy and resources for constructive use.

• For example, the Rotary International effort to eradicate polio, by marshalling the energies of persons of all political persuasion, has been remarkably effective, perhaps because it taps the conservative fear of diseases and the liberal concern for the well-being of all groups of humans of great diversity.

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Peace Building

• Another productive way to promote peace is to politically empower citizens of the liberal worldview. Persons of this worldview tend to trust and accept people different from themselves and want to cooperate with them.

• One way to politically empower liberal citizens is to design political parties to be independent of special interest group money, have platforms based on well-designed polls of well-informed citizens and party members, select and groom candidates for office that are low on warmongering proneness and high on constructive leadership attitudes and require that their campaigns be funded exclusively from party funds, no special interest group money.

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Peace Building

• Another way to politically empower liberal citizens is to promote the design and development of sustainable communities, as via institutes with multidisciplinary staffing. Research, information, polling of local citizens and professional guidance would all be key aspects of such designed communities.

• The designs would be comprehensive, including attention to the environment, affordable housing, health care and education, meaningful jobs for all who want them, protection of agricultural, water, forest and ocean resources, and development of civil and fair government serving the common good over the long perspective versus special interest groups over the short run.

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Peace Building

• Local citizens would carry out the designs, modify them periodically and negotiate with related governments, corporations, etc. to promote their interests.

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Sample Questions

1. How can psychology be used to promote peace and national development?

2. Evaluate the implications of diversity to national development.

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DIVERSITY Topic Two

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Diversity

• Most conflicts have occurred in Africa as a result of the individuals involved failure to appreciate the uniqueness in the actions, thoughts, and behaviours of the others; in essence not considering the diversities among the population.

• Due to the fact that individuals are different in terms of their thinking, behavior, beliefs, culture, and so on, we should understand that it will be very difficult for us to agree on all issues that confront us.

• Thus, our governments, educational institutions, and other stakeholders have an onerous responsibility of harnessing our diversities to stimulate progress and development in our country.

Slide 14

Diversity

• Progress is conceived on ideas and delivered via diversity, and not insult and intimidation (Nyarko, 2009). We don’t succeed when we always stick to our own opinions and consider those of others as nothing more than a figment of their own imaginations.

• We should learn to accept the ideas, views, and opinions of others regardless of their tribe, religion, political affiliation, etc. etc. if those ideas are capable of moving our country forward. The moment we perceive people, who hold views contrary to ours as enemies, and not partners in progress, we are denying ourselves of progress (Nyarko, 2009).

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Diversity

• In fostering diversity to stimulate development, our governments should consciously ensure gender parity in the various institutions in the country. Again, our governments and heads of institutions have to maximize their efforts to hire and support excellent individuals who are visible minorities or persons with disabilities.

• Psychology, as the science of behaviour and mind, enjoys the characteristics that make each person unique. We need to ensure that the composition of our institutions—both public and private reflects the wide diversity of the nation. Diversity in our various institutions will obviously enrich all of our lives. We also have to ensure that the individuals in our institutions, too, reflect and are enriched by that diversity.

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Diversity

• Finally an environment that stimulates open discussion and where hypotheses may be raised regardless of their political implications can only benefit our nation. Even those who fundamentally disagree with conservatism will agree that silencing political opponents will not convert them. By excluding those who disagree with (most of) us politically, we treat them unfairly, do ourselves a disservice, and ultimately damage the future of posterity as we fail to cash in on the talents of all of us.

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PATRIOTISM AND NATIONALISM Topic Three

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Patriotism and Nationalism

• Patriotism and nationalism are two features that are fundamental in the development of nations. Feshbach and his colleagues (Feshbach, 1987, 1990; Kosterman & Feshbach, 1989) in their bid to differentiate between patriotism and nationalism have wrestled with the relationship between positive feelings toward one's own group and negative feelings toward others.

• They wondered if negative feelings toward other groups were an automatic consequence of loyalty to one's own group. Or are there different types of attachments to one's own group that may or may not include consideration of other groups?

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Patriotism and Nationalism

• Their findings suggest that nationalism is associated more with a competitive or militaristic approach to the world, whereas patriotism has a more cooperative or peaceful approach to the world. The strategies that each would advocate appear to differ. In effect, the nationalists would constitute the hawks, the patriots the doves in any debate over policy.

Slide 20

Patriotism and Nationalism

• Patriotic and nationalistic attitudes towards one’s country are pillars that define their future success. As a country, we need to promote the belief in our country among the citizenry, promote love for the country among the people, reward persons who exhibit acts of bravery, and inculcate in the young the relevance of living the dreams of the fathers of the nation.

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References

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