Current Issues in Comparative Education (CICE) - Volume 26 - Issue 2 - Special Issue 2024 - From Universal to Pluriversal: Transforming Human Rights Education Policies in Colombia

Oct 15, 2026

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Examines Colombia’s National Plan for Human Rights Education (PLANEDH) as a case study on how positivistic, Eurocentric, and Western constructions shape a hegemonic understanding of human rights education. Although aligned with United Nations mandates, implementation remains largely symbolic, with minimal territorial reach and limited community participation. Advocates shifting perspectives through the Pluriversal Rights Education framework, integrating diverse ways of knowing and supporting participatory, community-driven policy design for a pluralized PLANEDH in Colombia’s education system.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryResearch & Report

FormatPDF

Pages20

Reading Time50 min

AccessFree to download

Introduction

Colombia’s PLANEDH policy and implementation gaps

Limits of universalist, top-down human rights education frameworks

Relevance for Comparative and International Education

Current Issues in Comparative Education (CICE), Volume 26, Issue 2, Special Issue 2024 From Universal to Pluriversal: Transforming Human Rights Education Policies in Colombia Angela Sánchez Rojas Independent Researcher This paper examines Colombia’s National Plan for Human Rights Education (Plan Nacional de Educación en Derechos Humanos, PLANEDH) as a case study to discuss how positivistic, Eurocentric, and Western constructions have inﬂuenced a hegemonic understanding of human rights education. While the PLANEDH policy aligns with the United Nations human rights education mandates, its implementation remains largely symbolic, with minimal territorial impact and limited community participation. This paper encourages a shift of perspectives applying the Pluriversal Rights Education framework. It discusses the importance of integrating diverse ways of knowing into human rights education dialogues and fostering participatory, community-driven policy design. The analysis oﬀers recommendations to reenvision a more plural implementation of the PLANEDH policy in the Colombian education system. Keywords: Human Rights Education, Pluriversal Rights Education, policies, Colombia. Introduction Since the adoption of the United Nations Charter (1945) and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) (1948), the United Nations (UN) has worked toward advancing human rights education (HRE) . HRE is seen as a tool to strengthen respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms, as well as to foster human development (Russell & Suárez, 2017) . In 1993, the UN reaﬃrmed the signiﬁcance of HRE in promoting mutual understanding and harmonious relations among communities through the Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action (VDPA)(1993) . This international framework speciﬁcally recommended that all member states develop national plans for human rights education (NPHRE) to integrate HRE into national education policies. The UN has developed an international approach to HRE establishing guidelines and priorities for countries to implement policies at the country level. Colombia’s National Plan for Human Rights Education (Plan Nacional de Educación en Derechos Humanos [PLANEDH]) was adopted in 2009 and updated for 2021-2034. It represents an ambitious eﬀort by this conﬂict-aﬀected country to embed human rights principles and HRE international mandates into a national educational policy framework. PLANEDH has remained a legal declarative document that has not been fully executed and implemented across all Colombian territories. PLANEDH’s organizational mechanisms have not been established, speciﬁcally the National © 2024, Sánchez Rojas. CC BY 4.0 . Current Issues in Comparative Education 26(2), 57-76. From Universal to Pluriversal: Transforming Human Rights Education Policies in Colombia Council and the Technical Regional Committees. This situation impedes an eﬀective policy implementation. Despite the relevant inﬂuence of civil society in Colombia through peace and popular education, there was limited participation by local communities, ethnic and vulnerable communities when enacting and implementing the most recent national HRE policy. For the previous PLANEDH version, the International Center for Human Rights Education studied more than 150 experiences (Velásquez Villate, 2020) . The PLANEDH was developed following a top-down model approach that prioritizes normative frameworks of international human rights law over co-creation processes of HRE policies involving local experiences and community voices. Applying the case of Colombia, this paper calls for a shift from a standardized, top-down legalistic model toward a participatory, community-driven approach that integrates local practices and decolonial pedagogies. Critical HRE scholars have highlighted how HRE policies often remain tied to legalistic human rights regime approaches, presenting challenges to engaging with its content (Zembylas, 2023) . Mainstream HRE frame

FAQs

How does the paper evaluate Colombia’s PLANEDH policy?

It reviews PLANEDH as a case study and argues that, despite formal alignment with UN mandates, its implementation is largely symbolic, with limited territorial impact and weak mechanisms for participation.

What does the paper identify as the main source of policy dominance in HRE?

It argues that positivistic, Eurocentric, and Western constructions support a universalist, one-size-fits-all human rights discourse that sidelines alternative ways of knowing.

What framework does the paper propose to improve HRE policy design?

It encourages using the Pluriversal Rights Education framework to integrate diverse ways of knowing and move toward participatory, community-driven policy co-creation.

Oct 15, 2026

Uploaded by OmBimo