„Discover Peace in Europe“ is a project about peace trails
to make people aware of the importance of peace!

The idea of this project

A concept of peace which relies on democracy, civil society, self-confident participation and courage asks for your attention in seven beautiful European cities. Peace-trails that you will find most worthwhile to walk get presented. The website invites you to the experience and leads you to the different stations on the trails.

Interesting articles inform about peace movements, important events and meaningful peace institutions of past and contemporary significance.

All in all the trails promote a complex understanding of peace and generate reflections on a concept that presents itself as active engagement in civil society. The peace trails combine exploration of rather unknown parts of the city with acquiring knowledge about relevant dynamic aspects of democratic societies. Buildings and locations gain new meanings. The aim of this project “Discover Peace in Europe” is to create stronger awareness of the importance of critical participation and of the relevance of civil rights movements.

This website presents discoveries: monuments, buildings and locations that you may have seen before, but now they disclose stories about people and activities with rich engagement for human rights, peace and democracy that took or take place, – unknown to most of us.

We want to draw awareness to peace matters. Since the 19th century peace movements have emerged throughout our cities, but seldom with public attention. In an outdoor learning process facts and stories on the peace trails present an important aspect of the history of our civil society and democracy. Most monuments in our cities display „heroes of wars“, but peace and human rights are hardly ever subjects for a memorial culture. This discrepancy will become obvious, thus promoting personal reflections on one’s own participation. – Only a change in thinking will bring about change in actions… .

Peace depends on the people. Participation is the indispensable condition for the development of democracy. The peace trails offer information, suggestions and opportunities for an active engagement in democracy building, social competences and peace matters.

Each trail counts locations which allow you as well to personalize the experience according to your personal interests and needs, either changing the order proposed or shortening the number of sites to visit if you run out of time.

The project started out with a grant from the European „Life long learning“ project, and has been kept in its original form until December 2020.

This followup site contains a number of the original peace trails and will be kept running as long as our sponsors cover the cost of running the site. We hope to add more trails in the near future. If you want to sponsor a trail, or propose a new one, backed up with a sponsorship, please contact office@peace-institute.com.