Since our founding, the Global Peace and Social Justice (formerly Peace Studies) program has endeavoured to educate students and the wider community about past and ongoing injustices and how to recognize systemic violence. The program has also worked to equip students with the tools to challenge and transform a system that allows injustice to continue.

Global Peace and Social Justice seeks to create informed and active citizens attentive to issues of inclusion and diversity and equipped with the knowledge, skills and values essential to the building of a world where conflict is addressed and justice and equity are promoted. The program’s core courses introduce the concepts, skills and values of Global Peace and Social Justice and shape students’ capacities through applied courses focused on inquiry and research. These capacities are expanded through relevant courses from History, Philosophy, English and Cultural Studies, Communication Studies and Multimedia, Women’s Studies, Indigenous Studies, Anthropology, Economics, Labour Studies, Political Science, Religious Studies and Social Work.

McMaster’s program puts particular emphasis on nonviolence as an overarching value and practice area. It has developed expertise in health as an arena for practical peacebuilding, which it shares with students in the program. Students are oriented to apply their knowledge through experiential learning, and to think about social action through a critical and responsible lens. Classes encourage problem-based and inquiry learning processes in small groups.

Undergraduate students choose from an interdisciplinary selection of courses to complete either a Combined Honours BA in Global Peace and Social Justice or a Minor in Global Peace and Social Justice.