About the Institute

The Kessel Institute for the Study of Peace and Change is dedicated to advancing the understanding and the existence of peace at all levels, from the individual to the global community. The Institute defines peace in its broadest sense, denoting not only the absence of conflict but also the interrelationship of the factors necessary to create or to enhance harmony within and among human beings and their environments.

 

The Kessel Institute is named after Abbas Kessel, an Minnesota State Univeristy , Mankato Political Science Professor for 19 years and life-long peace activist. The Institute affirms Kessel's insistence that for peace to be possible the values, behaviors and conditions essential for positive human relations must exist at multiple levels: personal, local, regional, national and international.

 

Like Kessel himself, the work of the Institute will reflect a multi-disciplinary approach, erasing artificial boundaries that separate various scholarly traditions, teaching and learning, research and practice, and the campus and the larger community.