about us
CENTRE FOR PEACE AND SECURITY STUDIES
University of Port Harcourt
History of CPSS
Centre for Ethnic and Conflict Studies (CENTECS) was established in 2003 ( became functional in 2005) as a unit of the Faculty of Social Sciences. CENTECS is a bold initiative by the University of Port Harcourt to revive and sustain the research culture in the University system. It is already common knowledge that little or no research activity is going on in our universities as a result of long years of under-funding and the consequent agitations, in the form of strikes by university lecturers.
It is also true that the conventional university academic Departments and Faculties have since ceased to provide effective platforms for organising any meaningful research work. Thus extra departmental structures in the form of research Centres’s or Institutes have become the new planks for fot the rebirth of purposeful work. It is against this background that the Centre for Ethnic and Conflict Studies was established. CENTECS meets this need by conducting researches that provide evidence-based information towards addressing the problem of conflict in the Niger- Delta, Nigeria, Africa and beyond.Between 2016 and 2021 CENTECS was merged with the Centre for Gender Studies.
Both Centres became Centre for Conflict and Gender Studies (CCGS). In April 2015, the two Centres were demerged.In consideration of the need to profer Intellectual responses to contemporary security issues that are threating the fabrics of national, regional and global integration, the Centre has been registered as Centre for Peace and Security Studies (CPSS) with effect from March, 2021.
Aims and Philosophy of the Programmes
The objectives of the centre are
- Make CPSS a Centre of excellence in peace and security studies through cutting- edge teaching and research.
- Transfer knowledge in peace and security studies through teaching, research and workshops.
- Develop our students’ understanding of peace and security study problems and their consequences for social life in Nigeria andglobal society and equip them with skill and compentences for managing the phenomenon.
- Deliver a high-quality programmes in Peace and Security studies.
- Provide students with adequate theoretical, methodlogical and practical foundations for the emerging field of peace and security studies in Nigeria.
- Educate students to appreciate the causes of intrastate and interstate conflict; security, conflict resolution and post-conflict peacebuilding process with special reference to Nigeria and Africa.
- Give students whose intial training was not in peace and conflict studies, an opportunity to achieve their desired goal of obtaining a certificate in the field.
- Apply our skills and competences towards the advancement of evidence based and policy relevant research in peace and security studies to facilitate the development of Nigeria, Africa and the world.
