Historical efforts to implement the UNESCO 1974 Recommendation on Education in light of 3 SDGs Targets

This paper presents an analytical overview of historical efforts by Member States of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) to implement the 1974 Recommendation concerning education for international understanding, cooperation and peace education relating to human rights and fundamental freedoms. The author of the review was hired in April 2016 to undertake an analysis of Member States’ progress reports submitted for the fourth (2008) and fifth (2012) consultations on implementation of the 1974 Recommendation.  
The main purpose of the review was to provide a historical overview of efforts to achieve Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) Targets 4.7, 12.8 and 13.3 and their proposed measurement indicators, based on states’ historical reporting on the Recommendation. A total of 94 country reports were reviewed for the exercise: 37 from the 4th Consultation (2008); and 57 from the 5th Consultation (2012). The coding involved retrofitting the content of reportsto conceptsthat may have been developed at a later date for the Sustainable Development Agenda and coding for data that was not explicitly requested in the Consultations. Following the coding, a quantitative and qualitative analysis was undertaken and is presented in the following report.