PEPE

In 1986, a few development-oriented NGOs based in the Philippines formed Popular Education for People's Empowerment, Inc., or PEPE. It is a non-profit, non-governmental organization that promotes popular education geared towards people empowerment. PEPE reaches out to a variety of individuals, namely the urban poor, peasants, fisherfolk, professionals, women, indigenous peoples, and more. As community educators, it aims to enhance the capacities of these sectors in terms of knowledge, skills, and attitudes.

What is popular education? According to PEPE, Popular Education means "liberative education. It is relevant. It is needed. It is an education that exposes and then breaks the cultural and structural bonds hindering people's enlightenment and empowerment. Pop-Ed is education for social change. It challenges the traditional way of ‘teaching’ people, an ‘education’ that makes them passive learners; one that silences them and makes them conform. It challenges attitudes and social structures that oppress people. Popular Education takes a political stand on the side of marginalized people everywhere. It aims to empower the poor and those who have been kept out of decision-making structures. It does this by helping them become aware of their own oppression. Pop-Ed also conscientizes people. It is about collective learning towards action for change." OR "Pop-Ed critiques conventional modes of thinking, opens itself to critique, restores people's dignity and humanity, poses questions about our very existence, is a venue for ‘intersubjectivity’, recognizes the importance of the non-rational, involves both the intellectual and the emotional, is creative and reflective, and is averse to any totaling framework."

PEPE envisions a society that promotes and guarantees access to education that is:

• holistic, authentic and interactive, a society that is built upon the critical thinking and leadership of its own members, one that espouses gender equality among all its members
• a democratic society -- with participatory governance and decision-making systems in place, one that is built upon solid communities of people
• an empowered mass that enjoys equitable access to the country's resources
• a society that promotes the realization of full human potentials and respects, completely and without discrimination, all human life
• one that actively pursues ecological, cultural and economic sustainability

PEPE's mission is to provide a catalyst for building a distinct Popular Education Movement as an integral part of the overall movement towards People's Empowerment, Sustainable Development, and Genuine Democracy.

Contact Information:
Popular Education for People's Empowerment, Inc. (PEPE)
http://www.pepe.org
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