This double workshop at the Stockholm Conference invited reflection in two basic directions. The first involved considerations about failure. For example, why did so many religious and ethical traditions fail to prevent the Holocaust, and what does that failure tell us about reevaluations of those traditions? The second area involved resources and responses for the present and the future. For example, if it can do so, how might study–teaching about and learning from–the Holocaust and the recurrence of genocide help to focus the resources that religions and ethics possess to check and to correct the conditions that may lead to genocide in the future? The latter question is particularly sobering in light of the fact that religious and ethical traditions have not been particularly successful in this arena. To a considerable degree, those traditions have been part of the problem instead. Nevertheless, the issue is this: How could they be more successful as antidotes to genocide? What would have to change for that to be the case? How could such change be effected, especially where education is concerned?

With these questions in mind, the first of the two workshop addressed the topic question “What can we learn from failure?” The panelist were asked to consider the following lines of thought: (1) Religious and ethical traditions, which are not necessarily the same, did not prevent the Holocaust or subsequent genocides. To the contrary, those traditions may have contributed to the Holocaust and subsequent genocides. As we study the Holocaust and subsequent genocides as well, what do we learn about the failures of religion in general and about the weaknesses of our specific religious traditions in particular? (2) As we study the Holocaust and subsequent genocides as well, what do we learn about the shortcomings of ethical traditions, whether religious or not, that have been central in human civilization? (3) How do responses to the first two questions help us to appraise what education–even education about the Holocaust and genocide–can and cannot do to prevent genocide in the future?
Panelists in the second workshop addressed the topic question “What should be done?” Those deliberations focused on issues such as these: (1) Weak, fragile, unsuccessful, even dysfunctional though they have been in the past, religious and ethical teachings are not going to disappear. Nor is it likely that much success in the prevention of genocide can be obtained without them. Indeed, apart from sound and successful religious and ethical teachings, there is arguably little chance that genocide will ever end. What, then, is to be done to strengthen religious and ethical teachings, and how might education about the Holocaust and subsequent genocides play a part in that work? (2) How should religious and ethical teachings, and the teaching of religion and ethics, be changed to make them more effective in combating conditions that lead to genocide? (3) To what extent should ethical teachings and the teachings of ethics be related to or separated from religion? (4) What are the limits that religious and ethical teachings face, even or perhaps even especially when they are grounded in education about the Holocaust? Where is it most important for such teaching and education to find allies if the chances of genocide are to be minimized, if not eliminated altogether.

The various findings of the panelists appear in their individual presentations, but a key result of the workshops’ deliberations was as follows: While pluralism and democracy may not be perfect, history shows that they are unlikely to produce genocidal societies. Every effort should be made to teach the respect for others and for differences that genuine democracy entails.