Conference notes IRRI-KIIB

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Summary. This is not an official record of proceedings and specific remarks are not necessarily attributable.

Mr Federico Mayor Zaragoza, President of the Culture for Peace Foundation and former Director-General of UNESCO (1987-1999), gave his vision of culture as instrument of external policy. He enumerated three dimensions of culture: culture as creativity, culture as identity and culture as behaviour. It is of extreme importance to try to keep up with our identity in the current global village and to communicate with others in order to have mutual enrichment. We must never impose one of this identities prevailing over the others. Culture as behaviour is the result of our heritage, our thinking in our family context, in our national context.

He appealed the public and the next generations to learn from the past and to commit for future. Culture is of all human beings and all of them are equal. We cannot predict the behaviour of every human being, because his or her behaviour will be different. "This is our hope. Diversity is our richness", he said. He emphasised that it is very important to be open to others. "The result of trying to protect a culture is the decline of the culture". He added that "The alliance of civilisations can hopefully change conflict into peace".

Mayor Zaragoza reminded the public of the context in which the UNESCO Constitution was written that urged us to be careful with misconceptions, partial knowledge of other people, because these led to terrible war. Mayor Zaragoza cited the first sentences of the preambule of the UN Charter. It said “we, the peoples”, because nowadays all peoples are part of this space where all cultures must meet and interact. According to him, we have to "keep in mind the memory of the past and above all, the memory of the future". He is convinced that present threats can be redressed by applying this cultural heritage.

He stated that welfare depends on political and economic development, but above all on intellectual and moral solidarity of human kind. We need to share information and knowledge. Knowledge is that which is produced as a result of reflection, thought, and becomes a personal response. We have to educate ourselves to be really able to act as fully-fledged citizens, but not because we are told to do so. "We must accept and respect the others, not accept the law of the ruler only because he is the strongest", he said. He emphasised that, as all human beings are different and unique, "this diversity is our richness, but we must be united by universal values". He went on referring to the Millennium Objectives and the unusual inclusion of cultural rights in Chapter V.

Mayor Zaragoza began the second part of his speech with the Unesco Task Force on Education for the Twenty-first Century and the report of the International Commission for which he asked Jacques Delors to be the President. He then spoke in French.

Selon la Commission, l'éducation a quatre piliers: apprendre à connaître, apprendre à faire, apprendre à être et apprendre à vivre ensemble. "Dans l'éducation, la chose la plus importante est être nous-même!", disait-il. Il souligne que le quatrième pilier pose de grands problèmes.

Il est convaincu que l'immense mosaïque des cultures est une grande richesse et qu'en Europe on ne peut pas imaginer cette diversité immense sans reconnaître l' égalité entre les hommes. Mayor Zaragoza met l'accent sur la Déclaration des Droits de l'Homme et le préambule dans lequel on dit: "nous souhaitons que tous les êtres humains soient libérés de la peur et de la misère. La peur est un grand problème! Aujourd'hui, il y a trop de silencieux. Il y a des gens qui peuvent parler, mais qui n'osent pas le faire. Il faut rompre le silence. L'orateur a aussi plaidé pour refaire chaque jour notre profil identitaire. Nous devons écouter les autres et voir que c'est parce que nous le voulons, que nous changeons notre identité.

Pour conclure, il a avoué que défendre la diversité culturelle n'est pas facile. Les produits de la culture, de l'high-tech et de la "high human touch", sont importants. La politique extérieure est le reflet de la politique intérieure. Les jeunes intellectuels doivent être proches des gouvernements pour leur rappeler la richesse de la culture, la diversité.  "La politique de promotion de la diversité culturelle est la meilleure", selon Mayor Zaragoza.

 

More information on:

- F. Mayor Zaragoza: President of the Fundación Cultura de Paz: http://fund-culturadepaz.org/eng/english.htm. In addition to this, he has created Ubuntu, a world forum of civil society networks, which had its first meeting in Barcelona in the spring of 2002.

- J.Delors - Unesco Task Force on Education for the Twenty-first Century: http://www.unesco.org/delors/

- Rapport à l'UNESCO de la Commission internationale sur l'éducation pour le vingt et unième siècle - "l'Education: un trésor est caché dedans": http://www.unesco.org/delors/delors_f.pdf

* Articles:

- Federico Mayor Zaragoza: Education, the cornerstone of democracy: http://www.uoc.edu/web/eng/articles/mayor_zaragoza.html
Universitat Oberta de Catalunya

- Interview: Federico Mayor Zaragoza: http://www.worldpress.org/Europe/1731.cfm - 
Carmen Font. World Press Review correspondent. Madrid, Spain. Jan. 7, 2004