PARIS – “It is UNESCO’s duty to sound the alarm about the dangers of globalization and constantly to recall the need for equality of access for all to what some call the ‘common good'”. said UNESCO’s Director-General Koïchiro Matsuura when addressing the 160th session of the Organisation’s Executive Board.
“Globalization is today generating uncharted challenges calling for new norms or ethical principles – or even regulatory mechanisms – with which to guarantee the continued exercise of universally recognized human rights. Many, if not all, of these challenges fall squarely within UNESCO’s defined responsibilities”, Mr Matsuura said.
In this regard, Mr Matsuura highlighted particularly important issues to be addressed by UNESCO, notably: cultural diversity, basic education in the knowledge society, the digital divide, dialogue among civilisations and freedom of expression and media pluralism. He stressed that these issues are making UNESCO “more relevant than ever”. But, he added, “our relevance has to be demonstrated and we must recapture recognised international leadership” in UNESCO’s specialised fields of competence.
The 160th session of UNESCO’s Executive Board was opened on October 9th, 2000 by its Chairperson, Sonia Mendieta de Badaroux (Honduras).
Ms Mendieta de Badaroux’s opening address recalled the absolute need for UNESCO to address human suffering, notably the scourges of poverty, violence and the HIV/AIDS pandemic, particularly its impact on children. She was encouraged by the outcome of the recent Millennium Assembly at the United Nations which set “some of the key objectives for the target date of 2015”: reduce the proportion of people suffering from hunger; improve access to safe drinking water; ensure successful primary education for children world-wide; and reverse the spread of the major diseases.
She declared: “We need to understand that economic growth and greater wealth do not in themselves produce morally acceptable governments or socially responsible citizens. [ ] We seem to have grown accustomed to the practice of sacrificing individuals and sometimes communities for a perceived general interest. This has often resulted in the exclusion or persecution of minorities.”
Ms Mendieta de Badaroux added: “It is in properly understanding UNESCO’s ethical mission that we in this forum should strive to foster a new global vision of development lending fresh impetus to the observance of the values contained in the Constitution of our Organization, and to the encouragement of human solidarity, mutual respect and cultural diversity. [ ] It is our bounden duty to assist the Organization in giving the developing countries – within its mandate – the means to consolidate their own development.”
In his address, largely devoted to the UNESCO reform process underway, Mr Matsuura welcomed recent events in the former Yugoslavia: “We cannot but rejoice at the recent news from Belgrade, where democracy has taken the upper hand and the people have become the masters of their own destinies. UNESCO has constantly supported independent media in ex-Yugoslavia, and this must certainly have played its part in the return to democracy.”
Speaking about the reform process he launched as soon as he took office eleven months ago, the Director-General said: “Reform is not a luxury or a foible. It is a must. If we do not reform, quickly and effectively, this Organization will be in the midst of a severe crisis.”
Mr Matsuura defined his reform programme saying: “The common thread running all through my proposals is relevance and excellence. Programme on the one hand, and management and administration on the other, are two sides of the same coin. There is but one context and one overall vision.”
The most painful part of the reform has already largely been accomplished, the Director-General declared, speaking about the sharp reduction in the number of high level posts and the rejuvenation of the Organization through the voluntary departure of some 100 staff members. Mr Matsuura also insisted on the need for quality recruitment and for increasing the budget devoted to personnel training from the current level of 0,13% of personnel expenditure to 1% in the next biennium and to 3% by the end of 2007.
Mr Matsuura regretted that the United States is not a full member of UNESCO, where major issues concerning globalisation are taken up, and spoke of his active work for the return of the United States to membership of UNESCO. He reported on his visit to Washington in September and said he had received strong support for his reforms there. He further announced that he will return to Washington in November at the invitation of the US Secretary of Education, Richard Riley, to participate in International Education Week.
Mr Matsuura highlighted the consensus that has emerged in consultations about the reform process and the need for UNESCO “to adopt, as a federating objective for its action in the years to come, the notion of globalisation with a human face”.
