UNITED NATIONS EDUCATIONAL, SCIENTIFIC AND CULTURAL ORGANIZATION. Address by Mr Federico Mayor

Transcription

1 DG/99/24 Original: Spanish UNITED NATIONS EDUCATIONAL, SCIENTIFIC AND CULTURAL ORGANIZATION Address by Mr Federico Mayor Director-General of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) on being awarded the Español Universal prize by the Fundación Independiente Madrid, Spain, 6 July 1999

2 DG/99/24 Mr Minister and President of the Prize Committee, I should like to thank you for coming to preside over this ceremony in a dinner jacket, which, I must say, suits you very well. So I owe you my thanks on two scores, since this was, in fact, what I suggested to the President of the Fundación Independiente and chief sponsor of this ceremony, Mr Ignacio Buqueras. Mr President, Mario Soares, my dear and much admired friend, Don José Antonio Ardanza, Lehendakari, a person whom I have also had the pleasure and honour of consulting on many occasions, Mr Secretary of State, Thank you very much. A few days ago we were together at the World Conference on Science. I should like to thank you most sincerely for being here tonight and, of course, for representing the Minister, to whom I request you to convey my regards and my gratitude for the congratulations that he has sent me on the occasion of this tribute. Ladies and Gentlemen, I only wish that I could now proceed to thank you one by one, because I am delighted to see once again so many people whom I love and admire. My teacher Ángel Santos Ruiz is here and it always gives me enormous satisfaction to see him again. He is one of those visionaries whom we need so much. In a country where biochemistry did not exist, it was he, Girado s assistant, who introduced it as part of the study of organic chemistry. For reasons of time I cannot mention each and every one of you. I can see Segovia Arana, for whom I have the greatest liking and admiration; there are people here who began to work with me and who form part of that select group of disciples - disciples who know far more about biochemistry than I do and do it much better, but who nonetheless began their work with me and for whom I feel a very special affection and esteem. Nor can I forget that here too is my academic mentor, the Rector, to whom I should like to express my very special thanks for his presence here today, as also to the President of the Higher Council of Scientific Research, and to you all. As I have already said, I should like to go around the tables and greet you all individually. Also with me tonight is my supreme authority - who has already been mentioned - my wife whom I love and my children, my son-in-law and my daughters-in-law. Here I am, surrounded by so many people whom I hold dear. My wife, of course, I see more often, because she comes regularly - regularly, I say, despite Iberia - to Paris, but sometimes months go by when I am deprived of the company of my children. These years in charge of UNESCO have been a fascinating period in my life, of great importance from every point of view. But the price of separation - although it is, of course, no more than physical - is a high one. These 11 years and nearly nine months now have been, on

3 DG/99/24 - page 2 the one hand, a permanent learning process but, on the other, a time of separation from all that is mine, from my house and from my garden. After hearing the remarks of Ignacio Buqueras, the Secretary of State Jorge Fernández, Mario Soares and the Minister, I am almost convinced that I deserve this tribute. And Mr Buqueras is well aware that I put up some resistance. Some of you will have already heard what I am about to say, since I always tell this very pointed and human story involving Miguel de Unamuno - a great man for so many different reasons - and Alfonso XIII. When Unamuno was awarded the Order of the Grand Cross, he too showed some reluctance but finally decided to go and receive the honour. So he went and said Your Majesty, I should like to thank you for this decoration which I so richly deserve. Whereupon the king said, How truthful of you, Don Miguel, all the others tell me that they don t deserve it. To which Unamuno replied, They too are telling the truth, your Majesty, they are telling the truth. By this I mean that I would rather not say that I don t deserve it. What I can say is that I am beginning to think that perhaps I do deserve it, although without going any further than that. This is a time for looking back into the past. I was thinking, as you might imagine, of the two people who have had the greatest influence on my life: my father and my mother. I would have been so happy if I am sure they would have been very gratified to see so many people gathered round their son, who received from them the supremely important lessons of generosity and unyielding attachment to principles. For it was my mother - and I have recounted this many times - who told me Never accept the unacceptable. I have always tried to uphold these principles and to follow the example set by my father, the example of imagination and, above all, tenacity. In the end, everything is possible through determination and perseverance. These examples are most important since, as an educator, I have realized that, when all is said and done, the only way to teach is by example and love. At times we ask ourselves What s going on? What s happening? How come that with all we teach and all the excellent teachers we have education just doesn t work?. What happens is that in school we teach certain ideas, values and principles, but afterwards what our children, the pupils, see in their everyday life is very different from what they are taught. No, there is no other way of teaching than by example and love. We need to live intensely, since every life is a monument, a masterpiece. Every human being has an enormous capacity for creation. Every human being is unique - in both biological and sociocultural terms. And this unique human being has - for a few years, for a short span of time - the opportunity to exercise that distinctive and absolutely unlimited capacity that far exceeds all we might expect of a bundle of finite biological structures. My mother used to say to me in Catalan - as I was explaining this afternoon - I am going to do this, I am going to do that - she was already getting on - and I used to tell her to slow down a little; not that I wanted her to retire, because that would not have suited her, but just that she should take things easier while she could. She always used to answer Cantem i allem, i ja descansarem cuan ens morirem. In other words, we should sing, dance and live life to the full while we can, because we will have plenty of time to rest when we die.

4 DG/99/24 - page 3 Ladies and Gentlemen, Since I am looking back to the past, I should like to mention the three universally recognized Spaniards who received this award before me: Camilo José Cela and Plácido Domingo - who were kind enough to come here this afternoon, although they both had other engagements during the dinner, so that we could have our photographs taken and spend a few minutes together - as well, of course, as that extraordinary figure of such great generosity and devotion to his fellow human beings, Vicente Ferrer. So, when we come to take stock after a period of years, having gone through a long stretch of our life, sometimes with the feeling of starting afresh, with renewed hope, each day, what is the final result? The result that really counts in the end is the number of friends that we have. I say this in all sincerity and I dedicate this belief to all of you who are here today. And I also dedicate it to those who could not be with us and to those of my friends who are unaware that this tribute is taking place. The only thing that really matters when we try to estimate our own worth - our past, but also our present, and above all our future - is our friends. And I can tell you that in this sense I consider myself to be a very rich man. I have not been able to accumulate great wealth, since I have not devoted myself specifically to making money, but I have one thing which is the greatest asset of all: I have friends all over the world. Those of you who are gathered here tonight are my best and closest friends and I can assure you that this wealth of friendship is one of the key factors that allows me to say Yes, it has all been worth while. I have spent so much of my life talking, conversing, arguing with people but what a pleasure it has been! What a pleasure, when I look back and think of all the excellent company I have had. And when I look around and see so many friends. And when I look forward into the future. When we look forward in this way we should try each time to see a little further ahead. What I notice around me in life, not only Spain but everywhere, is that so much is happening, so much information is available, that we are losing the ability to look forward: we are losing the capacity to see ahead and anticipate. The latest news, opinion polls, the shortterm view, events as they actually occur - because of all this we have no time to think, to analyse things, to feel or even to live. During dinner I was saying to Mr González Seara that one of the virtues of Africans is that they have acquired wisdom through having the time to ponder, more time than is available to many men and women living in this electronic, virtual, or digital age. As a result, Africans have added the notion of I feel, therefore I am to the Cartesian vision of I think, therefore I am. And if we can both think and feel, then we shall automatically be able to look further ahead. Instead of looking at ourselves, we shall look to future generations, to those who are here already, just one step ahead of us, and to those who have not yet been born. I remember always feeling moved when Commander Jacques Cousteau used to tell me of the emotion he felt whenever he thought about the unborn, who seemed to face us with questions in their eyes. Before even reaching spaceship Earth, they are asking whether we are making the effort to fulfil our obligations. If we are to do this, we need to map out a different future. Current trends and the directions we are taking at the end of the century and the millennium will not do. We need the peace of mind to face up to this fact, to analyse the situation and see how we can correct the course we have taken and how - in matters social, scientific, cultural and ethical - we can rectify the trends that are currently leading us into ever more critical situations. If we had the

5 DG/99/24 - page 4 impression that disparities were being reduced, we could say that s marvellous! It will take years, but at least we are on the right track. But no, disparities are on the increase, and this has a price, which always has to be paid in the end in the form of frustration, exclusion, marginalization And the result is sometimes feelings of violence and even aggression. Ladies and Gentlemen, If there is one really clear conclusion that I have come to in my life, it is the great importance of education - education that confers on human beings the capacity to be themselves and not to depend on other people s decisions. How wrong Samuel Beckett was when he told us that we have to wait for Godot! Or rather he told us you have to be patient. And yet we have spent so much time waiting to receive answers from outside ourselves to the questions we have asked - questions of deep concern to us, whether as citizens or as individuals. These questions can never be answered from the outside, because the answers lie within us. José Bergamin has written I find myself fleeing from myself when I am with myself. And that is true. We find it difficult to look deep within ourselves, but we must try to do so, because it is in this way, through meditation, by seeking what is within ourselves, that education finds its fullest expression. Education is more than information or instruction. Education involves the enjoyment of personal sovereignty, which allows us to say yes or no because we have freely chosen to say yes or no, which enables us to decide our own future every day. Education of this kind can change the present course of civilization. And that means the education of all - including those who govern us, all of them - and education for all, every day. Because we are all at one and the same time both lifelong learners and teachers. We all have something to say, we all have lessons to receive and to give. I should like to conclude by saying that if we are to produce this change and map out this new course - which we must try to make a central feature of the International Year for the Culture of Peace in the year we must also be ready to say enough is enough, by rejecting the inertia that prevents us from daring to change so many things. It is no longer acceptable to say that the arms industry - worth $826,000 million last year - is so large that we cannot stop it. I say that we can. We can - though not overnight - if we all work together to form alliances, not just for defence, but to counter the great social threats of our time, especially those features of them that may be irreversible. You already know my ideas on the ethics of time and my concern for the potential irreversibility of many complex phenomena, including social problems such as poverty and destitution and, of course, environmental problems and some health problems. The fact is that we have only one way of bringing about peaceful change - and it is not through force, on the grounds that I am stronger than you and therefore you have to do what I want, or because I am right, since it is always the strongest who are right - no, this is not the way. There is only one way and that is by making our voice heard. The voice of the people. This is called democracy. Democracy is not a set of formulas, which are sometimes used in a highly convoluted way, but a set of principles - which are, incidentally, clearly spelled out in the UNESCO Constitution - and their observance in our everyday behaviour. It is through the voice of the people and through democracy. It is through power to the people, through the people expressing their point of view and thereby ensuring that what is lawful is also just. Some of you - some of my friends - have heard me say this many times. I always tremble when people tell me that the rule of law exists in a country, because I always say

6 DG/99/24 - page 5 what law?. The rule of law also existed in the Soviet Union under Stalin and in the Weimar Republic, which allowed Hitler s rise to power. This is why we must let the people speak. And why we must speak for those whose voice is unheard. And it is our duty, as media professionals and parliamentarians, at all levels, to represent - until they can speak out for themselves - the voice of the silent. Why do people keep silent? Some because they do not know how to express themselves. Here there is an important task for all of us: the task of education. Others, however, remain silent because they cannot express themselves, because they are not allowed to. I was very much aware of this problem during the years when I got to know the Soviet Union, from 1961 onwards - first of all as a young lecturer in chemistry, then as a professor and the Rector of the University of Granada, and finally, more directly, with the team around Mikhail Gorbachov. It was then that I realized how terrible it is to want to speak and yet not be able to do so. This is the silence of those who have been muzzled, of those who cannot speak even though they want to, of those who know how to speak, but cannot. But what concerns me more now is the silence of those who do not want to speak, the silence of those who do not dare. Because silence of this kind, nowadays, may even be regarded as a crime. All those who can speak, who on account of their membership in the scientific or intellectual community are able to make serious judgements on social or environmental issues, have a duty to make their voices heard by the decision-makers, by those who have been elected by the people to take the decisions; they have a duty to make sure that their ideas and points of view reach the authorities. Because this is the only non-violent way of altering decisions and changing course. We must therefore try to make sure that our voices are heard loud and clear. And of course we must put an end to the silence of the silenced - like those I saw in the Soviet Union, teachers who were not allowed to speak. Some of you who are here tonight were also present on the day that I took up my appointment as Director-General of UNESCO, in November You will recall that I concluded my address by quoting the words of Albert Camus in La Peste: I despised them because being able to do so much, they ventured so little. We must be ready to venture what we can. First, we need to acquire knowledge and then we must dare to act boldly. I shall end by telling you that when, with my family, my wife and my three children, I arrived in Oxford in where I had the good fortune to work with a Nobel Prize winner, Professor Hans Krebbs - I was deeply impressed by the motto sapere aude, dare to know. As I am sure you are aware, the English use any language other than English - French or Latin for example - in their mottoes. In this case, it was Latin - sapere aude: dare to know: And true enough, knowledge has to come first. But afterwards I came to realize that knowing how to dare is just as important as daring to know. And so it is my dearest wish that all of us gathered here tonight - my friends who are my greatest asset - will together know how to dare, always without violence; that we will raise our voices in the attempt to change the present course of events; and that we will be able to look without blushing into the eyes of our children and our grandchildren. Thank you very much.