Governor General of Canada calls for an “ethic of sharing” in her address to UNESCO Executive Board

Paris, 6 October

Michaëlle Jean, Governor General of Canada, addressed a special plenary meeting of UNESCO’s Executive Board on 5 October, emphasizing the role of the dialogue of cultures and the importance of cultural diversity.

In their opening remarks, the Chairman of the Executive Board, Olabiyi Babalola Joseph Yaï, and the Director-General of UNESCO, Koïchiro Matsuura, welcomed Ms Jean, who was born in Haiti, as a symbol of diversity and praised her engagement on behalf of the most vulnerable.

Ms Jean stressed that she shared the values that guided UNESCO’s creation and that it continues to defend and promote. She continued, “Over 50 years later, though the circumstances have changed, the need to rekindle the bonds between us and to reaffirm the decisive role that the dialogue of cultures plays in promoting peace and democratization remains just as urgent. It is for the sake of that very principle that an organization like UNESCO was created and remains relevant to this day.”

The Governor General called for “an ethic of sharing” and a redefinition of the bonds and values that bring us together: “It is my firm belief that misunderstanding, exclusion and violence, which are never justified, are the result of dialogues that never took place and debates about ideas that were never launched. But our perspective—long limited to our own village, region or country—has now expanded to global proportions and calls for a more comprehensive redefinition of our realities.”

She praised the relevance of UNESCO’s Convention on the Protection and Promotion of the Diversity of Cultural Expressions, “which represents the first decisive step toward recognition of an international cultural right.” She underlined, “It is the difference between cultures that makes their encounter an inexhaustible source of renewal and that defines human genius.”

Ms Jean spoke of the young people and the women that she meets during her travels: “Those young people have shared something very important with me. They have told me that solidarity is a responsibility. That we must now include the entire world in our definition of community. A community they define not in terms of ethnicity or even space, but in terms of common values. […]There is no question in my mind that women play a key role in creating social consensus around difficult, but unavoidable, issues such as family planning, the physical integrity of young girls, violence as a response to a lack of understanding, access to education, food security, crime prevention and environmental protection.”

The Canadian Governor General then inaugurated the intersectoral exhibition “Cultures and Developments” organized at UNESCO for the duration of the General Conference (6-23 October).

• Author(s):UNESCOPRESS
• Source:Press release No. 2009- 113
• 07-10-2009