Liaison Newsletter > LIAISON Vol. 1, No. 1, January 1997 - Articles

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Facing a New Reality
UNESCO’s Dr. Federico Mayor speaks out on Reforming the United Nations

A decade of global change and conflict has prompted increasing pressure for reform within the United Nations. No one is more aware of this than Dr. Federico Mayor, the Director-General of the United Nations Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), who spoke at a public lecture held in Ottawa on November 28, 1996.

Addressing the issue of "UNESCO and the reform of the United Nations", Mayor feels strongly that as the intellectual arm of the Organization, UNESCO is paving the way to reform, and by extension ensuring the survival, of an endangered establishment.

The departure of the United States and the United Kingdom from UNESCO in the 1980s prompted urgent change and re-structuring of the agency, said Mayor. That past experience has enabled UNESCO to play a guiding role in the reform that is being demanded of the United Nations today. Accordingly, Mayor’s strategy focused on problem areas which have particularly threatened the effectiveness of the organization.

Mayor went on to say that UNESCO’s primary objective is to "attain world peace through intellectual and moral solidarity." As such, one of the primary aspects of reform is a global vision. "We need not an individual or national vision, but a global one. UNESCO is not just an institution in the heart of Paris. UNESCO is wherever there is a school, wherever there is an association of journalists, wherever there is an artist, wherever there is an educator, a professor. This is UNESCO."

The United Nations was founded to restore peace and order to a world shaken by war and grief. Mayor’s sense was that that mission can only be accomplished if this generation and future generations stand together. "(The United Nations) was founded on a promise given to our children and to our grandchildren, namely that we the peoples of the world, in all of our glorious diversity, have resolved to save the succeeding generations from the scourge of war," said Dr. Mayor. "The programs and agencies of the United Nations system must contribute to world peace according to their means and we must work together to do so."

Dr. Mayor also spoke of the dangers of "irreversibility". He defined the term as a tendency to delay or over-discuss a problem until an active response becomes useless, thereby rendering the situation irreversible. Reform in this instance is essential

Crucial to this reform is the implementation, as opposed to simple discussion, of working solutions. Dr. Mayor drew on his scientific experience to emphasize his point. "I am a bio-chemist, a brain bio-chemist. I have been working for many years in the prevention of the mental retardation in children. I know very well that what matters most is to make a decision at the right moment if you have the treatment. But if you don’t apply the treatment, then what is the value of the diagnosis? What is the value of having the treatment."

Dr. Mayor’s address was part of the "World Leaders Lecture Series", an initiative that was launched by the United Nations Association in Canada (UNA-Canada) during the celebrations that marked the fiftieth anniversary of the United Nations. Past speakers have included Prime Minister Jean Chrétien, Lord Frank Judd, a key member of the Commission on Global Governance, and His Excellency Boutros Boutros-Ghali.

Dr. Mayor has been Director-General of UNESCO since 1987. He has a Ph.D. in pharmacy and is a former member of the Spanish Parliament.