UNITED NATIONS EDUCATIONAL, SCIENTIFIC AND CULTURAL ORGANIZATION

Declaration of Oaxaxa

(Adopted at the Seminar on Education, Work and Cultural Pluralism,
convened by UNESCO and the Mexican National Commission for UNESCO, 1993.)

Cultural pluralism, as a manner of conviviality, rests on the conviction that mankind has a common origin and a common destiny. The principal problems afflicting human society today: war, racism, poverty, environmental degradation, authoritarianism, drugs, infant mortality, as well as inequality and injustice in trade, finance, scientific and technical progress, will not find universal solutions without new forms of governmental and radical change in international relations and cooperation. In essence, those solutions, which are ever subject to controversial economic and political interests and different cultural outlooks, demand a pluricultural dialogue, national and international, open and egalitarian. Such a dialogue, where Ibero-America is concerned, must include the indigenous people, the Afro-Americans and those of Asian and European origins.

The globalization of the economy, the migration of the work force and the evolution in communications have created a worldwide area where trends towards a standardization of values are matched by a vigorous reassertion of national, ethnic, cultural and regional particularities. The reassertion of the diversity of cultural identities and their consolidation are bulwarks against the danger of a technological society, which succumbs because it is powerless to achieve that democracy towards which mankind strives, because it is incapable of creating efficient instruments to attain a pattern of development that places the individual and his values at the center of its concerns. Identities, in short, that propel history, that are not frozen legacies but living syntheses, perpetually changing, thriving on inner differences, admitting and reworking contributions from outside.

A worldwide space needs common values derived from the specific characteristics of each nation, each ethnic group and each region. The concept of human rights as a formula open to new enrichment based on experience and understood in the broadest sense as cultural, social, economic, political and civil individual rights; and insofar as it stands of the right of people to peace, development, self-determination and decolonization, as a sound foundation for building true democracy in Ibero-America, a democracy that will find new syntheses for old aspirations, such as freedom and social harmony, growth and equity, efficiency and legality, sovereignty and interdependence.

We refer to a participatory democracy, where demagoguery, corruption and impunity are alien, a social and political construction that looks towards the future, that is rooted in the characteristics of each society and in the exchange of those values and institutions which man, in all historical latitudes, has forged in answer to his need of freedom, prosperity, equity and the reassertion of diversity. The full development of cultural pluralism will only be possible once respect for the equal dignity of all cultures has been implanted in Ibero-America, governed by understanding, dialogue and concertation as the alternatives to intolerance, exclusion and violence.

An environmental ethic implies the co-responsibility of developed and developing countries in the management and use of natural resources. Respect for indigenous cultures, for their special relationship with nature and the decision of the industrialized world to take up their particular financial and technical duties in preserving the biosphere, will be the cornerstone of a new ecological awareness reconciling environmental rights and development in accordance with Agenda 21 as adopted at the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro.

Education in itself is a cultural fact that proceeds from work, and it is through these means that man transforms his surroundings, organizes his life and builds his history. Globalization, economic adjustment and the transformation of the means of production have radically altered the economic, social, educational, cultural and vocational scenario of the countries of our Americas. It is necessary, out of respect for cultural pluralism, to alter educational concepts and practices and to incorporate deliberately and organically those aspect which are related to productive work, seeking to draw upon the traditions of indigenous people so as to utilize, re-create and preserve nature in the production process.

Widespread technological change has altered the character of work and is bringing about substantial modifications in the ways production is organized and in the rules and regulations that, historically, safeguarded workers' rights. It is indispensable to define educational strategies, vocational policies and legal directives for the guidance of immigrant and settled workers so as to prevent technological modernization from continuing to be a social curse. If they are not to lose legitimacy, the objectives of increased competitiveness together with improved quality and productivity cannot continue to be factors of social inequity, as hitherto.

The participants at the Seminar express their satisfaction at the important agreements achieved at the previous Ibero-America Summits in Guadalajara and Madrid in the light of item 8 of the Guadalajara Declaration, where the Heads of State affirm: "We recognize the immense contribution of indigenous people to the development and plurality of our societies and reiterate our commitment to ensure their economic and social welfare, as well as our duty to respect their rights and their cultural identity."

They therefore agree to:

1. Promote the consolidation of national constitutional and legislative provisions with a view to furthering the rights of indigenous people, setting up national commissions for that purpose and procuratories for the human rights of indigenous people.

2. urge states to ratify the Constitutive Convention of the Fund for the Development of the Indigenous People of Latin America and the Caribbean and its financial and operational strengthening;

3. encourage the initiatives of indigenous organizations and personalities with a view to the adoptions by the United Nations of a Decade for the Development of Indigenous People.

4. Undertake to protect indigenous people, encouraging the adoption without further delay of the Universal Declaration of Rights of the World's Indigenous People and wider ratification of Convention No. 169 of the International Labor Organization and its effective application

5. Uphold the efforts made by UNESCO in approaching the theme of cultural pluralism. Likewise, support its decision to create national and international areas for dialogue as a contribution to strengthening democratic culture.

Adopted at the Seminar on Education, Work and Cultural Pluralism, convened by UNESCO and the Mexican National Commission for UNESCO, 1993.