• 22-26 May 2000, UN Headquarters

 

• Civil society organisations

 

• Working text about culture/cultural diversity

 

“It is as commonly stated that globalisation is a phenomenon that will benefit cultural diversity as that it represents a danger to this diversity”  (p.1)

 

• Globalisation as a novel situation: 

communication and exchange

 

• Globalisation as the exporting and imposition of the western socio-economic and cultural model

 

Diversity versus homogenisation (p.2) :

• Capitalist market economy (‘neoliberalism’)
• Liberal democracy
• Individualisation of human rights
• Modern experimental science
• Modern positive law
• Secularisation
• Social and economic exclusion

 

Diversity and exchange/communication (p.3)

• cf. Castells about ‘affirmation of identity’  (p. 47)

 

 

Key concepts

 

Culture

 

• Very broad concept, ‘global standpoint’ (p.4)

 

• Linked to the idea of diversity as “human creativity in search of fullness” (p.9)

 

• Remember definitions of Ferraro and Hofstede

(The Cultural Dimension of Europe)

 

• Linked to the concepts of ‘cultural identity’ and ‘cultural community’ (p.5)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Cultural identity

 

• “...through which persons and groups are defined, manifested and wish to be recognised” (p.5)

 

• Image of the tree (p.6):

 

Roots: values, beliefs, and deepest myths

Trunk:   formal and informal institutions

Branches:  particular practices

 

• • • Question:

“Are values globalised? institutions? practices? all three together?” (p.7)

 

Cultural diversity

 

• Cultural identity is “a dynamic reality” (p.8)

 

• Question:  How do different cultures adapt (aanpassen) themselves to the new situations raised by globalisation?

 

• Cultural diversity and the ‘search of fullness’ (p.9)

 

• Accepting diversity = recognition of “the other ... as a full reality”

 

• Three conceptions of cultural diversity  (p.11):

- Hard uniformising model

- Meervoud Plural universal model

- Pluralist model

 

pluralisme
plu - ra` lis - me («Latijn) het -woord 1 opvatting dat de wereld bestaat uit een veelheid van zelfstandige aparte entiteiten; 2 het naast elkaar bestaan van een verscheidenheid aan opvattingen in het maatschappelijk en geestelijk leven

 

Within the framework of the latter model:

proposals for the Millennium Forum and the whole UN system

 

 

• Culture of peace - broad sense, recognition of different cultural conceptions

 

• Eradication (uitroeing) of poverty (Armoede)-  here as well: different conceptions and experiences

 

• Human Rights - universal as well as articulated alongside diversity

 

• Sustainable development - diversity vital (onmisbaar)  for the future of humanity