Premium
UNESCO AND THE ACHIEVEMENT OF PEACE
Author(s) -
Laves Walter H. C.
Publication year - 1951
Publication title -
the political quarterly
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.373
H-Index - 37
eISSN - 1467-923X
pISSN - 0032-3179
DOI - 10.1111/j.1467-923x.1951.tb00212.x
Subject(s) - politics , citation , laves phase , library science , political science , sociology , law , computer science , chemistry , organic chemistry , alloy , intermetallic
UNESCO AND THE ACHIEVEMENT OF PEACE By WALTER H. C. LAVES* I” the light of the deepening world crisis and the continu.ing danger of war, the unresolved question of Unesco’s proper role in United Nations &airs becomes an urgent and crucial issue which should be resolved once for all by the General Conference of Unesco meeting in Paris in June, 19j1. As the one agency of the United Nations created for the specific purpose of contributing to peace and security through education, science, and culture, it should play a central role in the total effort of the United Nations to achieve and maintain peace. Actually, Unesco has thus far played only a minor part in this task, although it has undertaken a wide variety of activities in the fields of education, science, and culture that are in themselves interesting and valuable. The degree to which the coming Paris Conference can succeed in focusing the work of Unesco directly upon the task of contributing to peace and security will not only affect the prospects for achieving and maintaining peace; it will also determine whether the people of the United Nations must find some other agency to perform the highly important function set forth in Unesco’s constitution. The question of Unesco’s relation to the achievement and maintenance of peace has from the start been a source of confusion and disagreement in the General Conference, the Executive Board, and the Secretariat. It has even been argued by responsible members of these bodies that it is not Unesco’s task at all to contribute to the achievement of peace, as the constitution explicitly provides, but rather to enrich the peace, if * Mr. Laves was the former Deputy Director-General of Unesco, 1947-50. He is now Visiting Professor of Political Science at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Mich., U.S.A.