Main trends of research in the social and human ... - unesdoc - Unesco

392 Jean Bourgeois-Pichat
In addition there are now four regional economic commissions - for Europe,
Asia and the Far East, Latin America and Africa.
This multidisciplinarity, however, goes hand in hand with a dividing-up of
responsibilities. Each of the agencies mentioned has its own budget, conferences
and programme. The large United Nations system thus creates conditions which
are contrary to those necessary for the proper functioning of a research institute
where research workers with varied training and interests work together.
This difficulty is now recognized by the United Nations which is considering
the establishment of a co-ordinating body. This body will doubtless merely discover
that everything is of interest to everybody, and will be hard put to it to
allot the part each should take.
It might well be that the establishment of an organization specializing in
population questions would meet the difficulties raised by this proposed coordination.
The recent creation by the Secretary-General of the United Nations of a
special fund for demographic questions is a step, albeit a timid one, in the right
direction.
The Advisory Committee on the Application of Science and Technology to
De~elopment,3~ a newcomer in the field of population problems, has correctly
attacked the issue. At its 10th session held in Vienna (Austria) in December,
1968, it requested the various agencies of the United Nations to present a
report on their activities in the field of demography which will be subsequently
examined at its 12th session at the end of 1969. The Committee proposes at that
time to ‘give special attention to the possible need, within the United Nations
family, for some new machinery, or a change in existing machinery, to maintain
an overall view of the scientific and technological aspects of population problems
and policies’.
A special case: the Council of Europe
122. Apart from the UnitedNations institutions, a number of other international
governmental organizations are interested in demographic questions.
There is:
in Paris:
- Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD);
in Geneva:
- the Intergovernmental Committee for European Migration (ICEM);
in Strasbourg:
- the Council of Europe.
This last organization deserves particular mention. It is the only one having
a political arm for translating into action the resolutions adopted by its assembly.
This provides an excellent means of encouraging research not possessed by
the United Nations Organization which has little authority over governments,
and whose appeals in favour of a co-ordinated development of demographic
research31 have so far remained without much effect.
Much can be expected from the experiment now being undertaken by the
Council of Europe. In 1966, this body convened a European Demographic