Investing cultural diversity and intercultural dialogue - Business and ...

28 . PART III – RENEWING INTERNATIONAL STRATEGIES
K The obelisk of Buenos
Aires, Argentina
Moreover, there can be no effective implementation of
civil and political rights unless the cultural requisites that
contribute to individual and collective self-realization are
themselves addressed. Exercising the right to vote, for
example, is to some extent contingent upon having
achieved at least a minimum level of education, such as
literacy. Most of these cultural requisites may be equated
with cultural rights, which are enablers of capacities.
Language rights are of particular importance since they
provide access to a capacity essential to all other rights.
Cultural rights are themselves poorly developed in
international law and have received scant mention in
a variety of international instruments. The broad compass
of cultural rights poses numerous problems of definition,
opposability and compatibility with other human rights.
Collective claims in the name of cultural rights – embody -
ing a rights-based approach to the promotion and the
protection of cultural diversity, relating to cultural
creations, cultural expressions or even the sum of a
community’s material and spiritual activities – are
difficult to translate in terms of human rights. Further -
more, it is not clear who is to guarantee the exercise of
such rights. Finally, there is an ongoing debate
concerning tensions between cultural rights and
fundamental human rights, such as the right to equal
treatment and non-discrimination.
Cultural diversity: A parameter of social cohesion
Cultural diversity today represents a key challenge
because of the multicultural composition of most
countries. The UNDP’s 2004 Human Development
Report, Cultural Liberty in Today’s Diverse World, stresses
the need to implement public policies that recognize
difference, champion diversity and promote cultural
freedoms. Yet this is only possible to the extent that we
are conscious of the conflicts that arise in multicultural
societies from the recognition of diversity. Experience
has shown that attempting to reinforce the national
fabric by pretending that differences do not exist leads
to cultural backlashes and that confronting cultural
differences is the only effective way of living with them.
While a culturally homogenous society has never existed,
the cultural web is becoming progressively more
complex as globalization takes hold. In many countries