EM7W3

38 | Proposals to the Nation
academic, humanistic, local and international spheres. They thus
provide the Academies with invaluable knowledge about Venezuelan
reality not only did their members witness and study the nation’s
experiences, but in many cases played an active part in
them.
A solemn session was held on 10 November 2010 in the
Main Hall of the Palace of the Academies in Caracas in order to
present the different “Proposals to the Nation” as a contribution
made by the National Academies as part of the commemorations
of the Bicentenary of our Independence. Given the limited time
available, coordinators from each Academy gave an overview of
their project and their texts were subsequently published in full
on each Academy’s website in order to give the public access to
them.
In order to communicate these important studies to a wider
public, the National Academies decided to make this compilation
of the final versions in order to provide a written record of
these meticulous analyses of key problems and their possible
solutions. We thus ratify our ongoing commitment to taking an
active and positive part in the life of the nation by putting the
invaluable intellectual resources the Academies boast at the service
of the nation.
The first Proposal to the Nation presented here was carried
out by the Academy of Political and Social Sciences under the title:
The Institutional Reconstruction of the Country. The study compares
the constitutional framework of the Democratic and Social State
of Law and Justice and the country’s political reality and concludes
that it is vital to carry out a peaceful reconstruction of the nation’s
institutions, based on a series of grounds that are analyzed and
proposed therein.
This Proposal to the Nation is followed by National Academy
of History’s study, which is entitled: Public policies on teaching
national history in Venezuela. Who better than this Academy of
the nation’s most distinguished historians to analyze this controversial
and relevant topic in today’s Venezuela, in light of the proposed
reforms to our children and young people’s study programs?
The third Proposal to the Nation presented here was produced
by the National Academy of Medicine, with the title: State
of Health in Venezuela. Considerations, concepts, statistics and
propositions. The study presents a brief description of the evolution
of health, ranging from rural Venezuela at the start of last
century up to today’s urban nation and an analysis of the current