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As a surprising preface to his now famous speech
announcing to the world his attitude and general
intentions regarding Iraq, the President – in thirtyseven
much applauded words – announced that “As
a symbol of our commitment to human dignity, the
United States will return to UNESCO. This
organization has been reformed and America will
participate fully in its mission to advance human
rights and tolerance and learning.”.
A few weeks later, at a ceremony held at the U.N. in
New York, First Lady Laura Bush, a teacher and
librarian by profession, accepted to be a U.N.
Ambassador for literacy under UNESCO
sponsorship.
It was decided that for budgetary and organizational
reasons, the best time for the actual return would be
at the next (32 nd ) UNESCO General Conference to
be held in Paris in late September and early
October 2003. As much heralded in the
international press, Laura Bush came to the
General Conference heading the U.S. delegation
together with U.S. Secretary of Education Paige.
Her “re-entering” speech, dealing mainly but not
exclusively with education, was well received and,
in a brief but meaningful ceremony, the American
flag was raised, joining the 189 others in front of
UNESCO Headquarters. International politics set
aside, there was clear satisfaction and pleasure
among the delegates and the Secretariat at the
return to “normalcy” i.e. American participation in
UNESCO’s programs and activities.
What led to the U.S. withdrawal from UNESCO? As
always, it was a combination of different factors,
domestic and international. The Republican Party
and President Reagan were in power with their
conservative outlook and emphasis on internal
affairs and a conscious or otherwise, hardly ever
admitted, re-emerging sense of isolationism. The
cold war was on and much was reduced to “being
with us or against us”, the struggle with the “evil
empire”, with the third world and its “automatic
majority” in international bodies being constant
irritants. After all, following the creation of the
League of Nations after World War I, the U.S.
Congress declined in 1919 to ratify President
Woodrow Wilson’s commitment to the new
international organization of which he had been an
instigator and ardent supporter.
Officially, the U.S. claimed that UNESCO was
mismanaged, that its bureaucracy was inefficient
and “corrupt”, that the Organization was “politicised”
and dealing with political issues rather than
“technical” ones for which it and the other
specialized agencies were intended (WHO, WMO,
ITU were cited as good examples). The obvious
fact that a governmental organization was “political”
by definition was ignored or not understood. In
addition, the Senegalese Director-General, Amadou
Mokhtar M’Bow was accused of promoting a World
Information Order which would result in government
regulation and control of the media and therefore an
end to freedom of the press and information in
general. The fact is that even though there had
been discussions of how to improve developing
countries’ management of their problems dealing
with information, nothing ever came of these
discussions which remained just that.
In the background, there was also resentment of a
perceived feeling of anti-Americanism resulting from
the loud voice of Arab countries, supported by some
other third world countries, against Israel. All of
these allegations, whether real, exaggerated, or
imagined, played in the hands of the majority of the
members of the U.S. Congress and others who
from the very start were not really sold on the
United Nations and its system of organizations in
which the U.S. had to be just one member state
among others, even if it was a permanent member
of the U.N. Security Council. Congress
overwhelmingly supported the government’s
decision to withdraw from UNESCO in December
1984.
To be sure, probably the U.N. and UNESCO never
would have been created had it not been for the
vision of Presidents Franklin Roosevelt and Harry
Truman as well as of important political and
intellectual figures like Senator J. William Fulbright
and Librarian of Congress Archibald Mac Leish. His
are the famous opening words of the UNESCO
constitution: “since wars begin in the minds of men,
it is in the minds of men that the defences of peace
must be constructed”. By the 1980’s, internationalist
thinkers like those of the 1940s were not much in
fashion with the government and the old latent
American distrust of culture, elitism and
internationalism, combined with the cold-war
atmosphere, contributed to the U.S. government
decision to leave UNESCO.
Exactly what led to the change in the attitude of the
present Republican administration is not clear.
Undoubtedly a certain realization of the benefits of
international cooperation and action combined with
the streamlining of the Organization brought about
by UNESCO’s present Japanese Director-General
Koichiro Matsuura and the impressive leadership
team which he assembled, contributed to the long
awaited US return to the Organization. Still, it is no
secret that in spite of the U.S. commitment at the
highest level, Congress has not yet fully
appropriated the necessary funds to cover the
assessed dues. However, it is expected to be
settled in the near future, as is the establishment of
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