The United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization, known to the world as UNESCO, has three principal mandates: the eradication of world illiteracy, the preservation of historical monuments, and the pursuit of scientific exchange. Those goals are ambitious enough to merit the energies and resources of an international commission.
But UNESCO doesn’t seem very interested in teaching the world’s illiterates how to read or write. Instead, UNESCO prefers to spend its time promoting controversial political goals.
Furthermore, it’s much more interesting and pleasant for UNESCO employees to work in Paris (where illiteracy is not a problem) than it is to endure the hardships of those vast areas of the world where illiteracy is a problem. So, four out of five of UNESCO’s employees are based in Paris, and only 20% of UNESCO’s funds are spent in the field.
UNESCO’s goal for the year 2010 is 90% world literacy, and today there are 800 million illiterates. Yet, only 40% of UNESCO’s budget is devoted to education, and less than half of the education budget is devoted to literacy.
Instead, UNESCO allows itself to be used as a conduit for Soviet propaganda in favor of disarmament. The UNESCO 1984-85 budget includes $2.5 million for peace and disarmament “education.”
For example, it includes a $272,600 study to help educators develop “a frame of mind conducive to the strengthening of security and disarmament.” The official title of this program is: “Implementation of the 1974 Recommendation and Follow-Up to the Intergovernmental Conference on Education for International Understanding, Cooperation and Peace and Education Relating to Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms, with a View to Developing a Frame of Mind Conducive to the Strengthening of Disarmament.”
Two out of three projects in UNESCO’s program for vocational, technical, and extension education pertain to disarmament. The UNESCO budget includes $122,400 for the distribution of a teaching handbook on peace, disarmament, and UNESCO’s version of human rights, and to prepare a guide “to methods of education in favor of disarmament.”
UNESCO plans to spend another $104,300 to foster cooperation between educational institutions and other organizations to “promote education for peace and disarmament among rural populations.” This includes pilot projects to help “alert organizations and community groups to the issues of peace.”
UNESCO has an educational extension program to bring together social scientists for training in educating students about the “dangers of nuclear war, of the arms race, and of certain harmful uses of science and technology.” This program is not for just anyone; it is aimed particularly at “those destined for positions of responsibility.”
UNESCO budgeted $153,500 to improve the Associated Schools system and its curricula, but this includes a study on the role of pre-school education in the promotion of peace. UNESCO budgeted $158,000 to improve the educational content of the mass media’s “civic rights and responsibilities” regarding peace and disarmament.
Toward the end of 1983, UNESCO spent four days haggling over the preamble of a resolution on human rights. In order to produce a resolution that would pass, all mention of specific freedoms had to be deleted and replaced by UNESCO-style wording which places the rights and prerogatives of the state over that of the individual.
Then UNESCO passed a second so-called “human rights” resolution, supposedly addressing education. It mentioned disarmament five times and established disarmament as one of UNESCO’s chief priorities for the next several years.
Disarmament isn’t the only mischief-making that UNESCO engages in. The 1984-85 budget includes such other exercises in useless paperwork as $105,800 to study the educational uses of leisure time, and $183,000 to promote an international convention on the recognition of studies (whatever that is).
It’s no wonder that the Reagan Administration concluded that salvation for UNESCO is hopeless and that the United States should stop feeding this monster with American dollars. There is no real hope for reform when the United States is limited to only one vote out of 161 and the overwhelming majority wants to spend our money to attack our policies.
