Second international meeting of professional cultural associations

ADDRESS BY MR JACQUES CHIRAC
PRESIDENT OF THE REPUBLIC

TO THE PERSONALITIES
GATHERED IN PARIS
FOR THE SECOND INTERNATIONAL MEETING
OF PROFESSIONAL CULTURAL ASSOCIATIONS

ÉLYSÉE PALACE

SUNDAY 2 FEBRUARY 2003

Right Honourable Ministers,
Mr Director-General of UNESCO,
Your Excellencies the Ambassadors,
Ladies and Gentlemen,

An artist gives savour, sense and beauty to life and to the world. As the reflecting-glass of humankind, he reveals its inner spirit. As the witness of our history, he personifies our revolt against the absurdities of time, our quest for a better reality. As pioneer, he expresses the most original characteristics of a people. He clears the path for us. Located at the core of man's questioning, he is doubt and frailty. He has need of freedom and respect. A society pulsates, stirs and progresses to the extent that it lets its creators and artists, all of you who illuminate our existence through your inspiration, occupy their rightful place.

Let me then offer you the warmest possible welcome. I am delighted to see assembled here in Paris, at the initiative of the Committee for Cultural Diversity, so many personalities from so many countries and from every field of art and creation. At a point where the future of languages and cultures, that is to say, of our identity, is critically at stake, your presence is the sign of an intense mobilisation. For this mobilisation I am thankful, since cultural diversity requires unremitting commitment.

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At a time when the map of the world is changing in outline, your International Meeting answers a double challenge: vigilance and action. The government and I are also aware of this challenge. The abolition of frontiers and distances, the opening-up of markets, the speeding of communications, the growth of information networks, all of these are factors for greater freedom. Globalisation holds out the promise of new horizons, of exciting discoveries, of blending and exchange among the world's cultures, as the arts of today demonstrate so well. Yet, if we do not take care, all this, for lack of rules and safeguards, could end by heaping power on the mightiest, ensuring triumph for products pre-formatted for the masses, accentuating inequality, fuelling confrontation between a dominant model and the rest of the world.

In this universe where competition and the search for profit are king, States, laws, national and international institutions have the task of setting the rules of the game, seeing that they are observed and correcting imbalances in a spirit of equity and solidarity. This holds particularly for the fields of culture and creation, which are activities rebel to market forces. Public institutions must conserve and enrich the heritage of all nations, and honour the genius, traditions and knowledge of all peoples. They must protect their unfettered and multiple expression. Through education, they must provide each person with a key to progress and a brighter future. These are indispensable to a civilised society in which free, enlightened and critical opinions can develop. The struggle for cultural diversity has as its goal the advent of a planet-spanning democracy, united on core matters but respectful of differences, the political expression of a controlled globalisation consonant with our values.

This is why culture must never bow under to trade. Culture will give us the weapons we need to deal with globalisation, this new challenge in the adventure of the human race. It will enable us to set respect for our fellow-beings and human dialogue against the adepts of the clash of civilisations, or the obsolete ethnic, nationalistic and religious dogmatisms that are still so painfully illustrated in the world.

That is France's conviction, the conviction upon which its cultural policy is grounded. It steadfastly and fiercely upholds this conviction in all forms of negotiation on the international stage. Our country is open to exchanges of all kinds; it refuses the steamroller of uniformisation. Aware of the present world's complexity, it defends diversity as a key to progress and enrichment. France, as a lover of peace, advocates dialogue among cultures.

Already at the Mauritius Summit in 1993, this was the unanimous view of Francophonie. It quickly became that of the European Union. During the GATT negotiations, the EU successfully demanded that creation, culture and thought be exonerated from the rules of liberalisation. This was followed in 1997 by the rallying of opinion against the Multilateral Investment Agreement. Your action was decisive in raising awareness of the dangers of unbridled liberalism. It was no longer a lonely battle to defend an exception; it had become a shared demand for diversity.

In the space of a few years, the demand for diversity has gathered momentum and found a wider audience. The notion has spread and taken root in both civil society and international fora, as may be seen from the Universal Declaration on Cultural Diversity adopted by UNESCO on 28 November 2001. It is now embraced by other cultural zones, be they Arab, Spanish or Portuguese speaking. Last September in Johannesburg, the Community of Nations acknowledged cultural diversity as being an ingredient in sustainable development, in other words, the future of the planet.

That was a victory, but it should not blind us to the long way that still lies ahead.

We find ourselves right now at a critical turning-point. With the opening in Doha of a round of international trade negotiations, the champions of unlimited trade liberalisation are once again lining up against those who believe that the creations of the mind cannot be reduced to the rank of ordinary merchandise.

For that reason, it is time to establish diversity as a principle of international law.

France proposes the adoption by the international community of a world convention on cultural diversity. It would take as its context the attachment to the humanist values which form our common background – those of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the pacts and treaties that flow from it. It would state that cultural diversity belongs to the common heritage of humanity, that it is a right which each State can claim. It would postulate the equal dignity of all cultures. It should formulate States' rights and obligations:

- respect for linguistic pluralism, and a mobilised effort to stop the extinction of languages throughout the world. At the present rate, half of them will have disappeared in the next fifty years. This would be an irreparable loss;

- stipulation of States' right to support creation by affirmative policies, appropriate action and mechanisms of their choice;

- affirmation of the exceptional nature of cultural assets, which are not ordinary goods, and whose specificity must be respected;

- recognition of the need for dialogue among cultures in order to progress towards a more peaceful world and together find solutions to contemporary problems;

- development of international cooperation mechanisms to assist developing countries to conserve their tangible and intangible heritage and defend their cultural creations.

France, along with its francophone partners mobilised since the Beirut Summit, the member countries of the International Network for Culture which will be meeting in Paris in a few days' time at the invitation of the Minister for Culture and Communication, and all the States committed to this cause, proposes that the next UNESCO Executive Council launch the drafting of this text with a view to its adoption by 2005 at the latest. France will take care to see that civil society, which you represent with talent and determination, is fully associated with this process. It is vital that the close and trusting dialogue between culture professionals and governments, which has been the secret of our strength in international negotiations for the last ten years, should remain at the centre of our action in the forthcoming period. We count on you, Mr Director-General of UNESCO, to give this undertaking decisive impetus and back it with all the authority of the eminent institution which you direct. It will be for UNESCO the confirmation of its special place among the institutions which regulate globalisation.

At the same time, France, speaking through the voice of Europe, will maintain its demand in the new round of trade negotiations: States or groups of States which so wish shall retain the right to confer exceptional status on audio-visual and cultural services, distinct from the obligations of liberalisation. This is the imperative negotiating brief entrusted to the Commission, and I know I can count on the determination of its President and the relevant Commissioners. Along the same lines, we urge States wishing to join the WTO to refrain from making any liberalisation offer in the audio-visual and cultural fields.

France is also conducting the campaign for cultural diversity within the Convention assigned to present a Constitution for Europe next summer. The French representatives have requested that the furtherance of and respect for cultural diversity be written into the future Treaty as part of the fundamental goals pursued by the Union. Not only that, but clearly our government will remain adamantly opposed to the adoption of a qualified majority vote in the negotiation of trade agreements dealing with audio-visual and cultural services. Lastly, we should like culture to receive greater attention in other Union policies, in particular so as to fortify the public aid devoted to it.

Alongside the current international negotiations and discussions concerning the future constitutional Treaty, we must build, all of us together, a European cultural area. It will require not only programmes that are novel in content and scale, but also increased exchange, cooperation and dissemination in every field of culture, strengthened and harmonised copyright protection, anti-piracy measures. These are some of the essential areas of work awaiting us. I must, of course, add Europe's duty to preserve its cultural industries and enable, for example, our programme industries, our cinema, to face up to globalisation. The review of the Television without Borders Directive should, in this connection, reconfirm the goal-oriented intention that underlay its adoption. In company with the MEDIA Programme, it forms the cornerstone of Europe's audio-visual policy.

At a moment when the Union is readying to receive ten new Members next year, each of them rich with its own history, languages and cultures, Europe's identity quite obviously merits a shared cultural ambition of this kind. Europe requires a major cultural plan.

A European cultural area will be strong to the extent that it provides its artists and creators with the conditions in which to produce lively and vigorous work.

That is why France, which does not consider culture as simple entertainment or something superfluous, intends to abide by the exceptional nature of its culture policy while adjusting it to world developments. Yes, the State and the public authorities are justified in offering support to creators and artists – it is our tradition and our strength – whether it be in our books and public reading policies, support for motion picture and audio-visual production, heritage protection and promotion, encouragement for the performing arts, music, song composers, writers, the plastic arts, backing for cultural industries, sponsorship development, deliberate incentives in favour of our cultural presence in the world.

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Ladies and gentlemen, when I see you gathered here, I cannot help being glad that, thanks to you, Paris is once again this evening the capital of cultural diversity. And I cannot help thinking that the notion of diversity has come a long way since France, confident in its humanism, universalism and republican values, was the first and almost alone to issue its call for dialogue and respect for all the world's cultures.

We mark well today that there are boundaries which globalisation has no right to abolish. They are the frontiers which enable us to go from one culture to another, which teach us that there is not one language, but many, that human universality takes singular shapes and that we must hold on to this treasure as one of humanity's most precious belongings.

The territories of the human race are not only material and geographic. They are also territories of the mind. On every continent, it is these territories which offer each person the yardstick for finding and measuring his own and his fellow's dignity. They are the arena where the peace and destiny of nations are decided, and where tolerance is acquired.

To reburnish the idea of human progress. To go in pursuit of a new utopia, a new ideal. To re-enchant the world, restore the dream in man, and give him back a land in which to live it. That is the purpose of your commitment. That is the reason for our engagement.

Thank you.






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