(M2'; 
 
 the defenses of peace 
 
 ft 
 
 Docum^ts Relating to 
 
 u N E S CJQ, 
 
 The United Nations Educational 
 Scientific and Cultural Organization 
 
 Part II 
 
 ^ ^ , THE DEPARTMENT OF STATE 
 
f'l 
 
 * 
 
 
 
 “The Governments of the States parties 
 to this Constitution on behalf of their peoples 
 declare that since wars begin in the minds 
 of men, it is in the minds of men that the 
 defences of peace must be constructed . . 
 
 — Preamble of the Constitution 
 OF UNESCO 
 
the defenses of peace 
 
 Documents Relating to 
 
 UNESCO 
 
 The United Nations Educational 
 Scientific and Cultural Organization 
 
 Part II 
 
 [Part I, printed separately, contains a letter of transmittal by 
 William Benton, a report by Archibald MacLeish, Chairman of 
 the U. S. Delegation, the Constitution of UNESCO, and other 
 documents of the London Conference.) 
 
 UNITED STATES GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE 
 Washington : 1946 
 
DEPARTMENT OF STATE 
 Publication 2475 
 
 Conference Series 81 
 
 For sale by the Superintendent of Documents 
 U. S. Government Printing Office, Washington 25, D. C. 
 Price 15 cents 
 
 
PREFATORY NOTE 
 
 The following material was prepared by the United States Delega- 
 tion, to provide information on the development of UNESCO up to 
 the present time and to explain the provisions of the Constitution and 
 the present status of the Organization. The article on the background 
 of the London Conference and the summary and analysis of the Con- 
 stitution were written by members of the Delegation as a joint under- 
 taking. The chapters on the various articles of the Constitution and 
 the Instrument establishing the Preparatory Commission were written 
 in the first instance by Delegation members who represented the United 
 States in the commissions where those portions of the text were con- 
 sidered. The manuscripts were collected and edited, under the guid- 
 ance of the chairman, by officers of the Department of State who served , 
 
 on the Delegation, and had the benefit of criticism by all the members 
 of the Delegation. 
 
 (HI) 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 Page 
 
 Prefatory Note in 
 
 Background of the London Conference for the estab- 
 lishment of an Educational, Scientific and Cultural 
 Organization 1 
 
 Summary and Analysis of the United Nations Educa- 
 tional, Scientific and Cultural Organization .... 13 
 
 Selected Quotations from Addresses delivered at Plenary 
 Sessions of the Conference for the establishment 
 of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and 
 Cultural Organization 42 
 
 Congressional Resolutions, 1945 49 
 
 Provisions of the Charter of the United Nations applica- 
 ble to UNESCO . 51 
 
 Text of Article I (Purposes and Functions) as approved 
 by the First Commission and referred to the Drafting 
 Committee for condensation 57 
 
 (V» 
 
7 
 
 I 
 
 \ 
 
 \ 
 
Background of the 
 
 LONDON CONFERENCE 
 
 for the establishment of an Educational, 
 Scientific and Cultural Organization 
 
 Scholars, scientists and educators, artists and writers have long 
 been accustomed to move about the world and to work together with- 
 out much attention to national boundaries, and this has been especially 
 true of Americans, who have kept closely in touch with what has gone 
 on in other countries in their various fields of interest. During the 
 last half of the previous century such intellectual interchanges came 
 to be organized into international congresses and even into permanent 
 international organizations. This movement, which was steadily 
 growing before the first World War, took on a rapid acceleration be- 
 tween the first and second World Wars; efforts toward international 
 organization in political and economic matters were paralleled by 
 international activities in education and in all other fields of intel- 
 lectual life, and increasing attention was given to the relationship 
 of thought and feeling to the basic problems of international peace. 
 Thus, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Or- 
 ganization is firmly rooted in earlier efforts, in which Americans 
 have had a large part, to develop international good-will and co- 
 operation, but it is a new, more determined, and more comprehensive 
 undertaking in this field, and it is motivated by a far greater sense 
 of urgency than existed a quarter of a century ago. 
 
 Many features of the Constitution for UNESCO adopted at Lon- 
 don, November 16, 1945, and many of the plans for its work in the 
 future are derived from the experience gained before 1939 by both 
 non-governmental and governmental agencies. The organizations 
 and activities of that period were more limited in scope and much 
 less adequately supported than is intended for the new agency, but 
 a brief review will serve to illuminate the guiding principles and 
 major problems of UNESCO. 
 
 N on-Govemmental Agencies 
 
 Governments were slow to move in the field of cultural coopera- 
 tion, and the patterns for international cooperation were set by 
 
 ( 1 ) 
 
2 
 
 voluntary groups. They were guided mainly by two motives : on 
 the one hand, to improve and facilitate their own work and advance 
 their interest by collaboration on common projects and, on the other, 
 to strengthen the fabric of international life by developing communi- 
 ties of interest that cut across national boundaries. 
 
 The period immediately following the first World War saw the 
 creation of many organizations, of which the International Council 
 of Scientific Unions and the International Union of Academies were 
 typical. The International Research Council, which later became the 
 International Council of Scientific Unions, was formed between Oc- 
 tober 1918 and June 1919 ; the International Union of Academies was 
 established for the humanistic studies, in a series of conferences last- 
 ing from March to October 1919. The basic constituent units of both 
 organizations were for each country the most representative national 
 academy or similar institution in their I’espective fields ; in the United 
 States the National Research Council and the American Council of 
 Learned Societies constitute the organizational links. The Inter- 
 national Council of Scientific Unions is organized horizontally, that 
 is, its membership includes international unions in the fields of astron- 
 omy, biology, chemistry, geodesy and geophysics, geography, physics 
 and scientific radio, as well as national central scientific institutions. 
 
 The international agencies in the various fields of education and 
 scholarship have not only derived from national activities, but, in 
 many cases, have strengthened and stimulated the national organiza- 
 tions. In the case of the International Council of Scientific Unions, 
 the United States was well prepared to participate because one of the 
 functions assigned to the National Research Council, when it was put 
 on a permanent basis by the Executive order of May 11, 1918, was to 
 provide the means for closer cooperation of American with foreign 
 scientists. The formation of the International Union of Academies, 
 on the other hand, was chiefly responsible for the federation of twelve 
 (now twenty-four) national associations and societies devoted to the 
 humanities and social sciences into the American Council of Learned 
 Societies. The International Federation of University Women, es- 
 tablished also in 1919, had a similar effect. In the United States, the 
 Association of Collegiate Alumnae and the Southern Association of 
 College Women united in the American Association of University 
 Women, in order to have representation in the international body — a 
 step which greatly strengthened this group and broadened its pow- 
 ers and influence for work at home as well as abroad. In many other 
 countries and many other fields, national organizations were founded 
 where none had existed before because of the desire to become affili- 
 ated with an international body. 
 
 Throughout this period non-governmental international organiza- 
 tions in the educational and cultural fields multiplied. Youth groups. 
 
3 
 
 religious groups, women’s associations, committees and councils to 
 foster international understanding by means of education were 
 founded or grew quickly from small pre-1914 beginnings, touching 
 the lives and interests of individuals in all lands. Students were ex- 
 changed, or went on special vacation tours, or attended summer 
 schools abroad; international fellowships were founded; teachers 
 were interchanged in all types of institutions. In contrast to the ab- 
 stention of the United States from international political institu- 
 tions, Americans and American organizations participated whole- 
 heartedly in these activities. This experience of cooperation helped 
 to establish strong bonds among the intellectual leaders who were 
 later to face the menace, and then the fact of fascist conquest. Many 
 of these men and women took part, after the years of resistance, in 
 the formation of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cul- 
 tural Organization. 
 
 The International Organization for Intellectual Cooperation 
 
 Intergovernmental action in this field dates from 1922. After an 
 initial failure to make cultural relationships a part of the structure 
 of the League of Nations, the International Committee on Intellectual 
 Cooperation was established by the League in that year. The Com- 
 mittee consisted of twelve distinguished scholars, scientists and men 
 of letters, chosen as leaders of thought, whose position transcended 
 national considerations. Since the Assembly of the League had taken 
 a negative attitude toward the possibility of working on educational 
 problems without invading national sovereignty, the Committee was 
 confined to what were considered less controversial activities, and was 
 very much limited with respect to administrative and research facili- 
 ties. The Committee’s work was broadened later and some attention 
 was given to the problem of education for international understand- 
 ing, after it began to be apparent that the maintenance of peace was 
 a matter of concern to all nations. This development was barely 
 under way, however, before the rise of aggressive nationalisms in 
 Europe and Asia challenged the whole international system. 
 
 The International Organization for Intellectual Cooperation grew 
 by accretion. In 1924 the French Government offered to establish the 
 Institute of Intellectual Cooperation in Paris, and the League of 
 Nations accepted the offer. The Institute was linked to the League by 
 making the Committee on Intellectual Cooperation the governing body 
 of the Institute, but the Committee retained a small secretariat at 
 the League headquarters in Geneva. A system of advisory committees 
 and other related bodies was developed as the scope of the Intellectual 
 Cooperation Organization broadened. 
 
 683358—46 2 
 
4 
 
 The existence of the Intellectual Cooperation Organization as a 
 technical organ of the League was recognized by the Assembly in 1926 
 and 1931. In 1938 an attempt was made to bring in the countries that 
 had left the League or had never belonged to it, and also to finance 
 the Institute on a broader basis. For these purposes the International 
 Act concerning Intellectual Cooperation was negotiated at Paris. The 
 intention of the Act was to place the Intellectual Cooperation Organ- 
 ization on an autonomous basis, but still within the League system. 
 The Act came into force on January 31, 1940, after the necessary eight 
 governments had signed it, and four more adhered by June of that 
 year. However, the program of intellectual cooperation could be 
 continued only in the Western Hemisphere from that time until after 
 the liberation of western Europe began in 1944. Although the Insti- 
 tute of Intellectual Cooperation was reopened early in 1945 the 
 expectation is that it will go out of existence when UNESCO comes 
 into operation. 
 
 The principal work of the Intellectual Cooperation Organization 
 was to develop the methods and practice of collaboration among the 
 intellectual leaders of different countries on concrete projects of mutual 
 interest. Exchanges of information among museum and archive offi- 
 cials were developed; studies of the problem of rights in intellectual 
 property were carried on ; and in 1938 the Institute began to serve as 
 the secretariat of the International Council of Scientific Unions and 
 to cooperate with that body in organizing conferences on special sci- 
 entific problems. Some work was done on visual aids to educa- 
 tion through the Educational Cinematographic Institute at Rome. 
 Through the International Studies Conference, as well as through the 
 “Conversations” in which the leading philosophers and writers of 
 many countries took part, attempts were made to clarify the intellec- 
 tual causes of the growing international crisis and to propose ways of 
 meeting the challenge. 
 
 The National Committees on Intellectual Cooperation did valuable 
 work in furthering the programs in this field and providing links with 
 the unofficial educational, scientific, and cultural groups. They were 
 not structurally a part of the Intellectual Cooperation Organization, 
 but their usefulness was recognized increasingly. Conferences were 
 held occasionally for the National Committees and in the Act of Paris 
 of 1938 the Institute was charged with assisting them in their work. 
 In 1939 the National Committees in the American Republics met at 
 Santiago, Chile, and in 1941 they held a conference in Havana, less 
 than a month before Pearl Harbor. Although the United States did 
 not belong to the League or the Intellectual Cooperation Organization 
 there was in this country a National Committee on International 
 Intellectual Cooperation which provided significant leadership both 
 nationally and internationally. 
 
I 
 
 5 
 
 That all of this activity touched far too few people was the common 
 criticism of the work of the Intellectual Cooperation Organization. 
 The lack of funds was partly responsible for this failing, but it was 
 also due in part to the fact that the Committee and the Institute were 
 confined in the beginning to specialized projects and seldom made a 
 direct impact on the lives of ordinary human beings. The number of 
 people who knew about the activities in intellectual cooperation was 
 small, and the number directly involved in them was smaller but was 
 growing rapidly. 
 
 The International Bureau of Education and Other Orgamzations 
 
 After the failure of the educators of various countries to win the 
 support of the League of Nations for an official international educa- 
 tional agency, the International Bureau of Education was set up in 
 Geneva. It started as a voluntary research agency in 1925, but in 
 1929 it was put on a quasi-official basis. Membership is open to all 
 governments, public institutions or institutions operating in the pub- 
 lic interest, or international unions. The Bureau has a membership of 
 fifteen governments and two non-governmental agencies, but the prin- 
 cipal educational officials of thirty-five or forty countries formerly 
 took part in the International Conferences on Public Instruction. 
 
 The main function of the Bureau has been to serve as a clearing- 
 house of information on education in various countries, but it also 
 carried on a continuous study of methods of education for interna- 
 tional understanding and peace. During the war, when many of its 
 normal activities were suspended, the Bureau developed the project 
 of Intellectual Assistance to Prisoners of War, which involved chiefly 
 the shipping of books to prison camps. 
 
 Inter-governmental agencies of a more specialized character were 
 founded or given new impetus in the 1920’s and 1930’s. Such tech- 
 nical bodies as the International Union of Weights and Measures and 
 the International Meteorological Union expanded and strengthened 
 their programs. Regional agencies developed also, especially in the 
 Western Hemisphere, where the Pan American Union, through its 
 Division of Intellectual Cooperation, fostered the rapid spread of 
 intercultural understanding. 
 
 The Conference of Allied Ministers of Education 
 
 In spite of the limitations and shortcomings of international cooper- 
 ation in educational and cultural activities between 1918 and 1939, 
 the spirit of solidarity which it had encouraged persisted even during 
 the war and played a part in the resistance of teachers, scholars, and 
 artists to the occupation forces. Those who were free continued to 
 use the machinery of international cooperation to deal with their 
 common problems, although they had to devise new agencies also for 
 
6 
 
 this purpose. Out of that cooperation and out of the wealth of ex- 
 perience gathered between the wars there came a new movement for 
 an international organization for cultural relations. It grew up in 
 unofficial bodies like the International Assembly in Great Britain and 
 the Liaison Committee for International Education in the United 
 States, which organized an International Education Assembly at 
 Harpers Ferry, West Virginia, in September 1943. 
 
 In the autumn of 1942 the Ministers of Education of the govern- 
 ments-in-exile located in London began meeting under the auspices 
 of the British Council, the agency of the British Government respon- 
 sible for cultural relations with other countries. The nations repre- 
 sented in the Conference from the beginning were Belgium, Czecho- 
 slovakia, France, Great Britain, Greece, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, 
 Norway, Poland, and Yugoslavia. The Ministers of Education were 
 concerned primarily with the problems which would face their coun- 
 tries after the expulsion of the enemy, especially the task of educational 
 and cultural rehabilitation. The problems discussed were, however, 
 such as to interest all the United Nations, and in 1943 China, the 
 United States, the Soviet Union, the four British Dominions, and 
 India sent observers to the Conference. 
 
 Proposals for a United Nations Organization for Educational 
 Reconstruction 
 
 On April 1, 1944 the American Education Delegation, headed by 
 Representative, now Senator, Fulbright, was sent to London to discuss 
 with the Conference the possibilities of international action. At a 
 meeting sponsored jointly by the Conference and the American group, 
 proposals were drawn up for a United Nations agency for educational 
 and cultural reconstruction. This draft constitution, which was sub- 
 mitted to the goveimments of the United Nations for study and com- 
 ment, was intended to set up machinery for international cooperation 
 to restore essential educational facilities and cultural institutions de- 
 stroyed by the Axis powers. It also provided that this agency should 
 make studies and take the necessary steps “to create an international 
 organization dedicated to the proposition that the free and unrestricted 
 education of the peoples of the world and the unrestricted interchange 
 between them of ideas and knowledge are essential to the preservation 
 of security and peace”. 
 
 After the London meeting on educational reconstruction, the posi- 
 tion of the United States in relation to the Conference became that of 
 a cooperating nation. Dr. Grayson Kefauver, Dean of Education of 
 Stanford University and former Chairman of the Liaison Committee 
 for International Education, was stationed in London where, as a con- 
 sultant of the Department of State, he participated actively in the work 
 of the Conference. 
 
7 
 
 Development of Plans for a Permanent Organization for Educational 
 and Cultural Cooperation 
 
 The draft proposals which were submitted by the London Educa- 
 tion Conference of April 1944 were studied in the Department of 
 State, and recommendations for amendment were submitted infor- 
 mally to the Governments of China, the Soviet Union, and the United 
 Kingdom. However, two developments subsequent to the London 
 Conference altered the approach to this problem. They resulted in 
 what amounted to a new set of proposals when it became obvious that 
 effort should be concentrated upon the creation of a permanent inter- 
 national organization for educational, scientific and cultural coopera- 
 tion rather than upon a temporary reconstruction agency in that field. 
 
 The first of these developments, in point of time, was that the United 
 Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Organization got under way. In 
 supporting UNRRA the United States made available considerable 
 sums for emergency aid in the form of food, clothing, and shelter 
 for the countries devastated by the war. Congress placed restrictions 
 on the use of funds appropriated by it to UNRRA. This limitation, 
 which discouraged the use of such funds for educational reconstruc- 
 tion, was based partly on a policy of giving first priority to the most 
 elementary human needs, and partly on a fear that UNRRA might 
 become entangled in political conflicts within the liberated countries 
 if it participated directly in the revival of education in those lands. 
 
 The second great development, overshadowing all others, was the 
 formulation of the Charter of the United Nations, from the drafting 
 of the Dumbarton Oaks Proposals in September and October 1944 to 
 the signing of the Charter at San Francisco in June 1945. The 
 governments of the United States and other United Nations felt that 
 the creation of an organization to maintain international peace and 
 security was the first order of business, and that it was essential to lay 
 the foundations of an orderly international community within which 
 the constructive forces of civilization would be free to work. 
 
 The Dumbarton Oaks Proposals carried the principles of inter- 
 national cooperation from the field of political security over into the 
 field of human welfare, which was recognized in this document as 
 an essential element in the establishment of peace. The Proposals 
 did not mention cultural relations specifically, but the general out- 
 line of arrangements for dealing with non-political matters center- 
 ing in the Economic and Social Council was considered compre- 
 hensive enough to include cooperation in education, science, and the 
 arts. 
 
 In the light of the Dumbarton Oaks Proposals, the Department 
 of State began a review of the plans for an international organiza- 
 tion for educational and cultural reconstruction. The Dumbarton 
 Oaks Proposals envisaged a system of specialized agencies in vari- 
 
8 
 
 ous fields of cooperation, working in close relationship with the gen- 
 eral United Nations Organization, the Economic and Social Council 
 being the organ through which their activities might be coordi- 
 nated. This scheme offered a way to achieve the independence nec- 
 essary for effective work in the educational and cultural fields, 
 together with a high degree of integration with the United Nations 
 s3^stem, A provisional organization no longer seemed necessary, and 
 it was decided to proceed with plans for a permanent organization 
 as a part of the United Nations system. 
 
 The organization structure sketched in the tentative draft con- 
 stitution brought back from London in April 1944 was taken as the 
 starting point, although the immediate purposes and functions of 
 the projected organization were very much altered and the concept 
 of its relationship with the United Nations system was greatly ex- 
 panded. Within the Department of State a gi'oup of specialists in 
 education, cultural relations, international organization, and inter- 
 national law worked together to prepare the new draft constitution. 
 Officials of other departments of the Government were consulted on 
 the text, as were representatives of American organizations con- 
 cerned with education, science, and the arts, and with the inter- 
 national interchange of persons active in those fields. The prepara- 
 tion of the text of the American proposals and the consultations took 
 about three months. 
 
 The draft constitution for an International Organization for Edu- 
 cational and Cultural Cooperation which emerged from these con- 
 sultations was laid before the Conference of Allied Ministers of 
 Education in London in April 1945, together with the proposals and 
 comments of more than twenty other governments of the United 
 Nations. 
 
 Reference to Educational and Cultural Relations in the Charter of 
 the United Nations 
 
 While the suggestions for a constitution of a permanent educational 
 and cultural organization were being studied at London, the move- 
 ment for such an organization picked up momentum in the delibera- 
 tions at San Franoisco. One of the first announcements made by 
 the sponsoring governments at San Francisco was that they had 
 accepted a proposal by the Chinese Government that educational and 
 cultural relations be specifically included among the matters with 
 which the United Nations Organization should concern itself. 
 
 During the early weeks of the Conference the public interest in 
 this subject, which had been gaining rapidly during the past two 
 years, manifested itself. The consultants group of the United States 
 Delegation, composed of men and women designated by forty -two 
 national organizations and representing labor, business, and agricul- 
 
9 
 
 ture, women’s activities, religious groups, and war veterans, as well 
 as formal education, agreed on the necessity of assuring the place 
 of education and international cultural relations in the United Na- 
 tions system, and felt that such assurance could be given only by 
 having the subject specified in the Charter. 
 
 The initial hesitation of the American Delegation about listing 
 the fields of non-political cooperation in the text did not spring 
 from opposition to the extension of the actual program of the United 
 Nations into the intellectual fields, but rather from a general posi- 
 tion that the terms of the Charter should be kept very broad and 
 that specific activities should rest upon interpretation. However, 
 a number of other delegations were pressing for more specific defini- 
 tions, and after consideration the Delegation of the United States 
 came to share this opinion with respect to educational and cultural 
 relations. 
 
 A further development during the course of the San Francisco 
 Conference is of considerable importance in this connection. On 
 May 22, 1945 the House of Representatives adopted the Mundt Reso- 
 lution, and on May 24 the Fulbright-Taft Resolution was adopted 
 in the Senate. Both resolutions were carried unanimously. The 
 resolutions did not refer to the problem of immediate concern to 
 the United Nations Conference on International Organization, but 
 rather to the general desirability of the creation of an international 
 educational and cultural organization. The time of their considera- 
 tion in Congress coincided with the period of greatest activity on 
 this issue at San Francisco, and the fact that the American Congress 
 expressed itself affirmatively on the general subject carried much 
 weight. 
 
 Following the inclusion of a special reference to “educational and 
 cultural cooperation” in the United Nations Charter (Article 56), 
 the French Delegation at the Conference circulated a memorandum 
 on cultural cooperation to the technical committee on Economic and 
 Social Cooperation, recommending that the members of the United 
 Nations should convene a conference to draw up a Statute of an 
 International Organization on Cultural Cooperation. When this 
 recommendation was presented to the committee, as a declaration 
 for the record, it met with general approval and the representatives 
 of several countries associated themselves with the proposal. The 
 Delegate of the United States called attention to the fact that, though 
 not a member of the Conference of Allied Ministers of Education 
 in London, the United States had been participating in its delibera- 
 tions for more than a year; that plans had already been laid there 
 for an international conference on an organization for educational 
 and cultural cooperation to continue and expand the work begun 
 after the last war; and that the Conference of Allied Ministers had 
 
10 
 
 recently voted to ask the Government of the United Kingdom to 
 call such an international conference sometime after the San Fran- 
 cisco Conference adjourned. 
 
 The decision to hold this conference in November was reached 
 very soon after the San Francisco Charter was signed, and on August 
 1 the Conference of Allied Ministers of Education released the text 
 of a proposed draft constitution of an Educational and Cultural 
 Organization of the United Nations, based upon the work of the 
 London Conference of 1944, and the suggestions submitted by a num- 
 ber of the United Nations, including the United States. Shortly 
 thereafter, the Government of the United Kingdom issued an invita- 
 tion, with which the French Govermnent associated itself, to all 
 of the United Nations Governments to send delegates to a meeting 
 in London beginning November 1 to consider the creation of the 
 projected organization. 
 
 Pre-Conference Discussions in the United States 
 
 The United States accepted the invitation at once, and both the 
 Government and the oi’ganizations interested in educational and cul- 
 tural matters started to prepare for the Conference. The Liaison 
 Committee for International Education, the American Council on 
 Education, the American Association for an International Office of 
 Education, the National Education Association, the Independent Citi- 
 zens’ Committe of the Arts, Sciences and Professions, and the Friends 
 Peace Committee of Philadelphia organized conferences to which lead- 
 ers in all fields of American life and thought were invited, and to which 
 the Department of State was asked to send representatives to speak 
 and to listen. Eegional meetings were also held, under the joint 
 auspices of local groups and the State Department, at Denver, San 
 Francisco, and Chicago. The Department initiated meetings in 
 Washington and New York, to which the heads of national organiza- 
 tions interested in all aspects of international cultural cooperation 
 were invited, and consultations were held also with the Board of 
 Directors of the National Association of Broadcasters, and represen- 
 tatives of magazines, radio, and motion pictures. 
 
 The opinions expressed at these meetings were summarized and 
 studied in the State Department and were placed before the members 
 of the United States Delegation when they started their pre-conference 
 deliberations. The American Delegation offered a number of amend- 
 ments to the draft of the Conference of Allied Ministers of Education, 
 which are discussed in the chapters on the various sections of the 
 Constitution of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cul- 
 tural Organization which follow. In preparing these amendments the 
 views of the educational and cultural gi’oups and leaders were carefully 
 considered. 
 
11 
 
 Work of the United States Delegation 
 
 The Delegation, headed by Mr. Archibald MacLeish, former 
 Assistant Secretary of State and previously Librarian of Congress, 
 was composed of men and women who hold positions of leadership in 
 American cultural life. In selecting the Delegation an effort was 
 made to have various types of educational and cultural interest repi’e- 
 sented in the Delegation, while making certain that the nation as a 
 whole should be well represented, and that the delegates should work 
 together as a team, rather than as representatives of different, and 
 perhaps conflicting, special group interests. 
 
 The Delegation held five meetings in Washington before leaving for 
 London and met twice a day throughout the Conference period. In 
 these meetings the members of the Delegation agreed upon the position 
 to be taken on the issues arising in the sessions of the Conference and 
 the commissions, keeping close touch with the State Department on 
 matters requiring important policy decisions. 
 
 The Organization and Work of the Conference 
 
 The long, careful preparations for the Conference made it possible 
 for the representatives of more than forty of the United Nations to 
 complete their work in sixteen days — a record for the creation of an 
 international organization of such breadth and importance. At the 
 beginning there were three and a half days of plenaiy sessions, and 
 three such days again at the end. In seven working days the five 
 technical commissions completed their draft texts, which were then put 
 into final form by the Conference Drafting Committee. The work of 
 the Conference was directed by an Executive Committee composed of 
 the President, the Associate President, and Secretary-General of the 
 Conference and the twelve Vice-Presidents, as well as the chairmen of 
 the five technical commissions. A smaller steering committee, com- 
 posed of five members of the Executive Committee and the President 
 and Secretary-General, dealt with the more detailed administrative 
 problems of the Conference. The President of the Conference was 
 Miss Ellen Wilkinson, Minister of Education for Great Britain, and 
 the Associate President was M. Leon Blum, Chairman of the French 
 Delegation. The Secretary-General was Sir Alfred Zimmern, who is 
 best known to Americans as the founder and head of the Geneva School 
 of International Studies. Many of the nations which participated 
 sent their Ministers of Education as chairmen of their delegations, and 
 the delegations included many men and women distinguished as edu- 
 cators, scientists, and cultural leaders, as well as outstanding political 
 figures. 
 
 The two principal documents which emerged from the Conference 
 are the Constitution of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and 
 
 683358—46 3 
 
12 
 
 Cultural Organization and the Instrument establishing a Preparatory 
 Educational, Scientific and Cultural Commission. The Final Act 
 which recorded the adoption of these texts also recorded the resolution 
 that the headquarters of the Organization should be located at Paris. 
 The Constitution will become effective when twenty governments have 
 formally accepted it and have signed it through their accredited 
 representatives. 
 
 The drama of the United Nations Conference on Educational and 
 Cultural Organization lay within the agenda of the Conference itself. 
 The long shadow of the war which had ended only a few months 
 earlier still lay over London and over the Conference group. For 
 the delegates from the lands that had not been ravaged by war, the 
 conditions under which the Conference was held were a lesson in war- 
 time austerity. For those who came from the Continent and the 
 Middle and Far East, London was a haven of comfort. But all dele- 
 gations came together with a keen realization that the avenues of 
 actual communication among peoples, after a period of being com- 
 pletely cut off and a threat of being forever destroyed, were again be- 
 ing reopened. All delegations were brought and kept together by the 
 common task of forging an organization designed to put the power 
 of learning, thought, and creative endeavor behind the United Nations 
 system for the maintenance of peace and the advancement of human 
 welfare. The economy of words and effort, the meeting of minds, 
 and the mutual appreciation among the representatives of so many 
 nations was in itself a bright augury for the success of the 
 Organization. 
 
Summary and Analysis of the 
 
 UNITED NATIONS 
 
 Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 The Name of the Organization 
 
 The question of a suitable name presented difficulties from the 
 beginning. There is no single word which describes in all languages 
 the working field of the new Organization. “Intellectual” is one 
 word in French and quite another in English. “Cultural” is not a 
 comfortable word in either tongue. Moreover, when the problems of 
 English usage are complicated by the problems of American usage, 
 the difficulties in both cases are enormously increased. Neither “Cul- 
 tural” nor “Intellectual” nor any other word expresses, in American 
 use, the common life of the human mind and the common vocabulary 
 of the human understanding which the new Organization is intended 
 to advance and serve. 
 
 The solution finally adopted was necessarily a list of adjectives, 
 rather than a single comprehensive characterization. On the motion 
 of the United States Delegation, the word “Scientific” was added to 
 “Educational” and “Cultural”, thus providing the title originally 
 suggested by the British Society of Visiting Scientists — “United Na- 
 tions Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization”. The main 
 reason for adding “Scientific” was to emphasize the role of science in 
 establishing the essential conditions for enduring peace. Moreover, 
 “Cultural” does not, in ordinary usage, include science as naturally 
 as it includes the arts, and might be taken to include the motion 
 pictures together with journalism by radio and by press. 
 
 No one, however, was altogether satisfied with the title which re- 
 sulted. A real disadvantage of the name as it now stands is the 
 danger that its implications may not be understood — specifically, the 
 danger that the broad scope of the new Organization may seem to be 
 limited by the particular references of the title. The United States 
 Delegation wishes to make it a matter of formal record that the Lon- 
 don Conference, as its discussions made clear, intended the new Organ- 
 ization to function not only in the fields specifically mentioned in the 
 title but in all fields useful to the development of international under- 
 
 ( 13 ) 
 
14 
 
 standing, including specifically the fields of mass communication 
 between the peoples of the world by press, radio and motion pictures, 
 the exchange of publications, the access to library holdings on an 
 international basis, international access to the fruits of scholarly and 
 scientific research, cooperation in the advancement of knowledge, and 
 all other means and methods of increasing the sense of the community 
 of human life. 
 
 CHAPTER II 
 
 The Preamble 
 
 The London Conference attached considerable importance to the 
 Preamble. It was felt that a new international organization, under- 
 taking work without exact international precedent, was under some 
 obligation to declare the reasons for its existence and the underlying 
 principles to which it was attached. The First Technical Commission, 
 to which the drafting of the Preamble was assigned, therefore devoted 
 a number of sessions to the development of the views of its members on 
 both points. Thereafter a subcommittee was appointed to undertake 
 the actual labor of drafting. It consisted of Representatives of 
 France, India, Mexico, Poland, the United Kingdom, and the United 
 States, with the United States Representative as Chairman. 
 
 The Drafting Committee had before it, when it undertook its work, 
 an expression of the opinions of the members of the First Commission, 
 a proposed Preamble drafted by the Conference of Allied Ministers of 
 Education, and a proposed Preamble drafted by the French Govern- 
 ment. In addition, it had access to the criticisms of these earlier 
 drafts — particularly the draft prepared by the Conference of Allied 
 Minister’s of Education — as expressed by individuals and groups to 
 whom the texts had been shown prior to the London Conference. 
 Finally, the speeches by the heads of the various delegations at the first 
 plenary sessions of the Conference, together with the addresses of the 
 Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and of the President of the 
 Conference, Miss Wilkinson, had developed general ideas, some of them 
 of great importance to any attempted statement of reasons and 
 principles. 
 
 The most important single contribution was unquestionably that of 
 Prime Minister Attlee whose speech at the opening session of the Con- 
 ference emphasized the principal importance of the labor of interna- 
 tional understanding in the modem world and the usefulness in that 
 labor of the great modern instruments of mass communication — the 
 press, the radio, and the motion pictures. Subsequently, the head of 
 the French Delegation, M. Leon Blum, developed the same theme, 
 referring to the declaration presented by the F rench Delegation at the 
 San Francisco Conference, which stated that “peace between the na- 
 tions if it was to be just and lasting, must be based on mutual knowl- 
 
15 
 
 edge and understanding”. The head of the American Delegation had 
 insisted upon the objective of international understanding as the cen- 
 tral purpose of the Organization and the basic reason for its existence, 
 and had urged that the Organization should include within the field 
 of its activity all instruments of commimication and all branches of 
 knowledge which would advance its ends. * 
 
 The discussions in the First Commission developed these general 
 considerations and added a particular concern for a declaration of 
 the relationship of the new Organization to the war and to the issues 
 upon which the war had been fought. The Delegate of Yugoslavia 
 spoke of the necessity of declai’ing and defending the democratic 
 ideas which had been contemptuously disregarded and attacked by 
 the Axis powers. The Representative of Poland urged that the Pre- 
 amble should confess a sense of responsibility for the children of 
 Poland and of Russia, the teachers of Norway, the martyrs of the 
 Maquis, and the Lidice miners. 
 
 The text prepared by the Drafting Committee reflected these vari- 
 ous observations and expressions of opinion. It defined “ignorance 
 of each other’s ways and lives” as a principal cause of the mistrust 
 among the peoples of the world through which their differences have 
 too often degenerated into war. It asserted the duty of all nations 
 to collaborate in the diffusion of knowledge and the education of 
 humanity for a peace founded upon the intellectual and moral soli- 
 darity of mankind. 
 
 It declared a common purpose on the part of the states members 
 of the new Organization to develop their means of communication 
 with each other and to employ these means for the purposes of mutual 
 understanding. It enunciated the three principles which would direct 
 the new Organization in its activities: full and equal opportunity 
 for education for all, the unrestricted pursuit of objective truth, and 
 the free exchange of ideas and knowledge. 
 
 This text, prepared simultaneously in French and English by the 
 Drafting Committee, was accepted unanimously by the First Com- 
 mission and subsequently by the plenary session of the Conference 
 itself. 
 
 The Preamble, as accepted by the Conference, was principally 
 notable for the fact that it makes the realization of mutual under- 
 standing among the peoples of the world the central objective of the 
 new Organization and that it commits the member states to the de- 
 velopment of their means of communication with each other and to 
 the employment of these means, under the great principles of intel- 
 lectual freedom, “for the purposes of mutual understanding and a 
 truer and more perfect knowledge of each other’s lives”. 
 
16 
 
 CHAPTER III 
 
 Article I; Purposes and Functions 
 
 The fact that the Constitution of the United Nations Educational, 
 Scientific and Cultural Organization breaks new ground is plainly 
 apparent in the First Article, which declares the purposes of the Or- 
 ganization and defines the functions it is to exercise. To a generation 
 which had not experienced the war against fascism at first hand, the 
 statement of purpose in the first paragraph of Article I might well 
 seem to include unnecessai'y references to peace and security, justice, 
 fundamental freedoms, and the rule of law. To our generation the 
 relationship between education, science, and culture on the one hand, 
 and peace, justice, law, and human rights on the other, is a logical and 
 direct relationship which should be stated. 
 
 The London Conference realized that it was meeting in the course 
 of one of the great crises of history and that that crisis was intellectual 
 and moral in its essential character. The intention of the Conference 
 was to devise a statement of purpose and of function which would 
 clearly recognize the crisis and which would indicate how, and by what 
 means, intellectual collaboration in the things of the mind can meet it. 
 
 Because of the close relationship between the Preamble and the 
 statement of purposes and functions in Article I, the First Commis- 
 sion adopted the same procedure for the latter as it had used for the 
 former. That is to say, the actual work of drafting was assigned to 
 the Drafting Committee which had prepared the Preamble, and the 
 Commission devoted its own time to a wide-ranging debate on the 
 underlying considerations which the article should express. 
 
 The Commission had before it the draft proposal submitted by the 
 Conference of Allied Ministers of Education and the French propos- 
 als for a statute for the Organization for Intellectual Cooperation of 
 the United Nations. The two differed not only in basic content but 
 in organization, the French draft incorporating the statements of 
 purposes and functions in one article, while the draft of the Confer- 
 ence of Allied Ministers of Education separated them. On motion of 
 the United States Delegation, the Commission decided to follow the 
 French lead in the matter of organization. Purposes and functions 
 were to be combined. 
 
 As to the content of the article, the proposal most frequently re- 
 peated and most emphatically made was that the new Organization 
 should have the mutual understanding of peoples as its principal objec- 
 tive and should employ for the achievement of that objective every 
 means available. First of all, and most immediate in effect, it should 
 work through the instruments of mass communication and all the 
 channels of diffusion of knowledge and of art. Second, deeper in 
 penetration though slower in time, it should collaborate with the mem- 
 
17 
 
 ber nations in their efforts to advance the education of humanity for 
 justice and liberty and peace. Third, later still in point of time but 
 profoundly important in point of lasting influence, it should make 
 use of all the resources of science and scholarship and of all advances 
 of knowledge. 
 
 The character of the discussions in the First Commission is indi- 
 cated by the nature of the comments made there on the possibilities 
 of work in education. Equality of educational opportunity was the 
 theme of recurrent statements. The Delegates of Poland and Mexico 
 and Czechoslovakia insisted upon the evil effects of discrimination in 
 educational opportunity and the great hopes offered by equality of 
 practice. The Delegate of China emphasized the right of every indi- 
 vidual to develop to the full his abilities and capacities. 
 
 On the basis of the debate in the First Commission the Drafting 
 Committee prepared a text of the First Article which was approved 
 by the Commission in substance but returned to the Drafting Com- 
 mittee for condensation. The condensed form was subsequently ac- 
 cepted by the Commission and approved by a plenary session of the 
 Conference. The longer form remains, however, a document of some 
 importance to a study of the Constitution, since it was approved by 
 the Commission in substance, and since the shorter, final form was 
 intended to contain at every point the meaning of the longer draft.^ 
 
 For example, the implications of paragraph 2 (a) of Article I with 
 reference to the relation of the Organization to the means of mass 
 communication are spelled out in greater detail in the long draft than 
 in the final form. The longer draft reads as follows : 
 
 “1. In order to advance the purposes of the United Nations to 
 maintain international peace and security, the Organization will pro- 
 mote, on the widest basis, the contacts between nations and the ex- 
 changes of ideas and persons best calculated to promote the spread of 
 knowledge and mutual understanding. The Organization will en- 
 deavor to assist all the media of mass communication, and all other 
 media in any countries which contribute to the dissemination of 
 knowledge and information internationally, to accomplish their task 
 of informing the peoples of the world about each other with truth 
 and justice and understanding. 
 
 “To this end the Organization will draw up and propose such inter- 
 national agreements as may be necessary to insure the greatest possible 
 freedom of the instruments of international information from censor- 
 ship, discriminatory competitive practices, and other obstacles to the 
 free movement of ideas by word and image among the peoples of the 
 world.” 
 
 * The text of the first draft approved by Commission I is included among the 
 documents appended to this Summary and Analysis. 
 
18 
 
 In the final draft, this became : 
 
 “2. To realize this purpose the organization will 
 
 “ (a) Collaborate in the work of advancing the mutual knowledge 
 and understanding of peoples through all means of mass communica- 
 tion and to that end recommend such international agreements as may 
 be necessary to promote the free flow of ideas by word and image.” 
 
 In the same way, a comparison of the earlier and the later form will 
 serve to amplify the intention of the article with regard to other func- 
 tions of the Organization. The preliminary form has, of course, his- 
 toric interest only and not legal status. 
 
 Although the Organization is not given any power of coercion and 
 has no right to legislate for the member nations, the Conference 
 thought it desirable to remove any possible doubts by incorporating 
 the prohibition (paragraph 3) against intervention in matters which 
 are essentially within the domestic jurisdiction of the members. The 
 states which belong to UNESCO will already be bound by the Charter 
 of the United Nations, which, in a similar clause, protects legitimate 
 domestic concerns from outside interference but at the same time 
 makes it clear that the maintenance of peace and security is not a 
 matter of domestic jurisdiction. Thus, if a member of UNESCO 
 utilizes its educational and cultural facilities in such a way as to 
 endanger peace, it runs the risk of having to submit to investigation 
 and, if the matter proves serious, it may have to answer to the Security 
 Council of the United Nations for its conduct. However, in the nor- 
 mal course of events, no member state needs to fear that UNESCO 
 will attempt to regulate its cultural life or its educational system. 
 Recommendations voted by the General Conference, relating to coop- 
 erative activities or to general educational and cultural policies and 
 practices, do not constitute “intervention”, since each state decid'es 
 for itself what to do about the recommendations. 
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 Article II: Membership 
 
 The question of which states should have membership in the United 
 Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization produced 
 little controversy. The principal point of issue in consideration of 
 this article was whether states alone could be members or whether non- 
 governmental international organizations could also be admitted. 
 After careful consideration it was decided that states alone were 
 eligible. 
 
 The proposal that non-governmental international organizations 
 should be entitled to membership, with voting privileges in the Con- 
 ference and representation on the Executive Board, was put forward 
 by the French Delegation. The principal argument offered in favor 
 
19 
 
 of the suggestion was that the international character of such asso- 
 ciations and the broad outlook of their leaders would help to counter- 
 act nationalistic tendencies that might emerge in a body composed 
 only of representatives of separate nations. It was also contended 
 that because the world associations reached into many countries their 
 influence would reinforce the programs of the United Nations Educa- 
 tional, Scientific and Cultural Organization. 
 
 The French proposal did not receive much support, either in its 
 original form or in the successively modified versions which attempted 
 to establish a conditional right of participation for non-governmen- 
 tal international educational, scientific, and cultural associations. The 
 other delegations felt that the difficulty of selecting the associations 
 to be represented in UNESCO counterbalanced any advantage to be 
 realized by their admission. 
 
 Moreover, it was pointed out that voluntary societies are not re- 
 sponsible bodies in the sense that governments are responsible both 
 to their own people and to other governments ; that it would be easy 
 for them to advocate measures which the governments could not or 
 would not carry out — so that futility and frustration might result. 
 At the same time the delegations all agreed on the value of coopera- 
 tion with non-governmental organizations through the establishment 
 of committees, exchange of observers at meetings, interchange of pub- 
 lications, and other working arrangements. Consequently, while the 
 proposal for membership of international associations in UNESCO 
 was rejected, arrangements for close cooperation were given a great 
 deal of attention, and provisions for such arrangements were incor- 
 porated in other articles, notably. Article IV, The General Confer- 
 ence, and Article XI, Kelations With Other Specialized International 
 Organizations and Agencies. 
 
 Other questions relating to membership which were explored in 
 some detail were: (1) the necessity of a provision for withdrawal; 
 (2) conditions for suspension and expulsion; and (3) relations with 
 the United Nations Organization with respect to the admission to 
 membership in UNESCO of states not members of UNO. 
 
 Before the Conference, especially in the United States, the question 
 of whether initial membership in the new Organization should be 
 confiined to the United Nations was widely and earnestly debated. On 
 the one hand, it was urged that the Educational, Scientific and Cul- 
 tural Organization ought to be opened at once to adherence by all 
 nations except the former enemies, and that even the latter should 
 be admitted at an early date. The principal argument in support 
 of this position was that a primary purpose of the Organization should 
 be to develop a will for peace in all nations. The view that initial 
 membership should be confined to the United Nations was based on the 
 
 683358 — 46 4 
 
20 
 
 thesis that the peoples who together had resisted the intellectual nihil- 
 ism as well as the armed might of the Axis could -work together 
 with greater zeal and effectiveness to build the intellectual foundations 
 of enduring peace. 
 
 The members of the London Conference were agreed that the Edu- 
 cational, Scientific and Cultural Organization should not go outside 
 the United Nations for its initial membership. There was a strong 
 desire to make this body an integral and important part of the United 
 Nations system, and the pattern of membership set by the Charter of 
 the United Nations was therefore felt to be appropriate for UNESCO 
 also. It followed that members of the United Nations would auto- 
 matically be entitled to membership in the new Organization. 
 
 But provision is also made for the accession to UNESCO of states 
 not members of UNO. The Constitution states that such states may 
 be admitted, upon recommendation of the Executive Board, by a two- 
 thirds majority vote of the General Conference. There was a strong 
 conviction in practically all delegations at the London Conference 
 that UNESCO ought to move toward a broadly inclusive membership, 
 and that no nation should be excluded except for reasons of the great- 
 est importance to the integrity and strength of the organized world. 
 
 It was felt, in fact, that one of the best ways to strengthen UNO 
 would be to encourage the cooperation of all nations, whether mem- 
 bers or non-members of that organization, in the promotion of the 
 peaceful, progressive, and uniting ideals of UNESCO. There are 
 nations which, for reasons of circumstances, have not yet been ad- 
 mitted to UNO, but fully share the hopes of UNESCO and have much 
 to contribute. Consequently, it should be possible to admit them to 
 membership by orderly and well considered action when it is gener- 
 ally agi’eed that their participation would contribute to the achieve- 
 ment of the basic purposes of the United Nations. Some former neu- 
 tral nations may be admitted promptly under this procedure. For- 
 mer enemy states will probably have to give proof of a sincere change 
 of spirit before they can be considered eligible for admission. 
 
 In drafting the provision for admitting new members, the Second 
 Commission of the Conference which had this problem under con- 
 sideration took account of the significance which it might acquire in 
 the development of close relationships with the United Nations Or- 
 ganization. The desire that UNESCO should have an essential place 
 in the United Nations system led to the conclusion that the agency 
 should not be in a position to thwart the purposes of UNO by its ad- 
 mission policies. At the same time, it was observed that the Charter 
 of the United Nations did not attempt to deal with the membership 
 of specialized agencies, and that the London Conference would not 
 be justified in anticipating the operating policies of UNO. There- 
 fore, it was decided to make the arrangements for admission to 
 
21 
 
 UNESCO of states not members of UNO subject to the terms of the 
 agreement to be negotiated between the two organizations. 
 
 The Constitution, like the Charter of the United Nations, is silent 
 on the subject of withdrawal from membership. The proposals before 
 the London Conference provided that a member state might withdraw 
 on giving due notice and fulfilling the financial obligations to the 
 Organization. At the urging of the United Kingdom Delegation, 
 supported by China, this provision was eliminated in drafting the 
 final text. The British view was that the right of withdrawal could 
 not actually be denied to any state except by the use of force, and that 
 an attempt on the part of this Organization to enforce any special 
 procedures and conditions would be at best unrealistic and unworkable. 
 The Chinese, Mexican, and French Delegates called attention to the 
 omission from the United Nations Charter of any provision for with- 
 drawal. They argued that UNESCO, which was designed to become 
 one of the specialized agencies of UNO, should conform to the Charter 
 of the United Nations in its fundamental provisions. In arguing to 
 omit the subject of withdrawal from the Constitution, the delegates 
 made it clear that UNESCO should not be indifferent to the problem, 
 and that the withdrawal of any member should be deplored. How- 
 ever, they felt that the binding force should not lie in a sense of com- 
 pulsion, but rather in a recognition of the value of the Organization 
 and the effectiveness of its program. 
 
 A member of UNESCO which has been suspended from the exer- 
 cise of the rights and privileges of UNO will be suspended from 
 UNESCO 'if a request to that effect is made by UNO. A member 
 which has been expelled from UNO is automatically expelled from 
 UNESCO. 
 
 CHAPTER V 
 
 Article IV The General Conference 
 
 Some of the most important issues before the London Conference 
 arose in the discussion of the composition and character, the powers 
 and functions of the General Conference, which is to direct the desti- 
 nies of UNESCO. The constitutional provisions which finally 
 emerged from these discussions provide UNESCO with an effective 
 central organ, representative of the states members of the Organiza- 
 tion and of the educational, scientific, and cultural forces at work in 
 the various nations. 
 
 In the early discussions of the form of the General Conference the 
 two concepts which had been the subject of controversy in considering 
 membership in UNESCO were again debated. It was held by some 
 delegates that both states and international organizations devoted to 
 
 ’Art. Ill merely names the organs of UNESCO; a General Conference, an 
 Executive Board, and a Secretariat. 
 
22 
 
 education, science, or the humanities should take part in the General 
 Conference. Other delegates held firmly to the position that, as a 
 specialized agency within the framework of the United Nations, the 
 deliberative body should represent states only. The second viewpoint 
 predominated. 
 
 As indicated in Chapter IV, this decision does not imply that the 
 various cultural, scientific, and educational organizations are to be 
 overlooked by UNESCO in carrying out its program. At no point 
 in the discussion was there any tendency to underestimate the impor- 
 tance of the contributions of international bodies to the development 
 of the work of the Organization. The issue related rather to the 
 character of the responsibility of governments. As representatives of 
 the people, the governments are expected to encourage and promote, 
 on a world-wide basis, the aims of the Organization. In so doing, they 
 will of necessity draw upon the full technical and professional resources 
 of international groups and associations interested in the programs of 
 UNESCO. The Constitution indicates ways in which this may be 
 done, including provisions for advisory committees and attendance of 
 invited observers at sessions of the General Conference. Provision is 
 also made for consultation by the governments with national groups 
 and organizations. In appointing delegates to the General Conference 
 the governments are expected to consult either with a National Com- 
 mission, broadly representative of educational, cultural and scientific 
 groups within the country, the establishment of which is suggested 
 in Article VII, or to confer directly with existing organizations in 
 these fields. 
 
 The General Conference is the central body of the Organization. 
 It determines policies, summons international conferences, submits 
 proposals to the member states, elects the members of the Executive 
 Board, appoints the Director-General, receives and considers reports 
 submitted by member states, and advises the United Nations Organi- 
 zation on matters in the field of its competence. 
 
 The reports of UNESCO to its member states are not, of course, 
 binding on the members. However, they are certain to command 
 respect and careful consideration. The standing of the men and 
 women who compose the national delegations in the General Con- 
 ference will undoubtedly help to obtain support within the member 
 nations for the recommendations of the Organization. 
 
 There was considerable discussion of the need for a provision estab- 
 lishing a quorum. Since the effectiveness of UNESCO rests upon the 
 free exchange of opinion among its members, a failure to participate 
 in discussions would be unfortunate. It was not felt, however, that 
 a quorum requirement would compel attendance and there was some 
 fear that it might be abused. It was decided, therefore, to omit 
 
23 
 
 any such provision and to depend instead on the maintenance of 
 interest in the work of the Organization. 
 
 The seat of the Organization is fixed at Paris by Resolution of the 
 London Conference but the annual meetings of the General Con- 
 ference are to be convened in different places from year to year. This 
 proposal was made by the Delegation of the United States in order 
 to emphasize the international character of the Organization. The 
 concept of variation, as expressed in the Constitution, does not bar 
 meetings at the headquarters city, so long as the location is different 
 in succeeding years. 
 
 All meetings of the Conference are to be open to the public with 
 due regard to the procedures to be set up. It is encouraging to report 
 that this principle was fully understood and endorsed by the delegates. 
 The only limitations will be those required to insure decorum and 
 effectiveness in the conduct of meetings. 
 
 Attendance in a special capacity of persons who do not represent 
 governments is dealt with in two places in the Constitution. In 
 Article XI, Relations With Other Specialized International Organi- 
 zations and Agencies, it is provided that UNESCO may make ap- 
 propriate arrangements with other intergovernmental organizations 
 for reciprocal representation at meetings. Article IV, Section E, 
 provides that international non-governmental organizations may be 
 invited to send observers to sessions of the General Conference. 
 
 A great deal of discussion and controversy preceded the simple 
 formulation of the plan for admitting observers from international 
 non-govermnental organizations to the General Conference. Sug- 
 gestions ranged all the way from proposals of full membership for 
 international organizations to the proposal that they should not be 
 permitted to be present at all. The provision adopted was more than 
 a compromise, if somewhat less than a solution. International organi- 
 zations of merit and substance, it is assumed, will be invited, but 
 invitations are not permanent tickets of admission. In fact, the terms 
 of Article IV, paragraph 13, make it clear that invitations will be 
 issued for “specified sessions” only. Observers, of course, will not 
 vote, nor will they participate in debate unless invited to do so in 
 accordance with rules to be formulated. The avowed aim is to keep 
 international organizations fully informed and to develop close work- 
 ing relationships with them. 
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 Article V : The Executive Board 
 
 The Executive Board is conceived of as the agent of the General 
 Conference to carry out its programs. Hence, its members act as 
 representatives of the Conference rather than as representatives of 
 
24 
 
 their respective governments. They represent the Confei’ence and 
 they also represent the arts, the humanities, the sciences, education, 
 and the diffusion of ideas. They are elected by the Conference be- 
 cause of their competence in one or more of these branches of knowl- 
 edge, and also because of their qualifications to fulfil the adminis- 
 trative and executive duties of the Board. The latter requirement 
 was suggested by the Canadian Delegation and received unanimous 
 approval. In drafting this article of the Constitution, many dele- 
 gates on Commission III expressed the hope that the finest repre- 
 sentatives of the various branches of knowledge and culture from 
 all parts of the world would find places on the Executive Board. 
 Certainly, the provisions of the Constitution make such an objec- 
 tive possible. There was no disagreement on this important matter. 
 
 The number of members and their tenure were discussed briefly. 
 It was quickly agreed that eighteen would be a satisfactory number, 
 and that the President of the General Conference should sit ex 
 officio in an advisory capacity. One third of the Board will be 
 elected each yeai'. The term of service was limited to two consecu- 
 tive terms of three years each, as a means of preventing too long con- 
 tinued service and to encourage a wider representation of diverse 
 cultures and a wider geographical distribution than would otherwise 
 be possible. Eligibility for two terms was deemed desirable as a 
 means for making possible a higlily necessary continuity in the 
 Board. 
 
 The alternative of electing to the Executive Board persons other 
 than delegates to the Conference was faced and rejected. It was 
 felt that the Executive Board, in order to act for the Conference, 
 should be chosen from among the delegates to the Conference. On 
 the other hand, it was deemed undesirable to require that they should 
 actually be in attendance at the Conference when elected. This 
 matter was worked out jointly by Commissions III and IV. It was 
 understood, though not stipulated in the Constitution, that should 
 a member of the Board fail to be continued by his government as 
 a delegate to the Conference, he should thereupon cease to be a mem- 
 ber of the Board. 
 
 The problem of alternates to members of the Executive Board was 
 discussed. The French Delegation proposed that a member might 
 designate a deputy to attend a meeting when he was himself unable 
 to attend. The proposal was not approved, in view of the accept- 
 ance of the theory that the Board should represent the Conference. 
 The suggestions that alternates should be elected at the same time 
 as members of the Executive Board, and that a panel be set up from 
 which to draw substitutes, were also given little attention. The pro- 
 vision for temporary replacement of a member by the Board itself, 
 
I 
 
 25 
 
 and permanent replacement by the Conference, was adopted without 
 opposition. 
 
 The provision of the draft of the Conference of Allied Ministers 
 of Education that the Executive Board should recommend to the Con- 
 ference the admission of new members to the Organization was 
 agi-eed to without objection. 
 
 The principle that the Executive Board is to act for the General 
 Conference under its authority when the Conference is not in session 
 involves the preparation of agenda for the sessions of the General 
 Conference and the forwarding of the Director-General’s annual 
 report on the work of the Organization. There was discussion of 
 the reporting system, and particularly of the question whether the 
 Director-General or the Executive Board should report to the Con- 
 ference, but the provision of the Constitution was unanimously 
 agreed to. 
 
 The provision that the Board should meet at least twice a year was 
 agreed to without objection. The proposal that the Director-General 
 could call a special session of the Board was rejected, after discus- 
 sion. It was agreed that the Director-General, as a purely admin- 
 istrative officer, should not exercise so great a power in policy matters. 
 
 The Board is empowered to elect its own officers from among its 
 own members. Only the Chairman of the Board is mentioned in 
 the Constitution. The Board also fixes its own rules of procedure, 
 subject to decisions of the Conference. No differences of view existed 
 as to these important points. The Board is required by the Con- 
 stitution to make arrangements to consult representatives of inter- 
 national organizations or qualified persons concerned with questions 
 within its competence. This provision also was adopted without 
 objection. 
 
 The provisions goveiming the first election of Board members re- 
 ceived careful consideration. It became clear as discussion proceeded 
 that the best way to decide which members should serve for one, two, 
 and three years, respectively, was by the drawing of lots, which should 
 be done immediately after election. 
 
 CHAPTER VII 
 Article VI : The Secretariat 
 
 Much of the vitality and efficiency of any intergovernmental agency 
 depends upon the adequacy of its secretariat. Close attention was 
 given this important subject at London, with results which will pro- 
 vide the new Organization with the necessary basic conditions for 
 successful operation. Broad powers are granted and broad govern- 
 ing policies are clearly stated, but in developing the Secretariat the 
 Director-General, the Conference, and the Executive Board are left 
 
26 
 
 free of restrictive provisions that might prove in the light of expe- 
 rience to be unvpise. 
 
 The French Delegate put this clearly when he stated that while 
 his Government believed that the Organization might wish to avail 
 itself of the contacts, the experience, and the documentation of the 
 International Institute of Intellectual Cooperation, he did not wish 
 to press the French proposal to utilize the Institute as the Secretariat 
 of UNESCO. 
 
 The text finally adopted makes the Director-General the “chief 
 administrative officer of the Organization”, following the Allied 
 Ministers’ draft. Discussion in Commission III convinced all dele- 
 gations, however, that the Director-General should be appointed by 
 the Conference rather than by the Executive Board, since all organs 
 of the Organization are ultimately responsible to the Conference. 
 It was agreed, however, that the Executive Board should nominate 
 the Director-General to the Conference. It was not felt that the 
 authority to remove an unsatisfactory Director-General needed 
 specific mention. 
 
 The degi’ee to which the Director-General should be left free to 
 develop his staff received careful attention. There was general agree- 
 ment that he should appoint and direct the staff according to a body 
 of regulations approved by the Conference. Whether there should 
 be two Deputy Directors-General, as proposed by a few delegations, 
 and whether the Executive Board should approve appointments in 
 “the higher administrative grades” as proposed in the draft of the 
 Conference of Allied Ministers of Education, received thorough con- 
 sideration. Agreement was easily reached that the first Director- 
 General should be free to work out within broad limits the adminis- 
 trative organization which it would be his responsibilty to direct. 
 The additional point was made, as in regard to the same problem at 
 San Francisco, that the independent provision of Deputy Directors- 
 General would tend to weaken the authority and responsibility of the 
 Director-General. 
 
 The term of service of the Director-General required only brief 
 consideration. After it had been determined that Executive Board 
 members could serve two consecutive terms of three years each it was 
 readily agreed that the chief administrative officer of the Organi- 
 zation should have a six -year term. It was felt, however, that a highly 
 successful incumbent should not be compelled by constitutional provi- 
 sion to retire after serving a few years only. Hence, a provision was 
 included making the Director-General eligible for re-appointment. 
 
 The matter of requiring the Executive Board’s approval of ap- 
 pointments in the higher administrative grades was much less easily 
 settled. The view was expressed that the Director-General would 
 be in a better position to defend important appointments from criti- 
 
27 
 
 cism if he shared responsibility for them with the Executive Board. 
 On the other hand, it was argued that the Executive Board would do 
 its highly important and responsible work with greater effectiveness 
 if it did not have to concern itself with personnel appointments. It 
 was further urged that the requirement of Executive Board approval 
 would be an open invitation to “log-rolling” pressures for appoint- 
 ments of nationals of individual countries in such a way as to hamper 
 the Director-General unduly in his administration of the Organiza- 
 tion’s affairs. When it proved to be impossible to muster the neces- 
 sary number of votes on either side, it was agreed to leave the matter 
 to decision by the Conference in the drafting of its regulations. 
 
 Whether to stipulate that the Director-General should be “imme- 
 diately responsible to the Executive Board”, as in the draft pre- 
 pared by the Conference of Allied Ministers of Education, “ulti- 
 mately responsible” to the Conference, as was suggested in the Com- 
 mission, or “responsible to the Executive Board between sessions of 
 the Conference”, as was also proposed, was considered fully. There 
 was no issue of substance, since everyone agreed that the Director- 
 General should be responsible to the Board and also to the Con- 
 ference. It was finally decided therefore that no language on the 
 specific point was necessary, and it was omitted. 
 
 The provision contained in the draft of the Conference of Allied 
 Ministers of Education for the establishment of an administrative 
 tribunal to determine disputes relating to the conditions and terms 
 of service of members of the staff was eliminated after very brief 
 discussion, on the ground that the regulations approved by the 
 Conference concerning the Secretariat could appropriately cover 
 such detailed administrative arrangements. 
 
 The role of the Director-General in providing leadership in the 
 Organization is clearly recognized in the provision that he shall pre- 
 pare the annual report of the Organization for submission to the Ex- 
 ecutive Board and the Conference (see Article V-B-9), and the pro- 
 vision that he or his deputy may attend and participate in all meet- 
 ings of the Conference, the Board, and committees of the Organi- 
 zation. He is also required to formulate proposals for action by the 
 Conference and the Board. 
 
 The international character and responsibilities of the Director- 
 General and the staff are clearly set forth, and the members of the 
 Organization are pledged to refrain from seeking to influence them 
 in the discharge of their duties. The desirability of recruiting the 
 staff on a wide geographical basis is subordinated only to the neces- 
 sity of maintaining the highest standards of integrity, efficiency, and 
 technical competence. 
 
28 
 
 CHAPTER VIII 
 
 Article VII: National Cooperating Bodies 
 
 The London meeting favored the establishment of national com- 
 missions as consultative bodies to the member states. There were 
 some delegations, indeed, which held that failui'e to establish such a 
 commission should deprive a state of the right of membership. This 
 extreme position was not maintained in debate. Members of the 
 Conference generally agreed that compulsion to form an advisory 
 body involved obvious contradictions. Moreover, if the appoint- 
 ment of a commission were made a condition precedent to member- 
 ship, the General Conference might be confronted with puppet com- 
 missions whose validity and acceptability would be peculiarly diffi- 
 cult to determine. It would not be easy, nor indeed proper, to deny 
 to any member state freedom to form its consultative bodies along 
 lines consistent with its national genius. 
 
 The first paragraph of Article VII, therefore, is in the nature of a 
 strong recommendation. It is a recommendation, however, from 
 which much is hoped. Governments familiar with the usefulness of 
 the counsel which leaders in education, science, and the humanities can 
 give know well that such an advisory relationship is healthy and 
 profitable. The United States Delegation is of one mind on this 
 point and it recommends that its Government, on joining UNESCO, 
 proceed at once to the formation of a strong national commission. 
 The example of the United States, the United Kingdom, France, 
 China, and other nations in establishing commissions of this char- 
 acter would do more, in our opinion, to give root to the idea than any 
 constitutional mandate. 
 
 It will be noted that members of the commissions may be repre- 
 sentatives of government as well as educational, scientific, and cul- 
 tural bodies. Distinguished men are to be found both in public and in 
 private service. It would, however, be regarded as unfortunate in 
 the United States if the commission were not truly representative of 
 those areas of intellectual activity which government has left tradi- 
 tionally to private initiative, and, in the case of American education, 
 to state and local initiative. 
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 Article IX : Budget 
 
 The budget provisions of the Constitution (Article IX) are brief 
 and simple. It is the more interesting, therefore, to note that the 
 wording of this article was agreed upon only after prolonged discus- 
 sions both within the American Delegation and in Commissions II 
 and IV. 
 
29 
 
 There was no question, of course, of the acceptance by the members 
 of the financial responsibilities allotted to them. This obligation is 
 inherent in membership. Nor was there any thought of determining 
 at this time the financial needs of the Organization or of allocating 
 quotas to the members. These are matters for later determination. 
 The question under discussion by the London Conference was as to 
 what body should have authority to make budgetary decisions. The 
 Conference of Allied Ministers draft had assigned this responsibility 
 to the General Conference. The French proposals had authorized the 
 General Conference to examine and approve the budget of the Organi- 
 zation, but had assigned the primary budget responsibility to the Gen- 
 eral Assembly of the United Nations Organization. 
 
 On behalf of the French proposal and similar suggestions, it was 
 argued that the budgets of the specialized agencies related to the 
 United Nations should be integrated with that of the parent organi- 
 zation. This would facilitate the coordination of the specialized 
 agencies by the Economic and Social Council, as provided in Article 
 63 of the UNO Charter. Moreover, there would be an advantage to 
 UNESCO if its requests for appropriations were presented to the 
 member governments as part of the over-all UNO request. Further 
 governments would find it more convenient to receive a consolidated 
 budgetary request for United Nations operations. 
 
 Those who questioned this point of view did not deny that UNO 
 ought to have some voice in determining the budget of UNESCO. 
 Indeed, Article 17 of UNO explicitly provides that the General Assem- 
 bly “shall examine the administrative budgets of such specialized 
 agencies with a view to making recommendations to the agencies con- 
 cerned”. It was urged, however, that integration should not be pushed 
 to an extreme; there was a danger that UNESCO might lose its 
 autonomy; an agency completely dependent upon another organiza- 
 tion for funds may find itself deprived of functions and with little 
 freedom to plan its own policies. Moreover, it was not clear that the 
 UNESCO Constitution could properly prescribe a budgetary relation- 
 ship with UNO which the latter organization had not yet accepted. 
 
 These considerations finally prevailed. It was decided that the 
 General Conference should be given responsibility for approving 
 and giving final effect to the budget, but that the responsibility 
 would be “subject to such arrangement with the United Nations 
 as may be provided in the agreement to be entered into pur- 
 suant to Article X”. Further, Article X explicitly provides that 
 “such agreement may, among other matters, provide for the ap- 
 proval and financing of the budget of the Organization by the 
 General Assembly of the United Nations”. Thus, it is left for 
 the two organizations to determine as seems wise to them when 
 
30 
 
 
 the agreement between them is made the precise budgetary relationship 
 which should exist. 
 
 An important section of the article dealing with budget permits the 
 Director-General, with the approval of the Executive Board, to receive 
 gifts, bequests, and subventions directly from governments, public and 
 private institutions, associations, and private persons. This provision 
 opens up interesting possibilities for financing special projects and 
 services consistent with the purposes of the Organization. 
 
 CHAPTER X 
 
 Articles X and XI : Relations With the United Nations Organization 
 and With Other Organizations and Agencies 
 
 UNESCO is to be a star of first magnitude in the new world con- 
 stellation of the United Nations. It will also be a sun around which 
 a system of great world associations both public and private will 
 cluster, shedding and receiving both light and warmth. This is the 
 inspiring possibility offered by the somewhat prosaic words of 
 Articles X and XI of UNESCO’s Constitution. 
 
 At San Francisco preparation was made for this development by 
 the provision in the Charter that “the various specialized agencies, 
 established by intergovernmental agreement and having wide inter- 
 national responsibilities, as defined in their basic instruments, in edu- 
 cational, health, and related fields, shall be brought into relationship 
 with the United Nations.” 
 
 At London, the specialized agency “in educational . . . and re- 
 
 lated fields” contemplated by the San Francisco Charter was created 
 and provision made in the Tenth Article of its Constitution that it 
 should be brought into relation with UNO as soon as practicable. 
 
 There had been some feeling, prior to the Conference, that the edu- 
 cational, scientific, and cultural activities of the United Nations 
 should not be launched until UNO itself was organized and that UNO 
 should then bring the proper agency into being. This view was not 
 shared by the Conference which felt that the provision for the develop- 
 ment of relations between UNO and UNESCO by mutual agreement 
 would permit the adjustment of any possible differences in a flexible 
 and creative manner satisfactory to both organizations. 
 
 An important aspect of this adjustment will be the method of financ- 
 ing. UNESCO under its Constitution passes on its own budget and 
 apportions expenses among its members. However, as pointed out in 
 Chapter IX, UNO and UNESCO may agree between themselves that 
 UNO is to integrate the UNESCO budget with its own after approval 
 of the budget by the General Assembly. If this is done the nations 
 which are members of both would receive one bill, though itemized, 
 
31 
 
 for their United Nations obligations and various other economies 
 would be effected. 
 
 The London Conference also considered the relation of UNESCO to 
 the planetary bodies which, it was foreseen, would gather around it 
 in a solar system of educational, cultural, and scientific organizations 
 of all kinds. Article XI treats of this relationship simply and di- 
 rectly, authorizing full and hearty cooperation with other specialized 
 intergovernmental organizations and private international organiza- 
 tions operating in UNESCO’s sphere of interest. 
 
 In the case of other specialized agencies such as the Food and Agri- 
 culture Organization, the International Bank and Fund, and the 
 Civil Aviation Organization, the Director-General may establish in- 
 formal working arrangements, and joint committees for cooperation 
 may be set up. Reciprocal representation at meetings may also be 
 arranged. 
 
 Although the new Organization will have its headquarters in Paris, 
 and the United Nations will presumably have its headquarters else- 
 where, the Director-General of UNESCO will maintain direct work- 
 ing relationships with the Secretariat of the United Nations and its 
 subdivisions — particularly with the Secretariat which will serve the 
 Economic and Social Council. Article XI of the UNESCO Constitu- 
 tion makes it possible for the Director-General, under the general 
 authority of the Executive Board, to establish informal relations and 
 exchange of information with other specialized agencies and to avail 
 himself of exchanges of personnel and methods. Formal arrange- 
 ments or agreements entered into with such organizations or agencies, 
 however, must have specific Executive Board approval. 
 
 Furthermore, paragraph 2 of Article XI permits UNESCO, sub- 
 ject to the approval of its General Conference, to accept transfer of 
 the resources and activities of other specialized intergovernmental 
 organizations or agencies whose purposes and functions lie within 
 UNESCO’s field of competence. Under this provision it will be pos- 
 sible for UNESCO, if it finds it desirable to do so, to take over the 
 properties and assets of the Institute of Intellectual Cooperation in 
 Paris, and thus solve the problem raised by the French proposals cir- 
 culated before the London Conference, which urged merger of the 
 Institute with the new Organization by constitutional provision. 
 Although the French Delegation did not push this proposal in the 
 Conference, it was recognized that the status of the Institute would 
 require attention in the future. Its disappearance is taken as a matter 
 of course, and the only problem will be how to utilize its assets. 
 UNESCO is authorized also to make arrangements with other agencies 
 which have library materials and scientific facilities which might prove 
 of value in the future. 
 
32 
 
 Finally, under Article XI, UNESCO may make suitable arrange- 
 ments for consultation and cooperation with private or non-govern- 
 mental international organizations concerned with matters within its 
 competence, and may also invite them to undertake certain specific 
 tasks. Such cooperation may also include appropriate participation 
 by representatives of such organizations on advisory committees set 
 up by the Conference. These provisions make it possible for the 
 greatest amount of interchange with distinguished and successful 
 organizations like the international scientific unions, which have ex- 
 isted since the end of the last great war, as well as with many other 
 international organizations supported by private funds or by a com- 
 bination of funds from private and public sources. 
 
 CHAPTER XI 
 
 Articles VIII, XII, XIII, and XIV : Miscellaneous Provisions 
 
 Reports hy Member States {Article VIII) 
 
 To facilitate the interchange of information is one of the chief 
 functions of the Organization. One useful service which the Organiza- 
 tion can render in this field is to gather and make readily available 
 authoritative information about the educational, scientific, and cul- 
 tural institutions and organizations of all countries. In order to assist 
 this work, members undertake (in Article VIII) to communicate 
 to the Organization published material of an official character. 
 
 In addition to this documentary material, the Organization will 
 need reports on subjects with reference to which it is contemplating 
 action or has acted. For example, if the Conference recommends to 
 the members that they endeavor to emphasize the teaching of inter- 
 national affairs in their schools, the Organization will need to know 
 what action, if any, has been taken. Such reports will provide factual 
 guidance for the deliberations and further recommendations of the 
 Conference. They will also supply evidence as to the success of 
 the Organization in furthering the attainment of the purposes which 
 the members have proposed. Accordingly, members undertake to re- 
 port periodically to the Organization, in a manner to be determined 
 by the Conference, on activities and developments related to the func- 
 tions of the Organization and on the action taken on the conventions 
 and recommendations adopted by the Conference. 
 
 A member obviously cannot be compelled to furnish reports. The 
 Organization is not endowed with police power. The incentive to re- 
 port fully and accurately at the request of the Organization will be 
 the desire to help the Organization discharge the functions with which 
 it has been entrusted. 
 
33 
 
 Legal Status of the Organization {Article XII) 
 
 An organization like UNESCO must have the legal capacity to 
 enter into contracts, to take title to real and personal property, and 
 to appear in court. Moreover, the legal status of its officials and 
 representatives must be established. The exact nature of the privileges 
 and immunities to which international organizations and their officials 
 are entitled is not yet sufficiently clear due to the fact that the practice 
 is relatively new and has varied from one organization to another. 
 
 The various problems arising in this connection were discussed at 
 San Francisco when the United Nations Charter was drawn up, and 
 provision was made in the Charter that the Organization should enjoy 
 such legal capacity as was necessary to the discharge of its functions, 
 and that the Organization itself, representatives of members of the 
 United Nations, and officials of the Organization should enjoy such 
 privileges and immunities as were necessaiy. (Articles 104 and 105 
 of the United Nations Charter.) 
 
 It was quickly agreed at London that similar provisions should be 
 included in the Constitution of UNESCO. The detailed application 
 of these provisions will be worked out in agreements among the 
 members and in their legislation. 
 
 Amendments {Article XIII) 
 
 It is self-evident that every constitution must provide some pro- 
 cedure whereby it can be amended. It is impossible to provide against 
 all contingencies, and undesirable to bind future generations by the 
 conceptions of the present. 
 
 There was considerable discussion at London of the amending pro- 
 cedure. Since the Organization is an association of governments, there 
 was a strong case for requiring that amendments, after being approved 
 by a stipulated majority of the General Conference, be accepted by 
 two thirds of the members, as was proposed in the draft of the Con- 
 ference of Allied Ministers of Education. 
 
 In opposition to this requirement, it was argued that this was a 
 slow and cumbersome procedure, because inertia and the pressure of 
 business might delay action by the member governments, even on non- 
 controversial amendments. The British proposed to avoid such 
 delay by making amendments effective on approval by both the Gen- 
 eral Conference and the General Assembly of UNO. This proposal 
 was linked with the proposal that the Constitution of UNESCO 
 should come into force upon the adoption by the General Assembly of 
 the United Nations of a resolution to that effect. It was opposed by 
 the United States Delegation as an attempt to anticipate the decisions 
 which the United Nations Organization might make with respect to 
 the specialized agencies. Other delegations agreed with this posi- 
 tion and the proposal was defeated. There was a strong desire, how- 
 
34 
 
 ever, among the members of Commission II, where this question 
 was taken up, that the amending process be made as flexible as pos- 
 sible. The United States Delegation sympathized with this desire, 
 while at the same time stating that the Constitution must reserve to the 
 United States Government its constitutional duty to pass on important 
 changes in the agreements to which it was a party. 
 
 Accordingly, an agreement was reached to harmonize these points 
 of view by the provisions included in Article XI. Under this article, 
 amendments come into force when they have been approved by two 
 thirds of the members of the General Conference, with the important 
 exception that amendments which involve changes in the obligations 
 of members or in the functions of the Organization must be submitted 
 for approval by two thirds of the member states. 
 
 Interpretation {Article XIV) 
 
 The Constitution provides that the English and French texts are 
 to be equally authoritative. This is in accordance with traditional 
 practice and was readily agreed to at London. It is further provided 
 that questions or disputes concerning the interpretation of the Consti- 
 tution may be submitted to either the International Court of Justice 
 or an arbitral tribunal. 
 
 CHAPTER XII 
 Article XV : Entry Into Force 
 
 The final article provides for the acceptance of the Constitution 
 and the bringing of the Organization into operation. As is custom- 
 ary, the host government of the constituent conference is named in 
 paragraph 1 of Article XV as the recipient of the acceptances. Ac- 
 ceptance of the Constitution involves both the filing of acceptance 
 with the Government of the United Kingdom and signing of the Con- 
 stitution. The Constitution will come into force when it has been 
 accepted and signed by twenty governments of the United Nations. 
 
 A proposal was put forward by the British Government to dispense 
 with acceptance by the individual governments, substituting adoption 
 by the General Assembly of the United Nations. This proposal was 
 urged on the grounds that it would secure speedier action on the Con- 
 stitution and provide a more convenient procedure for the amendment 
 of the Constitution. (See Chapter XI.) The French Government 
 proposed that the Constitution should come into effect when both the 
 General Assembly of the United Nations and a majority of the indi- 
 vidual governments had accepted it. The United States opposed both 
 proposals. We argued that UNESCO was a specialized agency of 
 the United Nations and that the United Nations Charter intended that 
 specialized organizations were to be brought into relationship with 
 UNO after they had been established — which meant that they must be 
 
 V 
 
35 
 
 established by the several United Nations first. We argued further 
 that since the United Nations Charter did not specifically give the 
 Assembly authority to approve the constitutions of specialized 
 agencies, a provision of the type suggested would amount to an at- 
 tempt by UNESCO to legislate for UNO. Attention was also called 
 to the practice followed in the establishment of other organizations 
 where acceptance by individual governments was usual, and to the 
 required approval by the national legislative bodies in the United 
 States and in certain other countries. The United States Delegation 
 expressed its earnest conviction that it was particularly important to 
 have the Constitution of UNESCO reviewed and approved by such 
 legislative bodies, in order that the peoples of the various countries 
 might be informed and might participate directly in a work of the 
 greatest and most immediate importance to them all. 
 
 This view prevailed. At the close of the London Conference the 
 Constitution was approved by the participating delegations and the 
 Final Act to which the Constitution was appended was signed by the 
 chief delegates of forty -three of the United Nations, together with the 
 Instrument establishing a Preparatory Commission. The Constitu- 
 tion itself was left unsigned by the United States Delegation until 
 approved by the Congress. 
 
 CHAPTER XIII 
 The Preparatory Commission 
 
 An Instrument establishing a Preparatory Educational, Scientific 
 and Cultural Commission was signed together with the Final Act of 
 the Conference. The chief function of the Preparatory Commission 
 thus created is to prepare the way for the permanent Organization 
 and to bring UNESCO into being as soon as the Constitution is 
 accepted by twenty United Nations. 
 
 Many complex problems arose in the planning of this body, which 
 had not been dealt with comprehensively in the three brief paragraphs 
 headed “Transitory Provisions” in the preliminary draft prepared by 
 the Conference of Allied Ministers of Education. There was a ques- 
 tion as to name. Should it be a Preparatory or an Interim Commis- 
 sion ? The draft of the Conference of Allied Ministers of Education 
 used the latter term, but it was agreed to adopt the term “Preparatory 
 Commission” as the title more accurately descriptive of the nature of 
 the Commission in the duties it was to be assigned. 
 
 Discussion of the composition of the Preparatory Commission 
 brought out two divergent attitudes toward the Commission and the 
 part it was to play in the interval between the conclusion of the 
 constituent Conference and the initiation of the Organization itself. 
 Those who looked forward, with confidence as well as hope, to the 
 
36 
 
 speedy acceptance of UNESCO, thought that the work of preparation 
 could best be performed by a specially selected, fairly small group of 
 fifteen to expedite the detailed program of setting up machinery and 
 preparing the agenda of the first meeting of the General Conference. 
 Others, fearful that a long time might elapse before the Organization 
 could be brought into being, favored a more widely representative 
 commission, with one representative from each nation represented at 
 the constituent Conference. Also, the small states were generally in 
 accord in wanting the second type of commission, feeling that it would 
 give them better representation and obviate the danger that their inter- 
 ests and their needs might be overlooked. The plan as adopted pro- 
 vides representation for all members on the Commission itself, but sets 
 up an Executive Coimnittee of fifteen to which the continuing business 
 of the Commission will be entrusted. The extent of the powers of the 
 Executive Committee will be determined by the Preparatory Commis- 
 sion itself. Thus, the two desiderata of democratic representation and 
 efficiency in operation were recognized. 
 
 The problems as to nomenclature and composition of the Prepara- 
 tory Commission were, however, of minor importance in comparison 
 with the problems of enumeration of functions. After considerable 
 discussion the following were agreed : The Commission is to call the 
 first session of the General Conference of UNESCO and to make all 
 practical arrangements necessary. It will prepare the provisional 
 agenda, and in this connection it will make studies, and draft recom- 
 mendations, on subjects proposed for the program of UNESCO. An 
 important part of its duties will be to prepare plans for the transfer 
 of the activities and assets of existing international agencies in the 
 fields within the scope of UNESCO. It will also arrange, though 
 without authority to take final action, for the terms of relationship 
 between UNESCO and UNO, and will plan for the Secretariat and 
 for the appointment of the Dii’ector-General. Again, the Commis- 
 sion will prepare plans for the budget, to be presented to the first 
 session of the General Conference. 
 
 It proved to be less easy to agree on the Commission’s responsibili- 
 ties in a secqjid area of critical concern to certain delegations and of 
 real concern to all. One of the problems most earnestly pressed upon 
 the constituent Conference was the problem of the needs of the 
 devastated countries for help in the reestablishment of their schools 
 and the acquisition of the elemental and basic materials needed for 
 the teaching of their children. 
 
 There was complete unanimity of opinion that these needs in edu- 
 cational materials and facilities must be met before educational co- 
 operation can proceed on the scale which UNESCO anticipates. The 
 question was whether the Preparatory Commission itself was to act 
 as a direct relief and rehabilitation agency, to seek and handle funds 
 
37 
 
 and to distribute contributions from governments and other sources, 
 or whether the Commission should merely serve as a body to make 
 studies of needs, to receive and transmit information, and to co- 
 ordinate contributions of money and goods and services — in short, to 
 act as intermediary between the countries whose needs are overwhelm- 
 ing and the governments and agencies already in existence which may 
 be able to help. 
 
 It was finally decided that the Preparatory Commission should not 
 assume relief functions which it could hardly perform without being 
 diverted from its chief business but should undertake, through a 
 special committee, to bring needs and help together. Three sections 
 of the Draft Instrument for the establishment of the Preparatory 
 Commission (Sections 2 (d) and 6 and 7) deal with this subject. The 
 Commission is to appoint a technical subcommittee to prepare a con- 
 spectus of the educational, scientific, and cultural needs of the 
 countries devastated by war. This information will be placed before 
 the first session of the General Conference. The Commission will act 
 as intermediary in bringing these needs to the attention of govern- 
 ments, organizations, and persons wishing to assist by contributing 
 money, supplies, or services and will do what it can to see that co- 
 ordinated relief is given directly by the donors or indirectly through 
 existing relief organizations. 
 
 CHAPTEK XIV 
 The Coneerence Eesolves 
 
 The statesmen and scholars, teachers and writers who convened in 
 London to fashion in UNESCO a new and powerful instrument in 
 the service of peace were not satisfied to write a Constitution. They 
 Avere determined to make certain that no time should be lost in mar- 
 shaling for constructive purposes the intellectual, moral, and cultural 
 resources of the world. Four resolutions were unanimously voted by 
 the Conference designed to assure the early functioning of the Organi- 
 zation and to give it direction. The first was introduced by the Dele- 
 gation of the United Kingdon and seconded by the United States 
 Delegation. The other three were introduced by the United States 
 Delegation. 
 
 Paris — Seat of UNESCO 
 
 The first of these resolutions stipulates that the seat of UNESCO 
 shall be in Paris, it being understood that the authority of the Gen- 
 eral Conference of UNESCO to change the seat of the Organization 
 by a two-thirds majority is not prejudiced by this act. 
 
 The warm applause which greeted this decision was a tribute to the 
 intellectual and cultural leadership exercised by France throughout 
 
38 
 
 the centuries, and an expression of faith in the future of France as 
 a stronghold of freedom of thought and cultural progress. It was a 
 tribute also to the country which, throughout the inter-war period, 
 had stood almost alone in supporting the International Institute of 
 Intellectual Cooperation. It has already been made clear that the 
 acceptance of the French invitation did not involve any specific action 
 respecting the Institute, nor, as was pointed out by the French Dele- 
 gation, any preconceived notion as to the nationality of the responsible 
 officials. It was the opinion of the Conference that UNESCO, located 
 in Paris, will be ideally broad in the range of its activities and com- 
 pletely international in character. 
 
 In discussing the seat of UNESCO a communication from the Egyp- 
 tian Delegation to the Conference is of interest. In this communica- 
 tion it was suggested that a regional office or “permanent center” of 
 UNESCO might be created in Cairo to serve as a link with the states 
 of the Arab League. No action was taken on this proposal, but it 
 may point the way to the establishment of regional centers in various 
 parts of the world. 
 
 Media of Mass C om/munication 
 
 ^he second resolution, introduced by the American Delegation, re- 
 flects the earnest desire of the Conference to make UNESCO an 
 effective means in furthering freedom of information and in rendering 
 assistance to the media of mass communication such as the radio, the 
 press, and the cinema in their task of promoting mutual understanding 
 and good-will. The resolution, accepted unanimously, needs no further 
 commentary : 
 
 In view of the paramount importance of the media of mass 
 communication such as the press, the radio and the cinema, in 
 advancing the purpose of the United Nations to maintain inter- 
 national peace and security by the spread of knowledge and 
 mutual understanding, and 
 
 In order to define, at the earliest possible moment, the most 
 effective ways and means in which UNESCO can cooperate with 
 all such media of mass communication in their effort to inform 
 the peoples of the world about each other with truth and justice 
 and understanding, and 
 
 In order to assist in establishing the greatest possible freedom 
 of the instruments of international information from censorship, 
 discriminatory economic practices, and other obstacles to the free 
 movement of ideas by word and image among the peoples of the 
 world, and 
 
 In order to determine more clearly the degree and type of par- 
 ticipation of the major agencies of mass conununication, private 
 and public, in the work of UNESCO, 
 
39 
 
 It is resolved 
 
 1. That the Preparatory Commission in drawing up the agenda 
 of the first conference of UNESCO provide full opportunity for 
 the discussion of the scope and opportunities of UNESCO in fur- 
 thering the use of the media of mass communication for the ends 
 of peace and for promoting friendly relations among nations in 
 accordance with the purposes and principles of the charter of 
 San Francisco. 
 
 2. That in working out the internal arrangements of UNESCO, 
 and particularly its committee structure and Secretariat, the Pre- 
 paratory Commission give special attention to the relationships 
 to be established with the various agencies and organisations 
 operating in the fields of mass communication. 
 
 3. That the Preparatory Commission shall advise with special- 
 ists and representatives of agencies and organisations interested 
 in these matters with a view to the organisation of discussions of 
 the mutual interests of UNESCO and the media of mass commu- 
 nication and of the ways in which they can work together for 
 their common ends. 
 
 Adult Education 
 
 Closely related to this resolution on the press, the radio and the 
 cinema as media of mass communication is another resolution also pro- 
 posed by the American Delegation and carried by acclamation : 
 
 Whereas the strength and stability of democratic government 
 depends upon the force of enlightened public opinion, and 
 
 Whereas Adult Education has an immediate contribution to 
 make to the enlightenment of the citizens of the world 
 
 It is resolitid 
 
 That UNESCO be urged to establish close working relationships 
 with the various adult education agencies, public and private, and 
 
 That the Preparatory Commission, in elaborating proposals for 
 the committee structure and the Secretariat of UNESCO, take 
 full account of the need for adequate machinery designed to pro- 
 mote such cooperative relationships. 
 
 By offering this resolution the American Delegation wished to make 
 it clear that the people of the United States are not interested only in 
 collaboration between groups of intellectuals specializing in the fields 
 of education, science, and culture, but that a secure peace seems to 
 them to require a common understanding between the peoples of the 
 world. The Conference, in accepting the resolution, accepted also 
 that interpretation of its purpose. 
 
40 
 
 International Council of Scientific Unions 
 
 Reference has been made earlier to the desire of the Conference to 
 assign the sciences an important place in UNESCO. It is hoped that 
 UNESCO will stimulate close collaboration between scientists 
 throughout the world with a view to the advancement of scientific 
 knowledge, not for purposes of death and destruction but to insure 
 a wider and fuller life for all. This hope prompted another resolution 
 introduced by the American Delegation : 
 
 Considering the urgency of restoring and extending the means 
 through which the scientists of all lands may exchange informa- 
 tion and work together for the advancement of knowledge and its 
 application to human needs, and 
 
 In view of the opportunity offered by the meeting of the Exec- 
 utive Committee of the International Council of Scientific Unions 
 on December 3 and 4 in London to begin the practical considera- 
 tion of ways in which that organization and the United Nations 
 Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization can cooperate 
 to their mutual advantage. 
 
 It is resolved 
 
 That the Preparatory Commission of the United Nations Edu- 
 cational, Scientific and Cultural Organization be requested by 
 this Conference to instruct its Executive Committee to consult 
 with the International Council of Scientific Unions on methods 
 of collaboration to strengthen the programs of both bodies in 
 the area of their common concern, and 
 
 That the plans thus formulated be reported to the First Con- 
 ference of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cul- 
 tural Organization, with recommendations for a suitable work- 
 ing arrangement with the International Council of Scientific 
 Unions. 
 
 Non-Self -Governing Territories 
 
 Last but not least, the American Delegation gave special atten- 
 tion to the educational and cultural needs of the peoples in non-self- 
 governing areas. In the course of the discussions in Commission IV, 
 which dealt with UNESCO’s relations with the United Nations, the 
 Czechoslovak Delegation submitted a memorandum which, among 
 other things, stressed the need for cooperation with the Trusteeship 
 Council of the United Nations. Following this initiative the Ameri- 
 can Delegation requested that the following paragraph be included in 
 the record of the Conference: 
 
 UNESCO shall hold itself available to act, within the scope 
 of its functions, in regard to any matters referred to it by the 
 
41 
 
 Trusteeship Council under Article 91 of the Charter, and in 
 regard to any matters arising out of Articles 73 and 74 of the 
 Charter which may be referred to it by any member of the 
 United Nations having responsibilities for the administration of 
 territories whose peoples have not yet attained a full measure 
 of self-government, or by any regional advisory commission like 
 the Anglo-American Caribbean Commission having responsi- 
 bility for such matters. 
 
 Of the above-mentioned articles of the United Nations Charter, 
 Article 73 is the most important. It contains the acceptance as a 
 sacred trust on the part of the members of the United Nations of the 
 obligation to promote to the utmost the well-being of the inhabitants 
 of non-self-governing territories and “to ensure, with due respect for 
 the culture of the peoples concerned, their political, economic, social, 
 and educational advancement . . .” Through counsel and advice 
 UNESCO may be able to play an important role in the fulfilment of 
 this pledge. 
 
 It is notable that these resolutions were accepted by the Conference 
 as a demonstration of the common will of all the delegations to settle 
 down to constructive labor at the earliest moment. One thought 
 characterized all the proceedings : UNESCO must not fail the hopes 
 of men and women everywhere who, tired of war and destruction, 
 are reaching out for effective tools to build a new world on the ruins 
 of the old. 
 
 I 
 
Selected Quotations From 
 
 ADDRESSES 
 
 Delivered at Plenary Sessions of the Conference 
 for the establishment of the United ^Nations 
 Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organi- 
 zation 
 
 The Rt. Eon. C. R. Attlee., C.H., M.P., Prime Minister of Great Britain 
 and Northern Ireland 
 
 “In the new world order towards which we are moving it is essen- 
 tial that we should have appropriate machinery to deal with each 
 of the major fields of human activity. Examples are labour, health, 
 food and agriculture, transport, finance. We have already made quite 
 a good beginning with this task of forging the instruments of our 
 cooperative international life in the future; but however we classify 
 the principal elements in the public life of the world it would be im- 
 possible to exclude from our classification that large and significant 
 field of activity which can be described broadly as the life of the 
 mind. . . . 
 
 . . Wars begin in the minds of men. And we are to live in 
 a world of democracies where the mind of the common man will be 
 all important. We have left behind us the days when kings and 
 their statesmen could declare war at will, regardless of the feelings 
 of their subjects, and we have no proof that democracy of itself is a 
 protection against a readiness to make war. 
 
 “Today the peoples of the world are ‘islands shouting at each other 
 over seas of misimderstanding’. They don’t understand each other’s 
 history, each other’s way of living, each other’s way of thinking. 
 The better they understand each other, the more they will realize 
 how much they have in common and why and how they differ, the 
 less prone they will be to take up arms against each other. ‘Know 
 thyself’ said the old proverb. ‘Knov' your neighbour’ we say today. 
 And the whole world is our neighbour.” 
 
 The Rt. Hon. Ellen Wilkinson, M.P., Minister of Education, Great 
 Britain; President of the Conference 
 
 “. . . We have a high responsibility, for entrusted to us is the 
 task of creating some part — and not the least important part — of that 
 
 ( 42 ) 
 
43 
 
 structure of the United Nations on Avhicli rest our hopes for the future 
 of mankind. It is for us to clear the channels through which may 
 flow from nation to nation the streams of knowledge and thought, 
 of truth and beauty which are the foundations of true civiliza- 
 tion. . . . 
 
 “We live in a machine age and the world has worshipped at the 
 shrine of the practical man and of technological achievement. But 
 we know that progress as machine users can lead only to disaster 
 unless we also have progress as human beings. Behind the machine, 
 and vastly more important, is man and the mind of man. It is in- 
 deed the mind of man — the right-mindedness of man — which alone 
 can prevent the misuse of the new powers always coming to his hand. 
 Civilization, it has been said, represents the conquest of nature. 
 But surely it must also depend on the development of all that is 
 best in human nature. . . . 
 
 “. . . I would like to send my voice beyond these walls and 
 address myself to teachers wherever they are carrying on their self- 
 sacrificing labours. I say to them : ‘Pay attention to what is being 
 done here in London. Support those who are establishing this or- 
 ganization and, when it is established, see that you make it your 
 own, to reflect your wishes and to meet your needs. See that its 
 influence penetrates from the officials at its centre to the scattered 
 workers on the circumference, so that the unity of the teaching pro- 
 fession may at last be no empty slogan but a living reality expressed 
 through the effective working of the new international organization.’ 
 
 “. . . In these days, when we are all wondering, perhaps appre- 
 
 hensively, what the scientists will do to us next, it is important that 
 they should be linked closely with the humanities and should feel 
 that they have a responsibility to mankind for the result of their 
 labours. I do not believe that any scientists will have survived the 
 world catastrophe, who will still say that they are utterly uninterested 
 in the social implications of their discoveries. 
 
 “It is the scientists themselves, I am glad to say, who have insisted 
 on the U. K. Delegation putting forward the proposal for the inclu- 
 sion of the word ‘Scientific’ in the title of the organization. There 
 are already in existence many international unions of different 
 branches of science. We welcome their co-operation and, of course, 
 do not wish in any way to cut across or interfere with their ac- 
 tivities.” 
 
 M. Leon Blum, France, Associate President of the Conference 
 
 “ . . . the spirit of peace is not a spirit of relinquishment or a spirit 
 of cowardice, but a spirit of courage and of firm resolve and when 
 necessary a spirit of sacrifice. To spread abroad the spirit of peace 
 means teaching the nations and teaching mankind that peace must be 
 
44 
 
 defended at the peril of their peace, and at the peril of their lives. 
 The Charter of the United Nations provides that peace shall be main- 
 tained or reestablished, if need be, by the application of force, and that 
 would be the only case in which force would have a legitimate use. 
 Moreover, the risk that the United Nations may be driven to this neces- 
 sity will diminish, the more general their desire and the bolder their 
 resolution not to shi'ink from it. At the same time the application 
 of force, war, is only an ultima ratio for the peoples. We all know 
 though our imagination cannot avail to depict it, that any new war 
 would be in the nature of what might be called cosmic destruction. 
 AVe all know that the free peoples must unite or perish. And what we 
 are all aiming at, what we hope to found, is a world in which peace 
 shall become a permanent or rather a natural state of affairs — a world 
 in which the spirit of peace shall become one of the guarantees, and 
 perhaps the surest guarantee, of peace. 
 
 “It would accordingly be impossible in our view to exaggerate the 
 importance that an Organization for Intellectual and Spiritual Co- 
 operation must assume in the creation of a peaceful world and in 
 the pacific organization of the world. But it goes without saying that 
 such an organization can be conceived of only as one of the many com- 
 plex parts of this organization, and its efiicacy, and above all its au- 
 thority, will depend in the last resort on the efficacy and the authority 
 conferred on the International Community itself. . . .” 
 
 Mr. A. Michelsen^ Denmark 
 
 “The Danish Delegation are of opinion that the scope of the Or- 
 ganization should be extended to cover the widest possible field. It 
 should not be confined to collaboration between representatives of 
 higher educational institutes. The Danish educational system, from 
 the primary school to the university, is based on broad and democratic 
 principles, and so are our Folk High Schools and our libraries. We 
 are convinced of the importance of bringing the common people within 
 the sphere of the new Organization. Only if it is able to reach the 
 common people and to foster in them an international outlook and an 
 understanding of the brotherhood of man, can the Organization be 
 said to be a success.” 
 
 His Excellency M. A. Fattan Amir Pasha, Egypt 
 
 “ ... no nation today can afford to live next door to poverty or 
 ignorance.” 
 
 M. Rene Cassin, France 
 
 “. . . we shall never lose sight of the fact, so adequately expressed 
 at the opening of our deliberations, that it is not the sum of knowl- 
 edge that is to be the distinguishing mark of the activities of our 
 
45 
 
 future Organization, but the development of culture. One of our 
 great authors has said : Science without conscience is but the ruin of 
 the soul. We can say : Knowledge without morality can only result in 
 barbarism. We who know that there can be no democracy without 
 culture, will direct our efforts towards adding something else to knowl- 
 edge : A gi'eat ideal, a clear vision of the great problems which must 
 be solved in the cause of international peace and lastly, and perhaps 
 most important of all, the mastery of self.” 
 
 Rajkumari Amrit Kaur^ India 
 
 “. . . There can be no true freedom and consequently no genuine 
 culture in a world which is half bond and half free, half fed and half 
 starved, where exploitation and social injustices flourish side by side 
 with pious expressions of good intentions and high-sounding policies. 
 
 “. . . The stories of the material destruction caused in the war will 
 be a mere myth for those who will come after us. But it is the wounds 
 of the spirit that it is ever so difficult but urgently important to heal 
 so that love and faith and hope may replace the spirit of hatred and 
 revenge. Children know no barriers of race or creed. Let us not 
 educate them to know them.” 
 
 M. Torres Bodet, Minister of Public Education of Mexico 
 
 “The world is waiting for something more than the delimitation of 
 frontiers and zones of influence, something more than a system of 
 agreements for the exploitation and marketing of its products, some- 
 thing more in short than an interim system of security. It looks for 
 the establishment of a new kind of relationship between nations and 
 between men, that is to say a different way of assessing the value of 
 acts, a new meaning for joy, work, hope, a definite object demanding 
 the collective effort of all, an object whose lofty nature would justify 
 the determination to seek it without hesitation or reserve. 
 
 “. . . It is self-evident that the totalitarian postulates which 
 guided those false guides of despotism have wrought enormous evil 
 throughout the world. But would it have been possible to carry on 
 this teaching of hate and murder if there had existed among all the 
 other peoples any real enthusiasm for democracy, any active love of 
 culture and, let us say it, without bucking the issue, any effective sys- 
 tem of education ? "What did the dictators see around them ? A col- 
 lection of very advanced peoples who could undoubtedly lay claim to 
 progressive technical sciences, healthy and prosperous industries, 
 learned and famous universities ; but in the shadow of those peoples, 
 how many others existed without books or schools, how many com- 
 munities wallowed in ignorance, how many latent victims awaited the 
 theorists of vital space, the doctrinaire protagonists of the domina- 
 tion of privileged races ! 
 
46 
 
 . . And it is this double debt which the world has con- 
 
 tracted — a debt towards the masses who have been sacrificed and a 
 debt towards the learned experts whose investigations supplied the 
 final instruments of victory — which points to the very essence of all 
 the problems now confronting us: our purpose is to find a modm 
 vivendi^ whereby the training of strong personalities shall not pre- 
 suppose the neglect of the masses, and the expansion of the masses 
 shall not imply the stifling of the individual.” 
 
 Professor G. van der Leeuw^ the Netherlands 
 
 . . the whole world should from now on know only of one 
 
 aim, that of realising what we have fought for. We call it liberty 
 and democracy, and we are right in doing so. But liberty and 
 democracy are utterly worthless when they are nothing but the 
 absence of oppression and dictatorship. Nazidom and Fascism were 
 only the symptoms of a graver illness threatening the world whereby 
 all ideals would become so many empty shells and whereby all sense 
 of there being something greater worth living for than having a good 
 time would be lost. . . . 
 
 “. . . Education is always dependent on some faith, tending 
 
 towards some ideal. It therefore cannot limit itself to work in 
 schools and universities. It comprises the whole field of modern 
 culture — radio, press, films. It may be truly national, and rightly 
 so, but it will fail utterly if it is not served in the spirit of obedience 
 to what is more than all things national, more even than all things 
 human.” 
 
 A/r. A. E. Campbell, New Zealand 
 
 “As delegates to this Conference have already been reminded, the 
 United Nations are pledged to promote ‘universal respect for, and 
 observance of, fundamental rights and freedoms for all without dis- 
 tinction to race, language and religion’. With that aspiration New 
 Zealand is very much in sympathy; and we take it that one of the 
 fundamental rights to which everyone is entitled is the right to a 
 full and generous education to the limits of his powers. This means 
 that we desire for all children a rich and happy family life ; it means, 
 so far as schooling is concerned, that we desire genuine equality of 
 educational opportunities; it means that we desire our schools them- 
 selves to be really civilized places — pleasant to look at, bright, spa- 
 cious, airy, and well equipped with modern aids to learning ; it means 
 that their discipline should be positive and humane, not negative and 
 repressive ; it means that we desire first-rate teachers at all levels and 
 first-rate teaching conditions, including reasonably small classes; it 
 means that we desire for each child a well balanced programme of 
 studies and activities that will foster his full development as a person, 
 bring him into touch with the creative activities of man, and prepare 
 
47 
 
 him for an active place in a democratic society ; it means that we wish 
 every citizen to have freedom of access to the cultural riches of man 
 and freedom to make his own characteristic contribution, however 
 small it may be, to the life of his society; and it means other things 
 as well.” 
 
 Mr. Nils Hjelmtveit., Former Minister of Education for Norway 
 
 “Without entering into details I may be allowed to emphasize that 
 the Organization must plough much deeper than to the strata of the 
 intellectual professions within the nations joining our Organization. 
 If it is to succeed it must raise the general education in the different 
 societies. To do away with illiteracy may perhaps be thought to be 
 a trivial matter, but it is a necessary first step in the countries where 
 it exists, and it must be followed by a general raising of the educa- 
 tional standards and the cultural level of the people as a whole. We 
 must give width and breadth to the education of the common people 
 if we are to lay a firm basis for democracy within the individual 
 nation and for understanding and collaboration between the peoples 
 of the world.” 
 
 Dr. Maximo M. Kalaw, the Philippines 
 
 “. . . the principle of race can be beaten by the principle of 
 
 community of ideas, culture and civilization.” 
 
 Mr. Czeslaw Wycech, Minister of Education of Poland 
 
 “Teachers and educationists, the learned and the artists, deem their 
 reason for existence to create as much as they can. The gifts of culture 
 do not become poorer — on the contrary, they grow richer, not only for 
 those who receive but also for those who give. By giving, the circum- 
 ference of influence widens, strengthens the spiritual ties which unite 
 societies and humanity and reaches the peak of satisfaction which 
 exists in the lives of mankind.” 
 
 Dr. Bernard Drsewieski., Poland 
 
 “. . . I am not a bit ashamed to tell you, friends, that we on 
 
 the Continent are terribly poor. We are terribly poor and we are 
 proud to be poor. The reason of our poverty is that we have been 
 ruined and devastated because we refused to accept the rule of Fascism, 
 because we have been fighting, straggling, resisting. You can ask the 
 Poles, the Yugoslavs or the Greeks and they will all tell you the same 
 terrible story. This has been the consequence of our struggle and our 
 resistance. We are poor. We are proud to be poor. You have to help 
 us not tomorrow or after tomorrow ; you have to help us today, immedi- 
 ately, presently, without any delay.” 
 
 H.E. Hasan- Ali Yucel, Turkey 
 
 “. . . It is not enough to teach men, they must be rallied round 
 common pacific principles. The war which has just ended has given 
 
48 
 
 us a startling confirmation of this truth; nations which had reached 
 a high degree of culture and education were dragged on and engulfed 
 in catastrophe by the national egoism of their political bodies. In the 
 space of a few years peoples who stood in the highest rank of culture 
 and technical achievement reverted to conceptions dating back to the 
 Middle Ages.” 
 
 Mr. Archibald MacLeish., United States of America 
 
 “. . . We believe in the possibility of understanding. We be- 
 
 lieve also that the Organization which we shall here construct is an 
 Organization through which the understanding of the peoples can be 
 fostered. We believe this not only because we are a believing and an 
 optimistic people. We believe it because we have the proof and record 
 to support our faith. 
 
 “It is a curious thing that men in our time are more willing to believe 
 in the incredible miracles of matter than in the simplest miracles of the 
 human spirit. They are more willing to believe in the power of the 
 invisible atom to construct and to destroy than in the power of the 
 human heart to love and to create. It is perhaps for this reason that 
 there are some among us — and not few — who compare our century with 
 earlier centuries not altogether to the advantage of our own. 
 
 “We in America have been called, and with some reason, a material 
 people. But we have behind us a history of belief in the dignity and 
 the possibility of man which is entitled also to consideration. And 
 we have behind us proofs that nothing in this faith in man, this confi- 
 dence that binds the living to the living, is national or limited or ever 
 need be. . . . 
 
 “. . . There is work to be done which none of us can do alone — 
 no nation — not the greatest or the most powerful or the most withdrawn 
 or the most fortunate. There is work to be done which can only be 
 done in common. There is work to be done such as the peoples of the 
 world have never before, in war or in peace, attempted. 
 
 “We of the American Delegation submit to you, our colleagues in 
 this great undertaking, that if we will make it the purpose of our meet- 
 ing to create an Organization through which the peoples of the world 
 may work together to perfect their understanding of each other and to 
 encourage their common heritage of knowledge, there can be no doubt 
 but that our labors will succeed.” 
 
 Dr. Ljubo Leontic, Yugoslavia 
 
 “. . . Today suspicion is often stressed as a potential source of 
 
 danger. But suspicion is never unilateral ; it is always mutual ; and 
 the indispensable condition of peace is mutual understanding, love and 
 esteem.” 
 
CONGRESSIONAL RESOLUTIONS 
 
 1945 
 
 The Mundt Resolution (H. Res. 215) 
 
 May 22^ 19 1(6 
 
 Whereas the achievement of a peaceful and orderly life among 
 the peoples of the world has become critical as a result of the war; 
 and 
 
 Whereas the future peace and security of the American and of 
 all other peoples rest upon the achievement of mutual understanding 
 among the peoples of the world, the universal application of the 
 principles of the Golden Rule, the application of reason and knowl- 
 edge to the solution of domestic as well as international problems, 
 and effective education at all levels ; and 
 Whereas the Axis countries have pursued a deliberate policy of 
 destroying the technical, professional, and teaching personnel of the 
 countries they have conquered, and have encouraged hatred and mis- 
 understanding between nations, peoples, and cultural groups ; and 
 Whereas these circumstances present a persisting problem which, 
 if not solved, will result in the perpetuation of conditions of life 
 most likely to cause peoples to resort to violence and war ; and 
 Whereas it is essential to collaborate with other nations to pro- 
 mote educational advancement and at the same time to direct educa- 
 tion toward the achievement of mutual understanding among the 
 nations : Now, therefore, be it 
 
 Resolved, That the House of Representatives of the United States 
 urges the participation by the Government of the United States in 
 the creation of an international educational and cultural organization 
 by the nations of the world for the purpose of advising together and 
 to consider problems of international education and cultural rela- 
 tions throughout the world and more pai’ticularly to organize a per- 
 manent international agency to promote educational and cultural 
 relations, the exchange of students, scholars, and other educational 
 and cultural leaders and materials, and the encouragement within 
 each country of friendly relations among nations, peoples, and cul- 
 tural groups: Provided, however. That such agency shall not inter- 
 fere with educational systems or programs within the several nations, 
 or their administration. 
 
 ( 49 ) 
 
The Fulbright-Taft Resolution (S. Res. 122) 
 
 May H, 19Jf5 
 
 Whereas the future peace and security of the American and of 
 all other peoples rest upon the achievement of mutual understand- 
 ing among the peoples of the world : Now, therefore, be it 
 Resolved, That the Senate of the United States urges the partici- 
 pation by the Government of the United States in the organization 
 by the nations of the world of a permanent international organiza- 
 tion for educational and cultural affairs, for the purpose of advising 
 together and considering problems of international educational and 
 cultural relations throughout the world, and more particularly for 
 the purpose of organizing a permanent international agency to pro- 
 mote educational and cultural relations and the encouragement within 
 each country of friendly relations among nations, peoples, and cul- 
 tural groups ; provided that such agency shall not interfere with edu- 
 cational systems or programs within the several nations, or their 
 administration. 
 
 ( 50 ) 
 
Provisions of the 
 
 CHARTER 
 
 of the United Nations applicable to UNESCO 
 
 Article 1 
 
 The Purposes of the United Nations are : 
 
 1. To maintain international peace and security, and to that end : 
 to take effective collective measures for the prevention and removal 
 of threats to the peace, and for the suppression of acts of aggression 
 or other breaches of the peace, and to bring about by peaceful means, 
 and in conformity with the principles of justice and international 
 law, adjustment or settlement of international disputes or situations 
 which might lead to a breach of the peace ; 
 
 2. To develop friendly relations among nations based on respect 
 for the principle of equal rights and self-determination of peoples, 
 and to take other appropriate measures to strengthen universal peace ; 
 
 3. To achieve international cooperation in solving international 
 problems of an economic, social, cultural, or humanitarian character, 
 and in promoting and encouraging respect for human rights and for 
 fundamental freedoms for all without distinction as to race, sex, 
 language, or religion ; and 
 
 4. To be a center for harmonizing the actions of nations in the 
 attainment of these common ends. 
 
 Article 2 
 
 7. Nothing contained in the present Charter shall authorize the 
 United Nations to intervene in matters which are essentially within 
 the domestic jurisdiction of any state or shall require the Members 
 to submit such matters to settlement under the present Charter; but 
 this principle shall not prejudice the application of enforcement 
 measures under Chapter VII. 
 
 Article 13 
 
 1. The General Assembly shall initiate studies and make recom- 
 mendations for the purpose of : 
 
 a. promoting international cooperation in the political field 
 and encouraging the progressive development of international 
 law and its codification ; 
 
 ( 51 ) 
 
52 
 
 5. promoting international cooperation in the economic, social, 
 cultufral, educational, and health ^fields, and assisting in the 
 realization of human rights and fundamental freedoms for all 
 without distinction as to race, sex, language, or religion. 
 
 2. The further responsibilities, functions, and powers of the Gen- 
 eral Assembly with respect to matters mentioned in paragraph 1 (b) 
 above are set forth in Chapters IX and X. 
 
 Article 17 
 
 1. The General Assembly shall consider and approve the budget 
 of the Organization. 
 
 2. The expenses of the Organization shall be borne by the Members 
 as apportioned by the General Assembly. 
 
 3. The General Assembly shall consider and approve any financial 
 and budgetary arrangements with specialized agencies referred to 
 in Article 57 and shall examine the administrative budgets of such 
 specialized agencies with a view to making recommendations to the 
 agencies concerned. 
 
 Article 1^8 
 
 1. The action required to carry out the decisions of the Security 
 Council for the maintenance of international peace and security shall 
 be taken by all the Members of the United Nations or by some of them, 
 as the Security Council may determine. 
 
 2. Such decisions shall be carried out by the Members of the 
 United Nations directly and through their action in the appropriate 
 international agencies of which they are members. 
 
 Article 66 
 
 With a view to the creation of conditions of stability and well-being 
 which are necessary for peaceful and friendly relations among nations 
 based on respect for the principle of equal rights and self-determina- 
 tion of peoples, the United Nations shall promote : 
 
 a. higher standards of living, full employment, and conditions 
 of economic and social progress and development ; 
 
 5. solutions of international economic, social, health, and related 
 problems ; and international cultural and educational cooperation ; 
 and 
 
 c. universal respect for, and observance of, human rights and 
 fimdamental freedoms for all without distinction as to race, sex, 
 language, or religion. 
 
53 
 
 Article 56 
 
 All Members pledge themselves to take joint and separate action in 
 cooperation with the Organization for the achievement of the purposes 
 set forth in Article 55. 
 
 Article 57 
 
 1. The various specialized agencies, established by intergovernmen- 
 tal agreement and having wide international responsibilities, as defined 
 in their basic instruments, in economic, social, cultural, educational, 
 health, and related fields, shall be brought into relationship with the 
 United Nations in accordance with the provisions of Article 63. 
 
 2. Such agencies thus brought into relationship with the United 
 Nations are hereinafter referred to as specialized agencies. 
 
 Article 58 
 
 The Organization shall make recommendations for the coordination 
 of the policies and activities of the specialized agencies. 
 
 Article 62 
 
 1. The Economic and Social Council may make or initiate studies 
 and reports with respect to international economic, social, cultural, 
 educational, health, and related matters and may make recommenda- 
 tions with respect to any such matters to the General Assembly, to the 
 Members of the United Nations, and to the specialized agencies 
 concerned. 
 
 2. It may make recommendations for the purpose of promoting 
 respect for, and observance of, human rights and fundamental free- 
 doms for all. 
 
 3. It may prepare draft conventions for submission to the General 
 Assembly, with respect to matters falling within its competence. 
 
 4. It may call, in accordance with the rules prescribed by the United 
 Nations, international conferences on matters falling within its 
 competence. 
 
 Article 63 
 
 1. The Economic and Social Council may enter into agreements with 
 any of the agencies referred to in Article 57, defining the terms on 
 which the agency concerned shall be brought into relationship with 
 the United Nations. Such agreements shall be subject to approval 
 by the General Assembly. 
 
 2. It may coordinate the activities of the specialized agencies 
 through consultation with and reconamendations to such agencies and 
 through recommendations to the General Assembly and to the Mem- 
 bers of the United Nations. 
 
54 
 
 Article GJf, 
 
 1. The Economic and Social Council may take appropriate steps 
 to obtain regular reports from the specialized agencies. It may make 
 arrangements with the Members of the United Nations and with the 
 specialized agencies to obtain reports on the steps taken to give effect 
 to its own recommendations and to recommendations on matters falling 
 within its competence made by the General Assembly. 
 
 2. It may communicate its observations on these reports to the 
 General Assembly. 
 
 Article 65 
 
 The Economic and Social Council may furnish information to the 
 Security Council and shall assist the Security Council upon its request. 
 
 Article 66 
 
 1. The Economic and Social Council shall perform such functions 
 as fall within its competence in connection with the carrying out of 
 the recommendations of the General Assembly. 
 
 2. It may, with the approval of the General Assembly, perform 
 services at the request of Members of the United Nations and at the 
 request of specialized agencies. 
 
 3. It shall perform such other functions as are specified elsewhere 
 in the present Charter or as may be assigned to it by the General 
 Assembly. 
 
 Article 73 
 
 Members of the United Nations which have or assume responsibil- 
 ities for the administration of territories whose peoples have not yet 
 attained a full measure of self-government recognize the principle 
 that the interests of the inhabitants of these territories are paramount, 
 and accept as a sacred trust the obligation to promote to the utmost, 
 within the system of international peace and security established by 
 the present Charter, the well-being of the inhabitants of these terri- 
 tories, and, to this end : 
 
 a. to ensure, with due respect for the culture of the peoples 
 concerned, their political, economic, social, and educational ad- 
 vancement, their just treatment, and their protection against 
 abuses ; 
 
 d. to promote constructive measures of development, to en- 
 courage research, and to cooperate with one another and, when 
 and where appropriate, with specialized international bodies with 
 
55 
 
 a view to the practical achievement of the social, economic, and 
 scientific purposes set forth in this Article ; and 
 
 Article 76 
 
 The basic objectives of the trusteeship system, in accordance with 
 the Purposes of the United Nations laid down in Article 1 of the pres- 
 ent Charter, shall be : 
 
 a. to further international peace and security ; 
 
 5. to promote the political, economic, social, and educational 
 advancement of the inhabitants of the trust territories, and their 
 progressive development towards self-government or independ- 
 ence as may be appropriate to the particular circumstances of 
 each territory and its peoples and the freely expressed wishes of 
 the peoples concerned, and as may be provided by the terms of 
 each trusteeship agreement ; 
 
 c. to encourage respect for human rights and for fundamental 
 freedoms for all without distinction as to race, sex, language, or 
 religion, and to encourage recognition of the interdependence of 
 the peoples of the world ; and 
 
 Article 88 
 
 The Trusteeship Council shall formulate a questionnaire on the 
 political, economic, social, and educational advancement of the inhabi- 
 tants of each trust territory, and the administering authority for each 
 trust territory within the competence of the General Assembly shall 
 make an annual report to the General Assembly upon the basis of such 
 questionnaire. 
 
 Article 91 
 
 The Trusteeship Council shall, when appropriate, avail itself of the 
 assistance of the Economic and Social Council and of the specialized 
 agencies in regard to matters with which they are respectively 
 concerned. 
 
 Article 96 
 
 1. The General Assembly or the Security Council may request the 
 International Court of Justice to give an advisory opinion on any legal 
 question. 
 
 2. Other organs of the United Nations and specialized agencies, 
 which may at any time be so authorized by the General Assembly, may 
 also request advisory opinions of the Court on legal questions arising 
 within the scope of their activities. 
 
56 
 
 Article 104 
 
 The Organization shall enjoy in the territory of each of its Members 
 such legal capacity as may be necessary for the exercise of its functions 
 and the fulfillment of its purposes. 
 
 Article 105 
 
 1. The Organization shall enjoy in the territory of each of its 
 Members such privileges and immimities as are necessary for the 
 fulfillment of its purposes. 
 
 2. Representatives of the Members of the United Nations and 
 officials of the Organization shall similarly enjoy such privileges and 
 immunities as are necessary for the independent exercise of their 
 functions in connection with the Organization. 
 
 3. The General Assembly may make recommendations with a view 
 to determining the details of the application of paragraphs 1 and 2 
 of this Article or may propose conventions to the Members of the 
 United Nations for this purpose. 
 
Text of 
 
 ARTICLE I (Purposes and Functions) 
 
 as approved by the First Commission and refer- 
 red to the Drafting Committee for condensation 
 
 1. In order to advance the purposes of the United Nations to main- 
 tain international peace and security, the Organization will promote, 
 on the widest basis, the contacts between nations and the exchanges of 
 ideas and persons best calculated to promote the spread of knowledge 
 and mutual understanding. The Organization will endeavour to assist 
 all the media of mass communication, and all other media in any 
 countries which contribute to the dissemination of knowledge and 
 information internationally, to accomplish their task of informing the 
 peoples of the world about each other with truth and justice and 
 understanding. 
 
 To this end the Organization will draw up and propose such inter- 
 national agreements as may be necessary to insure the greatest possible 
 freedom of the instruments of international information from cen- 
 sorship, discriminatory competitive practices, and other obstacles to 
 the free movement of ideas by word and image among the peoples 
 of the world. 
 
 2. In order to promote universal respect for and observance of 
 human rights and fundamental freedoms for all without distinction 
 as to race, sex, language and religion, and in order, further, to combat, 
 throughout the world, the ignorance and prejudice on which fear and 
 suspicion feed, and to give fresh impulse to popular education and the 
 spread of culture among the peoples, the Organization will 
 
 (a) Collaborate with Members, at their request, in the develop- 
 ment of educational activities, including collaboration in the 
 study of such matters as methods of teaching, comparison of cur- 
 ricula and equivalence of degrees ; drawing up to these ends agree- 
 ments calculated to insure that every nation shall benefit by the 
 experience and progress of others ; 
 
 (h) Institute collaboration among the nations of the world to 
 advance the ideal of equality of educational opportunity without 
 regard to origin or economic condition, or any other distinction of 
 any kind whatever; 
 
 ( 57 ) 
 
58 
 
 (c) Define goals of educational practice in order that the chil- 
 dren of the world may be well and truly educated for the respon- 
 sibilities of freedom. 
 
 3. In order to encourage and promote the development of the sci- 
 ences and the arts and to increase the world’s body of knowledge, the 
 Organization will encourage scientific research and humane studies 
 and will establish definitions of intellectual rights including rights of 
 literary property, drawing up and recommending international con- 
 ventions for their protection. 
 
 4. In order to make available to all peoples for the service of com- 
 mon human needs the world’s full body of culture and knowledge, the 
 Organization will 
 
 {a) Conduct and encourage the study of cultural problems re- 
 lated to the maintenance of peace and the advancement of human 
 welfare, giving pride of place to studies bearing on the peaceful 
 progress and mutual understanding of the nations, including the 
 interchange among them of knowledge of their several cultures 
 and of the rural and urban life of their peoples ; 
 
 (b) Encourage cooperation between the nations in all fields of 
 intellectual activity and organize the international interchange of 
 scholars, scientists, artists, writers, teachers, students, technicians, 
 workers, and representatives of other callings, together with ex- 
 changes of publications, objects of artistic and scientific interest, 
 and other materials of information ; 
 
 (c) Encourage and promote cooperative arrangements among 
 the nations through central bibliographical and indexing services 
 and through international inter-library loan, to give to all the 
 peoples of the world the readiest possible access to the printed 
 and published materials produced by any of them. 
 
 5. In order to assure the preservation and protection of the world’s 
 inheritance of works of art and monuments of history, the Organiza- 
 tion will draw up and recommend the necessary international conven- 
 tions to the nations concerned. 
 
 6. In order to preserve the independence, integrity, and necessai’y 
 differences of the cultures and educational systems of the nations 
 members of this Organization, the Organization is prohibited from 
 intervening in matters which are essentially within the domestic 
 jurisdiction of any state. 
 
 o