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International Conference on
"Dialogue among Civilizations"
Vilnius, Lithuania
23 - 26 April 2001

“Concepts of Civilisation for the 21^st Century”

Wednesday 25 April 2001, Vilnius University Little Aula Hall

Moderator:   Mr. Leonidas Donskis, (Lithuania)
Participants: Mr. Algis Mickunas, (United States of America)
                     Ms. Sonia Mendieta de Badaroux, (Honduras)
                     Mr. Tamotsu Aoki (Japan)
                     Mr. El-Sayed Mohamed Yassin, (Egypt)
                     Mr. Armen Darbinian, (Armenia)
Rapporteur:  Mr. FW (Russ) Russell, UNESCO Secretariat

Mr. Leonidas Donskis, Scholar, Cultural Studies and Philosophy, Lithuania, opened by discussing the concept of civilization through the ages.  He stated that far from including non-European societies and cultures in the discursive universe of civilisation, West European scholars and politicians went so far as to divide Europe itself on the ground of the polarity “civilisation vs. barbarity.” Civilisation and the resulting civilising mission were ascribed to Western Europe, whereas Eastern Europe was inscribed on the map of civilisation — and on the mind of the Enlightenment — as the vast land of barbarity, ambiguity, ambivalence, chaos, and uncertainty.  He mentioned that there remained a persistent dichotomy of the civilisations of East and West, both conceived as moral categories, rather than sheer geographical terms or historical references.  Donskis continued by stating that the philosophy of history and culture cannot cover a large expanse of human experience, of intellectual and moral sensibilities, of thought, and of sympathetic understanding of otherness that we ascribe to the contemporary comparative studies.  The current exponents of civilisation analysis and of the history of consciousness, hold two predominant methodologies in the context of the comparative study of civilisations and are perfectly aware of the fact that the concept of civilisation can serve as a means of symbolic and even actual exclusion, not only inclusion. This is why it significantly enhances our intellectual responsibility and attentiveness to the political and moral implications of the ways of our understanding of ourselves and others. 

The following problematical foci were presented by Donskis and represent the conceptual frame within which current exponents of civilisation analysis tend to describe civilisations as:

• consisting of social structure and symbolic organisation;

• symbolic designs (authority, power, configuration of values and ideas, etc.);

• explanatory and interpretative frameworks within which people search for concepts and frames of meaning to explain themselves and the world around them;

• world religions/great spiritual traditions;

• links bridging the realms of the secular and the sacred;

• theories dealing with world history and with the phenomena of consciousness and culture in terms of coherence;

• mentalities/histories of mentalities;

• relationships between theories and practices;

• ensembles of interrelated and complementary cultures in terms of style and common values;

• controlling principles of social/political action and of creative

He concluded by stating that much remains to be done to foster the comparative study of western and non-western concepts of civilisation, as well as a continuous civilisational dialogue of scholars. The miracle of dialogue occurs when we recognise the Other not as a threat, but as the only way to understand ourselves and the world around us.

Mr. Algis Mickunas, Professor, Department of Philosophy, Ohio University, USA, presented a provocative perspective of the concept of nomadic civilization referring to this modern trend to lifestyle as almost criminal behaviour where one moves about, in this day and age, from country to country whilst neither accepting the other’s culture not imposing his/her culture in the new environment.  The idea that discussions about dialogue among civilizations centre around the concept of globalisation is aberrant, he states, and one ought to be discussing the human being as an individual and not within the globalised context.  

Ms. Sonia Mendieta de Badaroux, Chairperson of UNESCO’s Executive Board and Ambassador and Permanent Representative of Honduras to UNESCO, Honduras, spoke about the different routes (The Silk Roads, the Slave Routes, and the Iron Roads…) that have helped to develop our collective civilizations.  The people who moved along these routes have all contributed to our civilizations.  Cultural diversity had developed at that time.  Transferring this historical example to today, one could look to the internet and the information highway as an example of a modern route for diversity.  

Mr. Tamotsu Aoki, Former President of the Japan Ethnological Society, Anthropologist, Member of the Japanese National Commission for UNESCO, Japan,  presented a paper on the foreign character of the term ‘civilization’.  For most Japanese, this term refers to ‘Western Civilization’. ‘Civilization’, for the Japanese, is defined in very secular, technical and scientific terms.  ‘Culture’, on the other hand, is a very inward, reflexive or traditional concept.  Westernization as he has defined it, should be framed in terms of modernization.  Culture is very personal whereas civilization is very materialistic.  There can be a global civilization, but not a global culture.  He posits that we should reflect on ‘glocalization’ – globalization and local cultures working together.  

Mr. El-Sayed Mohamed Yassin, Counsellor, Centre for Strategic Studies, Al Ahram, Egypt, stated that it was inappropriate to talk about the concepts of civilization without having first dealt with some of the indicators presently surrounding us.  He referred to the fact that we are currently witnessing a crisis, or paradigm shift where old paradigms are falling and new ones are being created.  Globalization is just a part of the historical process we are currently in – shifting from industrialization towards the global information society.  

Mr. Armen Darbinian, Former Prime Minister, the Republic of Armenia, stated that the objective within this workshop should be to provide a way out of the crisis has Mr Yassin was referring to.  He said that dialogue should emphasise values rather than self interests.  Post-modernity, he continued, lends itself well to this concept of dialogue based on values: pluralism, horizontal relationships and co-operation between societies, leading towards a world of dialogue, tolerance and plurality.  He said world leaders ought to defend projects that help in democracy building and regional development.  One should pay closer attention to cultural and educational reforms demonstrating these reforms in sizeable changes within national budgets.  Equal access to information technologies should be made available as well as greater infrastructure so as to ensure that all can receive these information technologies equally.  

The Moderator opened the floor to discussion.  The following salient points were raised:

• Any discussion on civilisation should not be reduced to a semantic approach to the term – one should avoid concept of the “white mans’ burden” and should not demonise other societies or cultures.  Equally, classifying humanity in arbitrary categories ought to be avoided.

• The spiritual dimension of life – its ethics – ought to be considered, this rising trend may be seen as a backlash to the materialistic trend of the past 50 years.

• There is a risk in this rise of religion today – we could consider today’s religions as sects or ‘fastfoodization’ processes which ought to be avoided.

• The forces of genetics and the advances of genome mapping are shaping the way we are now thinking of the human being – these forces could profoundly change the way we look at dialogue in the future.

• Perhaps a human being can participate in many civilisations and cultures at the same time – it is not possible to separate civilisations into isolated units – dialogue implies the ability of a person to question one’s self and situate one’s self within a civilisation or parts of several civilisations.

• We could consider cultures to be hybrids of many cultures.  We ought to avoid stereotypes of “Eastern” versus “ Western” cultures – perhaps the concept of hybridisation could be incorporated into the final Declaration.

• A definition of civilisation that was promoted was one which refers to a conscious way of understanding one’s self which involves human sensibilities and a capacity of understand our relationship with others.  Civilisations are symbolic designs in which people attempt to understand themselves.

Concrete proposals that UNESCO could consider:

• The relationship between genetics/genome-mapping and dialogue among civilizations could be explored.

• The notion of the hybridisation of cultures could be further studied.

• Provide advice to Member States concerning educational and cultural reforms where dialogue among civilizations is concerned.