The fourth World Science Forum is taking place on 5-7 November 2009. Dubbed “Budapest + 10”, it will not only mark the 10th anniversary of the World Conference on Science but will also be looking forward. It will be examining how to promote the need for science and scientific advice in political and economic decision-making, and how to communicate science and its values better to societies at large in the 21st century.

The World Conference on Science was organized by UNESCO and ICSU in Budapest in 1999. Within its Science Agenda-Framework for Action, the conference made a series of recommendations for instigating a new ‘social contract’ for science in the twenty-first century. While ten years after their adoption, the Science Agenda and the Framework for Action (WCS, Budapest 1999) remain visionary documents guiding policy makers through the world, the time has now come to take stock of what has been achieved as well as to assess the accomplishments and drawbacks of the follow-up process. Therefore, in order to assess policy changes in UNESCO Member States related to scientific research and innovation and higher education, UNESCO prepared a questionnaire to identify current challenges and define orientations for future action. The answers to this questionnaire have been analysed for presentation to two major events organized by UNESCO in 2009: the World Conference on Higher Education: the New Dynamics of Higher Education (UNESCO Paris, 6-8 July 2009) and the World Science Forum (Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Budapest, 5-7 November 2009).

The theme of the Forum in 2007 was Investing in Knowledge: Investing in the Future. A ‘Heads of State Panel’ addressed the issue of the Responsibility for Future Generations, while separate sessions focused on such topics as Science and Innovation as a Global Enterprise or Investment in Knowledge of our Environment. UNESCO and the Academy of Sciences for the Developing World organized a session on The Role of Science, Technology and Innovation in achieving the Millennium Development Goals: from Policy to Action.

Read the programme and abstracts for the World Science Forum 2009
Go to the Hungarian website for the World Science Forum
Read about the Special session on the role of Parliaments (World Science Forum 2007)
Read a brief History of the World Conference on Science and World Science Forum
Go to the website for the World Conference on Science
Read about World Science Day for Peace and Development

Read about two networks born of the World Conference on Science:
The Israeli-Palestinian Science Organization
The World Association of Young Scientists