[WSIS CS-Plenary] UNESCO AGREEMENT SHOWS POLITICAL COSTS

[DeeDee Halleck]

-----Original Message-----
From: Sanjoy Mahajan [mailto:sanjoy at mrao.cam.ac.uk] 
Sent: Thursday, October 20, 2005 11:04 PM
To: sanjoy at mrao.cam.ac.uk
Subject: [sm] UNESCO agreement to protect local cultures

The political costs to the US government of invading Iraq accumulate in
small and large ways.

City and national governments worldwide are slowly switching to the
free-software GNU/Linux operating system rather than pay tribute to
Microsoft.  Some of that shift is due to Microsoft's licensing fees,
some of it to free software improving, but some is due to growing
distrust of US power.

Also partly thanks to the Iraq war, American culture -- as seen in
pro-war political conventions, "Freedom Fries", violent movies, people
starving in New Orleans -- is held in low esteem worldwide.  So a large
majority of UNESCO, with only the US and Israel opposed, has approved
the "Convention on the Protection and Promotion of the Diversity of
Cultural Expressions."  Even Britain supported it.  The Independent
article highlights this extreme isolation in its first sentence:

  Not for the first time, the United States has found itself in almost
  total isolation in an international body...

Shades of the UNESCO battles of the 1970's and 1980's over global
information flows, perhaps not coincidentally after worldwide revulsion
towards the Vietnam war.

The US government of course is shedding crocodile tears because:

  repressive regimes could use it to justify "measures that would
  interfere with human rights and fundamental freedoms".

Meaning the human right to consume rubbish from Hollywood and lies from
CNN.

I'll be interested to see how, and whether, this vote is reported by the
US 'culture' industry.

-Sanjoy

`A society of sheep must in time beget a government of wolves.'
   - Bertrand de Jouvenal


http://news.independent.co.uk/europe/article321124.ece

Hollywood the loser as global culture plan backed

Independent (London)
21 October 2005

Not for the first time, the United States has found itself in almost
total isolation in an international body, as the rest of the world
adopts a convention which supporters say could help stop the
"steamroller" of Hollywood globalisation.

The "Convention on the Protection and Promotion of the Diversity of
Cultural Expressions" was approved in Paris yesterday by an
overwhelming majority of 191 member countries of the UN Educational,
Scientific and Cultural Organisation (Unesco). Only Israel joined the
US in opposing the text.

Britain - the current president of the European Union - voted in
favour of the 40-page document. The British ambassador to Unesco,
Timothy Craddock, described it as "clear, carefully balanced, and
consistent with the principles of international law and fundamental
human rights."

But the US ambassador, Louise Oliver, said the convention, adopted
during the UN cultural organisation's general conference which is held
every two years, was "deeply flawed". According to Washington - which
only rejoined Unesco two years ago after a 19-year boycott - it is a
charter for unscrupulous governments to erect trade barriers, suppress
minority cultures and block the free flow of information.

Vigorously backed by France, which tends to lead the world in cultural
protection, the convention authorises nations to take "regulatory
measures" to promote diversity. Under Article 8 they may identify
"situations where cultural expressions ... are at risk of extinction
and may take all "appropriate measures" to preserve them.

Arguments are certain to rage for years over the text's judicial
scope, but the French for one are confident it is an important marker
which will help it keep cinema, publishing and music out of the next
round of talks at the World Trade Organisation. The convention
enshrines the French policy of subsidising the arts and imposing
quotas on American films and music.

Indeed, the Paris press could hardly contain its glee at America's
isolation in the 60-year-old assembly, which was set up after the
Second World War to promote peace via the interchange of ideas.

"The incredible mobilisation of member states of Unesco ... will stay
in the memory as a rare moment," gushed Le Monde. "They have
reaffirmed loud and clear that culture is not a merchandise like
others. They have called on the creators of tomorrow ... to rise up
against the dominant culture and block the American steamroller."

Opponents of the US believe it is motivated by the sole urge to impose
Steven Spielberg and Mariah Carey on the world and strangle at birth
any alternative foreign film or music industry.

The Americans have been careful to base their opposition to the
convention on higher arguments. They have been helped by a text which
- with its use of terms like "interculturality" - lays itself open to
charges of ambiguous banality. According to the US State Department,
the convention could be wilfully misinterpreted to put up all sorts of
trade barriers - only this week France officially designated foie gras
as a "cultural item" - while repressive regimes could use it to
justify "measures that would interfere with human rights and
fundamental freedoms".


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