Tolerance - indispensable requirement for global security.

• Author: Mayor Zaragoza, Frederico
• Position: UNESCO projects promote global tolerance - Includes information on Year for Tolerance events

Fifty years after signatories of the United Nations Charter resolved "to practice tolerance and live together in peace with one another as good neighbours", the international community is witnessing a dangerous escalation of tolerance and violence in every region of the world. This includes flagrant acts of xenophobia, aggressive nationalism, racism and anti-Semitism, as well as violence and discrimination against ethnic, religious and linguistic minorities, refugees, migrants and other vulnerable groups, and individuals simply exercising their freedom of thought and expression. Wars of conquest between States are giving way to wars of intolerance within States, in a rush to find scapegoats for social ills in contexts of ideological and societal disintegration.

Today's ugly hatreds often come walking arm in arm with familiar demons from the past: historical grudges and rivalries, sinister myths of ethnic or cultural purity or superiority, religious fanaticisms, fears grounded in ignorance, and the appetite for domination. What begins as prejudice ends as armed conflict, or perhaps never ends at all. In the worst cases, it leads to the unqualifiable abomination of genocide or its near equivalent.

Tolerance-whether we speak of it as a moral virtue, as a political obligation or as an indispensable requirement for global security-has become essential for our very survival. For the human family is one and many. Diversity is of our essence, and human communities live by a delicate network of interdependence as fragile as any ecosystem.

Tolerance is the responsibility that upholds human rights and democracy. It enables us to live together in peace with our differences, holding to our convictions while accepting that others adhere to theirs.

Perhaps the most potent threat to tolerance is social and economic inequality, extreme poverty and social exclusion. Even discrimination based on race, ethnic origin and gender often finds its source in these social injustices. That is why UNESCO, particularly in follow-up to the World Summit for Social Development (Copenhagen, March 1995), has set its sights on building social integration through full implementation of civil and political, economic and social, individual and collective rights.

Regional meetings in the framework of the International Year for Tolerance, proclaimed by the General Assembly for observance in 1995, have yielded important political commitments in such countries as Brazil, India...