Source: Notes, Second Series, Vol. 5, No. 2 (Mar., 1948), pp. 165-168 Published by: Music Library Association Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/891431 Accessed: 11/11/2010 17:45 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use, available at http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp. JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use provides, in part, that unless you have obtained prior permission, you may not download an entire issue of a journal or multiple copies of articles, and you may use content in the JSTOR archive only for your personal, non-commercial use. Please contact the publisher regarding any further use of this work. Publisher contact information may be obtained at http://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=mulias. Each copy of any part of a JSTOR transmission must contain the same copyright notice that appears on the screen or printed page of such transmission. JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org. Music Library Association is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Notes. http://www.jstor.org UNESCO, FEBRUARY 1948 by CHARLES SEEGER "Since wars begin in the minds of men, it is in the minds of men that the defenses of peace must be constructed."-Preamble to Constitution of United Nations Education, Scientific and Cultural Organization. When the United Nations Organization was set up in San Francisco, provision was made for a number of dependent agencies. Upon the high- est level were the General Assembly, the International Court of Justice and the Security Council. Upon a second level were the Secretariat, the Trus- teeship Council and the Economic and Social Council. Dependent upon the last mentioned, though with no definitely established relationship, were a number of special agencies having to do with Human Rights, Health, Food and Agriculture, Labor, Statistics, Finance, etc., and a United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). There was general agreement that such a body should be authorized. But the name (which had quite a bit to do with the function and was suggested by the British Delegation) gave pause upon two grounds. First, considerable doubt existed as to inclusion of the word "education" in the title. United States Delegate Vandenberg, among others, feared it smacked too much of propaganda. United States educators relayed the news back home and such a flood of telegrams came in that the Delegation yielded. A second trouble was what to call the "and-so-forth" interests, not strictly scientific or educational, that were involved-libraries, museums, fine arts, letters, humanities, theatre, dance, folklore, radio, cinema, press. The blanket term "cultural" was adopted, following practice in most foreign offices and many other organs of governments, and on November 16, 1945, repre- sentatives of 43 of the 55 Member States of United Nations signed in London the Final Act of the Conference for the establishment of UNESCO. By September 1, 1947 there were 32 members, among them the United States. Unofficially, it was said on February 1, 1948, 41 nations had joined. From the beginning, the promise of a union of intellectual rationale and political common-sense that gave birth to the Organization has proven an inspiration to all who have worked in UNESCO or watched its growing pains. The difficulties of making the union work in day-to-day practice have proven enormous. Some of them, uppermost in the minds of those most concerned with the program, have been the supposition that peace can be taken by storm, the spreading of too little over too much and the pressure of special interests. These are largely political difficulties. But there are technical difficulties; not so easily identified. So rapid has been the development of intellectual progress in modern times that a lag of portentous size has grown between it and the progress of political thinking and action. The naivete of the intellectual in minimizing this lag is as 165 full of danger to UNESCO as is the ignorance of the average politician or "man-in-the-street" in magnifying it. The Conference in London wrote a magnificent Preamble to a very practical Constitution' and set up a Preparatory Commission to function ad interim to plan for the First General Conference in Paris, November to December, 1946, while acceptance by the minimum 20 governments re- quired to make it a going concern should be received. The organs of UNESCO are: (1) the General Conference, (2) Execu- tive Board, and (3) Secretariat. Membership is limited to members of United Nations in good standing, but may be open to non-members of that body elected by a two-thirds majority vote of the General Conference. Each Member State has one vote in the General Conference which meets once a year. Each year it elects a President of the Conference for that year and six new members of the Executive Board to three-year terms. The Executive Board elects the Director-General of the Secretariat. Each Mem- ber State is urged, but not required, to form a "national cooperating body" or commission to secure mass participation of citizens within the Member State. Six, among them the United States, had done this by September 1, 1947. The Secretary of the U. S. National Commission is Charles A. Thomson of the Department of State, Washington, D. C. Representation of music upon the Commission is by the National Music Council, through its President, Howard Hanson. There are several representatives for Library and Education, through whose fields music is well served. The American Library Association is represented by Ralph A. Ulveling, the National Education Association by William G. Carr and the American Council on Education by George F. Zook. Musicology has a friend in Waldo G. Leland of the American Council of Learned Societies. Relations with United Nations are provided for under Articles 57 and 63 of the Charter of the United Nations, and legal status in Articles 104-105 of that document.2 UNESCO may enter into relations with other inter- national organizations. But national organizations are supposed to deal with UNESCO through their respective Governments. The Constitution, we have said, looks good and seems to work smoothly. After considerable shifting around, which was to be expected in any new agency, there seem to have developed six main headings under which activity is carried on: (1) Reconstruction, (2) Communications, (3) Education, (4) Cultural interchange, (5) Human and Social Sciences, (6) Natural Sciences. Administratively, there are besides the offices of the Director-General, Deputy Director-General and Assistant Director-General, three bureaus (Budget, Comptroller and Personnel) and 15 Sections. Music falls under the Section of Arts and Letters and is budgeted under (4) Cultural Interchange. Musicology falls into the Section of Philosophy The Defenses of Peace. Washington, U. S. Department of State, Pub. No. 2457, Part I, p. 13-22.
Charter of the United Nations. Washington, Department of State, Pub. No. 2363. 166 and Humanities. Music Education will be taken care of by the Arts and Letters Section in cooperation with the Section of Education in a project calling for three consultants and a meeting of experts. A sum of $8,750 is allocated for that purpose. Music Library might claim to be divided between the Library Section and that of Arts and Letters. But in this latter there is a project "in collaboration with experts and institutions concerned with music, to prepare a catalog of world music, listing music which is already available in recorded form and music which should be recorded to supplement existing materials; provided that the Director- General should seek sponsors to bear the cost of publication, which should not be borne by UNESCO." A sum of approximately $8,000 was allocated to this project. Musicians, music librarians and music administrators will be interested in several dozen projects listed under Mass Communication (headings of Audio-visual aids and Telecommunication), but more particularly under Libraries, where there are 15 projects involving preparation and guidance of librarians, a multilingual dictionary of librarianship, creation of union catalogs, standardization of classificatory systems, bibliography, archive development, etc. Music and books about music might be concerned in the general sections Books, Publications, Journals, and Copyright. An im- portant liaison for music activity is found in the project "Fundamental Education" in which a regional conference has already been announced by the Pan American Union in cooperation with UNESCO. Others are in Reconstruction, Exchange of Persons, and Education in International Un- derstanding. Luiz Heitor Correa de Azevedo, distinguished Brazilian music historian and folklorist, who will be in charge of Music Affairs in the Section of Arts and Letters during 1948 (with one assistant), will have his hands full. Perhaps the action most significant to musicians was the resolution, adopted in Mexico upon motion of Helen White of the United States Dele- gation, instructing the Director-General "to make preliminary enquiries for the establishment of an International Music Institute and prepare pro- posals for furthering such a project for submission to the Third Session of the Conference in 1948." A large number of such institutes, councils and commissions already exist in special fields, among them an Interna- tional Theatre Institute, an International Commission on Folk Arts and Folklore, an International Federation of Library Associations, an Interna- tional Commission of Museums, etc. There is no reason to believe that a music institute or council cannot take its place among them. The picture, then, of UNESCO-an inter-government agency, dealing only with governments and other international organizations-surrounded by a planetary family of autonomous specialized organizations with which it can deal, but which are controlled and directed by private initiative, makes considerable sense. UNESCO has sufficient funds to aid many of 167 them in getting born and to nurse them through infancy, and so can do much to integrate the whole group. Such a set-up would mean that indi- viduals and organizations in any country would have two channels in which to throw their efforts toward international cooperation-one indi- rect, through their own government, another direct, through the interna- tional institute of their field. Two words of caution should be given to people with such intentions. First, in working via government or intergovernment, patience, ingenuity and, especially, watchfulness along the "production line" are necessary if concrete results are expected. In the United States the steps seem to be, roughly, as follows: 1. proposal to the Secretary or to a Member of the U. S. National Commission; 2. proposal and adoption in section meeting of Commission; 3. placing on agenda of General Meeting of Commission; 4. support upon the floor of the General Meeting of Commission; 5. inclusion by drafting committee of Commission; 6. approval by Department of State; 7. forwarding to U. S. Delegation to General Conference of UNESCO; 8. presentation at General Conference and assignment to committee; 9. support in committee; 10. support in programme committee; 11. support in budget committee; 12. support by Director-General in actual operation of Secretariat; 13. support by office or offices concerned in Secretariat. A project can be completely transformed or lost at any step of the pro- cedure and, so, needs chaperonage every inch of the way. It is possible to cut red-tape--that is, to short-cut official procedures. There are a myriad ways of doing this. And it is done daily in all deliberative and executive offices. But it takes know-how. The second word of caution is of more basic concern. It is: to remem- ber always that the three jewels in the crown of UNESCO-education, science and "culture" (which is to say, the arts and the humanities)- are not only hopes for peace. They are equally essentials for war. No nation backward in any one of the three can hope to fight a modern war- much less, to win it. There is much talk nowadays of the beneficent ef- fects of interchange of products and producers in these fields of human endeavour. Interchange is supposed to induce international understanding. And international understanding to induce peace. Nothing could be more false! The worst wars in modern times (it cannot be said too often) have been fought between nations that have been "interchanging" and "under- standing" for centuries. And civil wars, where there has been no need for either because education, science and culture have been held in com- mon, have been just as bad. If the words are anything but sematic illu- sions, it is UNESCO's task first to show how education, science, the arts and the humanities can be used specifically for peace and against war. Then, to go ahead and use them-specifically. All men of good will must wish them luck. 168