Dialogue is essential for developing a better understanding of not only others, but also ourselves. In recent times the teaching of philosophy in almost all regions of the world has included core components with a predominance of Western philosophers. This relates to the predominance of published works in European languages, and to the higher output of postgraduate degrees in philosophy in North America and Europe, in the past two centuries.

In order to strengthen local, regional and global awareness of the rich philosophical traditions of many regions of the world, UNESCO Social and Human Science Sector's program in philosophy has launched programmes on inter-regional philosophical dialogues in 2004.

The most recent conference was held 14-17 May 2010 in Port Dickson in Malaysia, as the Interregional Asia-Arab Philosophical Dialogue Conference: Culture of Peace and Human Dignity. The conference agenda and abstracts are available. The proceedings will be published.

In 2010 two books have been published which are available here as ebooks:

Darryl R.J.Macer and Souria Saad-Zoy (Editors). 2010. Asian-Arab Philosophical Dialogues on War and Peace. Bangkok, Regional Unit for Social and Human Sciences in Asia and the Pacific (RUSHSAP), UNESCO Bangkok. v + 119 p. ISBN 978-92-9223-316-7 (Electronic version, pdf file).

Darryl R.J. Macer and Souria Saad-Zoy (Editors). 2010. Asian-Arab Philosophical Dialogues on Globalization, Democracy and Human Rights. Bangkok, Regional Unit for Social and Human Sciences in Asia and the Pacific (RUSHSAP), UNESCO Bangkok. v + 119 p. ISBN 978-92-9223-314-3 (Electronic version, pdf file).

The reports of the 2004 (Inter-Regional Philosophical Dialogues: Asia and the Arab World; 16-17 November 2004; UNESCO Headquarters, Paris) and 2005 (Inter-Regional Philosophical Dialogues: Democracy and Social Justice in Asia and the Arab World; 28-29 November 2005; Seoul, Republic of Korea) dialogues are available to download as pdf files. The report from the conference, Asia-Arab Inter-regional Philosophical Dialogues: Encounters of Asia and the Arab Regions with Modernity, held on 15-18 November 2006, in Rabat, Morocco, is available(English, French) with summary reports also from each of the three working groups below. 

Working group meetings were also held in Seoul, Korea at the time of the World Congress of Philosophy (30 July – 5 August 2008) and a meeting in Hiroshima, Japan (25-27 July 2008). 

At present we have five working groups in the project, and reports of the 2006 and 2008 sessions can be downloaded here. You can find more information that is updated on the individual webpages:
1) Challenges of globalization to philosophy and democracy (2006 English; 2006 Arabic, 2008 English)
2) Philosophy facing the challenges of modern technology (2006 English, 2008 English)
3) The roles of philosophy in war and peace (2006 English, 2008 English)
4) Human dignity and philosophy

5) Environmental ethics and philosophy

The War and Peace working group and 2008 conferences also has issued statements on A Proposal for a Declaration on Perpectual Peace (here) and Depleted Uranium (here).

We hope to publish further volumes of papers that will be useful resources for philosophy teaching on these topics, and to include papers from individual philosophers as well as papers the result of dialogue between members of the groups.  These dialogues are expected to continue for some years in order to add the richness of traditions found in many civilizations to the mainstream of philosophical tradition.

In 2009 two major meetings took place:

High level Conference on Teaching of Philosophy in Asia and the Pacific,
25-26 May, Manila, Philippines

Draft Regional Action Plan on Philosophy teaching (Draft 5 - pdf file)

UNESCO Asia-Arab Inter-regional Philosophical Dialogues,
28-30 May, Bangkok, Thailand

Meeting Abstract book (pdf file)  Participant list (pdf file)

We are also open to suggestions of cooperation with other networks, and hosts to hold meetings of working groups. We also hope to use modern communication technology to enable dialogue.

More information on the principles of Dialogue, Working groups and objectives is available here.


There is a yahoo listserve: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/AsiaArabPhilosophicalDialogues

Inquiries to rushsap[at]unescobkk.org

Page updated: 3 June 2010.