Topic: Václav Havel´s Opening Remarks

Václav Havel´s Opening Remarks

Jacques Rupnik
Ladies and gentlemen, excellencies, and dear friends, welcome to Prague to the 11th meeting of the Forum 2000, which this year has as its main theme Freedom and Responsibility.

President Václav Havel, who started this tradition, will perhaps tell us what the Forum 2000 is. I find it easier, after a decade, to say what the Forum 2000 is not. It is not yet another conference about globalization of which there are many; it is not an institution with an interest in self-perpetuation; it is not a think tank or an advocacy group with a clear agenda. Its main agenda is to facilitate dialogue on major issues raised by the process of globalization from a longterm perspective. It brings together participants ranging from government officials to civil society leaders, from intellectuals to businessmen, from heads of governments to religious leaders; or, to use a phrase of one of our panelists, from the representatives of the mighty and of the almighty. Perhaps the main reason why the Forum remains such a unique gathering is that because under the influence of its founding father it has resisted two prevailing approaches to globalization and its discontents. And that was what I would call the economic optimists and the cultural pessimists. The approach of the economic optimists assume that the globalization of markets would necessarily bring with it greater communication, greater freedoms and global governments and, why not, a global civil society. Well, Forum 2000, from its inception, pointed to some of the limits of such a linear view of globalization and today we see that some of it has indeed happened, particularly here in Central Europe. But we also see the rise of authoritarian capitalism in Russia, China and other places.

The Forum has also resisted the opposite approach, that of the cultural pessimists, and it continued even, and I would say especially, after 9/11 to seek a dialogue between different civilizations and the search for a common moral minimum, as Václav Havel put it, which different cultures and religions could agree upon. And the third reason we are here and returning for the 11th meeting is that the Forum has remained relevant because of its prime concern with the issues of freedom and human rights. Do we share a common understanding of these words and, no less importantly, do we agree on the relationship between ends and means in trying to address them?

Prague, of course, is a unique place to attempt to do this. Thirty years ago, in this town, the Charter 77 human rights movement challenged the status quo in the conditions of “unfreedom” but with a sense of responsibility and destiny as Václav Havel then put it. We are still confronted with that predicament in other parts of the world today. Thirty years ago in connection with Prague and Charter 77 we used to discuss the fate of freedom and human rights in a divided continent, in a divided world. Today, we are here to reflect on the conditions of freedom and responsibility in a globalized world. No one, through his personal itinerary, is better qualified to introduce the subject than our host today.

Ladies and gentlemen, it is a great pleasure and an honour to give the floor to President Václav Havel.

Václav Havel
Ladies and gentlemen, dear friends, I take the liberty to most cordially welcome you here, and to express my great pleasure that so many of you have come—from close and from faraway countries, and also from this country. As you all know, this conference is already the eleventh in succession. The original plan was to hold just one conference, but life has decided differently; since 1997, the conferences have been held every year. These eleven years already reflect a piece of our recent history.

Those of you who attended the conference a few years ago certainly remember that this Forum was the only conference held immediately after the events of 11th of September. It was not cancelled as many others were. President Clinton was present here at the conference and he had a very interesting and lively speech which reacted to the situation at that time. Everything that is said here is important but what is also important is what occurs in the corridors: new friendships are formed, various ideas are born. It is a kind of ideological and intellectual crossroads for people of various professions hailing from different countries including former or future politicians who speak together; they talk about ways of preventing the conflict of civilizations, how to face environmental threats. This year’s theme is Freedom and Responsibility and I believe that we will hear many interesting thoughts and I believe that we will hear a lot about the real sources of responsibility. Of course, nobody needs to adhere strictly to this theme. This has never been the case of these forums.

One of the traditions of this forum is that each and every one brings with him or her themes which are of concern to him or her, themes which they think should be confronted with the opinion of others. In conclusion, I would like to remind you that yesterday it was a year since the murder of Mrs. Anna Politkovskaya. If she were alive she would probably be with us here today. So I think we should remember that today. We should also think about the broader context of this tragic event. And also, I would like to mention Burma. I am happy that our public recognizes this faraway country, that it is interested in this country and that the fate of human dignity, of human liberties in Burma is of much concern to our public. Mrs. Aung Sun Suu Kyi is a heroine also here in our own environment. We will offer a petition during the Forum. Those of you who want will be able to sign it. It is an appeal to the Burmese government and also an appeal to the international community. We hear that in Burma there is calm now, that stability has been restored. Those of us who have lived in communist countries know very well that calm may mean the calm of a cemetery. We must not therefore allow ourselves to lose our interest due to the fact that stability in that country is being sort of emphasized. It is a stability paid for by enormous fear, by an enormous amount of cruelty. So this was just a short remark and I hope I will be able to be an attentive listener to all the interesting things that we will hear here today and tomorrow.

Jacques Rupnik
Thank you very much, Mr. President, for your introduction and it is a pleasure now for me to pass on moderation of this morning session, which will be devoted to freedom and responsibility in politics, to Kim Campbell, the former Prime Minister of Canada.