With the slogan “What unites us towards the Universal Human Nation”, the 5th European Humanist Forum will take place on the 11th, 12th and 13th of May in Madrid. The opening session will take place in the Education Science Faculty of Spain’s Distance Education University and on Saturday and Sunday, events will take place at the El Pozo Cultural Centre.
In the Manifesto that explains the meaning of the event, the organisers give a clear framing: “We are at a crossroads in which the beliefs of the past and the images of the futures have collided, with both trying to impose themselves on the other. In a few decades the world has become planetary, creating unprecedented intercommunication between peoples and cultures, and an inter-penetration of their traditions, beliefs, values, their ways of life and conceptions of the world. Simultaneously, technological advances are creating an opening towards new horizons and are awakening aspirations that were dormant but are now pushing human beings to want to go beyond what we already know, beyond the allowable limits of space and time.”
Highlighting the manifestation of a new sensibility which is growing in younger generations, the aforementioned manifesto continues: “A new sensibility is starting to appear strongly; the sensibility of humanity with a heightened vision in which some signs can be seen that are worthwhile investigating and go deeper into, namely; that human life is the central value in society while the environment and other species must be protected; that all human beings must have the same opportunities; that no one can be discriminated against; and that everyone has the right to discover their existential dimension and legitimately ask themselves about the meaning of their lives.”
To start to go deeper in these subjects, this 5th edition of the European Humanist Forum will open with a panel on “The role of Europe in uniting its peoples and building bridges to others” to which different specialists will give a response to this challenge from the respective fields and areas of activity. Among others will participate Carlos Umaña, ICAN coordinator for Latin America (2017 Nobel Peace Prize winner for the work on the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons); Sabine Rubin member of the French National Assembly for France Insoumise; Riccardo Petrella, economist and specialist in matters of poverty and water as a common good; Clara Gómez-Plácito, anthropologist and activist; Piero Giorgi, neuroscientist and peace researcher; Mayte Quintanilla, activist in the field of Universal Basic Income; and Guillermo Sullings, economist and author of the book “At the Crossroads of Humanity’s Future: The steps towards the Universal Human Nation.”
Over the course of the 12th and 13th, there will different working areas, panels, chats, documentaries and artistic presentations, on subjects as diverse as disarmament, human rights, social ecology, politics, spirituality, technology, new economics, active nonviolence, the strength of the feminine, the psychosocial background, art, social mysticism, journalism, social movements and cultural convergence, among others.
This forum follows on the back of those that took place in Moscow (1993), Budapest (2004), Lisbon (2006) and Milan (2008) in Europe and others that took place in Mexico (1994), Santiago (1995), Quito (2006) and La Paz (2007).
We aspire to enrichen ourselves with different regards, seeking to find what unites us in order to build new realities. We invite you to register here.
Registration is free and the voluntary donations that we receive will be used to cover the minimum expenses that we incur. All those involved in the realisation of this forum are doing so as volunteers.
Press contact: Tony Robinson press@humanistforum.org +447958254938
