Home / Themen / Globales Lernen / UNESCO-Dokumente / The Hamburg Declaration on Adult Learning, 1997
Proposed Draft
1. Learning throughout life is one of the keys to the twenty-first century. It is both a consequence of active citizenship and a condition for full participation in society. It is a powerful concept for fostering sustainable development, for promoting democracy, justice, and scientific and economical development, and for building a world in which violent conflict and war are replaced by dialogue and a culture of peace. Learning throughout life implies a rethinking of content and approach to education at all levels, including adult education, to open up opportunities for learning for all.
Many international conferences reaffirm that only human-centred development and a participatory society based on the full respect of human rights will lead to sustainable and equitable development. The informed and effective participation of men and women in every sphere of life is needed if humanity is to survive and to meet the challenges of the future.
2. Adult education denotes the entire body of instructional processes taking place, formal or otherwise, whereby people regarded as adults by the society to which they belong develop their abilities, enrich their knowledge, and improve their technical or professional qualifications or turn them in a new direction to meet their own needs and those of their society. Adult learning encompasses both formal and continuing education, and the spectrum of non formal learning available in a learning society.
3. Though the content of adult learning, and of education for children and adolescents will vary according to the economic, social and cultural contexts, and the needs of the people in the societies in which they take place, both are necessary elements of a new vision of education where learning becomes truly lifelong and lifewide. The perspective of learning throughout life commands such complementarity and continuity. The potential contribution of adult and continuing education to the creation of informed citizenry, economic and social development, eradication of illiteracy and alleviation of poverty is enormous and should, therefore, be capitalized upon.
4. The objectives of adult and continuing education are to develop the autonomy and the sense of responsibility of people, to reinforce the capacity of adults to deal with the transformations taking place in the economy, in culture and in society as a whole, and to promote an informed and creative participation of citizens in their community, in short to enable people to take control of their destiny and society to face the challenges ahead. It is essential that approaches for adult learning be based on adults' prior experiences and that the diverse ways in which they are implemented facilitate and stimulate the learners' active involvement and expression.
5. It is with these convictions foremost in mind that we, the representatives of governments and organizations participating in the Fifth International Conference on Adult Education, have decided together to explore the potential and the future of adult learning, broadly and dynamically conceived within a framework of lifelong learning
The growing role and potential of adult learning
6. During this decade, adult learning has undergone substantial transformations and experienced enormous growth in scope and scale. In the knowledge-based societies that are emerging around the world, adult and continuing education have become an imperative in the community and at the workplace. New demands from society and working life raise expectations requiring each and every individual to continue renewing knowledge and skills throughout the whole of his or her life. At the heart of this transformation is a new role for the state and the emergence of expanded partnerships devoted to adult learning within the civil society. The state remains essential in ensuring the right to education, particularly for the most vulnerable, and in providing an overall policy framework. Within the new partnership emerging between the public, the private and the community sectors, the role of the state is shifting. It is not only a provider of adult education services but also an adviser, a funder and a monitoring agency. Governments and social partners must take the necessary measures to allow individuals to express their educational needs and aspirations, and to have access to educational opportunities throughout their life. Within governments, adult education is not confined to ministries of education; all ministries are engaged in promoting adult learning, and interministerial co-operation is essential. Moreover, employers, unions, and non-governmental and community organizations are involved and have a responsibility to interact and create opportunities to lifelong learning for all adults.
7. Adult learning means people, individually and collectively, realizing their potential. It is not only a right, it is also a duty and a responsibility both to others and to society as a whole. The challenges of the twenty-first century cannot be met by governments, organizations or institutions alone; the energy, imagination and genius of people and their full, free and vigorous participation in every aspect of life are also needed. Adult learning is the means to increase significantly creativity and productivity, in the widest sense of the terms, and in doing so, to escape from the cul-de-sac of much conventional development thinking. It is for this reason that education of, by and for every adult woman and man is an indispensable condition for meeting the complex and interrelated problems of a world beset by accelerating change, and growing complexity and risk.
8. The new concept of adult education presents a challenge for existing practices because it calls for effective networking within the formal and non-formal systems, and for innovation and more creativity and flexibility. Such challenges should be met by new approaches to adult education within the concept of learning throughout life. The ultimate goal should be the creation of a learning society.
Key issues
9. Adult Literacy. Literacy, conceived broadly as basic knowledge and skills needed by all in a rapidly changing world, is a basic human right. In every society, literacy is a necessary skill in itself and the foundation of other life skills. There are millions, the majority of whom are women, who lack opportunities to learn or who have insufficient skills to be able to assert this right. The challenge is to enable them to do so. Literacy is also a catalyst for participation in social, cultural, political and economic activities, and for learning throughout life. We therefore commit ourselves to ensuring opportunities for all to acquire and maintain literacy skills, and to create, in all Member States, cultures of literacy and learning. The provision of learning opportunities for all, including the unreached and the excluded, is the most urgent concern.
10. The recognition of the Right to Education and the Right to Learn throughout life is more than ever a necessity, it is the right to read and write, to question and analyse, to have access to certain resources, and to develop individual skills and collective competence.
11. Women's empowerment. Adult learning policies should give priority to expanding educational opportunities for women and eliminating prejudices and stereotypes that both limit their access to adult education and restrict the benefits they derive from participating in it. Women have a right to equal opportunities; society, in turn, depends on their full contribution in all fields of work and aspects of life.
12. Culture of peace. One of the foremost challenges of our age is that of constructing a culture of peace and tolerance within which dialogue and negotiation will replace violence, in homes and communities, within nations and between countries.
13. Diversity and equality. Adult learning must reflect the richness of cultural diversity and respect traditional and indigenous knowledge and systems of learning; the right to learn in the mother tongue, where possible, should be respected and implemented. In turn, intercultural education should encourage learning between and about different cultures in support of peace, democracy, justice and liberty.
14. The transformation of the formal and the informal and social economy. Globalization, necessary changes in production, rising unemployment and the difficulties to secure livelihoods call for more active labour policies and increased investment in developing the necessary abilities of men and women for employment and income generating activities.
15. Access to information. Adult learning approaches should be the means through which communication on all matters of importance to the individual and society such as health, especially reproductive health and environment, can become interactive, providing people with the space and the means to participate and to take appropriate decisions regarding their lives.
An appeal for action
16. We must act with the utmost urgency to increase public, private and community investment in adult learning, the key to unlocking the potential and creativity of people, and thereby transforming global realities. Economic and social development demand it. The Agenda for the Future which we have adopted here is a plan of action to achieve this end.
17. We, gathered together in Hamburg, convinced of the necessity of adult learning, pledge that all adults will have the opportunity to learn throughout their lives. To that end, we will forge extended alliances to mobilize and share resources in order to make adult learning a joy, a tool, a right and a shared responsibility;
18. We call upon UNESCO as the United Nations lead agency in the field of education to play the leading role in promoting adult education as an integral part of a system of learning throughout life and to mobilize the support of all partners, particularly those within the United Nations system, to give priority to implementing the Agenda for the Future and to facilitating provision of services needed for reinforcing international co-ordination and co-operation.
I The term "adult learning" used in the English version has to be translated differently in the other languages to take into consideration the expression used in the different linguistic communities.
Unesco 1997