Page 150 - CULTURE IN THE COMMUNICATION AGE

SUPERCULTURE FOR THE COMMUNIC ATION AG E

Figure 7.1 The superculture

Universal values
‘We may have different religions, different languages, different colored
skins, but we all belong to one human race. We all share the same basic
values’.
Kofi Annan, General Secretary of the United Nations (Annan 1998)

Annan’s claim that we all share the same basic values can easily be criticized,
but that obvious gesture would obscure an important point: discursively the
notion of universal values has considerable currency. Universalist discourses
represent the first cultural sphere to be considered here in our brief presentation
of the superculture.
The very idea of universal values was codified in the Universal Declaration
of Human Rights adopted by the UN General Assembly in 1948. That docu-
ment speaks of the ‘equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human
family’ and prescribes ‘a common standard of achievement for all peoples and
all nations’ (Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human
Rights 2000: 1). The Declaration contains thirty articles. Among the ‘universal’
assumptions and rights prescribed by the United Nations relevant to this
cultural analysis are the following:

• All human beings are born free and equal (Article 1).
• Everyone has the right to life, liberty, and security of the person (Article 3).
• No slavery (Article 4), torture, inhuman, or degrading treatment (Article 5).

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