Fr Roy Sebastian, SJ
The Nepal Jesuit Social Institute (NJSI), a Canadian Jesuits International partner, underscored the importance of education as a human right, and as a path to dignity and empowerment during the 2024 World Social Forum (WSF) held in Kathmandu February 15 to 19.
“Students are not to be treated as puppets programmed to behave according to anybody’s interests, they are evolving conscious beings,” said Fr. Roy Sebastian, SJ, Director of NJSI. Children have the right to develop their own consciousness and should have the opportunity to discover their relationship with other human beings, with nature and the Divine, he added.
Fr. Sebastian spoke during a panel discussion organized by NJSI and Fe y Alegría Nepal on the theme, Right to Education is Right to Truth, at Ratna Rajya Campus on February 17.
A “conducive and open environment” for students to discover the truth “is a fundamental right in opposition to limitations set by the narrow, often one-side worldview of the fundamentalism of one particular culture, religion, politics, or business,” he said.
Critical thinking among students must be developed even from primary education, he added. “The sustainability of humanity depends on the formation of the minds of human beings whose decisions and actions have a participatory role in designing the future.”
The NJSI- Fe y Alegría presentation was one of about 400 programs, workshops and other events featured at the WSF, which adopted the theme “Another World is Possible.” An estimated 50,000 participants attended – in person and virtually – from more than 1,400 organizations representing 98 countries, and discussed economic inequality, climate justice, gender equality, peace, migration, democracy, authoritarianism, human rights, Indigenous rights, and the right to information, among others.
A WSF statement noted that the world is facing “an unprecedented environmental crisis coupled with rising inequality, widespread food insecurities, majoritarian violence, the aftereffects of the last pandemic and the threat of a future one, and escalating tensions [among] major powers.”
The world has “transformed significantly as globalization, formerly championed by the West, gives way to trade conflicts and military confrontations,” it noted. “Corporate power, short-term state interests and right-wing majoritarian forces are employing all means possible to undermine democratic participation and the well-being of our societies and the globe at large.”
The WSF was launched in 2001 as an alternative to the World Economic Forum, which gathers world leaders and powerbrokers annually in Davos, Switzerland. The WSF offers a space for diverse social movements, trade unions, academia, youth organizations and other groups to gather and collaborate on social justice issues.
The WSF ended with a solidarity march attended by thousands in downtown Kathmandu, and with 60 declarations pledging action to create a just world.
