The First International Congress on Cultural Rights : the Dialogue on Cultural Rights and Human Development , was held between 24 and 27 August, 2004 in Barcelona, within the framework of the Universal Forum of Cultures 2004. The Dialogue was co-organised by the Interarts Foundation, the Spanish Agency for International Cooperation (AECI), UNESCO and the Universal Forum of Cultures. The event counted with the collaboration of the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights and the Office of the United Nations Human Development Report. During the Dialogue, more than 80 invited speakers from more than 40 countries and over 700 participants took part in different sessions.

For the Interarts Foundation hosting this Dialogue was a great satisfaction. At the same time it meant a great achievement after many years of work initiated by Eduard Delgado. This work aims at indicating that cultural rights and the role of culture in development are essential in today's world. The results of the Dialogue were important as the conference managed to foster international exchange within cultural field and attracted many different participants including a strong representation of the civil society. During the Dialogue it was stated that the civil society needs to make its voice heard and to mobilise itself around cultural values in order to promote a better understanding of cultural rights and the role of culture in development. There was a consensus that this should be a shared responsibility that takes into account local development necessities.

Since its founding in 1995, one of the objectives of the Interarts Foundation has been to become a platform for encounter, exchange and research, and to raise awareness. The results of the dialogue have shown that it was important to hold this dialogue; the first international congress on cultural rights and human development. In the development field not everyone understands the importance of culture. Culture has always been the poor relative in the development budgets, and the results of the dialogue indicated the enormous necessities that there are to be answered in order to make culture the base for development. This responsibility belongs to all of us.

The Dialogue formed a natural continuity of the work that the Interarts Foundation has been carrying out during many years in the field of cultural rights and indicators. Eduard Delgado, the founder of Interarts, was a master of innovative ideas and networking. The role of culture and its importance to the well-being of people, and the protection of culture and cultural rights were special passions to him. He took part in many international forums, seminars, and projects on these themes and was the master mind behind the Charter of Cultural Rights and Responsibilities of the Citizen of Barcelona that the Interarts Foundation elaborated jointly with the Culture Institute of the Barcelona City Council in 2002. This Charter was the result of a participatory process of consultations with the civil society in order to articulate the fundamental elements that permit to construct a shared space for co-living. The idea of bringing the debate to a new level was born as a result of the Charter process with the objective of including the civil society so that different actors could be heard. The invitation was also addressed to international organisations.

The Dialogue had three main goals: to provide information, to share experiences and to mobilise a sector that is often considered very fragmented. In general there seems to be a consensus that we achieved to answer to these goals. The Dialogue aimed at attracting transversal interests by combining the presence of specialists and academics with artists and professionals from the cultural sector and international organizations; researchers, local authorities; citizens and students. Based on the richness of the presentations, representation of regions, ideas, themes and professions we could consider that the Dialogue managed to be an extraordinary encounter to discuss such important matters.

On one hand, one of the main objectives was to contribute to the redefinition of the right to take part in cultural life in accordance with the current debate at the United Nations and the presence of this right in the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. Throughout the Dialogue, different contributions from intergovernmental organisms as well as from academics and representatives of the civil society, dealt with these issues, including the relationship between cultural rights and other dimensions of human rights. Apart from the affirmation that cultural rights form an integral part of human rights, the participants agreed on the belief that any cultural practice should not infringe human rights. It was also affirmed that all human rights have clear cultural dimensions.

On the other hand, within the Dialogue we also put attention to the attempts to define and construct indicators that permit to evaluate the contribution of culture to human development. In spite of the growing recognition of the importance of culture in the quality of life, it�s certain that the attempts to establish transferable guidelines have not been very successful. The recent publication of the Human Development Report 2004 of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) that for the first time affirms the relevance of cultural freedom to human development is an important step. This volume was presented in Barcelona by its lead author and director of the Office of the Human Development Report, Sakiko Fukuda-Parr. Together with her, throughout the event, the participants were invited to contribute to the development of indicators, and to present policies and best practices that could serve for a better understanding on how diversity, access and participation in culture, creativity or education are related to human development.

Within the Dialogue we tried to close the gap between international law and the realities of cultural communities in order to see which are the priorities that cultural groups and people have. We were not only looking for a wide and conceptual debate on different definitions on what is culture and its dimensions in relation to human rights and development, but also to create a dialogue between different agents so that we could have real concrete results.

During the Dialogue we had the chance to listen to more than 80 speakers from 43 different countries from all the five continents in the plenary sessions as well as in the workshops.

During the Dialogue it was stated that the cultural sector should start to respond to the challenges posed by human development: poverty, conflicts, democracy, and to the notion of the principles of cultural rights that are linked to other human rights as well as to the UN Millennium Development Goals. Another observation was that the cultural sector needs to integrate in other sectors as well. The Dialogue offered a great variety of points of view, shared opinions between representatives of different continents, and a great many of ideas, knowledge and rich experiences.

It was also stated that culture and education should be more linked to development policies. It was also indicated that the roots of social exclusion should be tackled at the same time as we are fighting against social and economic exclusion.