Communication is the key and communication means dialogue ... encounter ... precisely to construct a dignified and sovereign country that is just, respects the rights of all, including those of nature. A country where human beings, plants or animals are not exploited … where there is no poverty either among people or in the soil ... it is imperative that nobody lives off the labor of others or the fruits of nature.
To build such a country, we need dialogue. Around 40% of the population is influenced by anti-communist prejudices, mistakes of 20th Century Socialism, the inefficiencies and errors of the current process, media campaigns, sectarianism … dialogue is vital in every community and diverse social classes, and with all those who can be united.
Dialogue is practical, it's pedagogy. Wherever a real social leadership arises, no media sermon can sustain itself for long.
For example, it's untrue that our rights end where another's begin. They continue where the other's begin because they exist to build community and are undertaken from solidarity, from dialogue. Not from simple individual enjoyment. Not from walls or frontiers. What it doesn't mean is the negation of the person, family and local specifications … There is no unity without diversity. Recognizing the other, is to recognize one's self.
That my rights end where those of the other begin, has come to mean that my property ends where that of the other begins, since this society has been building itself on the basis of property rights, big property, generally obtained through violent means. We're not talking about the property of owning a home, personal items and what people save as a result of their work, having a butcher's store … they're all legitimate rights.
The fact that certain politicians have perverted the course of dialogue does not rule out its importance.
Who wants to dialogue to build a dignified country?
You should be made very welcome.
Julio Escalona
julio.escalona@gmail.com
H.E. Ambassador Julio Escalona is Venezuela's Adjunct Ambassador to the United Nations in New York. He holds degrees in economics, geopolitics and environmental issues, and is a former director of the School of Economics at the Universidad Central de Venezuela (UCV) in Caracas and head of its department of human development. He is a professor of economics, general economic history, economic education in Latin America, contemporary Marxism and contemporary social problems. He has coordinated research seminars on economic integration, local economies and local development, and alternative technologies and has been a participant and guest lecturer at seminars, forums, academic institutions in Peru, Brazil, Japan, Paris, Mexico and Venezuela.