Prague Manifesto (Esperanto)

The Prague Manifesto (Esperanto: Praga Manifesto) is a set of seven widely shared principles of the Esperanto movement. It was drafted at the 1996 World Congress of Esperanto in Prague by officials from the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) and attendees of the congress. The document emphasizes democratic communication, language rights, preservation of language diversity, and effective language education. The following is the full English text of the 15-page pamphlet, which includes the same text in French, Spanish, Russian, Chinese and Arabic. (The pamphlet, published by Universala Esperanto-socio, is undated).

We, members of the worldwide movement for the promotion of Esperanto, address this manifesto to all governments, international organizations and people of good will; declare our unshakable commitment to the objectives set out here; and invite each and every organization and individual to join us in our effort.

Launched in 1887 as a project for an auxiliary language for international communication and quickly developed into a rich living language in its own right, Esperanto has worked for more than a century to connect people across language and culture barriers. Meanwhile, the objectives of its speakers have not lost importance or relevance. Neither the worldwide use of a few national languages, nor advances in communications technology, nor the development of new methods of language instruction will likely realize the following principals, which we consider essential for just and effective language order.

A communication system which privileges some people but requires of others that they invest years of effort in order to attain a lesser degree of competency is fundamentally undemocratic. Although, like any language, Esperanto is not perfect, it greatly exceeds all rivals in the sphere of equitable global communication.

We assert that language inequality entails inequality of communication at all levels, including the international level. We are a movement for democratic communication.

Any ethnic language is linked to a certain culture and nation or group of nations. For example, the student who studies English learns about the culture, geography and politics of the English-speaking world, primary the United States and United Kingdom. The student who studies Esperanto learns about a world without limits, in which every country is like a home.

We assert that the education of any ethnic language is linked to a specific worldview. We are a movement for transnational education.

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