The Union of International Associations is a non-profit non-governmental organization researching, under UN mandate, the global civil society and publishing information on international organizations, international meetings, world problems, etc. Headquarters are in Brussels, Belgium. It was founded in 1907 by Henri La Fontaine, the 1913 Nobel Peace Prize laureate, and Paul Otlet, a founding father of what is now called information science.
Its stated goals (taken from its website) include:
- Contribution to a universal order based on principles of human dignity, solidarity of peoples and freedom of communication;
- Facilitation of the development and efficiency of non-governmental networks in every field of human activity, especially non-profit and voluntary associations, considered to be essential components of contemporary society;
- Collection, research and dissemination of information on international bodies, both governmental and non-governmental, their interrelationships, their meetings, and problems and strategies they are dealing with;
- Experimentation with more meaningful and action-oriented ways of presenting such information to enable these initiatives to develop and counterbalance each other creatively, and as a catalyst for the emergence of new forms of associative activity and transnational co-operation;
- Promotion of research on the legal, administrative and other problems common to these international associations, especially in their contacts with governmental bodies.
Famous quotes containing the words union of, union and/or associations:
“Those graceful acts,
Those thousand decencies, that daily flow
From all her words and actions, mixed with love
And sweet compliance, which declare unfeigned
Union of mind, or in us both one soul.”
—John Milton (1608–1674)
“One thing that makes art different from life is that in art things have a shape ... it allows us to fix our emotions on events at the moment they occur, it permits a union of heart and mind and tongue and tear.”
—Marilyn French (b. 1929)
“Wild as it was, it was hard for me to get rid of the associations of the settlements. Any steady and monotonous sound, to which I did not distinctly attend, passed for a sound of human industry.... Our minds anywhere, when left to themselves, are always thus busily drawing conclusions from false premises.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)