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What is Open Society?
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| The concept of open society is based
on the recognition that people act on imperfect knowledge and
nobody is in possession of the ultimate truth. Open societies
are characterized by a reliance on the rule of law, the existence
of a democratically elected government, a diverse and vigorous
civil society, respect for minority opinions, and free market
economy. A closed society expends most of its energies in preserving
the existing order, whereas an open society takes law and respect
for rights of others as its starting point and creates progress
and prosperity from that base. |
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Debate
Program
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The Debate program is one
of the Soros network educational programs. The program mission
is to develop critical thinking through debate. It is developing
in 29 countries of the world. In preparation for debates on
set topics, young people select materials from books, newspapers
and other information sources. They learn to analyze information,
work out their own opinion, convey it to others, and also
acquire teamwork skills. This program is meant for high school
students and teachers and also university students.
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By George Soros
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| Central European University came
into existence in response to the revolutions which swept Central
and Eastern Europe in 1989.The idea was first broached at a
seminar series organized by the Soros foundations network at
the Inter-University Center in Dubrovnik in April 1989. Schoiars
with different national backgrounds, yet with a shared experience
Soviet system of the, felt a strong urge to work together to
develop a new mutual understanding and to educate a new elite
that would be inured to the pitfalls of both communism and nationalism.
Central European University was founded to reinforce the idea
behind the revolutions of 1989;that is to say, the idea of an
open, pluralistic, democratic, market-oriented form of social
organization. To be sure, this idea was not universally shared
by those who opposed the Soviet regime, and it is far from certain
that the concept will prevail now that the regime has collapsed.
That is all the more reason to foster and develop it. As an
exponent of open society, I did not want CEU to become an institution
extolling the virtues of open society, but rather to serve as
a prototype of an open system of education in which dif- ferent
ideas are critically examined, subjects are studied in a compara-
tive rather than a national context and original and creative
thinking is given the greatest possible scope. Next
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