In the 47th. year of the Space Age, I believe that anybody can doubt about the positive impact that space activities have had on individuals and society as a whole. From the view of an inhabitant of a developing country like Uruguay, I can confirm that the multidisciplinary nature and universality of space activities, allow countries to assume roles and to coparticipate, beyond economic or political potentialities.
This has been our experience since the institutionalization of the Centro de Investigación y Difusión Aeronáutico-Espacial (CIDA-E) in 1975, described by the ESA as a world pioneer center (ESA/STA-S/JdD, 09/06/99). We met a series of achievements and took responsibilities that we could maintain thanks to cooperation, whether in the intergovernmental organizations we participate in (UNCOPUOS, since the admission of Uruguay in 1981; UNISPACE I and II; the Space Conferences of the Americas ,CEAS) or in the international non-governmental academic institutes from which our Center is member of (IISL, IAF, IAA, among others). This permanent work, which develops independently from scientific or social circumstances, demonstrates that no country must consider itself excluded from the benefits derived from space activities.
As recognized by International Law, space activities "must be carried out for the benefit and in the interests of all countries, irrespective of their degree of economic or scientific development, and shall be province of all mankind". We support the idea that a greater contribution of national capacities (being them human or material) will allow to reaffirm a real planetary solidarity of shared responsibilities, taking into account that in space activities the scientific-technological and scientific-legal aspects are indissoluble related, serving the latter as stimulus and guarantee to the former which must develop within the aims and purposes in force in the International Community (National Paper presented by Uruguay to UNISPACE II).
The basic elements to achieve these goals are education and space awareness. It is also necessary to have a scientific critical mass which should remain active and stable, despite economic and political changes of each country. Uruguay is one of 8 countries which provides educative opportunities in Space Law and Policy (ONU, Office for Outer Space Affairs, A/AC.105/671, Add. 1).
But the scientific-technological advances must be consistent with a new Ethic, the Ethics of the Homo Spatialis (not the old Homo Sapiens) which should allow us to block the negative impacts they also produce. In sum, it should help us to understand the necessary unity it must exist and the essential nature of human beings that inhabit planet Earth, from which definitely depends our own survival.
Prof. Dr.
Eduardo
E.
Gaggero
Director General
Centro de Investigación y Difusión Aeronáutico-Espacial. CIDA-E.
Professional Category:
Legal
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