UNESCO Honors "Philosopher Activist" Sergio Vieira de Mello

Sergio Vieira de Mello (AP Images)

What leads a gifted philosopher with movie-star good looks and charisma to devote his life to the United Nations? On November 17, a UNESCO auditorium filled with several hundred people grappled with this question during a roundtable discussion entitled “Sergio Vieira de Mello: A Philosopher’s Fight to Change the World.” The roundtable was sponsored by the U.S. and Brazilian delegations to UNESCO on World Philosophy Day in order to examine the life of this celebrated UN worker, who was, in fact, a philosopher by training. The roundtable was followed by a special screening of Greg Barker's HBO documentary, "Sergio". 

Sergio Vieira de Mello was one of the UN’s “brightest stars”, a master at mediation and conflict resolution. His commitment to human rights led him to work in the most difficult conflict situations of the post-Cold War era, from Serbia to Rwanda and finally Iraq, where he was killed in an Al Qaeda attack on UN headquarters just months after being named Special Representative of the UN Secretary-General.  Greg Barker’s HBO documentary “Sergio” offers a fascinating portrait of this exceptional yet enigmatic man, who succeeded in negotiating with the most difficult of parties and managed to save lives in the worst of conflict zones while urging political leaders to face the human cost of war and instability.

The roundtable discussion, moderated by U.S. Ambassador to UNESCO David Killion, emphasized Sergio’s remarkable capacity to surpass the boundaries of countries and ethnicities, of good guys and bad guys, and to be of service to all people no matter their political stripe.  Staffan de Mistura, now Ban Ki-moon’s Special Representative to Afghanistan, emphasized Sergio’s role as a problem-solver who saw creative solutions others wouldn’t have considered, while Fareed Yasseen, the Iraqi Ambassador to France, testified to Sergio’s vociferous insistence on democratic structures in post-Saddam Iraq. So instrumental were the efforts of the Brazilian UN worker that the Iraqi Ambassador insisted, “democracy has become the greatest Latin American export to Iraq.” Robert Misrahi, the philosophy professor at the Sorbonne who oversaw Sergio’s postgraduate work, discussed his philosophical underpinnings, built upon the essentiality of recognizing the other; he even compared Sergio’s death to that of Socrates. Yet opera legend Barbara Hendricks, whose work with refugees brought her into contact with Sergio, differed. In her words: “He was not a perfect man, not a god, but a human. And I miss him terribly.”

Filmmaker Greg Barker ended the roundtable by emphasizing Sergio's enduring capacity to inspire.  He recounted how he was moved to make the film "Sergio" after meeting people Sergio had worked with in the field and reading Samantha Power's biography, "Chasing the Flame: One Man's Fight to Save the World".  And Mr. Barker spoke of how humbled he is by the number of people who decided to change their lives after watching his documentary and learning about the life and the legacy of Sergio Vieira de Mello.