Doha meeting to stress importance of family ties

Marital problems and domestic disputes will be the focus of the two-day International Conference for the Family, which opens today in Doha.

The event will also highlight new policies to protect the family.

Delegates will help collect and discuss information produced for the International Year of the Family and carried out by academics and NGOs worldwide.

The objective is to demonstrate that a family focus is the best guide to sustainable social health and encourage governments to implement policies that protect the family.

“Many modern social ills can be traced to one root cause: the disintegration of the family,” said a statement issued on the occasion by the Supreme Council for Family Affairs (SCFA), the conference’s organiser.

“Marital and familial instability worldwide is reaching epic proportions with devastating effects on social health, including increased poverty, crime, illiteracy, drug use, social injustice and disease,” the statement said.

“Without a strong and vigorous reassertion of the values that have supported every healthy society … continued rapid social decline is inevitable.”

The conference will bring together the world’s leading academicians, policy analysts, religious leaders and government officials to evaluate trends, make proposals for positive change and refocus attention on the family’s vital role in maintaining healthy societies, the statement said.

Topics of particular interest will include the social role of marriage, developmental needs of children, the impact of the media on family life, government policy and the family in the social and economic field, the family and human dignity and historical and global perspectives on the family.

The event will end with the adoption of an official declaration restating the fundamental truth embodied in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights that states: “The family is the natural and fundamental group unit of society and is entitled to protection by society and the state.”

It will also reaffirm international commitments to marriage, maternity, parental involvement with children and the centrality of the family.

The Doha Conference process began in March with the World Congress of Families III and continued with three regional meetings in Stockholm, Geneva and Kuala Lumpur. At the conclusion of these regional meetings, various reports and declarations were prepared for submission to Doha.

On December 15, 2003, the Doha Conference was welcomed as an official event of the UN International Year of the Family by a resolution of the UN General Assembly.

The organising committee includes representatives from the World Family Policy Centre at Brigham Young University, the Family Research Council, the Catholic Family, the Human Rights Foundation and Care.