The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) was conceived within the United Nations (UN) Charter, which was ratified on October 24, 1945. In the view of its founders, it was to revive within the new UN system, the International Institute of Intellectual Cooperation (IIIC), created, in 1924, by the League of Nations' International Committee on International Cooperation (ICIC). The institute had counted among its members such eminent world personalities as Albert Einstein, Henri Bergson, Sigmund Freud, Marie Curie, Gabriela Mistral, Aldous Huxley, Miguel de Unamuno, Paul Valéry, and Rabindranath Tagore. The UNESCO Constitution was adopted on October 24, 1945, by thirty-seven countries, By October 2003, it was composed of 190 Member States and six Associate Members.

At the outset, some of its more influential members were of the opinion that UNESCO should be the world organization in which "intellect would...