Philosophy

Under the impact of globalization, modern societies
are threatened by homogenization and the loss of the identity of the objects
and subjects which form their discernible components. In combination with the current
unreasonable use of natural resources and, in the totalizing spirit of
globalization, the identification of a quality lifestyle solely with material
wealth and of free time exclusively with entertainment, modern societies adopt a
frail hierarchical model of values, which debases the meaning of education.

Given
the fact that future modern societies will exclusively consist of urban centers,
while rural areas and other marginalized social groups will shrink – a process
which will be further advanced by citizen and governmental interventions in the
context of the latter’s attempts to find solutions to the problems of urbanized
societies, hence dramatically influencing the way of life in suburban rural
areas –, rural regions are inevitably led to social exclusion. Through this
idiosyncratic, non-empirical cultural mutation, they will experience the
imposition of the aloof and fixed cultures of “TV-citizenship” and “plastic
money”, followed by the overpowering dependence of their residents on
employment.

Empirical knowledge has already succumbed to the domination of scientific statistical
data and information recycling, while the industrially-paced production of
graduates in our universities threatens us with intellectual indolence,
jeopardizing the vivacity of sober brains.

The dangers entailed are easily discernible. Crete is
gradually led to the brutal violation of its environmental, residential and
cultural identity, in the name of an easy acquisition of wealth, based on mass
tourism and the clearance of Cretan land. Thus the social web is deconstructed,
delinquency is rising and the island experiences, both on a national and on an
international level, the humiliation of its traditional values.

As
equilibrium to the effects of the aforementioned factors, the University of the
Mountains emerges as a development vision which values respect towards the
particularities of locality, the centuries-long cultural tradition of the mountainous
rural areas and the special traits of local society and economy.

This vision is materialized as a multi-dimensional action-project, which is founded on “a human population base” and invests in local
societies situated in the mountainous regions of Crete.
At the same time, it is expressed as a project of meticulous intervention in rural
areas and as a product of original, systematic and innovative reasoning.

Among the
objectives of the University of the Mountains is the protection of human and natural
environments, the boost of local economy through modern management tools for the
deterrence of exploitation regarding natural resources, the annihilation of delinquency and the independence from loan and
subsidiary-orientated economy. The
project, therefore, aspires on the one hand to restore lost human relationships
and the cultural identity of small societies, and to redefine, on the other, human
happiness in the context of human indicators rather than financial data.

As tools for the realization of its objectives, the University
of the Mountains will use dialogue and the combination of empirical with
scientific knowledge provided by the people that serve them within and outside
academia, in the field of primary production. Scientific support will be
provided at all levels in main fields of intervention: education, culture,
economy, health. Other means of implementation will be the nurturing into the
culture of essential consumerism and the organization of cultural and visual
arts festivals.

The University of the Mountains as a University outside academic campuses will operate on the outskirts of mountainous and isolated communities, at the heart of each local society, attempting to materialize the European dream for a multi-cultural society. There the maintenance of “rural identity” will become the
essential and efficient condition for the formation of the social mosaic of a
globalized European image.