The Philosophy of the Foundations

 

The aim of the Soros Foundations is to promote the creation of open societies. The term open society was introduced to scientific thinking by French philosopher Henri Bergson in 1932. It was further developed by Karl Popper of Austria, primarily in his well-known book Open Society and Its Enemies, written during World War II. Having lived in Hungary under both the Fascist and the communist regimes, George Soros gained an insight into the oppressive power of closed societies.

In his book Open Society he describes his interpretation of the open society concept as follows: "I propose the concept of open society as an ideal to which our global society should aspire. My conception is that it is in the interest of open societies to help foster the development of open societies throughout the world and to establish the international institutions appropriate to a global open society. I should like to gather sufficient support for this idea to be able to translate it into reality."