Search

The article discusses various topics related to heritage conservation and management. It begins by addressing the UK government's consultation on the adoption of the UNESCO Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage (ICH), emphasizing that ratifying the convention does not automatically impose additional burdens or obligations. The article also explores the relationship between intangible heritage and physical places, as well as the challenges faced in preserving authenticity and cultural characteristics in urban environments. It further examines the role of citizen participation in cultural heritage management, the destruction of heritage assets in Kenya, the representation of Indigenous Peoples' rights, and the integration of industrial heritage in planning documentation. The article concludes by highlighting the need for collaboration, understanding, and respect in sustainable conservation practices, particularly in the context of the climate crisis. [Extracted from the article]

Although Turkey is a signatory to the UNESCO Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage it is the Ministry of Culture and Tourism which is responsible for intangible cultural heritage using procedures distinct from those used to preserve tangible cultural heritage'. In the spring of 2020 at the start of the Covid pandemic, it became increasingly clear that public open spaces were key resources in the development of policy to maintain public well-being. Railways and railway heritage form an important part of the historic environment, and a rapid review of the media, academia and popular literature reveals an extensive range of issues raised by the historic remains of railways. [Extracted from the article]

Between 2018 and 2020, CyArk, Google Arts and Culture and the International Council for Monuments and Sites (ICOMOS) worked together on the Heritage on the Edge project. Launched on the Google Arts and Culture platform in January 2020, this project utilised a range of techniques to highlight the impacts and local experiences of climate change at five cultural World Heritage Sites in Bangladesh, Peru, Rapa Nui, Scotland and Tanzania. All five sites are experiencing different climate change impacts and each has been responding and adapting to these challenges in unique and locally appropriate ways. The project illustrates both the value of collaboration between different organisations, and the role of this historic environment in climate change communication and public engagement. This paper will introduce the project aims, objectives and methodology with a particular focus on the project review and web analytics for the six-month period following the project launch. Results suggest global meaningful engagement with some considerable gaps especially in low and middle-income countries. It concludes by exploring some useful lessons for future digital projects, exploring ways to increase geographical reach and improve viewer engagement, and to ensure more equitable collaborations with partner sites and countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Hisar District is located within the borders of Osmangazi County. Hisar has a rich historical and cultural heritage and is a valuable historic landscape which carries not only the physical and spatial traces of this heritage but also preserves social and cultural features. With these features, Hisar District should be conserved for a sustainable future. Bursa Metropolitan Municipality considered the Hisar (Citadel) District as an Ottoman and World Heritage site and a research team from Bursa Uludag University has been given the task of preparing a management plan as a project in order to achieve conservation of the site with a sustainable approach. Led by the author of this paper, Dr Çahantimur, Bursa Uludag University Project Team prepared the plan with a place-specific and participatory approach. This study presents both the significance of Hisar heritage site and the participatory process of the site management plan. It also presents a critical review of the actions undertaken by the municipality since then. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Among the instruments elaborated for protecting and promoting cultural heritage, the UNESCO World Heritage Convention (WHC) and related policies remain dominant, despite criticism in academia. Studies on the role and influence of WH inscription in urban areas are abundant, although they rarely engage with comparative analysis, preferring to investigate single-site dynamics. This article suggests that comparing the evolution of different WH sites reveals interesting parallels, suggesting that some recurrent patterns are identifiable. Our comparative analysis identifies (a) key ontological complexities emerging from the candidature and inscription phases, and (b) common trends of post-inscription consequences as pertains to urban areas. In particular, our results point to: the limitedness and fixity of 'Outstanding Universal Value' statements; the selective identification of heritage resources, based on exclusive instead of inclusive values; the marginalisation of local traditional expertise by international heritage professionals; the unwillingness of local administrative actors to seek for a holistic revitalisation of historic cities. More broadly, results of this study suggest that national neoliberal agendas based on tourism-driven development treat urban heritage resources as commodities, hindering the possibility of inclusive and participatory urban practices, while policies adopting 'rights-based' approaches are more likely to promote local heritage awareness and to encourage identity construction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The growing complexity of contemporary local public governance is a clear challenge to the success of public policies. The policy domains of culture, broadly, and heritage preservation, specifically, in Portugal are good examples of that complexity, since municipalities are their biggest public funders and promoters, although experiencing several institutional capacity difficulties. These national realities are, nevertheless, largely under analysed in the literature. This paper thus aims to analyse the critical factors for the implementation of the management programmes of three Portuguese World Heritage historic centres: Évora, Porto and Guimarães. Through the analysis of programme documentation and interviews launched on local managers, it was possible to identify that the most decisive factors were issues of local political support, funding, and management structure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The notion of authenticity in the cultural heritage context has been at the centre of an intense debate and policy evolution over the past decades, with significant normative implications, notably within the World Heritage Convention. Two main factors have been driving these processes: the need to integrate new cultural perspectives into the discipline, especially from the non-Western world; and the growing recognition of the role of 'communities' in defining heritage value.A shared understanding of what authenticity means and of how it can be demonstrated, however, seems to be still lacking among practitioners and scholars. This is shown by the continuing controversies among experts, as well as by the comparatively large number of heritage properties which, in their nominations for World Heritage inscription, are apparently unable to make a convincing case for their authenticity, at least according to ICOMOS' evaluation.Against this background, the paper aims at providing a clearer definition of what authenticity means in the context of cultural heritage conservation. It does so by reassessing the whole question from a fresh perspective, drawing more from philosophical and semantic conceptual frameworks than from the existing corpus of doctrinal texts in the heritage field, in an attempt to clarify persisting ambiguities and contribute to the ongoing reflection. In doing so, the paper provides the key elements of a framework to operationalise the concept of authenticity within the cultural heritage context, while also highlighting issues that will require further study and exploration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Recommendation on the Historic Urban Landscape (2011) adopted on the 36th UNESCO General Conference stressed that Historic Urban Landscape (HUL) was not a new type of world heritage, but an innovative method in urban heritage conservation. The paper discusses current efforts for applying the HUL Approach in the case of urban heritage conservation of Kulangsu in China, a project for World Heritage nomination in 2017. For Kulangsu, the World Heritage nomination provides an opportunity to rethink its values and characteristics in the global perspective. The HUL Approach also provides a new perspective for identifying the heritage components of the site, and thus changes the conservation system and strategies in order to improve the built environment, the quality of social life, and to enhance the interaction between the community and the site. The paper will introduce the outstanding universal values of the site, the identification of the elements of urban heritage, the understanding of its integrity, the practical challenges and conservation strategies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sir Patrick Geddes remarked that a city is a living organism, which experiences birth, growth, maturity, decline, decay and rebirth. It is a palimpsest in the urban landscape, a historic layering of human interventions. Some layers may remain in good physical condition, while others may deteriorate or vanish due to different factors such as ageing, neglect, natural disasters or armed conflicts. The unfortunate destruction of districts and cities, inscribed on the UNESCO List of World Heritage in Danger, is not the end of their wheel of life because new layers can emerge. Some may resemble old ones to meet the claims and needs of contemporary society. This layering process echoes the thinking that underpins the Recommendation on the Historic Urban Landscape (HUL). While the term ‘reconstruction’ does not appear in the latter, it is implied in Item 20: ‘Changes to historic urban areas can also result from sudden disasters and armed conflicts. […] The [HUL] approach may assist in managing and mitigating such impacts’. This paper takes ongoing intellectual discussions and studies on reconstruction in the World Heritage context forward by exploring how this approach may be of assistance. A critical examination of the recurring concept of authenticity is included. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The effective public service delivery of the regulatory management of the built historic environment in the U.K. is primarily based on the planning system. The setting of heritage assets is just one specific aspect of consideration for assessing the impact of proposed development but it is relevant to all assets, whether World Heritage Sites, buildings, monuments or landscapes. All heritage assets have a setting. This area has, in the past, been given comparatively little consideration within the tools and guidance available to practising heritage professionals but new and forthcoming guidance and legislation in the U.K. may go some way to addressing this. There are, however, aspects of assessment and analysis which deserve further consideration, especially from a practitioner’s viewpoint. This paper seeks to explore these aspects through examining a high-profile case study from Wales, chosen because of the author’s personal involvement in the case, the wide range of assets involved, and the interesting outcomes. This study helps to identify where universally applicable lessons can be learnt and will perhaps further inform the future development of informative, relevant and practical regulatory management documents, policies and tools. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Roşia Montană is an important gold mining area in the Apuşeni mountains of Romania. It has been proposed for inscription as a World Heritage site and a dossier sent to UNESCO. The significance of the proposed cultural landscape, however, is contested and has been the subject of a failed application to continue gold mining and the focus of worldwide protest. This paper describes the complexity of the factors behind the heritage case which have influenced the proposal of Outstanding Universal Value. It situates the application in current practice at an important period in the evolution of world cultural heritage and identifies the issues which will make the conservation of Roşia Montană a key case study in the management of industrial heritage. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The heritage offer at Ironbridge is long established: for over 50 years, the story has been told of innovation and technological development in the Ironbridge Gorge at the beginning of the industrial revolution. That story achieved even higher recognition over 25 years ago when the area was awarded World Heritage Site status, recognising its outstanding universal value of technological innovation. The heritage product at Ironbridge has changed in significant ways over time reflecting increased competition in the sector, the transformed expectations of the visitors and varied responses by the museum trust to political agendas to which the sector must respond in order to gain support for its activities. It is also demonstrable that the very success of Ironbridge has transformed the appearance, and demographics of this part of what were historically a fiercely working class East Shropshire coalfield. Not the least of the successes has been to turn the area into a desirable place to live again, but not for the working classes who have been superseded by a more affluent sector of society. The aim of this paper was to explore the nature of these changes and to provide an overview of how the perception of heritage in the area has shifted over time. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The last decade has seen a steady increase in the number of cultural World Heritage serial transnational nominations. For this concept of heritage, new approaches and tools are required beyond those used for traditional site management. This paper focuses on the monitoring tool and methodologies developed for the Silk Roads serial transnational World Heritage nomination in Central Asia. A monitoring tool was developed to document the state of conservation and possible threats to the Outstanding Universal Value based on a risk management approach. It was implemented as web-based Geospatial Content Management System, following international documentation standards and methodologies. The first Silk Roads World Heritage property was listed in 2014 and more are under preparation. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article addresses the challenges of Indigenous Peoples’ participation in conservation nomination processes and in the management of the sites they inhabit. It analyses the developments – conceptual and legal – produced both in UNESCO and in the United Nations Human Rights system for the inclusion of Indigenous People’s interpretations and visions and the respect of their rights in the context of World Heritage Sites. The author argues that the inter-governmental composition of the World Heritage Committee can make the introduction of an Indigenous Peoples’ rights-based approach in the World Heritage Convention decision-making processes extremely difficult; especially because some States have supported an outdated and manifestly wrong interpretation of sovereignty. This is why, in contrast to the traditional approach which focuses on ‘specific’ Indigenous Peoples norms, this paper suggests that a stronger emphasis on the recent developments in the International Human Rights system concerning the ‘general’ human right to take part in cultural life – which include Indigenous Peoples’ rights – would be, strategically speaking, a better way to support the inclusion of a rights based-approach to the World Heritage Convention decision-making processes. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Every site that is listed as World Heritage comes with its own justification for inscription, explaining why this specific place is considered to be of Outstanding Universal Value (OUV). This global cultural significance is to be described based on attributes, tangible or intangible, and their subsequent values. As suggested by the management approach indicated in the United Nations Education, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) Recommendation on the Historic Urban Landscape, the management of such attributes and values should be integrated into a wider sustainable urban management framework. Though, how can they be properly included in such framework when most often, it is not clear where they are located exactly? In order to develop efficient management plans to manage cultural significance, a thorough understanding of what exactly reflects this outstanding universal value is required. The aim of this paper is, firstly to present the results of a research on systematically revealing and locating a selection of attributes of the Amsterdam Canal Zone, as described in the Nomination File (Kingdom of the Netherlands,Canal Ring Area of Amsterdam) and the Advisory Body Evaluation (International Council on Monuments and Sites (ICOMOS),Canal Area of Amsterdam). Next, some recommendations will be provided on how they can be integrated in the local urban management framework. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper describes the elaboration of the management plan for the UNESCO World Heritage site of Crespi d’Adda, a late-nineteenth-century company town that was inscribed in the World Heritage List in 1995 due to the integrity of its urban structure and the functional continuity of its productive and residential system. At the time of inscription, a management plan was not mandatory, and inscription did not produce a real development strategy able to counter the risks arising from de-industrialisation. The management plan preparation, launched in 2007, was assumed to represent an opportunity to ensure both protection and sustainable evolution. The process of elaboration made it necessary to promote coordination and dialogue among different institutions. This permitted enhancement of local governance. Moreover, the management plan acted as a framework within which to set guidelines for intervention on the external and internal features of the buildings, aimed at preserving the values of the site through the implementation of good practices. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper examines the results of the Periodic Report for Europe, completed in 2015. The paper examines general trends in World Heritage and compares the results of Periodic Reporting, completed by member states, with those of Reactive Monitoring cases brought to the World Heritage Committee. It concludes that there have been improvements in the implementation of the World Heritage Convention in the last decade, but also recognises that there are still many pressures. In particular, there is a need to engage the interest of external stakeholders and decision-takers more closely and convince them better of the importance of heritage to society as a whole. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper examines issues concerning the protection and management of World Cultural Heritage properties in five countries (China, Spain, Switzerland, United Kingdom and United States) which formed part of a research network funded by the United Kingdom’s Arts and Humanities Research Council during 2013–2015. The themes examined in this context include: legal and administrative measures for protection (including recommendations and guidelines of international organisations), other protection mechanisms (planning policy and regulations), management systems and their efficiency at protecting cultural world heritage properties in ‘the day to day’ administration (tourism, financial resources and sustainable development), as well as unusual situations (development, risk and disaster), and the role of management bodies and representatives, capacity building and monitoring of the properties (practical experiences). These issues are broadly examined from questionnaires responses from the five countries through this paper and set the scene for the development of the themes of the international conference on ‘World Heritage Sites in a National Context: The Implementation of the 1972 UNESCO Convention concerning the Protection of the World Cultural and Natural Heritage’ held at the University of Kent, Canterbury 15–16 January 2015, which are examined in the other papers included in this issue. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper aims to assess the implementation of the 1972 Convention in 10 countries (Australia, China, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Spain, Switzerland, the United Kingdom and the United States) which were part of a research network funded by the UK’s Arts and Humanities Research Council in 2012–15 by examining the selection process of cultural properties at the national level through a survey. The survey consisted of a questionnaire that aimed to identify national practices regarding the identification and nomination of sites for submission on the state’s Tentative List and then onto the World Heritage List. It highlighted that despite the efforts of the World Heritage Committee to unify the submission process through long and detailed Operational Guidelines, there are important differences at a national level that lead to the List’s lack of representativity and an heterogeneous implementation of the Convention. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The acceleration of development pressures in recent decades has focused attention on the spectrum of major challenges facing the diverse stakeholders charged with the safeguarding and protection of World Heritage Sites. This paper compares two sites that have highlighted these challenges, both of which were inscribed on the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) World Heritage List in 2004: Dresden Elbe Valley, Federal Republic of Germany, placed on the World Heritage List in Danger in 2006 and delisted in 2009; and Liverpool - Maritime Mercantile City, UK, placed on the World Heritage List in Danger in 2012 and the subject of ongoing debate. The paper questions inconsistencies in the decision-making processes that may have triggered conflicts of interest in these two cases, positions the developing UNESCO concept of historic urban landscape as an enabler of integrative urban development, and draws lessons for the implementation of the World Heritage Convention. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 2006, a requirement came into effect for World Heritage Site management plans to include an assessment of the possible impact of climate change on the heritage site, and to include mitigation strategies as appropriate. This paper focuses on progress in the UK towards developing and implementing climate-change adaptation policies within these plans. Research undertaken to examine this complex area of work has identified key challenges faced by site managers when including and subsequently implementing climate-change policies. Information was collected through a questionnaire survey of all UK World Heritage Sites, reviews of relevant documents, and in-depth interviews with a wide range of professionals. The study found that plans are gradually being updated to include climate-change considerations, however, this is not always straightforward and plan implementation is proving challenging. Concerns about data reliability and the contested nature of scientific data on climate change are widespread, and there is a perceived lack of the necessary information to make fully informed decisions. Resource constraints, a need for more specialist skills and guidance, and differing levels of interest and motivation in the issue are other challenges. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since the end of the last century, heritage damage caused by inappropriate tourism development in China has occurred constantly in practice. Property rights economics suggests that an institution of property rights plays a key role in property conservation and utilisation. Cultural and natural heritage actually comprise a kind of peculiar scarce property. Therefore, the institution of property rights is crucial for heritage conservation and tourism development. The 30-year tourism history of the Wulingyuan World Heritage Site demonstrates that the heritage damage occurring in China is mainly caused by its present institution of property rights for heritage. Thus, sustainable tourism is the logical choice for solving the conflicts between tourism development and heritage conservation. To achieve this goal, further reform of the present institution of property rights for heritage in China should be prioritised, aimed at establishing clear definition, independent government regulation, and efficient market mechanisms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]