World Heritage Convention Research Articles

Protecting World Cultural and Natural Heritage against Climate Change and Disasters: an Assessment of the Effectiveness of the World Heritage Convention System

Protecting World Cultural and Natural Heritage against Climate Change and Disasters: an Assessment of the Effectiveness of the World Heritage Convention System

World Heritage on the Move: Abandoning the Assessment of Authenticity to Meet the Challenges of the Twenty-First Century

At a time when climate change, conflicts, disasters, and other global crises and challenges are increasingly affecting World Heritage properties, the utility of conservation assessment standards must be rethought. This article proposes abandoning the assessment of authenticity to treat properties less as “things”, deemed authentic or not, and more as evolving “processes” that embrace continuity and compatible change, which, it is argued, helps meet the challenges of the twenty-first century, namely climate change mitigation and adaptation; building back better after conflicts, disasters, or pandemics; and, ultimately, achieving sustainable development goals. Drawing on policy analysis and a wide range of literature, the article explains why authenticity is not a useful concept and why the idea of “heritage as process” is more relevant to the contemporary world. It shows how this idea can be put into effect and linked to Outstanding Universal Value, integrity, protection and management, which are already requirements in UNESCO’s Operational Guidelines for the implementation of the World Heritage Convention. In doing so, it contributes to aligning the implementation of the Convention with that of the global agendas of our time.

Advisory Bodies

People make heritage, value heritage and take care of heritage. As much as we put importance on creating heritage and identifying its significance, the stages which lead to the inscription of a site to the World Heritage List, the action of protecting and managing a heritage place is truly the focus and objective of the World Heritage Convention.

Autour du Louvre-Lens: An Ambitious Tourism Engineering Project

Abstract Two driving factors underlie this tourism initiative: the decision to create a Louvre satellite museum in the ex-industrial town of Lens and the candidature for UNESCO World Heritage status for the mining area in the Pas-de-Calais region of France. The challenge is how best to develop tourism in an area which has no previous experience or reputation as a tourist destination. ‘Mission Louvre-Lens Tourisme’ was launched in 2010. This case describes the journey in the last decade of developing and implementing the strategy. Information Dr Roger Carter and Gaëlle Connolly, adapted from a case study prepared for the OECD manual Operationalisation of Destinations Management Organisations in Romania (March 2020) © CAB International 2021

Securing world heritage sites: insurgency and the destruction of UNESCO’s world heritage sites in Timbuktu, Mali

Because of the political and religious disagreements in Mali, the protection of the country’s world heritage sites (WHSs) has been a constant agenda of state-parties to the World Heritage Convention (WHC). To avoid irreversible damage and loss of these valuable national heritages, appropriate action is needed at every level for their conservation and preservation. Significant attention has been directed at understanding the relevance and benefits of WHSs to the economic sector specifically, but, there has been relatively little academic and policy research on the destruction and looting of WHSs especially in Timbuktu, Mali. This is the gap this study intends to fill. This calls for serious questions regarding what precipitated and led to the destruction of Timbuktu’s cultural heritage. What is the significance of Timbuktu’s WHSs to the Malians? How should government authorities respond to the destruction of the sites? Finally, against the background of the destruction of the Timbuktu WHSs, how can the WHSs be preserved and protected? This study critically interrogates insurgents’ attacks on the WHSs, with the motive of developing a sustainable template suitable for forestalling potential attacks by Islamic/jihadist insurgents, or any other insurgents for that matter, in other locations in Mali, using the attacks in Timbuktu as a case study.

Imagine the Old Town of Lijiang: Contextualising community participation for urban heritage management in China

The UNESCO 2011 Recommendation on the Historic Urban Landscape (HUL) states community participation is a pivotal tool for integrating heritage practices into sustainable urban development. While community participation is significant but limited in China, various participatory methods have been developed, tested and evaluated worldwide. For example, inspired by HUL, the Ballarat Imagine in Australia has successfully used public engagement in the development of a community vision for local conservation and development. This paper aims to contextualise community participation in China, by testing and adapting a community participatory method, the (Ballarat) Imagine. Imagine was tested in the Old Town of Lijiang as an academic scoping exercise, to critically examine its viability and potential for contextualisation to the Chinese context. During the fieldwork, three workshops were organised with residents in Dayan, Shuhe and Baisha, which are the three housing clusters constituting the World Heritage property. In the workshops, residents responded to three sets of questions focussing on their feelings about local historic urban landscape as well as their ideas about future public engagement in local heritage management. This paper discusses the contextualised approach of community participation tailored to the management of the Old Town of Lijiang, and also China as a whole, seeking to find a balance between top-down and bottom-up processes. This academic exercise confirmed that the community participatory method, the Imagine, can be further adapted to the Chinese context. Further research could test it in other cities, to better face the challenges of rapid urbanisation.

A Geospatial Study of Archaeological Remains at Halebidu: An Integrative Approach to Identify Unexplored Features

The site Halebidu in Karnataka, India, is famous for its ornately carved Hoysala style temples. This fortified city was the capital of Hoysala dynasty in the twelfth century AD and possessed unique and exquisite examples of temple architecture that was typical of Hoysala style, only a few of which have survived. The site of Halebidu features as one of the two sites in the "Sacred Ensembles of the Hoysala" in the tentative list of WHC (World Heritage Convention) since 2014 [ https://whc.unesco.org/en/tentativelists/5898/ (accessed on 1 January 2020).]. The other site being Belur, which was the old capital of the dynasty. The next and most important step towards attaining WH (World Heritage) status is for the State party [States Parties are countries which have adhered to the World Heritage Convention: https://whc.unesco.org/en/statesparties/ (accessed 24 Oct 2020)] to prepare a nomination file. INTACH, Bengaluru, has recently prepared the nomination dossier for the "Sacred Ensembles of the Hoysala" and has submitted to Archaeological Survey of India in Sept 2020. [ https://www.thehindu.com/news/national/karnataka/somanathapura-temple-included-for-world-heritage-site-nomination/article32709882.ece (accessed 24 Oct 2020).]. The description of the salient feature of Halebidu available on UNESCO’s WH web page lists several temples, tanks and mantap (pavilion). In addition to the ornate temples and tanks, the city was surrounded by a fort wall whose perimeter is approx. 7.3 km enclosing an area of 2.9 sq. km. surrounded by a deep and wide moat. The moat connected a series of tanks which indicates the planning of water management of the settlement. On ground, parts of the fort wall can still be seen. In accordance with the WHC criteria for geospatially identifying core and buffer zones, the property should include: (1) areas which are a direct tangible expression of the Outstanding Universal Value and (2) areas which in the light of future research possibilities offer potential to contribute to and enhance such understanding. Therefore, it is important for the nomination dossier to recognise the context of the temples in the larger landscape. Towards this agenda the present study has conducted geospatial analysis using old survey maps and remote sensing imagery and has found the extent of fort wall and demarcated several other archaeological features (unprotected and unexcavated mounds, archaeological islands in the largest tank, old settlement, and buried temples) that are worth including in the area identified for protection. The findings of this study can help the State Party in delineating the core and buffer zones in a rational and appropriate manner; hence, these have been conveyed to INTACH, Bengaluru, who prepared the nomination dossier for WH inscription.

Объекты всемирного наследия ЮНЕСКО как фактор содействия межкультурному диалогу, гуманистическим идеалам и межконфессиональному согласию

The article focuses on promoting intercultural cooperation and strengthening international community on the example of UNESCO World Heritage sites, inscribed into the World Heritage List that is being formed on the basis of the World Heritage Convention of 1972. UNESCO is a universal intergovernmental UN structure responsible for international cooperation in the sphere of education, science, culture and communication. One of the main activities of the Organization is the world heritage conservation and intercultural dialogue. The article analyzes the UNESCO role in the geopolitical architectonics of Eurasia in which the World Heritage gains a qualitatively new meaning. In the context of a sustainable development the integration of promoting intercultural interaction and heritage safeguarding becomes particularly urgent. The article deals with several initiatives aimed at enhancing the cultural component of the Eurasian integration, including the goals and perspectives of discussion platforms set up for experience exchange in the sphere of World Heritage sites’ conservation and their management. The article seeks to identify the most important challenges and goals of the cooperation strategy between UNESCO and the institutions concerned in the field of the intercultural dialogue promotion in the Eurasian area that seems to be very important both for Russia and the CIS countries, and for the perspectives of the emerging global civilization of the future

Authenticiteit, een geloofwaardig begrip?

In het sluitstuk van diverse bijdragen in dit nummer over authenticiteit wordt de vraag gesteld of authenticiteit als begrip geloofwaardig is. Dit gebeurt aan de hand van de betekenis die authenticiteit heeft voor monumenten op de UNESCO Werelderfgoedlijst. Monumenten met het predikaat werelderfgoed hebben volgens de Operational Guidelines for the Implementation of the World Heritage Convention van UNESCO ‘Outstanding Universal Values’ (OUV). Tevens beantwoorden ze aan de eis van integriteit en authenticiteit, in ieder geval waar het cultureel erfgoed betreft. In navolging van The Nara Document on Authenticity (1994), en rekening houdend met de mondiale culturele diversiteit, kan de authenticiteit gebaseerd zijn op een grote variëteit aan eigenschappen.
 Twee Nederlandse werelderfgoedmonumenten, het Rietveld Schröderhuis (1924) en de Van Nellefabriek (1925-1931), behoren tot de architectuur van de Moderne Beweging. In de nominatiedossiers van deze twee monumenten wordt authenticiteit verschillend beargumenteerd. In beide gevallen is, zoals bij monumenten uit de Moderne Beweging zeer gangbaar is geworden, de ‘ontwerpauthenticiteit’ echter van groot belang. Is het begrip authenticiteit dan zodanig verbreed dat het uiteindelijk willekeurig wordt toegepast? Volgens de auteur kan authenticiteit zeker een kwaliteitskenmerk zijn, als er maar binnen de eigen culturele context een duidelijke en geloofwaardige definitie wordt gehanteerd.

ОБ’ЄКТИ УКРАЇНИ ДЛЯ МОЖЛИВОГО ВКЛЮЧЕННЯ ДО СПИСКУ ВСЕСВІТНЬОЇ СПАДЩИНИ ЮНЕСКО

The list of objects of Ukraine which are included in the UNESCO World Heritage List, as well asthose that are candidates for inclusion in this list has been analyzed. The opinion has been expressed thatthe relatively small number of objects of Ukraine in the World Heritage List (seven) is to some extentis explained by the fact that when selecting objects for consideration, the requirements (or criteria) forthese were not sufficiently taken into account. Consequently, a large number of Ukrainian object, whichare currently is in the list of candidates (seventeen), are left for many years without a positive decisionby the UNESCO Intergovernmental Committee. However, in Ukraine there are several objects which correspond to the criteria of World Heritage Convention and can actually be included in this list. Suchobjects include the Danube Delta, the Romanian part of which was included in the list in 1991. In thiscase, it is important not only that the Danube Delta belongs to both countries, but also that this delta isincluded in the list of 200 most valuable ecosystems of the Earth – Global 200. It is justified that severalother objects correspond the requirements of the Convention, namely the Caves of Ternopil region, theFortresses of Transnistria, Serpent Shafts. It was carried out the description of these objects, as well asa list of articles of the Convention to which they correspond. In particular, it is noted that the caves ofTernopil region, some of which are among the longest in the world, correspond at least two criteria of theConvention: vii – the object is a natural phenomenon or space of exceptional natural beauty and aestheticimportance, and viii – the object is an outstanding example of the main stages of the Earth history, inparticular a monument to the past, a symbol of geological processes, the development of relief. The sameapplies to the Oleshkivski Sands.The fortresses of Transnistria and the Serpent Shafts are unique culturalheritage sites as well. Each of these objects meets at least three criteria of cultural heritage, both of whichare as follows: iii – the object is unique or at least exclusive to the cultural tradition or civilization, vi – theobject is associated with events or traditions and is of exceptional importance. Some other natural andcultural sites of Ukraine also correspond to several criteria of the Convention.

Elena Belokurova, Dmitry Vorobyev, Promotion of World Heritage Values: Experiences in St. Petersburg and Other Cities of Russia

The paper reflects the experiences of the social movements, civic initiatives and NGOs in St. Petersburg and other cities of Russia as well as in some other post-Soviet countries, aimed at the promotion and raising awareness of local populations about the World Heritage value in their cities. These efforts are needed, because the outstanding universal values of the historic centres of St. Petersburg and other cities are threatened by illegal construction, misguided urban planning, neglect and a lack of public attention; churches and cultural landscapes suffer from poor restoration, development pressure and an unregulated tourism boom. These effects are often possible because the almost most local population has no knowledge about the UNESCO World Heritage status and its implications. As a result, they are not sufficiently able to speak out for the protection of their site, and do not know how the status of world cultural heritage can help them. Moreover, the population has little understanding of both the cultural value for their own community and what it means to be a World Heritage in general, leading to an insufficient realization of the potentials in the status of world cultural heritage.

Stephan Doempke, World Heritage Watch: Strategic Goals, Achievements and Challenges after Four Years

The World Heritage Committee routinely receives information about the state of conservation of WH properties from State Parties or ICOMOS orIUCN mission reports. While State Party Reports are often incomplete, outdated or even incorrect, Advisory Missions suffer from being too short and understaffed in order to fully grasp the local situation. The author will show that the observations of civil society must be brought in as checks and balances to let the WH Committee have a full understanding of the dynamics that affect World Heritage Properties. For many years, UNESCO has been requiring the participation of local communities in all procedures of the World Heritage Convention - from tentative lists and nominations to management and monitoring.

Indigenous Cultural Heritage: Developing New Approaches and Best Practices for World Heritage Based on Indigenous Perspectives and Values

In support of advancing the recognition and inclusion of Indigenous Cultural Heritage in all its diverse forms within the UNESCO World Heritage Convention and World Heritage Site designations, this paper documents and discusses the presentations, Indigenous-led Forum, and recommendations and outcomes of the International Conference on Indigenous Cultural Heritage organized by the ICOMOS International Scientific Committee on Theory and Philosophy of Restoration and Conservation in partnership with the First Nations House of Learning, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada, in November 2019.

Planned Villages as Rural Heritage in the Function of Sustainable Development: Case Study of Gornji Vrhovci in Slavonia, Croatia

Although cultural values are the subject of an increasing number of officially adopted documents, at international as well as on European level, elaborations of planned villages’ values are rare. In 1990, the term cultural landscape was confirmed in several international texts as a concept related to the protection and heritage (World Heritage Convention, 1992; Recommendation on the Integrated Conservation of Cultural Landscapes Areas as Part of Landscape Policies, 1995). From the beginning of the 21st century, the concept is dispersed into several disciplines and the focus shifts to the side of natural values, visual values of the landscape, built structure, heritage values, elaborating the concept of the cultural landscape more widely and at the same time clarifying its components more in depth. The paper analyses the values of planned rural settlements in the context of the cultural landscape and the values of the rural heritage. The importance of planned rural heritage as a tourist attraction and potential destination is examined through a spatial multi-level research of the regional area on the example of the area of Western Slavonia, Croatia. Since the middle of the 18th century, in the area of Slavonia, there is the largest number of planned and regulated villages that have been integrated into the landscape, contributing to the spatial diversity and consequently the spatial identity. Therefore, the question arises whether their planned spatial structure can be recognized as a heritage and whether this part of heritage can be used in the function of rural tourism development. This paper explores the historical urban - architectural reconstruction of the village Gornji Vrhovci (1945-1948) after its damage during World War II, and reconstruction (1995-1998) after the damage during the Homeland War. Since the architects led both reconstructions of the village, the paper explores whether the recognizable spatial structure of the village can serve as a contribution to the development of a model for the development of rural tourism. The paper concludes that, despite the need for the development of rural tourism in Croatia, the identity of spatial structures of the village are neglected by the development plans both in the sense of heritage and resource sustainable development.

Tourism and Cultural Landscapes in Southern China’s Highlands

Cultural landscapes are combined work of man and nature. In 1992, the World Heritage Convention adopted the cultural landscape in the World Heritage List. In Asia, the ongoing urbanization and rural-urban migration have threatened the continuing cultural landscapes as people leave their homes. Tourism has brought new challenges and opportunities to these areas, while its impacts on the cultural landscape are inadequately researched. This paper aims to fill the gap through case studies of two subtropical rice terraced field cultural landscapes in China’s highlands. A stakeholder approach is applied in understanding the attitudes and practices of different agents towards terraced fields and traditional villages. Mixed method research, including researching secondary materials, in-depth interviews, participant observation, and questionnaire surveys were conducted on local households and other stakeholders. The continuing urbanization process threatens the cultivation traditions by displacing agricultural livelihoods, rural-urban migration, and enabling young generations to abandon work on the farmlands. Tourism may slow down the loss of terraced fields by providing alternative opportunities and attracting people to return from the cities, while the commodification in tourism businesses also led to dramatic changes to the village landscapes. The continuing cultural landscapes are created collaboratively by people and nature, and by the collaborative practice of people. Effective management policies on cultural landscapes must put their creators and their livelihoods at the center rather than the physical manifestations. Tourism and conservation policies should evaluate the interests of all stakeholders and their behavioral consequences on cultural landscapes.

Heritage Impact Assessment, beyond an Assessment Tool: A comparative analysis of urban development impact on visual integrity in four UNESCO World Heritage Properties

Abstract Urban growth and modernisation are inevitable phenomena in the developing and developed countries, in which, cultural heritage properties as sensitive urban components may encounter irreparable losses. In the context of UNESCO World Heritage, the uprising conflict between urban development policies and heritage conservation in recent years has drawn more attention to Heritage Impact Assessment (HIA) as an assessment tool to identify and analyse human-induced impacts on cultural heritage properties by the aim of maintaining a balance between cultural heritage protection and urban development needs towards sustainability. This paper aims to review the consequence of urban development pressure on cultural World Heritage properties. It further aims to explore the role of Heritage Impact Assessment (HIA), as an assessment instrument, in recognising and analysing the potential threats in advance and in solving the potential conflicts to safeguard the heritage values. The challenge of conservation of cultural heritage within the broader urban development policies is conducted through reviewing the relevant reports and guidelines. Furthermore, a comparative analysis of four World Heritage properties, that their visual integrity has been affected by urban development projects, is carried out to show the different procedures in mitigating the impact and the role of HIA in the processes. Respectively, this paper compares two World Heritage properties of Meidan Emam (Esfahan, Iran) and Cologne Cathedral (Cologne, Germany) which faced a similar urban development threat at the same time. It further elaborates on how the state parties responded to the identical uprising conflict differently. Moreover, the two cases of Golestan Palace (Tehran, Iran) and Historic Centre of Vienna (Vienna, Austria) are reviewed to emphasise the need for multi-sectoral cooperation and capacity-building in the area of HIA, beyond its assessment methodology, to adequately manage the urban development pressure in the future.

Heritage Management at the Local Level: Heritage Communities and Role of Local Authorities

Heritage management at the local level benefits heritage properties and serves the public interest. By using comparative and interpretative analyses, we argue for the use of the “heritage community” term in current heritage management, and analyse what this expression brings for the role of local authorities. We upgrade this definition with attributes that characterize heritage communities. The paper presents the evolution of the concept of participatory heritage management in the context of the Operational Guidelines for the Implementation of the World Heritage Convention. It tests the relevance of the participatory approach in the heritage field against the theory of social systems. Conclusions comprise principles defining the role of local authorities in facilitating direct participation of heritage communities in heritage management.

Culture and Diplomacy: Maritime Cultural Heritage of the Western Indian Ocean

The article argues that UNESCO’s 1972 World Heritage Convention provides a global platform for projecting not only India’s maritime cultural heritage but also building bridges and collaborative networks with other Indian Ocean littoral countries for the promotion of shared cultural practices and traditional knowledge systems of the Indian Ocean. Unfortunately, this collaborative research aspect of the World Heritage Convention has yet to be tapped for nominating and inscribing transnational heritage or cultural routes across the Ocean. This is despite the fact that India was the founder member of the intergovernmental organisation, Indian Ocean Rim Association, one of whose thrust areas relates to promoting cultural heritage on the UNESCO platform. Given India’s rich maritime past, there is an urgent need to implement measures to establish academic networks with littoral countries for not only creating awareness of the maritime cultural heritage of the Indian Ocean but also harnessing linkages between maritime communities for building a culturally diverse but harmonious future.

Resilience and transformation of heritage sites to accommodate for loss and learning in a changing climate

The predicted increases in climate change vulnerability of heritage sites are alarming. Yet, heritage management focuses on enabling a steady state of heritage sites to ensure the continuity of values embedded within those properties. In this paper, we use the concept of resilience to demonstrate how expanding the heritage paradigm from solely a preservation perspective to one that also embraces a transformation perspective can accommodate for loss as well as promote learning. We argue that adaptation as currently conceptualized in the heritage field is limited, as it is not economically or ecologically feasible for all heritage sites or properties. When heritage properties are severely impacted by climatic events, we suggest that some remain damaged to serve as a memory of that event and the inherent vulnerabilities embedded in places. Moreover, when confronted with projected climatic impacts that exceed a financially viable threshold or ecological reality, or when rights holders or associated communities deem persistent adaptation unacceptable, we argue for transformation. We claim that transformation enables a reorganization of values focused on the discovery of future values embedded within changing associations and benefits. Therefore, we recommend that the heritage field adopts an alternative heritage policy that enables transformative continuity through applications of persistent and autonomous or anticipatory adaptation. We conclude by suggesting a pathway for such change at the international level; specifically, we call for the World Heritage Convention to develop a new grouping of sites, World Heritage Sites in Climatic Transformation.

Karst groundwater in UNESCO protected areas: a global overview

Recent studies have clarified the global distribution of carbonate and evaporite karst and global utilisation of karst waters. This study provides an initial assessment of the extent to which UNESCO protected area designations cover areas with karst (carbonate and evaporite), and hence the groundwaters that they contain. There are four UNESCO protected area designations: Biosphere Reserves (BR), Ramsar Sites (RS), UNESCO Global Geoparks (UGGp) and World Heritage Properties (WHP). Following analysis of data on the protected area websites, databases have been compiled listing sites in each category that contain, or are thought to contain, carbonate or evaporite karst. The total numbers are: 151 BR in 62 countries, total area 42,181,357 ha; 124 RS in 55 countries, total area 4,766,652 ha; 61 UGGp in 21 countries, total area 10,892,586 ha and 56 WHP in 35 countries, total area 43,478,128 ha. This list includes 32 protected areas with multiple designations and the area of overlap is estimated to be 14,684,072 ha, leaving 86,634,650 ha in 360 individual areas that may contain karst with groundwater. However, in most cases only part of each protected area is underlain by carbonate or evaporite rocks and, as the areas are sometimes reported as a core and sometimes as core+buffer, the total protected area will be less than the combined total area. There are 86 countries in which there is at least one UNESCO protected area with karst.