HERITAGE

Learning Objectives

1. To understand the broad meaning of the term ‘heritage’ and the differentiation between tangible and intangible heritage.

2. To understand heritage in the context of development, and the opportunities that it offers in connection with territory, resources and knowledge transfer.

3. To recognise the cultural and symbolic importance of cultural heritage, and understand how this is threatened in conflict and disaster scenarios.

CHALLENGING PRACTICE: MODULE HANDBOOK

Understanding Heritage

Heritage as a concept has developed significantly over the last century. It is understood as a wide idea that relates to those human and natural realities that connect our past to our future, including the meanings and uses we extract from them. Those realities can be tangible or intangible, that is, they can be part of our natural and man-made physical inheritance; or part of our habits, ideas, beliefs or traditions. They have been passed on to us and are integral elements of our culture and environment that hold value and significance for communities at local, regional or global levels. Therefore we intend to safeguard them for future generations.

In the 19th century, owing to the acceleration of industrial and political development, various categories of cultural and natural heritage were created. Initially reserved for emblematic objects, buildings and other artifacts; the meaning of ‘heritage’ was highly symbolic for national identity. The identification and care of classified objects was the subject of national movements starting in a few European countries. The emergence of the idea of heritage is now directly associated with conservation, as well as with protection and respect during conflicts and disasters. Heritage has more recently been categorised as both tangible and intangible. (UNESCO, 1972)

The links between the built environment and heritage are strong. Beyond contexts marked by heritage buildings and landscapes, there are multiple forms of intangible heritage and cultural manifestations that can strongly influence the environment.

As built environment practitioners, it is worth recognising the role that heritage can play for local communities. It is strongly linked to the sense of identify of a place, but the relevance is much wider. The broad framing of heritage, firmly linked to culture, is manifested for example in cultural expressions that take place and are rooted in public and open spaces; in the local understanding and management of the natural environment; or in construction tradition and use of available resources. Increasingly, we are interested in understanding these knowledge and practices as they not only embody significance and value for people and can foster bond and strengthen communities, but they offer insight and inspiration for a more sustainable built environment. Heritage can be seen not only as something to respect and preserve, but as a valuable resource that has an active part in the future of communities.

International policy framework

International charters, declarations and conventions have provided principles for the protection of heritage since the mid-twentieth century, including in the event of armed conflict. The 1972 UNESCO World Heritage Convention, which enjoys the largest international support, fosters the protection of natural and cultural heritage and emphasises the interconnection between them. (UNESCO, 1972) The definition of cultural heritage in this convention concerns only tangible heritage, focusing on monuments, groups of buildings, or sites with outstanding universal value of a historic, artistic, scientific, aesthetic, ethnological or anthropological nature.

This definition of heritage was reliant on top-down value recognition and left out many forms of cultural manifestation. The UNESCO 2003 Intangible Heritage Convention indicated a major shift in the recognition of heritage, defining ‘intangible heritage’ as “the practices, representations, expressions, knowledge, skills – as well as the instruments, objects, artefacts and cultural spaces associated therewith-that communities, groups and, in some cases, individuals recognize as part of their cultural heritage”. (UNESCO, 2003) Besides broadening the scope of heritage protection, this convention introduces another important element: the role of communities and groups in recognising their own heritage.

The UNESCO 2005 Convention on the Protection and Promotion of the Diversity of Cultural Expressions signifies the latest major recognition by the international community of the universal value of culture.

Notwithstanding these international agreements, there are countries where heritage policy and governance is limited. In these contexts, heritage awareness becomes crucial to ensuring that it is considered fairly.

Values and significance

The recognition of the role of communities in defining the value and significance of their own heritage means that heritage is no longer subject to static or objective evaluations, commonly provided by experts. It has become a dynamic process closely linked to people’s engagement and appreciation. This means that top-down approaches (experts’ opinions) must be combined with bottom-up approaches (community participation in valuation processes), which in practice is still a challenge. Advocacy remains essential for raising awareness of the value of heritage. [See module 11. Participation]

Heritage, Sustainability and Development

Heritage has not played a significant role in international development in the past. International development agendas have prioritised physiological needs and safety, leaving out references to safeguarding heritage e.g. Millennium Development Goals (UN, 2000). Viewed via a hierarchical system of needs, heritage can easily be seen as a luxury. This approach risks not recognising the cultural subjectivities of aid receivers. (Basu and Modest, 2015) Furthermore, by excluding heritage from international development efforts, it can become a luxury only accessible to wealthier countries.

Engagement with heritage in development contexts has been further contested by some who consider it elitist or divisive. The shift from top-down to bottom-up recognition of heritage, promoted by UNESCO’s most recent declarations, promotes the democratisation of heritage, which is no longer exclusively for the educated or wealthy. Nonetheless, education and awareness remain essential for preventing manipulative uses of heritage to differentiate and exclude.

With global development incessantly pursuing economic growth, culture becomes increasingly relevant as a response to globalisation. Arguments to recognise culture as a fourth pillar of sustainable development have grown since the start of the 21st century, resulting in culture gaining weight as an agent of change. (Wiktor-Mach, 2019)

The UN 2013 Resolution on Culture and Sustainable Development “Recognizes the role of culture as an enabler of sustainable development that provides peoples and communities with a strong sense of identity and social cohesion and contributes to more effective and sustainable development policies and measures at all levels, and stresses in this regard that policies responsive to cultural contexts can yield better, sustainable, inclusive and equitable development outcomes”. (UN General Assembly, 2014)

UNESCO’s approach to heritage is articulated in The Power of Culture for Development which responds to the MDGs by identifying culture as a vehicle for economic development, social cohesion and stability, environmental sustainability, and community resilience. (UNESCO, 2010)

Heritage in Urban Development

The most significant progress in integrating heritage in processes of development has been achieved with relation to urban contexts. The Sustainable Development Goals, for the first time, make direct reference to the safeguarding of heritage under SDG 11, Sustainable Cities and Communities. Stating that to make human settlements inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable it is necessary to “strengthen efforts to protect and safeguard the world’s cultural and natural heritage”. (UN General Assembly, 2015)

This followed the UNESCO Recommendation on the Historic Urban Landscape that sees heritage as a social, cultural and economic asset and advocates for an integration of heritage policies into wider development goals for culturallysensitive urban development. (UNESCO, 2019)

The need to safeguard heritage is also acknowledged in the New Urban Agenda, emphasising the role heritage plays in “rehabilitating and revitalising urban areas and in strengthening social participation and the exercise of citizenship”. (UN-Habitat, 2016)

The discourse linking heritage and development continues to evolve, with recent efforts focusing on the place of heritage in meeting the SDGs. (see for example: UNESCO, 2018).