ABSTRACT

The introduction of cultural landscapes within the framework of the 1972 UNESCO World Heritage Convention is widely hailed as a landmark achievement. While it is often described as a boon for the recognition of non-European cultural heritage, we show that this is largely a myth. In the drawn-out gestation process, European countries’ listing ambitions were crucial, and topics such as Indigenous sites were brought up by the Global North while a concern for, as well as representatives from, the Global South were largely absent. Introducing the category in 1992 significantly broadened the types of acceptable sites, but European countries continued to dominate just like for other cultural heritage, filling the World Heritage List with vineyard landscapes rather than the sacred mountains that were first inscribed. European states also eagerly used extra nomination slots for cultural landscapes while non-European List leaders prioritised natural heritage and the conventional cultural heritage they had not yet exhausted instead. Moreover, non-European cultural landscapes have struggled to gain expert approval, as is demonstrated for African nominations. The mere introduction of a new heritage category thus does not suffice to alter a dynamic more than ever determined by national self-interests.

摘要

在 1972 年联合国教科文组织世界遗产公约框架内引入文化景观被广泛誉为具有里程碑意义的成就。虽然它经常被描述为承认非欧洲文化遗产的福音，但我们表明这在很大程度上是一个神话。在漫长的酝酿过程中，欧洲国家的上市雄心至关重要，土著遗址等话题是由全球北方提出的，而对全球南方的关注以及来自全球南方的代表基本上没有。1992 年引入该类别显着扩大了可接受的遗址类型，但欧洲国家继续像其他文化遗产一样占据主导地位，在世界遗产名录中填满了葡萄园景观，而不是最初被列入名录的圣山。欧洲国家也急切地为文化景观使用了额外的提名名额，而非欧洲名单的领导人则优先考虑自然遗产和他们尚未用尽的传统文化遗产。此外，非欧洲文化景观一直难以获得专家的认可，非洲提名就证明了这一点。因此，仅仅引入一个新的遗产类别并不足以改变由国家自身利益决定的动态。