The Importance of Cultural Heritage

The Blue Shield’s work is founded on the belief that cultural heritage – tangible and intangible - is important. It is a vital expression of the culture that makes up unique communities and its loss during conflict and disaster can be catastrophic.

a large stone bridge with a mountain in the background and buildings with people standing on the bridge

“Why do we feel more pain looking at the image of the destroyed bridge than the image of massacred people? Perhaps because we see our own mortality in the collapse of the bridge. We expect people to die; we count on our lives to end. The destruction of a monument to civilisation is something else. The bridge in all its beauty and grace was built to outline us; it was an attempt to grasp eternity … A dead woman is one of us – but the bridge is all of us forever.”
Croatian writer Slavenka Drauliç
(in Bevan (2006): The Destruction of Memory. Reaktion Books; 26)

Stari Most Bridge, Mostar, before destruction © Zoran Kurelić Rabko, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Cultural heritage is the heritage we have inherited: our legacy, our memories, physical places, objects and intangible beliefs and practices, and so much more. Intangible heritage can often be associated with particular tangible cultural heritage. For example, placing poppies on a war memorial is a practice commemorating an event, but it takes place at a physical location. In Australia, many aboriginal groups have detailed practices passed down for many generations which are integral components of places in the landscape. Our heritage – physical and non-physical – is an important part of who we are and what we identify with, for individuals and communities.

a hilly field with a wall running along the hills, and a large tree in a dip in the hills by the wall, and a cloudy blue sky

Sycamore Gap, on Hadrian's Wall World Heritage Site, 8 October 2020. When the tree was deliberately cut down in 2023 in an act of vandalism, there was a national outcry. © Clementp.fr, CC By-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

This cultural identity relies on the memory of communities and individuals: it is key to identity, well-being, decisions and actions. Although memories are not always positive, and can be contested, they are an integral part of individuals, communities and societies. Cultural property is a powerful tool in determining what is remembered – and what is forgotten or obscured. For example, after conflicts and disasters, buildings can provide visible symbols of who is given priority in rebuilding if the community is divided – or who is not given permission at all.

Blue Shield strives to prevent the loss of heritage to communities, recognising that it is a fundamental part of their wellbeing. There are seven key reasons for this.

Cultural/society

Cultural property is central to the cultural and social life of communities and at a national level is frequently used as the ‘stage’ for aspects of intangible cultural heritage (for example, national ceremonies often take place at historic buildings). There can, of course, be ‘negative’ issues involved in these associations of tangible and intangible heritage: ISIS used the Roman Theatre at the World Heritage site of Palmyra for mass executions in 2016. More frequently, however, cultural property helps preserve national and local traditions and culture while helping to build a community’s association with its heritage, and creating identity.

Political uses

Cultural property is often used for political ends. Saddam Hussein deliberately linked himself to ancient Assyrian kings to legitimise his reign, building a palace at the ancient site of Babylon, and inscribing his name on the ancient bricks. It can even act as a catalyst for conflict: Nelson’s Column in Dublin, Ireland, was deliberately bombed in 1966 because of its colonial associations. More positively, cultural property can become a tool to promote mutual recognition and reconciliation through a shared, accepted, memory of a common (or difficult) past. Following the difficulties the Spanish people experienced in reconciling their memories of a bitter civil war, the Spanish government declared 2006 a Year of Memory, and worked hard to try and reconcile the memories and the fallen of both sides.

a bronze statue of a man in a room lying on its back with red paint on it

Defaced Colston statue at the M Shed museum, Bristol.
Colston was a senior executive of the Royal African Company who organised the Atlantic slave trade. Proceeds from that trade contributed to his philanthropic works, and a statue was erected to commemorate that, which was designated a Grade II listed structure in 1977. On 7 June 2020, the statue was toppled, defaced, and pushed into Bristol Harbour during the George Floyd protests related to the Black Lives Matter movement, before eventually being moved to the M Shed Museum. © Adrian Boliston, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons

international humanitarian rights

In addition to its position under IHL, the right to access and enjoy cultural heritage is guaranteed under International Human Rights Law, in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. This includes the right to understand, visit, make use of, maintain, exchange elements of, and develop cultural heritage, as well as to benefit from your cultural heritage and others’, and has been interpreted as an obligation to design and implement preservation and safeguarding policies and programmes. This view was supported by Resolution 33/20 on Cultural Rights and the Protection of Cultural Heritage adopted by the UN Human Rights Council in 2016.

international humanitarian law

Cultural property protection during armed conflict is an obligation under international humanitarian law (IHL). In addition to the 1954 Hague Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property in Armed Conflict and its 2 Protocols, cultural property protection is an explicit part of the 1977 Additional Protocol I to the 1949 Geneva Conventions, and the 1998 Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, which includes destruction of historic monuments and religious buildings as war crimes. The Blue Shield has a role to play in debating the balance of military necessity (as defined in IHL) and humanity in each and every armed conflict, all of which will be unique, not least in terms of the military means and methods employed.

A series of white stone tablets with writing on them. The first one clearly says

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights in monumental form at the Anne Frank Human Rights Memorial in Boise, Idaho is one of the few places on the planet where the complete text is on permanent public display. © Kencf0618, 14 May 2017, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

medical/wellbeing

Research suggests there is a relationship between historic environments and an individual’s ‘wellbeing’. Those who live in historic environments appear to have higher ‘social capital’ - a term which refers to benefits in terms of wellbeing, good health and civil engagement. Research also suggests that such communities tend to be more cohesive and, it has been suggested, tend to be less expensive medically to look after.

sustainable economic development

Tourism is one of the world’s fastest growing industries. A desire to see other people’s culture and heritage is a major element of tourism and in many countries is a large part of a tourism industry that provides a significant proportion of the national economy. Cultural property protection is an important element in protecting individual livelihoods, the national economy, and security.

Academic value

Access to cultural property is critical to our study and understanding of both past and contemporary culture and of what it means to be human. Regardless of whether cultural property is claimed by only a small community or is considered to have value for the whole of humanity, if the physical evidence of past and contemporary culture does not exist, or if the community remembering intangible cultural heritage has been destroyed, a vital element in our ability to understand human society and development has been lost, and with it, a vital piece of who we are.

References for Political Uses:
- Read about the bombing of Nelson Pillar on the Old Dublin Town website.
- Read about the Year of the Memory in the Independent Newspaper, or if you have any academic library access, read work by Dr Dacia Viejo-Rose.

References for International Humanitarian Law:
- Read more about Customary Law, the Geneva Conventions, and Military Necessity in the Law Library of the BSI website.

References for International Human Rights Law:
- Read more about the Cultural Heritage and International Human Rights Law (IHRL) in the Law Library of the BSI website.
- Read more about the work of the United Nation's Special Rapporteur in the Field of Cultural Rights on the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights website.

References for Medical/Wellbeing:
- See examples on the Museums and Wellbeing Alliance blog, or read this research by Professor Chaterjee.

References for Sustainable Economic Development:
- Read more about how cultural heritage relates to sustainable development in the International Initiatives Section of the BSI website.