[Noriko Ikawa] Intangible cultural heritage protection and local development from a policy perspective
Abstract: Since the entry into force of the 2003 Convention for the Protection of Intangible Cultural Heritage (hereinafter referred to as the "Convention") in 2006, within the framework of intangible cultural heritage (hereinafter referred to as the "intangible cultural heritage"), careful use of intangible cultural heritage protection has begun to appear.
Measures to promote local economic and social development.
The Intergovernmental Committee for the Safeguarding of Intangible Cultural Heritage (hereinafter referred to as the "Committee") has been treating this issue with caution.
Initially, the committee focused mainly on the negative impact of commercialization in intangible cultural heritage protection; later, the discussion developed to recognize that the economic use of intangible cultural heritage can contribute to its sustainability, revitalization, and the economic and social development of relevant communities.
Looking back at the debates at previous Committee meetings and meetings of the Conference of States Parties to the Convention, we can gain insight into how discussions on the topic developed.
In Japan's heritage development practice, attention has been paid to integrating heritage protection with local development and laws related to cultural heritage have been gradually revised.
According to the revised law, the implementation of heritage policies is delegated to local administrative departments, and the main goal of heritage protection actions is to promote the economic and social development of various regions and local communities.
Keywords: Intergovernmental Council; commercialization; community; sustainable development; rural revitalization
The Kyrgyzstan delegation's speech at the seventh session of the Intergovernmental Committee for the Protection of Intangible Cultural Heritage was a turning point when the Committee began to accept the compatibility between the protection of intangible cultural heritage and economic and social development.
During the discussion on the nomination for the Representative List of Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity, the Kyrgyzstan delegation stated its position and opposed the review body's criticism of the country's nominated project,"Kyrgyz traditional felt carpet craftsmanship," because its protection plan included the commercialization of carpets.
The delegation believes that protecting handicrafts will inevitably be linked to commercialization and the economy of local communities.
Therefore, the delegation supported the view that economic development would not undermine the protection of intangible cultural heritage; on the contrary, it would help protect intangible cultural heritage and should be regarded as part of the sustainable development of intangible cultural heritage.
The delegation advocated that economic development should complement the protection of intangible cultural heritage.
Prior to this, most of the members of the review body were anthropologists and folklorists, and the committee has been systematically criticizing the commercial use of nominated intangible cultural heritage projects.
The reason may be that moral responsibility for "heritage" often prevents economic considerations because it can "undermine the purity of heritage." For example, Dr.
Regina Bendix believes that it is very interesting that from a cultural anthropological perspective, people continue to try to "completely separate the idealism of heritage from the economic instrumentalization."
Dr.
Richard Kurin once pointed out that although the economy plays an important role in the sustainable development of cultural traditions, the 2003 Convention for the Protection of Intangible Cultural Heritage does not clearly state the connection between the protection of intangible cultural heritage and economic and social development processes.
Before the adoption of the new chapter "Protection of Intangible Cultural Heritage and Sustainable Development at the National Level" of the Operational Guidelines for the Implementation of the Convention for the Safeguarding of Intangible Cultural Heritage in 2015, UNESCO did not have any document clarifying this important issue.
This article will first focus on the clues of discussion on intangible cultural heritage and economic issues at the meetings of the Committee and the 2003 meeting of the Assembly of States Parties to the Convention for the Protection of Intangible Cultural Heritage in order to illustrate how this discussion evolved; then, it will use Japan's handling of this issue as an example to illustrate.
Encouraged by the gradually developing national policy of using local intangible cultural heritage to revitalize rural areas, and encouraged by relevant measures from the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport, Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries and other departments, the Japanese Ministry of Culture revised the 1950 Cultural Property Protection Law.
According to the law, local traditions and folk cultural expressions can be used to promote economic and social development in relevant areas.
1.
Discussion between the Committee and the Assembly of States Parties on the development of intangible cultural heritage economy
Two years after the Convention entered into force in 2006, before including the previously announced 90 "Representative Works of Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity" into the "Representative List of Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity", the Committee over-commercialization of intangible cultural heritage projects.
and tourism development have issued warnings.
Cherif Khaznadar, Chairman of the second session of the Assembly of States Parties, delivered a speech at the opening ceremony of the third session of the Committee, warning of the possible negative impact of economic utilization on relevant representative works.
He said he had been told of three types of this "virus", such as "musealization","over-tourism development" and other "commercial activities." They have affected some previously announced "Representative Works of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity" projects.
At the fourth session of the committee, the review body once again expressed concern that excessive commercialization could distort intangible cultural heritage, drew the committee's attention to this, and stated that this economic process should be controlled by the relevant communities.
The committee then discussed and approved the content of the "Operational Guide" related to "raising awareness of intangible cultural heritage", which included provisions related to "commercial activities related to intangible cultural heritage." Although these provisions on commercial activities also recognize that commercial and trade activities can raise people's awareness of intangible cultural heritage and improve the living standards of relevant communities, they also firmly emphasize that these commercial activities and trade should not affect the nature and survival of intangible cultural heritage.
Force, relevant communities should be the main beneficiaries of these activities.
The terms also further emphasize avoiding commercial abuse, managing tourism in a sustainable manner, seeking an appropriate balance between the interests of business parties, public management and cultural practitioners, and ensuring that commercial use does not distort the meaning and purpose of intangible cultural heritage to the relevant communities.
However, concerns about the commercialization of intangible cultural heritage still exist.
During the fifth session of the committee, the review body pointed out the commercial activities included in the protection plan and reminded the committee of this.
A number of Committee members, such as the Observer States of Albania, Greece, Peru and Uruguay), believed that the inclusion of commercial items in the List, in particular allowing them to use the Convention's logo, could undermine the credibility of the Convention.
Similar situations continued to arise at the sixth session of the Committee.
The review agency once again demonstrated some cases of commercialization of intangible cultural heritage, especially regarding handicrafts.
For example, Belarus's "felt craftsmanship" and India's "traditional copperware making craftsmanship".
The review body reiterated that countries nominating projects should ensure that relevant economic measures do not affect the social functions of the project in the relevant communities and that the main beneficiaries of these activities should be the relevant communities.
But the committee also praised South Korea's "Hemashiro Heritage in the Hanshan Region" project, arguing that the inclusion of geographical indications in its conservation plan could be seen as positive commercialization.
At the seventh session of the committee, a new trend began to emerge in the way review bodies treat the commercialization of intangible cultural heritage.
During discussions on the "Kyrgyz Traditional felt carpet craftsmanship" project, the Kyrgyzstan delegation defended the criticism of its nominated project for commercialization.
They believe that handicrafts are closely linked to the local economy, economic activities will not reduce the cultural value of handicrafts, and "commercialization" should be better regarded as a "sustainable development activity." In addition, they also pointed out that "both businesses and governments can participate in the protection process through cultural tourism, museums and handicraft development, and cultural and economic issues are complementary." The delegation of Morocco responded to this statement and believed that it was a recurring issue and that the Committee therefore needed to clarify its position.
The delegation of Belgium further stated that the Operational Guide needed to include constructive guidance on how to address the relationship between protection, economic areas and sustainable development.
The delegation of Brazil stated that encouraging handicraft production could develop a creative economy and that marketing should be regarded as a reasonable protective measure.
The Spanish delegation added: "The issues of commercialization and protection should be approached in a coordinated manner, rather than putting commercialization and protection in confrontation." Based on these discussions, the Committee requested the Secretariat of the Convention to elaborate on the provisions related to the commercialization of intangible cultural heritage and to present draft recommendations on commercialization and sustainable development in the Operational Guide at the next session.
At its eighth session, the Commission established a separate agenda dedicated to the relationship between conservation, commercialization and sustainable development.
After recalling the views expressed by the Committee on this point at its previous session, the Secretariat stated that the relevant document recommended amending articles 116 and 117 of the Operational Guide only within the framework of the chapter on "Awareness raising" because the complexity of the issue goes far beyond this topic.
They suggested adding a new chapter to the "Business Guide" focusing on "protecting intangible cultural heritage and sustainable development at the national level", while the contribution of intangible cultural heritage to the creative economy and commercialization issues could be discussed in its chapters.
This recommendation provides an excellent opportunity for the Convention Secretariat to launch a new initiative to link intangible cultural heritage with sustainable development to fill the gaps identified in previous internal oversight and evaluation reports.
The report pointed out that regrettably, the Convention does not state whether or how intangible cultural heritage is compatible with sustainable development, and the Operational Guidelines do not explain how intangible cultural heritage can promote sustainable development.
In addition, the report recommends actions to follow the views expressed in periodic reports submitted by countries and different stakeholders, which largely recognize the full contribution of intangible cultural heritage to sustainable development, especially the economic contribution of participating communities.
As further reasons, the Convention secretariat also recalled a proposal made at the Chengdu meeting.
In September 2015,"Changing Our World: The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development" was adopted at the United Nations Summit on Sustainable Development.
All United Nations agencies and Member States should be consistent with the principles contained in the "2030 Agenda" when formulating their policies.
In June 2015, the UNESCO World Heritage Conference also adopted the Policy to Integrate the Vision of Sustainable Development into the World Heritage Convention Process.
The document also prompted the committee to draft a similar document.
The timetable proposed by the Convention Secretariat is to organize an expert meeting in 2014 to draft a new chapter of the Operational Guide; submit a draft of the new chapter at the tenth session of the Committee in 2015; and submit it to the sixth session of the Conference of States Parties in 2016.
The Committee adopted the timetable of the Convention Secretariat.
At the ninth session of the Committee, the first draft of the new chapter of the Operational Guidelines,"Protection of Intangible Cultural Heritage and Sustainable Development at the National Level", drafted by an expert meeting held in Turkey in September 2014, was discussed.
The draft includes four elements: "inclusive social development","inclusive economic development","sustainable environmental development" and "peace and security".
During the discussion, the delegations of Belgium and Afghanistan raised clarifications on the concept of sustainable development.
The delegation of Saint Lucia is cautious about the possibility that sustainable development will be overemphasized to the detriment of the protection of intangible cultural heritage.
The Morocco delegation pointed out that the relationship between intangible cultural heritage and sustainable development goes far beyond the economic level, and also includes health, environment, society and culture.
It is worth noting that while the review body continues to express caution about the economic use of intangible cultural heritage, many of the nominations in 2015 linked their protection plans to sustainable development in general, especially economic development of intangible cultural heritage in a positive manner.
The committee decided to submit the draft new chapter of the "Business Guide" to the tenth session of the committee in 2015.
2015 is a historic year for the entire United Nations system.
The "2030 Agenda" is the development agenda after 2015 adopted by the United Nations General Assembly.
The agenda adopts 17 sustainable development goals and the basic principles of respect for human rights, equality and sustainability, forming an action plan to respond to the three aspects of sustainable development: economic, social and environmental.
After lengthy discussions, the 10th session of the Committee adopted the draft of a new chapter 6 of the "Operational Guidelines","Protection of Intangible Cultural Heritage and Sustainable Development at the National Level." South Korea proposed that due to the policy nature of the draft text, it should appear as an appendix to the Operational Guide rather than a separate chapter; otherwise, there was no other substantive discussion in this committee.
The Committee decided to submit a new chapter of the Operational Guide to the sixth session of the Conference of States Parties in June 2016.
At the sixth session of the Conference of States Parties, the States parties to the Convention reviewed the new draft chapter 6,"Protection of Intangible Cultural Heritage and Sustainable Development at the National Level", and reviewed a total of 27 articles paragraph by paragraph.
At the beginning of the discussion, States parties seemed to generally agree on the draft text that included four subchapters: "Inclusive social development","Inclusive economic development","Sustainable development of the environment" and "Peace and security".
However, some countries, especially those in Latin America and the Caribbean, are dissatisfied with the text proposed by the secretariat of the Convention and even try to deny the initiative of the secretariat to add a chapter on intangible cultural heritage and sustainable development.
Brazil criticized the "lack of harmony" between the text structure of the draft and the structure of United Nations documents.
The main argument is that the content related to "peace and security" in the fourth chapter of the draft text is not included in the United Nations "2030 Agenda".
The "2030 Agenda" includes only three pillars of economic, social and environmental development.
Although the United Nations document mentions "peace and security" in its preamble as a cross-cutting theme that promotes sustainable development, the Brazilian delegation stated that because "peace and security" is a complex political issue, the content on "peace and security" in the fourth chapter of the Operational Guide should be deleted.
A number of countries in Latin America and the Caribbean, as well as countries such as the Philippines, Palestine, Algeria, Egypt and Portugal, agreed with Brazil that in fact "peace and security" are not the goal of the Convention.
However, most States parties, including Latvia, Norway, Sweden, Italy, France, Greece, Cyprus, Morocco, and Senegal, prefer to retain the text of Chapter 4,"Peace and Security," in its original form.
When discussing the theme of "inclusive social development", the Brazilian delegation once again raised its objection.
They argued that since the goal of the Convention is not to solve very difficult and complex issues such as health care, food security, quality education and safe water, but to adapt and coordinate the Convention with the concerns in the 2030 Agenda, the use of language should not be arbitrary and prescriptive, such as including terms such as "must").
After two days of lengthy debate and many revisions, all 27 articles to be added to Chapter 6 of the Operational Guide were adopted.
However, when adopting the overall revised draft of the Operational Guide, countries such as India, the Philippines, Palestine, Brazil, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Egypt, Colombia, and Portugal also questioned whether the document should be included in the Operational Guide.
Take documents similar to the World Heritage Convention as an example.
They are called "policy documents" and are not included in the "Operational Guidelines for the Implementation of the World Heritage Convention".
These delegations called on UNESCO's legal advisers to express their opinion on the applicability of the Operational Guide, including these 27 provisions.
After confirmation by the UNESCO Legal Office, the "Revision of the Operational Guide" was finally adopted after two and a half days of heated debate on the agenda.Among the four pillars of the document, the second pillar, namely "Inclusive Economic Development", includes three aspects under the provisions: "Income generation and sustainable living","Productive employment and decent work","Tourism's impact on intangible cultural heritage, and the impact of intangible cultural heritage on tourism."
2.
Japan's cultural heritage protection policies and development
Japan's protection policy on intangible cultural heritage has mainly gone through three stages, and the 2018 revision of the Cultural Property Protection Law can be regarded as the beginning of the fourth stage.
The first phase began with the promulgation of the Cultural Property Protection Law in 1950, covering tangible and intangible cultural property.
The revision of the law in 1954 created the "National Treasure on Earth" system.
The concept of cultural heritage protection contained therein was developed based on the material cultural heritage protection model.
It is characterized by the state protecting cultural heritage through a process of choice.
Cultural heritage that can benefit from national conservation actions is material and intangible heritage that meets the standards of aesthetic and historical value.
The second stage began with the revision of the Cultural Property Protection Law in 1974.
The revised law also regards expressions of folk culture as cultural heritage, which expands the scope of national protection to folk cultural property.
The third stage occurred in the 1990s and early 21st century.
At that time, Japan introduced a new policy that linked cultural heritage protection to economic and social development in rural areas.
Since the 1990s, economic stagnation in rural areas of Japan has been more serious than in urban areas due to the decline of local industries and the resulting outflow of people.
In this case, the survival of folk cultural expressions in these areas is also threatened.
Some departments are the first to try to protect these folk cultural expressions, including traditional and religious festivals, local diets and local handicrafts, in order to use them to promote tourism development and promote regional economic and social development.
In 1992, at the initiative of the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism, a law was enacted on revitalizing local culture and promoting the spread of traditional culture in various regions, often known as the "Festival Law".
This marks the first attempt to shift cultural heritage protection policies to allow decentralized management of the revitalization of folk cultural expressions and handicrafts.
Before that, it was only to protect the expressions of folk culture chosen by the country.
In 1999, the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries also promulgated the Basic Law on Food, Agriculture and Rural Affairs, recognizing that one of the functions of agriculture is to respect cultural traditions.
Under this law, local agricultural traditions, including eating styles, are protected, revitalized and promoted.
The Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Transport, the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry, etc.
have also promoted regional revitalization strategies by revitalizing and developing local cultural and historical heritage.
Perhaps inspired by the above measures, the Japan Agency of Culture formulated the "Hometown Cultural Regeneration Project" plan in 2001.
Under the plan, the Department of Culture provides subsidies to master plans submitted by local governments to revitalize and protect expressions of folk culture, such as local festivals, local traditions or folk performing arts.
Master plans generally include revitalizing folk cultural expressions by training new generations; providing costumes, masks and other necessary equipment to allow local cultural traditions to be passed on; and producing audio-visual documents.
The innovation of the plan is that it can subsidize related protection activities for folk cultural expressions that are not designated by the state as "important intangible folk cultural assets." In 2001, all 47 first-level administrative districts across Japan submitted master plans, and each administrative district received a subsidy of approximately US$900,000 to protect and revitalize traditional and folk cultural expressions.
Among them, the vast majority belong to folk performing arts; followed by traditional handicrafts, festivals, rituals and customs.
As protection measures, many plans propose the revitalization and dissemination of traditional and folk cultural expressions.
Unfortunately, however, most master plans focus only on heritage protection plans and do not extend them to the economic revitalization of villages, towns and cities.
The reason seems to be that neither central government officials nor local governments understand the purpose of the new plan and the new concept of decentralized management.
Encouraged by government initiatives to use traditional and folk cultural expressions to promote tourism, many regions have promoted the development of local festivals and traditional performances, especially those hoping to attract tourists to remote areas.
However, not all communities or villages accept these initiatives.
Taketomi), a remote island in the Yaeyama Islands, has a "seed harvesting ceremony" that is an important annual ceremony or festival for residents.
Over a week-long period, local residents will hold more than 70 traditional rituals, dramas, dances and music performances during the worship activities.
This event has been recognized as Japan's "important intangible folk cultural property." The island's economy relies entirely on tourism, and tourists from Japan and Europe like to come here to admire the beautiful traditional buildings, streets and white sandy beaches.
However, residents of Taketomi Island stop all tourism activities and close all hotels, inns, shops and restaurants on the island during the festival every year.
Residents are all devoted to the festival and worship activities.
This is an example of a local community suspending tourism for one week of the year in order to host an annual festival.
Because despite the extensive development of tourism, strong local spiritual traditions still exist.
Another case is that with the support of local government policies, the remote village of Hijeki in northern Japan was transformed from an isolated village into a tourist village.
Villagers are accustomed to performing local traditional kabuki in the courtyard of the shrine to express their respect for the gods.
Folklorists spoke highly of these performances.
However, it was not until 1999 that the villagers agreed to include kabuki as an "important intangible folk cultural property" and accepted state funding for kabuki protection.
At one point, tourists wanted them to perform at the village's cultural center, but the villagers refused.
Apparently, they believed that performing to tourists would change its nature.
They were required to perform to foreign audiences outside the shrine; previously, they had performed at shrine venues for the local public, who, like them, were believers and in some cases participated in prayers.
This is another example of how community members decide how to revitalize cultural traditions and for whom.
However, both cases are exceptions; most communities tend to succumb to pressure from local governments or economic developers to put their traditions and folk performances at the service of tourism.
Today, the most critical measure needed should be to raise awareness among community members and let them decide how to revitalize their traditional cultural expressions.
In order to achieve this goal, community members must have the right to make their own decisions.
To this end, cultural intermediaries or cultural brokers, such as folklore and anthropologists and other cultural workers, can assist them.
After the above-mentioned departments adopted a number of measures to use cultural heritage to revitalize rural areas, especially in poverty-stricken areas, from the perspective of economic, social and cultural development, the Japan Agency of Culture revised the Cultural Property Protection Law in 2018.
This revision is a major change in cultural heritage policy and marks the fourth stage of the development of Japan's intangible cultural heritage protection policy, because it focuses more on the revitalization, promotion and development of heritage rather than on protection itself.
The revised law aims to revitalize various regions in Japan, especially rural areas, which have been plagued by economic stagnation and population loss.
The main feature of this shift is the delegation of inheritance management power from the central to local governments.
First-level administrative regions will formulate their own cultural heritage development strategies, and local governments will draft master plans to revitalize and utilize cultural heritage to promote local economic and social development.
Upon approval, the central government will subsidize the implementation of plans to protect and utilize cultural heritage, including tangible and intangible heritage, regardless of whether it is recognized as important cultural property.
It is understood that Hiraizumi, a world cultural heritage site, is carrying out a master plan to build a children's playground on the ruins of a 12th-century palace.
III.
Conclusion
Since the Convention entered into force in 2006, the Committee has been cautiously discussing the protection of intangible cultural heritage and its economic utilization.
At the four committee meetings from 2008 to 2011, the institutions that reviewed the nomination project documents held a negative attitude towards the commercialization of intangible cultural heritage.
They were deeply concerned about the adverse impact of commercialization on intangible cultural heritage projects and their communities of practice.
During each meeting, the review body reported to the committee that their members were indignant about the business factors contained in some of the nominated projects.
However, subsequent discussions gradually progressed to recognizing that the economic use of intangible cultural heritage can contribute to its sustainability, revitalization, and the economic and social development of relevant communities.
Of course, there is a prerequisite for this, which is to take some necessary measures to mitigate the adverse impact of economic activities on intangible cultural heritage projects and related communities.
Even during recent committee meetings, review bodies mentioned cases where listings were not recommended, where nomination documents contained over-commercial content but did not indicate how to deal with such negative effects.
Regina Bendix predicted in 2009 that the economic use of heritage should not be ignored "because of its impact on the role of heritage in the discourse of identity." When the United Nations began discussing the Sustainable Development Goals of the 2030 Agenda in 2015, the theme became even more important for the committee.
However, it is a long process for the committee to accept the connection between intangible cultural heritage and economic and social development.
The adoption by the Conference of States Parties of the new chapter of the Operational Guidelines,"Protecting Intangible Cultural Heritage and Sustainable Development at the National Level", is a very tortuous process.
As far as Japan is concerned, it is worth noting that other departments other than the Department of Culture have adopted new policies that combine heritage protection with rural development; while the Department of Culture's policy focus is on protecting cultural heritage itself and protecting the heritage designated by the country as "important intangible folk cultural property".
This may be because the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Transport and the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries are closer to rural communities, and they understand better that the livelihoods of practitioners of these folk cultural expressions need to be ensured first in order to ensure the vitality of cultural heritage.
Most importantly, all stakeholders, especially community members who own and practice local cultural heritage, fully understand the issues involved in the 2018 amendment to the Protection of Cultural Property Law, which will allow them to decide how to achieve the revitalization of cultural heritage.
The revised law officially came into effect in April 2019.
It is hoped that Japan's local communities will have enough power to dispose of their cultural assets and use them for their own needs; and that their heritage will not fall victim to "viruses" such as "musealization,""overexploitation of tourism" or other "commercial activities" warned by Sharif Kaznadal.
(This article was published in "Folk Customs Research", No.
1, 2020.
The annotations are omitted.
See the original issue for details)