Processuality And Relationality

Since the adoption of the Convention Concerning the Protection of the World Cultural and Natural Heritage in 1972,World Heritage has continued to evolve and has far-reaching effects,and is regarded as UNESCO’s flagship programme.After fifty years,the global World Heritage enterprise has not only been successful in protecting and managing heritage items of outstanding universal value,but has also been involved in a range of social issues such as national identity,international competition,regional conflicts,tourism development and climate change.Most studies on World Heritage are oriented towards the historical development of the rules,guidelines and concepts related to World Heritage or the practical issues of conservation,management and tourism.In order to understand World Heritage in its entirety,it is necessary to disentangle,observe and analyse the processes and relationships involved in the making of World Heritage.This study is to take the process and relational approach as the research path,to draw on interdisciplinary research horizons,and to combine typical examples of World Heritage sites in China and abroad to understand and consider World Heritage in a comprehensive and in-depth manner.World Heritage is a process rather than an outcome,and therefore institutional and structural analyses are not sufficient.A processual study of World Heritage requires a constant emphasis on contingency and unpredictability,while at the same time tracking in real time the exact course of key points to write a picture of the continuity and iterative change of World Heritage.Firstly,the processual ity of World Heritage means that World Heritage is a historical concept and phenomenon,i.e.it has grown out of the European civilizational tradition,and its eventual institutionalization is closely linked to the wars and conflicts of the first half of the 20th century.Since its inception,its heritage typology,value criteria,practical guidelines and theoretical interpretations have also evolved in the course of globalised applications.Secondly,the processuality of World Heritage implies a process of generation from scratch,from local to international,where for something to have certain cherished values and thus gain entry into the heritage framework and eligibility for protection is the first step towards becoming a World Heritage site,followed by the processes,procedures and steps to gain World Heritage status through inscription,and finally the complex development dilemmas faced after becoming a World Heritage site.Many controversial events,moments and actions are latent in the making of World Heritage.The complex web of relationships that are constantly entering and exiting the World Heritage Site makes it necessary to write about the many actors involved in the World Heritage Site and the negotiations,dialogues and communications between them.Since its inception,the number of relational subjects and chains of relationships involved in World Heritage has been increasing.In summary,the relationality of World Heritage is centred on three aspects:firstly,the entanglement between the ontological and the superficial.At the ontological level,World Heritage refers to monuments and buildings that derive from the past and have outstanding universal value,but the extrinsic value of heritage is given and is closely linked to the collective aspirations and intentions of the actors in the present.World heritage thus exists both as an objectively existing social phenomenon and as a layer of theoretical doctrine and academic hypothesis for examining the phenomenon of world heritage.Secondly,the dilemma of the relationship between place,nation and world.World Heritage is a rather fractured existence;geographically and in reality,World Heritage has been an important part of the local community from the beginning;in terms of ownership,World Heritage,as a resource within the territory of China,belongs to the state;at the same time,when it has World Heritage status,its value is universal and its importance is directed towards all humanity.These three levels of capture of different aspects of the World Heritage Site are tearing and pulling the World Heritage Site’s network of relationships,which is destined to keep the World Heritage Site in the vortex of controversy.In the pre-,mid-and post-World Heritage phases,the overall picture of World Heritage is linked by free and strategic stakeholders,each with their demands and objectives,but all working together under institutionalised rules.It is through the involvement of stakeholders that we see the vibrancy and vitality behind the scenes of World Heritage,and this stakeholder-driven narrative of World Heritage is very different from the rigid and institutionalised narrative.Moreover,this acknowledgement of stakeholders implies openness and transcendence of World Heritage processes and relationships,which allows for narratives that transcend time and space.The processuality and relationality of World Heritage are interrelated research concepts and pathways,with relations growing and interweaving within processes,and the continuity and iteration of processes benefiting from the construction of relations.This paper intends to reveal the relationship between local,national and global processes through the process of becoming a World Heritage Site,and in doing so,to explore how World Heritage is transformed and its social and material consequences.It is within the World Heritage process that the relationships between elements such as heritage,actors,governments,institutions,scholars,communities,international organisations,and the environment,as well as the ideological and epistemological structures that inspire and give them meaning,are highlighted.Furthermore,the various types of actors involved in the World Heritage process not only represent certain attitudes between subjects and heritage,but also constitute the dynamics of change that alter particular things and trends.The discovery of the power of actors largely corrects the structural and institutional analyses of institutionalised rules only,offering dynamic possibilities not only for process studies but also for relational networks of interaction.