Shared Responsibility – A Guiding Principle of the World Heritage Convention – Perception – Implementation – Future

Abstract

Responsibility is a central category required for the protection of human heritage. But what does responsibility mean for the protection of our heritage today? Who was and is responsible for which form of responsibility, and how is it communicated? These central questions are derived from the theoretical basis of Hans Jonas’ approach to our ethical responsibility for the consequences of technological development and Max Weber’s approach to our political responsibility, which arises from the role of the state as a legitimised system of rule. Last but not least, reference is made to Hannah Arendt, who argues for individual human responsibility based on human morality. For the learning of responsibility and its implementation, reference is made to education on the basis of international conventions.

1 Introduction

The text of this chapter is translated with Deepl. Translator (n.d.). Retrieved June 5, 2021 from https://www.deepl.com/translator#de/en/. Manual editing by the author.

“…since wars begin in the minds of men, it is in the minds of men that the defences of peace must be constructed” (UNESCO, 1945, Preamble). This is the most important message of the UNESCO Constitution, signed on 16 November 1945. It is the most fundamental declaration of the responsibility that the international community assumes for achieving peace in the world. The status of the legal, organisational and financial independence of UNESCO as the representative organisation of the people of the world as well as its tasks, competences and responsibilities are defined in article 63 of the Charter of the United Nations (UN), which was adopted on 26 July 1945.

In its introductory statement, the following is stated:

We the peoples of the United Nations determined to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war, which twice in our lifetime has brought untold sorrow to mankind, and to reaffirm faith in fundamental human rights, in the dignity and worth of the human person, in the equal rights of men and women and of nations large and small, and to establish conditions under which justice and respect for the obligations arising from treaties and other sources of international law can be maintained, and to promote social progress and better standards of life in larger freedom. (U.N. Charter, intro)

As formulated in the UN Charter, the attribution of responsibility to people for peace in the world goes hand in hand with the attribution of rights that they must sustainably preserve and protect. The attribution of rights and duties and the concomitant responsibility of the global community continue to be the basis of the “Universal Declaration of Human Rights” adopted in 1948. The focus of this Declaration is, therefore, an important progenitor for the attribution of responsibility that people must assume for the protection of their heritage.

Heritage is identity-forming and is thus a constituent part of people’s rights. The destruction of heritage was and is, therefore, always based on a deliberate disregard for people’s rights. The Declaration of Human Rights was accompanied not only by an internationally recognised understanding of rights but also duties and responsibilities. Moreover, the responsibility of societies for keeping peace in the world through protecting human beings and their heritage is also the message of many other treaties or conventions adopted by the United Nations and other organizations. Concerning heritage, the famous ones are here presented in chronological order: The Hague Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict, 1954; the Convention on the Means of Prohibiting and Preventing the Illicit Import, Export and Transfer of Ownership of Cultural Property, adopted in Paris on 14 November 1970; the World Heritage Convention adopted 1972 in Paris; the Underwater Cultural Heritage Convention from 2001a; the Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage from 2003; or the Faro Convention of the Council of Europe, 2005.

Last but not least, the responsibility we all have for the sustainable protection of our world – including our heritage – is part of the 17 SDGs of the 2030 Agenda, which is on the way to being implemented worldwide.

2 Perception

Constructing peace in the “minds of men” and thus in the world as a whole requires awareness of what responsibility means and how it is to be assumed internationally, nationally and also individually. Awareness of responsibility and the willingness to take responsibility both require knowledge about the identity of human beings and how that identity is shaped. Furthermore, it requires consciousness of the important components of human identity and how an awareness of oneself helps to achieve peace in the world.

Based on these perceptions, further agreements were adopted by the United Nations.¹ From the beginning, this included an understanding of cultural diversity, which states that people can only live together in peace if they recognise that the world is made up of many cultures encompassing their heritage, traditions, lifestyles and expressions. The cultures in their diversity, including their varied components, are equally valuable and must therefore be respected and sustainably protected.

Furthermore, with the implementation of UNESCO’s mission to anchor peace in the world, global educational processes were initiated with the intention of promoting science and culture and different disciplinary and epistemological positions. They not only highlighted the message of UNESCO and other international organisations, but they precisely developed concepts of how peace in the world could be achieved. And peace could and still can be achieved through accepting the responsibility of the human being for the sustainable safeguarding of heritage.

I would like to highlight Structural Functionalism as an epistemological approach of Critical Sociology in the interpretation of Norbert Elias² and the version of Cultural Studies strongly associated with Stuart Hall.³ The responsibility of humans and societies for their heritage is also the message of one of the most famous scientists in UNESCO’s context, namely the French Structural Ethnologist Claude Lévi-Strauss.⁴ It is not surprising that the responsibility to protect the heritage of humankind is, therefore, the guiding principle of the World Heritage Convention.

But what does responsibility mean, what does assumption of responsibility mean? On what legal, social or even cultural basis must people bear responsibility, or how is the assumption of responsibility attributed to people and societies?

3 Implementation

The theme of this paper is the assumption of responsibility by people and societies for World Heritage. I first reflect on theoretical approaches with which responsibility for the protection of heritage can be interpreted and implemented. To this end, I refer to Hans Jonas, Max Weber and Hannah Arendt. Their interpretations of responsibility were and are theoretically fundamental and therefore also applicable to the protection of heritage.

I first refer to the German American philosopher Hans Jonas. With his world-famous book The Imperative of Responsibility: In Search of an Ethics for the Technological Age,⁵ he contributed to international reflections on the social, cultural or political impact of technological progress on people and their natural environment and our overall ethical responsibility. One of his most famous statements on this is, “Act in such a way that the effects of your action are compatible with the permanence of genuine human life on earth” (Jonas, 1984, 36).

Hans Jonas first dealt with questions of human development as they were reflected in Existentialist Philosophy and, on this basis, formulated his ethical positions on the relationship between humans and nature in the wake of the development of technology. His “Imperative of Responsibility” was written at the end of the 1970s. In it, he considered the ontological effects of technological change and assigned people and societies responsibility for the consequences of these developments.

On the one hand, he wrote that responsibility has something to do with current life, with the “here and now… It is those who are alive now… who have a claim on my behaviour” (Jonas, 1984, 23). For the future, however, a “new dimension” of responsibility is needed. For this, it is necessary to consider “modern technology”. This has introduced “actions of such novel consequences that the framework of earlier ethics can no longer grasp them” (Jonas, 1984, 26).

This new dimension goes beyond previous knowledge. “That is, that the predictive knowledge lags behind the technical knowledge that gives power to our actions, itself takes on ethical significance” (Jonas, 1984, 28). The new knowledge must “take into account the global condition of human life, and the distant future…” but is not really prepared for this. This concerns, for example, “nature as a human responsibility”. It concerns not least the “biosphere as a whole and in its parts, which is now subject to our power and has something like a moral claim on us” (Jonas, 1984, 29).

The problem outlined here also concerns our responsibility to protect our heritage. World Heritage represents the heritage of all humanity. It has been created, among other things, through technical developments over the centuries and, at the same time, is permanently exposed to “technological change”. Responsibility for sustainable protection of heritage is, therefore, to be derived from the effects of technological change on World Heritage itself.

This attribution of responsibility is formulated in the preamble of the World Heritage Convention (UNESCO, 1972). It identifies the many dangers to which World Heritage has been, and still is, exposed over the years and which the international community is responsible for eliminating. For example, the first paragraph states that “… the cultural… and the natural heritage are increasingly threatened with destruction not only by the traditional causes of decay, but also by changing social and economic conditions…”, e.g. based on technological developments (UNESCO, 1972, para. 1). As a consequence, the international community must take care to anticipate potential dangers of technological developments and prevent the negative consequences of such developments.

It remains to be seen whether the challenge of technological change for heritage conservation can be sustainably implemented with the assumption of responsibility demanded here. Much has been achieved in implementing the criteria of “Outstanding Universal Value” (OUV),⁶ laid down in the “Operational Guidelines”⁷ of the Convention, and in implementing the criteria of “Authenticity”⁸ and “Integrity”.⁹ The sporadic transfer of a site to the so-called “List in Danger”,¹⁰ due to intermediate damage to the OUV, has also been able to correct threats in most cases.

In the face of real technological developments and growing threats to World Heritage, much remains to be done. To return to Hans Jonas, it is necessary to formulate and implement an ethic for technological civilisation to anticipate and avoid potential damages to our heritage. However, the world community is still far away from achieving those forward-looking assumptions in the implementation of the many criteria for the protection of World Heritage.

Hans Jonas was one of the theorists who recognised the positive and negative effects of technological developments on people relatively early and derived from this the duty to assume responsibility. In the case of World Heritage, the following are just a few examples: the destruction of landscapes by extractive industries; loss of biodiversity in natural heritage sites; ambivalence of renewable technologies with problematic impacts on habitats, humans and animals; displacement of local knowledge in agricultural regions by technological developments; the endangerment of natural catastrophes around the world; or the threatening of our heritage by climate change in general etc.

The relevance of his insight becomes clear not only by answering questions about who recognises the consequences of such developments and takes responsibility for them; his ethical reflection also motivates questions about how responsibility should be implemented. Does taking responsibility mean, for example, correcting technological developments or taking them back? Who is responsible for this? How should responsibility be implemented? Hans Jonas did not answer these questions. Nevertheless, they are part of his ethics and irreplaceable for the sustainable protection of World Heritage. After 50 years of the World Heritage Convention, it is high time to address them, to derive concepts for action from them and to implement them.

Complementary to the ethical responsibility of Hans Jonas, as a responsibility to anticipate the effects of technological development on our heritage, is the reflection of the German sociologist and national economist Max Weber. Max Weber became known in particular for his critical analyses of social structures at the beginning of the twentieth century. He presented his concept of political responsibility, summarised in his famous critiques of the “ethics of mind versus the ethics of responsibility” (Weber, 1992, 70f.),¹¹ which he presented in a student lecture in January 1919. The title of this lecture was later published with the title “Politics as Profession”.

If one compares the political constellation of societies in 1918/19 with that of the founding period of the UN and UNESCO in 1945, then references to the experiences of people and societies in the years 1918/19 are easy to make. Both were epochs in which national competencies of nation states for peace in the world and for implementing responsibility were urgently needed and required international commitment through the founding of the League of Nations in 1920¹² and the United Nations in 1945.

In this lecture, he argued that any political responsibility derives essentially from the rules and norms enshrined in the constitution of the state, which attribute to it “the monopoly of legitimate physical violence” (Weber, 1992, 6). “The state is,… a relationship of domination of people over people based on the means of legitimate (…) violence” (Weber, 1992, 7f), regardless of the form of government. It concerns the individual state just as much as the state system of the United Nations with 193 member states or, via the latter, the monopoly of the adoption and enforcement of international agreements.

Relevant to the attribution of political responsibility to states for their populations is the abovementioned focus on an “ethics of responsibility”, which he distinguishes from the “ethics of mind”. He justifies this by saying that the responsibility of human action in the “ethics of mind” is not attributed to human beings themselves but to “God”. This is precisely what makes people helpless and irresponsible. Therefore, it is man’s “self-responsibility” to manage peace and justice as well as the protection of heritage whose implementation is formulated in the “ethics of responsibility”.

Weber (1992, 70f) writes:

…it is an abysmal contradiction whether one acts according to the ethical maxim – religiously speaking – ‘the Christian does right and entrusts success to God’, or according to the ethical maxim of responsibility: that one has to pay for the (foreseeable) consequences of one’s actions.…

“If the consequences of an action flowing from pure sentiment are bad, he [the ethicist of sentiment, emphasis added] does not hold the person acting responsible, but the world, the stupidity of other people”, etc. “The ethicist of responsibility, on the other hand, will say: these consequences are attributed to my actions.” (Weber, 1992, 70f.)

It is precisely this individual and societal ethic of responsibility that also defines the protection of humanity’s heritage. With Max Weber’s (1992, 8) position, this responsibility is based on the legitimate rule of the state as well as on the political system, which in modern societies is based on “domination by virtue of legality, by virtue of the belief in the validity of legal statutes and the factual ‘competence’ justified by rationally created rules”. This includes “on the one hand, the attitude of human action” and “obedience” to the bearers of “legitimate power” and “on the other hand, by means of this obedience, the disposal of… material goods” (Weber, 1992, 8).

UNESCO, as a “specialized agency” within the United Nations (UN) community of states, can be interpreted on this basis as an institution comparable to a state system. With the “mandate of contributing to achieve peace in the world” (U.N. Charter, chap. X, art. 63), as a community of states, it bears the responsibility for peace defined by it in the same way as the states themselves. In Max Weber’s political approach, this attribution of political power and rule is then delegated by the states to their political functionaries and implemented by them. This then also involves the people as representatives of a structure of rules based on legality (Weber, 1992, 8).

If one reflects on the responsibility for peace and justice, equality and dignity or the protection of heritage ascribed to the people of the United Nations and its member states – formulated in the charters, conventions or declarations already mentioned – then they are comparable in style. Heritage forms identity, and identity is necessary for the creation of peace, justice and equality. In order to achieve these goals, responsibility – to argue once again with Max Weber – is transferred to the “system of rule”. In the case of responsibility for human heritage, this concerns the United Nations as a community of states. It concerns the member states and their protagonists, the people themselves.

This system can be exemplified by the Declaration of Human Rights. In the introductory statement, the following is said: “The General Assembly proclaims this The Universal Declaration of Human Rights as a common standard of achievement for all peoples and all nations … to secure their universal and effective recognition and observance, both among the peoples of Member States themselves and among the peoples of territories under their jurisdiction” (United Nations, 1948, intro.).

Defining rights is one thing; implementing them is another. The implementation of rights and also of duties is rarely done on the basis of declarations alone. Rather, this requires, among other things, educational measures, which are also formulated in the introductory statement of this declaration. Thus, it is then stated that “to the end that every individual and every organ of society, keeping this declaration constantly in mind, shall strive by teaching and education to promote respect for these rights and freedoms and by progressive measures, national and international” (United Nations, 1948, Preamble).

In this respect, it can be said that the Declaration of Human Rights was accompanied by an internationally recognised understanding of the rights, duties and responsibilities of human beings to achieve and maintain peace in the world and to protect their heritage. It was furthermore accompanied by a variety of important scientific publications which provided theoretical backgrounds and scientific contexts as well as practical recommendations (Langfield et al., 2010; Levy & Sznaider, 2010).

If one looks at the international implementation of The Declaration of Human Rights and, in particular, at the non-observance and violations, grave doubts remain about the interest of the international community in its implementation. Have the states, the international community and the people failed? Was Max Weber wrong in his theoretical analysis and in his vision?

The conclusion is that the observance of human rights and obligations is not self-explanatory. Rather, it must be communicated, in general and within the signatory states of the Declaration. It must also be communicated to individuals. Only if the individual has sufficient knowledge about the rights and duties arising from the Declaration will they be able to interpret this Declaration for themselves. If, in addition, they have the corresponding moral values, they will also be prepared to bear responsibility. Only then can this Declaration be implemented successfully at national and international levels.

This brings me to Hannah Arendt’s concept of responsibility, which seems important to me as another dimension of the responsibility outlined here – ethical, political, in person. On the basis of Hans Jonas’ ethical principle and Max Weber’s political principle, I will now reflect upon Hannah Arendt’s remarks on individual responsibility. I will demonstrate the individual and personal responsibility that people must assume for the protection of heritage. As a Jewish German American scientist, Hannah Arendt became known internationally for proving that people were personally responsible for Hitler’s dictatorship. To this day, she stands for a theoretical reflection on people’s personal responsibility in and with the Third Reich that is so fundamental that it can be applied across societies, situations or systems.

The remarks I refer to here are set out in the lecture “What does personal responsibility mean in a dictatorship” (Arendt, 2020),¹³ which she gave in the USA in the early 1960s.¹⁴ In this lecture, she focuses on the individual and thus provides a theoretical reflection on the personal responsibility of people in and with the Third Reich that has not been repeated to this day. It is at the same time a critical reflection on the morality of people’s right or wrong behaviour in and for the “maintenance (of laws that) we consider essential for the integrity of our human community” (Arendt, 2020, 15).

The basis of this lecture is a reflection on the guilt of the Germans for the Hitler dictatorship and on who bears what responsibility as a result. The central paradigms of Hannah Arendt already become clear in the introductory remarks of this lecture. There she deals with the “deceptive assumption of a collective guilt” of the Germans for the dictatorship.

Arendt (2020, 14) writes:

The attribution of a ‘fallacious assumption of collective guilt’ (of the Germans)… is… a concept that was applied for the first time to the German people and their collective past, a conception that has proved in practice to be a highly effective cleansing…; where everyone is guilty, no one is guilty.

In spite of such a white washing interpretation of responsibility and guilt, there is the “morality of human behaviour”, which is considered the basis of all humane values and from which the dimension of individual responsibility is derived. (Arendt, 2020, 15ff.) According to Hannah Arendt, morality is not based on laws. It is nevertheless her leitmotif as shown by the example of the international acceptance of the Declaration of Human Rights.

Her criticism of the attribution of collective guilt to the Germans for the Hitler dictatorship and the justification derived from it for the long-overdue assumption of individual responsibility for the system was, therefore, groundbreaking. It not only named individual responsibility for social processes. It also justified it with morality for human behaviour. In this respect, the responsibility of the individual and their responsibility for the heritage of humanity is also established. However, in order for individuals to be able to assume their responsibility, they must have the necessary knowledge to do so, because, in general, people are not prepared for such “moral questions” (Arendt, 2020, 16ff.) and do not have the necessary knowledge to implement their responsibility.

This is precisely why educational processes need to be initiated. These must impart both ethical-moral standards for the protection of World Heritage and the knowledge necessary for its sustainable protection, which brings me back to the declarations and conventions mentioned at the beginning of this paper. The call for responsible implementation of the Convention through education is formulated in § 27. Whereas in § 28, this task is delegated to those politically responsible in the sense of Max Weber.

Article 27(1) states:

The States Parties to this Convention shall endeavour by all appropriate means, and in particular by educational and information programmes, to strengthen appreciation and respect by their peoples of the cultural and natural heritage defined in Articles 1 and 2 of the Convention. 2. They shall undertake to keep the public broadly informed of the dangers threatening this heritage and of the activities carried on in pursuance of this Convention. (UNESCO, 1972, art. 27(1))

Article 28 states:

States Parties to this Convention which receive international assistance under the Convention shall take appropriate measures to make known the importance of the property for which assistance has been received and the role played by such assistance. (UNESCO, 1972, art. 28)

Responsibility for the protection of the heritage of humankind, therefore, entails an ethical responsibility in the sense of Hans Jonas and, in particular, a responsibility that looks to the future. This has arisen and continues to arise as a result of changing social, economic and technological developments in the world with their corresponding effects on the heritage of humankind. It refers to the mission and role of states and the community of states, which are responsible as “institutions of governance” in the sense of Max Weber. Last but not least, it refers to the individual responsibility and its assumption by individuals. Taking responsibility for the protection of heritage is, therefore, always a personal task. Only when the individual is willing and able to protect heritage can it be protected in the long term.

4 Future

I think that today, more than ever, more attention needs to be paid to communicating the importance of heritage for people and societies and for their identities. This happens through the initiation of educational processes and across institutions and multidimensionally. That is, from cognitive processes to analytical – from reflective processes to experimental – from empirical learning processes to processes that require abstractions. It is necessary to anchor the moral relevance of human rights or heritage protection in people’s value scales and to enable them to implement them.

Only by communicating the importance of heritage for people can the responsibility and morality in the sense of Hannah Arendt become comprehensible, even though they are already named in many of the above mentioned conventions or charters. In this respect, the protection of our heritage can and must be anchored more strongly than before in formal and non-formal educational processes. There are many ways to implement this. Some of those possibilities were presented and discussed within the framework of the international conference that we conducted last year for the launch of this book, and others have been tested by the Institute Heritage Studies in several educational projects.

The project “Transboundary European World Heritage – a Topic for UNESCO Associated Schools”, is an important example intended to encourage students and teachers to explore their joint European history and thus their heritage with the goal of learning responsibility for the future (World Heritage Education, https://worldheritage-education.eu/en). With a comparable goal and result, in the project “Our World Heritage – Mining Cultural Landscape Erzgebirge/Krušnohoři”, we focussed on students and teachers in creating videos reflecting on historical and intercultural understandings (Institute Heritage Studies, 2021).

Nevertheless, it remains to be said that, against the background of the developments endangering World Heritage, the continuation of the discourse on responsibility is an ongoing challenge that societies, states and their communities and not least individuals must face.