Keywords

1 Conflicts Related to Urban Transformation

There is not one conflict but a bundle of diverse conflicts related to urban transformation and the implementation of the World Heritage Convention (WHC). These conflicts can be related to the (unequal) distribution of wealth, health, access to common goods and different generations of users (McPhearson et al., 2016). Global challenges, besides increased urbanisation, include climate change, war, terror, different and conflicting values and differences between global and local agendas and objectives or other parts of the context in which these conflicts may arise. Some of these conflicts are affecting sites on the World Heritage List (WHL), and others are more considered a result of inscription; however, the distinction between cause and effect is far from easy. While developing a typology or presenting an ultimate collection of these conflicts is not within the focus of this introduction, some examples from different contexts around the world are provided in Table 7.1.

Table 7.1 Examples of conflicts associated with urban transformation at World Heritage Sites
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Inscription on the WHL is not always the (only) cause for these conflicts. Conflicts can be the result of different needs of temporary (e.g., tourists) and permanent (inhabitants) users of the city. World Heritage listing can lead to significant changes in the urban fabric and a range of conflicts between temporary and permanent users of the city (Siemer & Matthews-Hunter, 2017).

The example of gentrification can be observed in a number of WHS around the globe (Krakow, Rhodos, Amsterdam, Cusco, Shanghai, Visby, and several others) and is often caused by multiple factors, some of which can be related to general societal changes like an improved overall economic situation (Zuk et al., 2018). As a result of the unique history of Berlin as a divided city, the process of gentrification has developed at times and in patterns that are markedly different from other global cities (Siemer & Matthews-Hunter, 2017). In different districts, examples of “new-build gentrification” (Davidson & Lees, 2005) with the boom of luxury housing estates and “rental gentrification” (van Criekingen, 2010) with the displacement pressure resulting from the gap between long-term rental agreements and new contract rents are evident. In addition, elements of “tourism gentrification” (Gotham, 2005) with the transformation of rental housing into holiday flats can be observed, with the stock of social housing reduced from 370,000 units in 1993 to less than 150,000 in 2012 (Holm, 2014) (Fig. 7.1).

Fig. 7.1
A close-up view of a sticker that reads, WEM GEHORT KREUZBE.

Protest sticker from an NGO against gentrification in Berlin. (Note: Image by Matthias Ripp, 2015)

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Other conflicts that are related to urban transformation are, e.g., over-tourism, which is noticeable in many WHS such as Krakow, Cusco and Bamberg, and displacement effects on traditional crafts and business such as informal trade in Cusco. For many WHS, conflicts are a result of challenges of global significance like climate change. Urban WHS such as Regensburg are struggling with an increased number of days with extreme temperatures and the effects of disasters and severe weather like flooding. Other WHS are threatened by close proximity forest fires. These are not potential but existing life-threatening risks and events, and their prevention would often mean altering the historic urban fabric and deviating from dogmatic and strict rules of preservation for historic ensembles. Behind these specific cases, where, for example, walls to protect towns and cities from flooding or new trees in a WHS are opposed by local preservationists with reference to the WH listing, there are often conflicts between different values that are unfortunately rarely verbalised. Artistic values of monuments – sometimes even described as intrinsic values (Fusco Girard & Vecco, 2019) – conflict with use values (Smith, 2006). Khalaf (2021) suggests, in view of the global challenges that we face today, the concept of authenticity needs to be adapted, and more elements of a process should be incorporated into our World Heritage management approaches.

Similar issues arise with conflicts between the heritage sector and urban transformation and urban development as described by Gustafsson (2011), who suggests such conflicts can be overcome if stakeholders and decision-makers first enter a “trading zone” of discussion, from which all parties ultimately benefit. Many of the described conflicts have the potential to contradict the original objective of the World Heritage Convention, even if sometimes in an indirect way. Gentrification, as one example, can also lead to development pressure with the spread of more “heavy” urban functions like hotels, which can result in severe architectural interventions and potentially harm the heritage fabric and impact local societies (Okech, 2010).

Further examples in the following chapters of this book are connected to urban transformation that has occurred as a direct or indirect result of the designation of a city as a WHS or happened in parallel. These examples include conflicts in an African setting that have been identified as a result of colonialism and its long-term implications. Other examples are touristic mega-events, such as huge international sports events or the European Capitals of Culture, and particularly the festivalisation of heritage cities that led to the temporary rapid growth of tourism and tourism-related activities, which hitherto resulted in conflicts, for example, through congestion in the streets, rising prices for housing, etc. Planned revitalisation of urban areas is another field of practice where urban heritage is related to conflicts that can be rooted in touristification or gentrification. The effects of various processes of urban transformation have been analysed and described, for example, in McCormick’s “Advancing Sustainable Urban Transformation”, which serves as an analytical lens to describe and understand the continuous, complex and contested processes and dynamics in cities (McCormick et al., 2013) (Fig. 7.2).

Fig. 7.2
A snapshot of people walking on the streets.

Tourists at the Bund in Shanghai. (Note: Image by Matthias Ripp, 2018)

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2 The Role of Cultural Heritage and the World Heritage Convention

During the last decades, the understanding of cultural heritage has changed. In the UNESCO Convention concerning the Protection of the World Cultural and Natural Heritage 1972 (article 1), three different types of cultural heritage are mentioned: monuments, groups of buildings and sites (UNESCO, 1972). This rather “sectoral” understanding of UNESCO is focusing on different elements of cultural heritage, especially tangible heritage, and does not address, for example, the more multi-layered, versatile and complex urban heritage (Ripp & Rodwell, 2016) that many people encounter on a daily basis. Several other international conventions followed that have broadened the understanding of cultural heritage.

1975, the Resolution of Bruges: Principles Governing the Rehabilitation of Historic Towns, adopted by ICOMOS, included references to beauty, the human scale and social function (ICOMOS, 1975). In 2015, ICOMOS published a review to understand the impact of this influential Resolution: “A Future for Our Past. The 40th anniversary of European Architectural Heritage Year (1975–2015)” (Falser and Lipp, 2015). This publication represents the first comprehensive appraisal of the European campaign of 1975 as the most important and successful campaign of its time, with its recognition of the importance of urbanistic ensembles, plurality within the categories of historic monuments, citizen engagement, and, finally, and legal and administrative measures for monument protection.

1976, the UNESCO Recommendation Concerning the Safeguarding and Contemporary Role of Historic Areas (Nairobi Charter) addressed community identity and at the same time promoted the integration of historic areas into “the life of contemporary society (as) a basic factor in town planning and land development” (UNESCO, 1976).

1987, ICOMOS declared the integration of urban conservation into policies for socio-economic development and the participation of residents in the Charter for the Conservation of Historic Towns and Urban Areas (Washington Charter) (ICOMOS, 1987).

Then, in 2005, the “Faro Convention”, officially titled the Council of Europe’s Framework Convention on the Value of Cultural Heritage for Society, stated in Article 1, c (Aims of the Conventions), that “the conservation of cultural heritage and its sustainable use have human development and quality of life as their goal” (Council of Europe, 2005). Consequently, the understanding of cultural heritage has become wider and different definitions have been used. “Traditionally, planners viewed historic areas as a collection of monuments and buildings to be preserved as relics of the past, whose value was considered to be totally separate from their day-to-day use and city context” (Siravo, 2014, p. 161). This mainly materialistic approach to heritage is based on the physical appearance of monuments and a traditional interpretation of heritage and preservation as a mainly material science (Ripp, 2021).

UNESCO’s Recommendation on the Historic Urban Landscape in 2011 finally supported a holistic view of heritage management, acknowledging the different urban layers and connections and at the same time beginning to integrate the goals of urban heritage conservation and those of social and economic development (UNESCO, 2011). The International Guidelines on Urban and Territorial Planning (UN-Habitat, 2015), the Pact of Amsterdam (European Commission, 2016a) and the Urban Agenda for the EU (European Commission, 2016b, 2019) and, finally, the European Commission’s Cohesion Policy 2014–2020 (2014) all follow the concept of the Historic Urban Landscape.

The World Heritage Convention, on the other hand, was based on a more linear, monument or site-based understanding of preservation that was described by some authors as a preservationist paradigm following mainly material aspects (Holtorf, 2012). While contemporary theories of conservation are changing this notion (Viñas, 2002; Orbaşli, 2017), the scientific discussion connected to the implementation of the World Heritage Convention – for example, on the definition of the outstanding universal value (OUV), statements of significance or the emerging idea of attribute mapping – is still following the narrative of definition and separation rather than that of connecting and integrating different aspects into one holistic, systemic and procedural understanding of heritage. Slowly more systemic approaches are gaining popularity in the field of heritage (Barile & Saviano, 2015), and, in parallel, concepts like urban transformation can be beneficial for understanding and mitigating existing conflicts connected to the implementation of the World Heritage Convention. By narrowing down the implementation to maintaining the few attributes that are considered the core qualities of World Heritage sites, the complexity of the system of urban heritage and the processes of urban transformation can hardly be addressed in a comprehensive way.

While the scope of cultural heritage has broadened, it shifted from a single-monument and object-based approach to a more holistic understanding. This shift towards a more complex idea of heritage has stimulated systemic approaches that can better address higher levels of complexity and multi-level stakeholder approaches (Sacco et al., 2014). While a more linear and sectoral approach was prevalent in the beginning of monument preservation, policies and tools also followed such an approach. Laws to preserve monuments and methods to conserve the physical monuments in the best possible way have been rooted in this thinking. Later, when the concept of heritage became more complex (Ripp, 2018), for example, with the introduction of the ensemble and later the Historic Urban Landscape, there was a need for methods, tools and policies that reflected this complexity and were more related to systemic approaches.

3 Urban Transformation as an Emerging Scientific Concept to Address the Systemic Nature of Heritage

Urban transformation as an emerging scientific concept has the potential to analyse existing conflicts and expand the possible solutions beyond already existing interventions to broader systemic interventions that take greater account of the complexity of the users.

According to Anne Maassen and Madeleine Galvin (2019, p. 9), transformation—urban or otherwise—is commonly described “…using adjectives such as deep, far-reaching, radical, long-term, persistent and sometimes also as systemic and structural, irreversible, non-linear, non-incremental, complex (multi-scale, multi-actor, multi-level), and inherently contextual and political…”. They suggest that urban transformation is an outcome of change processes in which (large) parts of cities change in fundamental ways. It involves “…overcoming inherited patterns of exclusion, neglect or risk across the various social, technical, and natural systems that make up the city…” (Maassen & Galvin, 2019, p. 9). The authors indirectly follow the notion that what we call a city is a system that consists of several subsystems. More precisely “Cities are complex systems that are made up of different entities that form the components of the system. These entities can be subjects, objects, processes, other fluid and changing developments, organisations and subsystems” (Ripp, 2021, p. 25). Processes of transformation are severely affecting these entities or their respective subsystems and lead to altered urban functions and new local needs and opportunities (Hölscher & Frantzeskaki, 2021).

Urban transformation research is an emerging interdisciplinary field with open boundaries that combines complex system studies and urban studies. It is a field that explores the patterns and dynamics of change that link cities and diverse socio-technical and social-ecological systems across levels and scales and develops new forms of intervention to foster the sustainability of these systems (Wolfram et al., 2016, p. 20). Rather than focusing on separate phenomena, defining and excluding them in their entirety, urban transformation research emphasizes the connections, interrelations and processes between them. Seven key factors that co-shape urban transformations have been recognised: agency, politics, capacity, policy, experiments, foresight and geography. The term “urban transformation” thus refers to the process and the outcome of changing the systemic configuration of urban areas (Maassen & Galvin, 2019, p. 9) and is mostly studied from the perspective of the sustainability performance or achievements of these areas.

The adoption of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development (United Nations, 2015) alongside the New Urban Agenda (2016) set global standards of achievement in sustainable urban development, rethinking the way we build, manage, and live-in cities through collaboration between relevant stakeholders (UN-Habitat, 2016) to achieve safe, inclusive, resilient and sustainable cities (Maassen & Galvin, 2019, p. 2). Urban transformation and urban development are different. Urban development may be defined as “a process of synergetic integration and co-evolution among the great subsystems making up a city (economic, social, physical and environmental), which guarantees the local population a non-decreasing level of wellbeing in the long term” (Camagni, 2017, p. 272). While urban development is associated with a “project-approach”, urban transformation may be more related to processes that occur suddenly– desired or not.

As the methods related to urban transformation are very diverse, it is beyond the scope of this paper to introduce or demonstrate the application of any of the methods or even to list all of them. The following are some relevant methods in relation to UNESCO World Heritage sites:

Governance and Planning, recognised as key methods for innovation and implementation of sustainable urban transformation (Wamsler et al., 2013). The planning process and the concept of governance highlight the critical roles of collaboration and engagement of stakeholders, particularly residents in urban areas (Radywyl & Biggs, 2013).

Collaboration and learning, it is only through collaborative action that urban sustainability projects can be effective, particularly when there are ambitious goals (McCormick et al., 2013). The international community has also responded with solutions that are related to the global sustainability agenda and the Sustainable Development Goals, for example, target 11.4 “safeguarding the world’s cultural and natural heritage” to achieve Goal 11 in making “cities safe, inclusive, resilient and sustainable” (United Nations, 2015). In addition, the adoption of the Davos Declaration (Conference of Ministers of Culture, 2018) “Towards a high-quality Baukultur for Europe 2018” responded to societal needs and values of the built environment by enabling the assessment of Baukultur qualities of places and was fully supported and continues to be endorsed by international partner Europa Nostra.

4 Conclusion, Outlook

In the context of the described shift in the understanding of cultural and especially urban heritage, urban transformation is an approach that takes into account the complexity and systemic nature of urban heritage and can develop a deeper understanding of the conflicts and the ways in which they connect, interrelate and influence different parts of the urban heritage system. While many urban development projects still follow a more linear-thinking-based project management concept, a more systemic view and the introduction of methods based on systems thinking, and especially circular economy as well as circular business and governance models (Gravagnuolo et al., 2017; Stanojev & Gustafsson, 2021), would be more suitable to address urban complexity. A paradigm of rationalities (Nida-Rümelin, 2011) is often even prevalent in the Management Plans, which are the most prominent tools for World Heritage management. Data and measurable parameters, often quantified, form the basis for rather long-term defined objectives that are then to be met by the different parts of the local authorities. Tools and projects that followed this paradigm of rationalities have resulted in important findings and contributed greatly to professionalise and improve the management of WHS. These types of management tools are rooted in linear-thinking-based management by objective theories and do not offer enough flexibility to adapt to rapid challenges and therefore are not even fully implemented at many WHS after their design (Ripp & Rodwell, 2016). There are also Resource Manuals, such as the Management Guidelines for World Heritage Cultural Sites (UNESCO World Heritage Centre et al., 2013; Feilden & Jokilehto, 1993) and a Resource Manual on Managing Natural World Heritage (UNESCO World Heritage Centre, 2012) with an accompanying manual in 2013 for cultural properties. To facilitate resilience in WHS and achieve long-term objectives, we need a more systemic understanding of the existing interconnections and more flexibility (Ripp & Rodwell, 2016; Ripp, 2018) as well as more stakeholders involved in the decision-making processes (Gustafsson, 2011, 2019). To fully understand the system and processes that cultural heritage represents (Ripp, 2018), it is also necessary to consider the entities that are outside or contradict this rationality paradigm and are changing, fluid and unpredictable to some extent but most certainly occur in connection with urban transformation. These include, for example, values (Della Torre, 2013), emotions (Yusoff, 2019), motivation (Ripp & Hauer, 2017), sense of ownership (Boyd et al., 1996) and agency of heritage (Collins, 2007). They can be described as essential, even constitutional, to what we might call the human factor in heritage.

Focusing on connections makes processes clearer rather than narrowing the discussion to small sub-phenomena. Focusing on narrow (often disciplinary-led) phenomena rarely leads to the holistic and systemic understanding that is needed to fully embrace what is happening in terms of urban transformation. Drawing circles around specific urban phenomena, such as the preservation of a listed building, often misses the connection to other phenomena or systems (such as use, processes of climate change, social processes in the city, etc.) that are relevant and important if we look at the bigger picture. This is also necessary if cultural heritage is to be used to implement the UN SDGs, which are formulated as individual objectives, but which are all based on a systemic understanding of sustainable development (Ripp, 2021).

The key players need to be trained and enabled to implement a more systemic understanding. For examples of how exactly this can be done, the work of Otto Scharmer from MIT or the recent findings of consultants and coaches from the field of organisational development are valuable resources (Atwater & Pittman, 2006). Urban transformation has been revealed as a systemic transformation that includes transformation within people. Following the ideas of Scharmer and his Theory U Concept, true change in any system always involves change on a personal level (Scharmer, 2009). Therefore, a stronger focus on this aspect can be helpful to understand and influence urban transformation. The spirit of interdisciplinary and cross-sectoral work is equally relevant in academia to understand these urban systems and for urban practitioners on the ground to understand and address the urban transformation processes.

Future research should embrace transformation or change, even at its extremes such as emerging and total loss, as a natural process of any system. When linking urban transformation research to the SDGs and the new paradigm of resilience (SHELTER, 2020), it does not help to look at singular SDGs like Nr.11. All of the SDGs can be affected or part of urban transformation processes and conflicts; therefore, a systemic and holistic view is beneficial, as is explored, for example, in the SOPHIA (Social Platform for Holistic Heritage Impact Assessment) Project (https://sophiaplatform.eu/en).

The attitude – and this is more than a mere understanding – that every system includes the “birth” or emerging of new “things” or “entities” and their “death” or total loss can broaden perspectives and enhance understanding and empathy between other disciplines, experts and researchers that are embracing different views or paradigms.