Participatory Governance Models to Manage World Heritage Sites. Innovative Management Bodies from the Natural Site of the Chaîne des Puys-Limagne Fault Tectonic Arena and the Cultural Landscape of the Causses and the Cévennes

Abstract

World Heritage sites, recognised for their cultural or natural values and as sustainable tourist destinations, must be preserved and controlled via long-term legislative protection and the implementation of a specific management plan. This process is strongly recommended to involve all the concerned actors, including the local populations. Our research presents the governance arrangements of two World Heritage sites: the Chaîne des Puys-Limagne fault tectonic arena together with the Causses and the Cévennes Mediterranean agropastoral cultural landscape. These arrangements’ establishment is studied through different stages, such as creation, implementation, and institutionalisation, as well as further evolutions. We focus on the diversity, multi-party system as well as coherence of the governance. This chapter shows how innovative participatory governance bodies can allow the local community’s involvement in the sustainable management of World Heritage sites, including the tourism sector.

1 Introduction

1.1 Context

The World Heritage Convention, adopted in 1972, celebrated its 50th anniversary in 2022. Over 1157 properties have been recognised as World Heritage sites (WHS) to protect their Outstanding Universal Value (OUV). Hence, States Parties should set up, with the local stakeholders’ contribution, reporting systems and management plans, that became mandatory for the sites listed after 2007. In the same year, the local communities’ involvement was considered the fifth strategic objective of the World Heritage Capacity Building Strategy. In 2013, a call for action was made to ensure their effective involvement, as local actors were recognised custodians contributing to fostering local development, mainly through sustainable tourism. Indeed, it is “one of the sources of economic benefits and empowerment for local communities” (UNESCO WHC, 2013).

The locals’ involvement locals was first enhanced during the nomination phase to minimise potential conflicts of interest (Albert et al., 2012). Indeed, local communities’ perception of heritage and expectations for the site recognition may be overlooked and the Universal Value of the Property can omit local values (Skilton et al., 2014). Inhabitants can be marginalised (Zhang, 2017) or even excluded from the UNESCO property’s management when the inscription process is top-down and specific institutionalised management bodies outside the community are put in place (Dharmiasih, 2020). In that sense, “mechanisms for the involvement and coordination of the various activities between different partners and stakeholders” (Decision 43 COM 11A) must be included in the management plan sent in the application file during the listing process. Thus, the decisions about the property’s governance must be thought through before the designation and will directly affect future management arrangements and effectiveness (de Merode et al., 2004).

In that prospect, the involvement of local communities should start at the earliest stage of nomination to protect the local communities’ rights (Larsen, 2012). By taking ownership of this process during collective actions (McGuire, 2013) local actors build a sense of belonging and cooperation (Saisho & Sandron, 2017). The listing process can be a lever for coordination between actors, whether they are protected areas’ managers, local authorities (Peng & Marinos, 2022), or institutions by creating a common project around the site’s OUV. The creation of partnerships between the stakeholders can lay the groundwork for future cooperation after the designation between the local stakeholders and site managers (UNESCO WHC, 2012) and help establish consensual site’s management. Indeed, inscription on the World Heritage list can be a strong external incentive to manage the recognised property beyond the conflicts which can be resolved during the writing of the plan management (Muke et al., 2007). However, the effects of the candidature process on conflict resolution may be temporary (Qian, 2021) and the partnerships need to be implemented beyond the signed documents (Jones et al., 2018).

1.2 Research Issues

Even if several policies and studies on local communities’ involvement set the stage for new management approaches, a review by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) of communities and rights within WHS has shown that the effective integration of local actors during the nomination process and after the listing remains a work in progress. Specific guidance to implement participatory processes remains limited (Brown & Hay-Edie, 2014). Periodic reporting highlights the struggle of site managers to engage with local communities even if they are motivated to establish a dialogue. To fill this gap, this communication’s goal is to understand how innovative governance arrangements at the local level are created and institutionalised for WHS.

Our research objective aims to understand the participatory processes including government and local communities towards WHS’ sustainable management. Targeted research on participatory practices in the WHS’ management, more specifically on the integration of local communities and the tourism sector, can then contribute to characterising successful examples to be shared among properties and as such to promote capacity building.

Thus, we make the hypothesis that governance arrangements at the local level are created to respond to the requirements of the WH Convention and its orientations, and then are modified to be adapted to the operative WHS’ management. This suggests that governance arrangements can evolve and be mobilised in order to involve government, site managers and local communities in managing WHS. To test our hypothesis, we have investigated how governance arrangements are established in WH properties. The results are presented according to three themes. First, the governance arrangements created and mobilised by those actors are described. Second, the cohesive management implemented between the different managers of the pre-existing protected areas and the WHS is explained. Third, we will focus on the participatory and collaborative processes allowed by these arrangements. Lastly, the creation of adaptable governance models’ analysis will offer some perspectives on the local management of WHS.

2 Methodology

2.1 Case Studies

In this study, the governance arrangement of two WHS has been studied. The first is the Causses and the Cévennes (CC), recognised in 2011 as a cultural landscape representative of the Mediterranean agropastoral system. The second is the Chaîne des Puys-Limagne fault tectonic arena (CPFLTA), which has been on the list since 2018.

The two sites were chosen because they present two main similarities, and thereby can be compared in order to respond to our research question. Firstly, both sites are located in the Massif Central, a highland area in France. They include pastures that are maintained by agropastoral practices which, in one case, allow to maintain the attributes of agricultural and husbandry practices, and in the other, keep the vegetation low on the top of the volcanoes to ensure their visibility. These rural landscapes are protected by different national and regional regulations and their most emblematic and visited sites are labelled “Grands sites de France” (GSF). The multiplicity of land uses and protected area authorities in both sites enhances the complexity of a new site’s management.

Secondly, the consistent involvement of local actors in recognising their territories on the WH list has been noted by the consultative bodies of the WH Centre (WHC). In the CC, the involvement of the farming community in sustaining the cultural landscape was recognised (UNESCO WHC, 2011). For the CPFLTA, the “IUCN in past evaluations noted a largely positive situation regarding the strong and successful efforts to engage local communities and a range of diverse stakeholders to collectively support the conservation of the nominated property. This culture of stewardship appears to still be very strong for the site and bodes well for the future. The State Party has reasserted that local communities covering the site have adopted a series of complementary protective measures across the nominated property. This reinforces the nature of participatory governance and management” (IUCN, 2018).

2.2 Data Collection and Analysis

This research is based on qualitative data, acquired as part of this study, and on bibliographic analysis.

The primary data was collected in two ways—either during direct observation of governance bodies’ meetings or during interviews. In total, 29 meetings were attended to between May 2021 and June 2023, as well as 34 exploratory interviews conducted during the same period with the management team, local elected officials or departmental tourism agencies. Additionally, 69 semi-structured interviews with the participants of the governance bodies’ meetings were achieved, mainly with institution representatives and researchers engaged in the WHS’ management. Furthermore, 63 interviews have been conducted with entrepreneurs, local business owners or lucrative associations’ adherents mostly in the tourism sector. They have been selected in the membership list of networks specifically created to enhance the socio-economic effects of the WHS’ listings.

A second work of reading and analysis of the programmatic documents was carried out. The objective was to identify the management of the pre-existing protected areas and labelled sites before, during and after the process of the properties’ listings. The most significant documents are the application and renewal files, management plans and action programs, for the GSF located inside the WHS, the National and Regional Natural Parks (RNP) and the UNESCO properties. For the two studied properties, the partnership agreements signed by the managers were also studied. Additionally, an analysis of the scientific conference reports about the WHS, the support letters from local representatives and the archives of the project managers written during the application phase has been undertaken.

3 Results

3.1 Multi-Party Governance Arrangements

The governance arrangements of WHS have been described systematically in their candidature files since 2007. In the CPFLTA, the project leader, i.e. the Puy-de-Dôme department, signed early on, during the application process, a partnership convention with the “Volcans d’Auvergne” RNP, which preserved the site since its creation in 1977, together with the region and the prefect. It was already stipulated that “the project of an inscription on the WH list constituted an important lever, making it possible to mobilise all the actors mentioned around a common management plan in favour of the preservation of the universal value exceptional” of the site (Puy-de-Dôme, 2012). This document focuses in particular on the definition of common management objectives, planning and consistency of public policies. Furthermore, it lays the foundations for participatory management.

In order to ensure the implementation of this management plan, governance arrangements were imagined by taking an example of the Loire Valley, which is the first French UNESCO property managed by a specific team in charge of the WHS’s administration (Table 22.1).

Table 22.1 Intentional and effective WHS’ governance arrangements

The CC have also reproduced this governance scheme, by creating several management bodies each focused respectively on the consultation, orientation and implementation of the management plan. This tripartite system is also found in other French cultural landscapes such as the Climats of the Burgundy terroir or the Nord-Pas de Calais Mining Basin.

This tripartite system had been effectively implemented before the CPFLTA recognition. The consultative body has been meeting annually since 2013. The membership list concerns a large diversity of stakeholders, including public servants, local authorities, environmental managers and associations, landowner representatives, company leaders, academics, etc. Its role is to inform the different stakeholders of the site about the management actions, the project’s evolution and prospects, more than just to consult them on a specific strategy decided by the steering committee. This steering committee consists of the Puy-de-Dôme department, the region, the State represented by the prefect, as well as the RNP and the five inter-municipalities concerned by the WHS.

They have met only once, but the team behind the inscription, including employees of the Puy-de-Dôme department and university academics are still deliberating on the decisions concerning the site. The partnership between both institutions has been formalised as of 2010 and has been expanded to include some researchers who have been transferred to the department during and after the listing process. An international symposium, called Managing Inhabited Natural Heritage, was organised in 2013 by these local academics and the department. Following this event, the Puy-de-Dôme department began the process of creating an association of inhabited natural WHS in order to bring together managers of protected natural areas that are also anthropised areas. The association also aims to support the application process for other geological sites with criterion (viii), as it had already been the case for the Danakil tectonic depression or the Garrotxa volcanic site.

In the CC, the steering committee is also based on the individuals who were engaged in the process of candidature, mostly local representatives. Officially, the Association for the Promotion of the CC Area, which was leading the application process, has been transformed into this orientation committee. This evolution was made to allow the local support to continue after the inscription. Moreover, it was a way to award an official status to the leader of this project, who could not become the president of the management structure, as this role is reserved for the president of one of the four departments where the WHS is located. After its withdrawal from public life, this association has been dormant since 2016. This trend of loss in momentum at the local level, aggravated by the Covid crisis, can also be seen in the hiatus of the consultative bodies between 2018 and 2022 and the lack of quorum in the board of directors of the cross-region management team. To counterbalance this local divestment, the managers and prefects are contemplating a new governance arrangement to engage local inhabitants in the WHS in the wake of the management plan for 2022–2030.

To assist these bodies perennially, a scientific council has been established, like those already implemented in National Parks, with the academics that had been previously engaged in the candidature process and other experts of the recognised OUV. Some of them have also participated in meetings of the network of Mediterranean agro-silvo-pastoral territories (TerrAMed) between 2007 and 2014, first to define the OUV, and then to promote other agropastoral sites’ nominations on the WH list.

Opinions from specialists in other fields, such as agriculture or tourism, can be gathered in ephemeral working groups, depending on the challenges that the management team may face. Working groups have also been set up on themes specific to the properties, such as agropastoralism in the CC or quarries in the CPFLTA. In the CC, they are animated by the management team during the writing of the management plan for the property, to evaluate the work carried out according to the orientations of the previous one and to propose actions to be included in the new one. In the CPFLTA, working groups are used to take ownership of the management plan and implement its actions. They are co-animated either by the department, the park and/or the decentralised State services. These latter have formalised a strategy following the site’s listing with specific guidelines for each working group. What is of interest here is that the consultation spaces are not used for the same purposes. In the tectonic arena, the management plan, decided by the managers and validated by the decentralised State services, is appropriated by the local authorities a posteriori, while in the cultural landscape, the management plan, drawn up with the local authorities and experts then validated by the decentralised State services, is applied by the management team created for this purpose.

3.2 Simplified and Cohesive Management

A tripartite governance system is based on the different roles assigned to each body. However, their member composition can be overlapping. For instance, the team behind the operational body must attend consultation and orientation meetings. It is also the case for the managers of the pre-existing protected areas located entirely or partially within the WHS, who are invited during consultative sessions, contacted by the technical team and participate in multiple working groups. Not only are these managers part of the governance arrangements, but initiatives have also been made to facilitate the management of the studied WHS in line with those already implemented for other conservation areas.

In the CPFLTA application file, the project leader set the goal to pool together the management between the classified site by the French law of 1930, the GSF and, at the time, the potential WHS, in order to ensure consistency in their supervision from the beginning of the candidature process. To be able to bring together the various management documents into a single management plan and simplify the understanding—and therefore the appropriation—of the protected natural areas to the west of Clermont-Ferrand, it was also decided to merge, in compliance with each type of protection, the delimitations of the protected areas. Thereby, the file for renewing the GSF label in 2020 requested the extension of the site to include the entire Chain and no longer devote itself solely to the development of the Puy de Dôme’s summit. A request for classification of the mountain of the Serre is also in progress so that the whole UNESCO property has regulatory protection. The objective is to extend the GSF once again during its next renewal to the Serre Mountain. The WHS, the GSF and the classified areas will therefore more or less cover the same geographical areas by 2026 to form a single territory (Fig. 22.1).

Fig. 22.1

Map of the different protected and labelled areas intersecting the CPFLTA. (Source: author’s own elaboration and Eric Langlois)

Beyond the merging of the perimeters, the agreement between the Puy-de-Dôme department and the “Volcans d’Auvergne” RNP has been edited to encompass new strategies after the site’s recognition, such as the creation of a shared management team with employees of both institutions in January 2020. Their intention is to present only one mutual front shop to inhabitants and local authorities. Hence, this shared management team has met in 2021 with each municipality of the WHS, to present itself and gather all the fears and expectations of the local representatives about the recognition. Some local politicians were already engaged during the candidature process when all municipalities affected by the listing voted in favour of the project, others, newly elected, were made aware of the management challenges of the recognition. With these local representatives, the shared management team is currently shaping a landscape plan for the WHS. Other plans are being made with the management team and locals, in particular for the management of sets of volcanoes with landowners, foresters and farmers. Innovative practices are being invented to preserve both the quality of the volcanic soil and of the landscape, and at the same time allow the valorisation of natural resources for wood extraction or recreative use, such as the experiments carried out on the Chaumont’s volcano.

This shared team has also made it possible to facilitate preservation operations on the site, such as the rehabilitation of the Pariou’s volcano, the second most visited site on the WH property. Two strategies had been previously considered with the association of landowners to preserve the crater of this volcano, one from the department and the other by the RNP. By regrouping both teams, a single solution was finally presented and then proceeded. Since 2022, reflections have been carried out to gather all these teams to implement a common post-inscription strategy, specifically for the site, regardless of the teams’ specialities.

Unlike in the CPFLTA, it was decided in the CC to create a new operational management entity in addition to the institutions in charge of the other protected natural areas, too numerous to consult multilaterally. Following the inscription of the site on the UNESCO WH list, the project leaders were expected to create a specific management body for the new property. The four departments concerned by the new UNESCO property have thus worked together to create the interdepartmental organisation of the CC as quickly as possible. Created in 2012, it was identified as the manager delegated by the State following the signing of an agreement by the coordinating prefect. Its objective is to implement management guidelines and enhance the cooperation between the other management teams regarding the cultural landscape OUV preservation.

Its role does not in any way consist of replacing the pre-existing institutions that the locals are familiar with. This new entity has since co-managed the property by agreement with the Cévennes National Park, the “Grands Causses” RNP, as well as the “Centre Permanent d’Initiatives pour l’Environnement des Causses Mériodionaux”. Three other institutions are also considered as co-managers: the joint management associations of the two GSFs located partially inside the WHS and one intercommunal association carrying the candidature to obtain the label (Fig. 22.2).

Fig. 22.2

Map of the protected areas intersecting the CC’s cultural landscape. (Source: AVECC 2011)

The interdepartmental organisation focuses on communication and preservation projects specific to Mediterranean agropastoralism and associated landscapes, unlike the other co-managers who work on a multitude of themes in more restricted areas. During the drafting of the new management plan for 2022–2030, an emphasis has been placed on developing a multi-stakeholder approach, especially between co-managers. One proposition is to renew conventions about action programs preserving the WHS’s integrity although being implemented in each protected area, that were once put in place at the beginning of the first management plan’s period. Another recommendation is to convene the scientific councils of the two parks and the WHS together based on the model from a first meeting organised after the recognition of the site. This should be fostered by the presence of members of the WHS’s Scientific Council in those established in the parks.

Beyond the existence of multiple protected areas, the CC is also spread over four departments. The prefect of the Lozère department, which represents the State that is responsible for the conservation of the WHS, established the committee of the decentralised State services in 2016. This board regroups public servants from the four departments and different agencies specialized for instance in agriculture, environment and hunting. It aims to harmonize and mesh the public policies implemented in each administrative area to facilitate the conservation of the site.

Following the third Decentralisation Act, French regions merged in 2016. Thanks to this administrative decision, the four departments of the WHS are now part of the same Occitania region. The interdepartmental organisation of the CC and its scientific council are contemplating ways to engage the region in the property’s management, including a potential financial contribution. They are also aspiring to involve the federations of municipalities and the five gate cities surrounding the site by changing the status of the management team from an interdepartmental organisation to a possible joint association in order to allow them to participate in its functioning.

3.3 Participatory and Collaborative Processes

In addition to the politico-administrative and scientific sphere, governance arrangements have been designed in ways for residents and businesses to get involved in the management of UNESCO properties. Networks have been created so that actors in the socio-economic sphere have the opportunity to get involved in actions to promote the UNESCO WH listing.

During the application process of the CPFLTA, a foundation was created in 2012 by seven locally-based and internationally renowned companies such as Michelin and Limagrain to support the candidature in association with the department of Puy-de-Dôme. Its objective is to financially support specific actions of the management plan such as the creation of a guarded mobile herd to keep the summit of the volcanoes free of high vegetation in order to maintain the crater’s visibility.

A year after the listing, the departmental council of Puy-de-Dôme launched the “All Ambassadors” program in order to promote the property. Three networks have been created to enhance the WH listing, including one specifically for individuals and associations (Fig. 22.3). The objective is to continue to mobilise the inhabitants of the property, and more widely of the Puy-de-Dôme. Around 400 ambassadors now have access to specific training and field trips to the WHS. They can volunteer in participatory worksites for trail restoration or during cultural events.

Fig. 22.3

Representation of local actors’ mobilisation in the application process and management of the CPFLTA. (Source: Author’s own elaboration)

A CPFLTA discovery mission has also been initiated. It aims to strengthen the supervision of visitors’ groups by professionals recognised as experts on the characteristics of the property. Guides, sports and/or environmental educators can now claim the status of referenced professionals after training sessions. An experiment was carried out in 2022 with the landowners of the most frequented part of the Chaîne des Puys, which was forbidden to groups since 2006 after conflicts of use in the area. It offers an exception to this ruling to groups that are supervised only by referenced professionals.

A network of a hundred committed professionals, from all industries and sectors, has also been created but still needs to be animated. It was designed to offer a catalogue of derivative products of the WHS and a brand with a logo to communicate about the property.

Finally, private actors themselves have created a network of seven tourist destinations in the Puy-de-Dôme. It aims to offer a selection of frequented sites for their cultural or geological heritage and a discount if visitors discover multiple establishments following their travel diary. The initiative comes from the Lemptégy volcano and the Cave of the Volvic Stone, both former quarrying sites in the Chaîne des Puys transformed into educational and recreative museums. The Puy de Dôme volcano’s train and the Michelin Museum are also part of this network. Since they are the major tourist facilities, with the amusement park of Vulcania, their representatives are invited to the WHS’s local board. In 2011, Vulcania held the first, and for now only, forum on the enhancement of geological heritage through tourism called geotourism.

In the CC, an ambassadors’ network brings together twice a year 114 private actors specialized in tourism or agritourism, living or working within the property’s perimeter, committing to implement an awareness-raising action about the WHS (Fig. 22.4). Created by the Gard Departmental Tourism Agency in 2012 and then developed by the three other departments, it is now led by the management team. Its objective is to involve private actors of the territory so that they appropriate this recognition, and then promote it to locals and visitors.

Fig. 22.4

Representation of local actors’ mobilisation in the application process and management of the CC. (Source: Author’s own elaboration)

Besides the private actors’ network, other initiatives have been implemented in the CC to engage local businesses in the site’s promotion. Since 2017, the interdepartmental organisation of the CC signed agreements with private actors holding sports, cultural or scientific events organised in the property or its buffer zone in exchange for the right to display the CC logo.

The same year, the Lozère department initiated a summer program “Farm Visits” to support agritourism. It was then taken over by the interdepartmental organisation of the CC and focused on agropastoralism to raise visitors’ awareness of its heritage value. Moreover, breeders and farmers who contribute with their agricultural practices to preserve the OUV of the property have also implemented agropastoral initiatives. Projects of vernacular heritage restoration or assistance for the creation of sheep farms have been carried out mainly by public actors, such as the Pastoral Pact of the “Causses Aigoual Cévennes Terres Solidaires” inter-municipality.

However, groups of producers with protected designation of origin located in the UNESCO property, such as Roquefort, have not concretely taken up the inscription on the WH—at best, they evoke the CC to present the production area on their website. The management team meets with these producers when invited and participates in scientific action programs. They have also supported the lobbying of common agricultural policy for a better consideration of the grazing system inside the WHS and the area concerned by the Pélardon PDO in 2015.

An association of CC’s farmers, shepherds and breeders was created a year after the listing to create social interactions within the profession locally and around the Mediterranean Sea. Even if its president still advocates to defend the rights of producers, the organisation has been dormant since then. In order to engage farmers and explain what the listing entails for their productions, the interdepartmental organisation is nowadays considering the creation of a network dedicated to farmers on the model of the tourism ambassador system. This proposition ensues from a survey carried out among farmers in 2021, some of which have called for the creation of governance arrangements including them and animation of professional meetings to better integrate pastoralism in their daily practices.

To mobilise inhabitants who are not WH ambassadors, the management teams created awareness actions both on-site and off-site. Public conferences and talks were not only organised in the villages located within the properties but also in the surrounding cities. The anniversaries of the sites’ listing on the WH list were also celebrated with expositions, meetings and walks to discover the properties and their attributes. During the academic year, the management teams can intervene in classrooms to sensitize the youth to the exceptional heritage they visit regularly or in which they live.

Interpretation centres have opened to reach a larger public, and more are being conceived. In the CC, the first one was inaugurated in 2020 next to the management team’s office. Two others plus three in the making, named “High-Place of agropastoralism” are distributed throughout the cultural landscape, present in the same way the WHS while being more specific to one attribute, such as local architecture, transhumance, cheese production, or geomorphology. Public institutions such as municipalities, departments or co-managers of the site lead these projects. The same concept can be found in the Puy-de-Dôme with a main facility called the UNESCO’s house, and other tourist information offices such as the one in Volvic presenting its famous volcanic rocks and waters but also the WHS.

4 Perspectives: The Creation of Adaptable Governance Models

To respond to our research issue questioning how innovative governance arrangements of WHS at the local level are created and institutionalised, the management of the CPFLTA, as well as the one implemented for the CC cultural landscape, have been studied. In both cases, governance arrangements to preserve the site are determined during the candidature phase by public actors, based on the governance scheme of other WHS. They respond to the requirements of the WH Convention that stipulates the urge to edit and implement the management plan with the participation of local communities.

The first changes appear when the site is recognised with the formalisation of the different governance bodies. The governance arrangements are implemented in an institutional context with pre-existing managers, a political context with set priorities acting in a financial context with limited resources allocated. This period also corresponds to the first valorisation actions with the private actors’ involvement, especially from the tourism sector. Later changes can still occur depending on the local actors’ involvement and the animation of each working group. Indeed, the creation of a thematic group or a network does not mean it will be mobilised and perpetuated. Governance arrangements can then be different on-site from the ones described in the application files.

For the two studied areas, working operational and advice bodies are functioning and have adapted to the local context, mainly by the pooling of means, such as protection tools and human resources. However, it lacks a steering committee after the listing of the WHS. This situation is pointed out by the private sector which is waiting for a clear vision and territorial development strategy from the public actors. Moreover, consultative bodies can still be improved in order to consult or even deliberate, more than just inform, a large diversity of local actors. This confirms our main hypothesis that governance arrangements are created to respond to the WHC’s requirements and then are modified to be adapted specifically to manage the property.

Therefore, governance arrangements can evolve to simplify co-management and be mobilised to involve government, co-managers and local communities. They engage a high diversity of actors: protected area managers, State services, politicians, local representatives, companies including the tourism sector, landowners and/or environmental associations. However, we point out the lack of farmers or their representatives in the members invited to the governance bodies, even if they are the first to maintain the WHS integrity on the field. Furthermore, local communities are represented by officials or associations and can participate in management activities but are neither decision-makers nor their appointees. Moreover, the government is mainly acting through its decentralised services, which are backing managers and being the regulatory authority on the classified site, even if it is responsible for the site’s conservation. Hence, our underlying assumption shall be nuanced, and further research is needed to apprehend not only the identification and description of the governance arrangements, their roles, compositions and adaptations but also the interactions between the individuals and institutions that composed them.