Context 163 - March 2020

C O N T E X T 1 6 3 : M A R C H 2 0 2 0 13 Ireland tourism and regeneration, historic buildings dating roughly from the 17th century onwards can still at times be perceived by the public in a subtly distinct manner in the shadow of history, characterised by a cultural detachment arising from the endurance of deeply embedded but complex cultural relationships.³ Inparallelwith the controversial cases described above, the planning system of the Republic of Ireland emerged, through which architectural heritage protection is implemented today. The Irish planning system has broad similarities with that of the UK – most notably, the system of local government created in 1898 is similar to UK systems, and the foundational Irish legisla- tion, the Local Government (Planning and Development) Act, 1963, is substantially based upon the UK’s Town and Country Planning Act 1947. However, the Irish Free State (until 1937, thereafter Ireland) was disproportionately dependent upon agriculture, and protectionist economic policies pursued after independence hindered industrial development, resulting in a comparatively lower level of threat to the historic built environment. By the late 1950s, economic stagnation led government to shift towards a more outward- looking free-trade approach and an emphasis on stimulating and enabling development that still characterises Irish planning today. Moreover, private property rights are protected under Bunreachtna hÉireann (Constitution of Ireland), which has resulted in a tendency sometimes to prioritise these rights at the expense of wider regulatory goals.There has also been a tendency for Irish representative democracy to be char- acterised by clientelism and individualism.  4 In this context, conservation was less central to the 1963 Act than in UK legislation, with only discretionary provision made for local planning authorities to protect architectural heritage. It was only through Ireland’s ratification of the Granada Convention in 1997 that a comprehen- sive system of architectural heritage protection was finally put in place. More specifically, despite some limited earlier attempts at architectural inventories, a National Inventory of Architectural Heritage (NIAH) was established on a statutory basis in 1999. Also, Part IV of the Planning and Development Act, 2000 (hereinafter referred to as the 2000 Act) introduced mandatory protection of struc- tures of heritage significance, by requiring each local authority to include a record of protected structures (RPS) under its development plan; architectural conservation areas (ACAs); con- servation grants for protected structures; and powers of enforcement, among other related provisions. The fundamental features of these legislative provisions have been set out recently by others, 5 and are therefore not repeated again here; however, a number of related points are discussed. First, heritage significance is determined on the basis of eight categories of ‘special interest’: architectural; historical; archaeological; artistic; cultural; scientific; social; and technical. The scope for protection is therefore expansive, broader than in the UK, and broader even than the Granada Convention. Despite this, these categories arguably have considerable additional potential to contribute to more comprehensive, inclusive and representative identification and assessment of built heritage significance, and more effective protection and management, through greater use of innovative participatory approaches. Second, the concept of ‘character’ is central to legislation and guidelines, and while guidelines indicate material attributes that may contribute 3 Parkinson, A, Scott, M and Redmond, D (2017) ‘Revalorizing colonial era architecture and townscape legacies: memory, identity and place-making in Irish towns’, Journal of Urban Design , 22(4), pp502–519 4 Parkinson, A, Scott, M and Redmond, D (2018) ‘Contesting conservation-planning: insights from Ireland since independence’, Planning Perspectives (published online ahead of print, 20 August 2018) available at https://doi.org/10. 1080/02665433.201 8.1509016 (accessed 1 December 2019) 5 O’Rourke, M (2018) ‘Heritage Protection in Ireland’, IHBCYearbook 2018, pp87–88 Castletown House, Celbridge, Co Kildare, was acquired by the Hon Desmond Guinness in 1967 and subsequently restored through the Irish Georgian Society.