CONTEXT 176 : JUNE 2023 17 WORLD HERITAGE SITES The designation process Before a candidate world heritage site can be submitted by a state party to the World Heritage Committee for consideration, it must first be included on a ‘tentative list’ prepared by the state party. The list should include sites that are considered to have outstanding universal value and could be brought forward for preparation of a nomination dossier. Unesco advises that tentative lists be revised at least every 10 years. As the state party representative and focal point for world heritage in the UK, the Department of Culture, Media and Sports (DCMS) is currently reassessing the UK 2011 tentative list and expects to establish a revised list during 2023. The preparation of a comprehensive world heritage site nomination dossier by site promoters, its submission to the World Heritage Committee by the state party and an extensive evaluation by the World Heritage Committee and its expert advisory bodies (ICOMOS, IUCN and ICCROM) usually takes at least three years. The nomination of the English Lake District World Heritage Site, a complex cultural landscape, took more than 10 years. The nomination journey and commitment involves considerable investment of resources by site promoters and stakeholders. The UK is currently bringing forward a world heritage site nomination for a natural site: the Flow Country blanket bog landscape in Caithness and Sutherland. It will be submitted to the World Heritage Committee in early 2023 and evaluated over the following year, before being considered by the World Heritage Committee in 2024. The UK collection The UK has 33 world heritage sites: 29 ‘onshore’ and four in its overseas territories. Although outstanding universal value is the common denominator, the sites in the world heritage collection vary greatly terms of size, type, context, boundaries, governance, investment and management requirements. The UK collection includes a rich and diverse range of globally important places, including historic monuments and structures, city-centre townscapes, industrial legacy sites, extensive cultural landscapes, parks and gardens, archaeology of many different periods, natural and geologically important locations, and representations of 20th-century science. Currently, the majority of the sites are of the cultural type. When considered as a whole, they have the potential to capture, explain and celebrate our island story and identity over 5,000 years. Surprisingly, given their accepted international significance and arguably being the best of the best of our heritage inheritance, UK world heritage sites do not have statutory protection as designated assets with associated core funding. While recognised as being of the highest significance in the National Planning Policy Framework, there is a lack of parity with national parks and areas of outstanding natural beauty, which benefit from underpinning legislation and core funding for local management. The continued inscription of UK world heritage sites has evolved over 36 years with limited strategic guidance nationally. In the mid-1980s, achieving inscription was relatively simple, broadly focusing on already nationally designated, monocentric and iconic sites (such as Durham Cathedral and Castle). During the 1990s and beyond, many sites were brought forward that were more extensive, multiply owned cultural townscapes and landscapes with a diverse mix of values, requiring complex partnership, governance and support arrangement for management. During this period the UK’s approach to world heritage site nomination, protection, management, community engagement and investment demonstrated best practice and was sought out by other countries. In the last 20 years, however, as public resources have continued to be reduced it has proved increasingly difficult to consistently implement in full the visions and conservation objectives of all world heritage sites. Managing the sites There are over 500 organisations involved in the planning, administration and management of UK world heritage sites at the international, national and local levels. This jigsaw of many parts presents a complicated and confusing picture of governmental and non-governmental roles and responsibilities for world heritage.This has arisen in part from the cross-cutting nature of the world heritage concept, the diversity of the types of site, and the ad hoc evolution of world heritage site inscription since 1984. Local and individual governance and arrangements for the day-to-day management of world heritage sites are also very varied. It falls to a mix of local authorities (32 per cent), mixed public partnerships (21 per cent), central-governmentfunded agencies (18 per cent), the National Trust (11 per cent) and other independent charitable trusts (18 per cent). More than 70 per cent of sites depend on public or governmental funding. All UK world heritage sites now have comprehensive management and action plans (unlike in many other countries), and have a locally employed world heritage site coordinator, whose role usually focuses on management plan implementation, world heritage site promotion and community engagement.
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