گزارش نشست تخصصی«درک تدوین موازین یونسکو برای حراست از میراث ناملموس»

گزارش نشست تخصصی«درک تدوین موازین یونسکو برای حراست از میراث ناملموس»

Capturing the International Zeitgeist: UNESCO Standard-setting for Safeguarding Intangible Cultural Heritage

انجمن ایرانی مطالعات سازمان ملل متحد به مناسبت هفتاد و پنجمین سال تاسیس یونسکو نشستی تخصصی با عنوان «درک تدوین موازین یونسکو برای حراست از میراث ناملموس» را در تاریخ 29 آذرماه1400 به صورت مجازی و با حضور دکتر ژانت بلیک عضو هیئت علمی دانشگاه شهید بهشتی برگزار نمود.

دکتر نسرین مصفا-رئیس انجمن- جلسه را با بیان سخنانی در باب شکل گیری و اهمیت یونسکو سازمان تربیتی، علمی و فرهنگی ملل متحد آغاز کردند.به گفته ایشان، این سازمان با هدف اصلی کمک به صلح و امنیت در جهان از طریق ترویج تشریک مساعی میان ملل در امور آموزشی، علوم و فرهنگی به عنوان یک موسسه تخصصی ملل متحد در چارچوب فصل نهم منشور پا به عرصه حیات در سال ۱۹۴۶ گذاشت که در طول حیات  فعالیت های گسترده ای را در زمینه های مختلف علایق بشری مبتنی بر اساسنامه خود انجام داده است. به لحاظ گستردگی فعالیت ها و همچنین پیچیدگی های مفهوم و نگرش به فرهنگ ، اقدامات این سازمان از مناظر متفاوت مورد تحلیل می باشد، که فرصت های دیگری را برای بررسی نیازمند است. نتایج کار این سازمان در زمینه هنجارسازی به ویژه در حیطه میراث مشترک بشری، که نمونه آن کنوانسیون حراست از میراث نا ملموس فرهنگی است، موردتوجه و نیاز جامعه جهانی است.

دکتر مصفا سپس ضمن تشکر از شرکت کنندگان در این نشست و قبول دعوت انجمن توسط دکتر بلیک، ایشان را یک چهره شناخته شده علمی در  سطح بین المللی، استاد دانشگاه شهید بهشتی و مهم تر از همه شخصیت محترم و خلیق که همیشه بزرگوارانه در خدمت جامعه علمی و دانشگاهی بوده اند، معرفی و اشاره کردند دکتر بلیک صاحب تالیفات متعدد در زمینه های حقوق بشر، حقوق محیط زیست و موضوع نشست امروز و سایر زمینه های فعالیت یونسکو هستند.

گزارش ذیل خلاصه مطالب مطرح شده در این نشست می باشد.

Dynamism and Evolution of Cultural Heritage Law

Cultural heritage law is a dynamic field of international law that has responded over time to experiences and developments, addressing in 1954 the deliberate destruction of cultural property in time of war (now accepted as a crime against humanity and often by non-state actors), preventing looting of and trafficking in cultural property in 1970 (reflecting a post-colonial priority) and, more recently, safeguarding intangible aspects of heritage in 2003. Nowadays, trafficking in and crimes against cultural property are seen as global security challenges and as a part of broader transnational criminality.

The developments we have seen over the years in heritage treaty-making have been a response to contemporary needs at a given time and to the progress of international policy, while also serving to support fundamental purposes of the UN Charter in particular protecting human rights, supporting peaceful co-existence among States and, more recently, achieving more sustainable forms of development. Here, I wish to take each of these in turn, after a brief review of the major international policy developments that underpinned UNESCO’s 2003 Intangible Heritage Convention which, as the most recent purely heritage-based global treaty, is the best exemplar to take.  This treaty reflected a fundamental shift in how we think about heritage today. It represented a major shift in the heritage protection paradigm by placing “communities, groups and … individuals” at the centre of all stages of safeguarding (from identification, to designing and implementing safeguarding plans). It is also strategically situated within the inter-connected discourses of human rights and sustainable development as a vital context for ensuring the sustainability of communities and their heritage and, incidentally, supporting their social, cultural and economic rights.

It is notable that this Convention was particularly championed by countries of the ‘global South’ which felt their interests had not been met in previous UNESCO cultural heritage instruments, especially the World Heritage Convention. This can be seen as a response to the evolution in international development policy from the 1970s, moving away from a purely economic paradigm, via the idea of ‘endogenous development’ championed in Latin America and Africa (that placed local and Indigenous cultures at the centre) to the human development and sustainable development approaches. This occurred in tandem with an increasing importance being accorded to cultural rights in the 1990s – culminating in the adoption of UNESCO’s 2001 Declaration on Cultural Diversity – and calls to recognize more explicitly the central role of (traditional) culture as a driver of development. Sadly, as despite UNESCOs efforts since the late 1990s and early 2000s, we still do not have a sustainable development goal in the 2030 Agenda that explicitly relates to culture and heritage, although they may be implicit in many of the 17 SDGs.

1. Safeguarding Intangible Heritage – Towards the Sustainable Development Goals

Intangible cultural heritage mirrors the sustainable development agenda in its cross-sectoral character, cutting across as it does health, food security, education, peace-building, etc. and effective safeguarding requires horizontal cooperation between governmental bodies. This broadening out of the conception of the role of cultural heritage in society provides States Parties with a framework within which to develop heritage-based policies related to a wide number of aspects of government. The importance given to community (and group) participation in safeguarding heritage in the 2003 Convention also responds directly to an important procedural principle of sustainable development. Sustainable development is explicitly mentioned in the Preamble to the Convention and its Operational Directives now have a chapter devoted to how implementing the Convention can contribute towards sustainable development. Importantly, for a human rights perspective, this includes the notion of inclusivity with regard to social and economic development, development that is inclusive of vulnerable and marginalized groups in society. Most recently, this approach has also been incorporated into the new results-based framework for monitoring implementation of the Convention and reporting on this be States Parties.

2. Human rights and cultural heritage protection

The Human Rights Council Report on the right of access to and enjoyment of cultural heritage (2011) noted that: “Cultural heritage is important not only in itself, but also in relation to its human dimension, in particular its significance for individuals and communities and their identity and development processes” (paragraph 1) As we know, cultural heritage (especially its non-physical attributes) is essential for an individual’s sense of identity and, hence, human dignity. Consequently, cultural heritage protection is central to fulfilling this main purpose of the UN Charter. As one of the more recent cultural heritage treaties, and reflecting the increased international value placed on cultural rights and diversity, the 2003 Convention very explicitly situates itself within human rights by referring in the first recital of the Preamble to the International Bill of Rights. It also defines intangible heritage in terms that clearly show the role it plays in the construction of individual and group identity, while also setting a human rights limitation on what can be regarded as falling within the scope of the treaty.

3. Intercultural Dialogue, Cultural Diversity and Peace

It is worth noting that the 2003 Convention grew directly out of UNESCO’s 2001 Universal Declaration on Cultural Diversity and Action Plan and, so, the value of cultural diversity lies at its heart. This is understood as the totality of diversity that exists among the different cultural traditions worldwide and is demonstrated particularly in the philosophy of “representativeness” underlying the Representative List of Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity. This list was conceived by the drafters (even if not always by the States Parties) as primarily aimed at celebrating the global diversity of this heritage and its bearer communities through the inscription of representative types of such heritage.

As a corollary to this philosophy, the idea of developing mutual respect and tolerance for the cultural heritage of others is one of the four main purposes of the Convention (Article 1(b)) and the Preamble also calls for renewed dialogue among communities as a counter to the threats from intolerance. Moreover, the possibility of multinational nominations to the Representative List is an extremely important departure from previous treaties, especially the World Heritage Convention, and has been very successful in Africa, Latin America and the Baltic States.  Although the experience of competitive listing of shared heritage elements in East Asia and Western Asia has been less positive, the inscription of Traditional Korean Wrestling by both Koreas in 2018 and Nowrouz by 12 countries (Afghanistan, Azerbaijan, India, Iran, Iraq, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Pakistan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Turkey) is an important achievement in a region that does not always enjoy friendly relations. This demonstrates the potential of cultural heritage to fulfil the primary goal of the UN Charter in helping to foster peaceful relations between States.

در پایان سخنرانی دکتر بلیک به سوالات شرکت کنندگان حاضر در جلسه پاسخ دادند.