\" Why do we conserve special places? \"

‘Landscape Values: Place and Praxis’ Conference June 2016

31st May 2016

Colm Murray, The Heritage Council of Ireland Proposal for a paper answering the theme of ‘Place Values’

3,556 words

“Why do we conserve special places?” Abstract There are four basic and distinct types of reason why people wish to ‘prolong the cultural life’ of ‘familiar and cherished’ buildings, places and landscapes. I use these ‘meta-categories of value’ to create a conceptual framework to map the values people ascribe to them. This disaggregates concepts and motivations along a scale from the concrete, objective properties which places and buildings have, through the terms provided by charters and legislation to articulate values, to the most abstract and all-embracing concepts such as ‘society’, ‘culture’, the ‘economy’. The map is intended to be used as a tool for recognising power relations and in negotiating stakeholder conflicts about the significance of places. Further, the approach outlined above queries the centrality of the concept of ‘authenticity’ in conservation, and replace it with a communicative theory. Along with ‘Commodity, Firmness and Delight’, the structures we build, as well as the places and landscapes that we inherit and choose to cherish, embody messages, meanings and symbols; they communicate. *****

Fig. 1 The Demos Triangle of heritage values (from, Clarke (ed), 2006, Capturing the Public Value of Heritage) Meta-categories of value The way in which we conceive of, and give value to, cultural heritage determines the way in which we ‘protect’ that heritage. While it may appear axiomatic that cultural heritage should be ‘protected’, its scope, importance and the basis upon which ‘protection’ is sought, is a complex and emotive issue. (Forrest, 2010)1 In 2006, The UK Heritage Lottery Fund and English Heritage published ‘Capturing the Public Value of Heritage’2, which described three main categories of value provided by heritage. These were ‘intrinsic’ value, the more or less conventional expert-identified set of criteria and reasons why we designate places, for their architectural, artistic, historic and (more recently) ‘social’ values. There is an ample literature which describes how values can be ascribed to places within the expert-technical 1

paradigm3. Secondly, there are instrumental values, those reasons described in the Council of Europe’s 2005 Framework Convention on the Value of Cultural Heritage for Society4 (‘the Faro Convention’). This form of value has been frequently advanced by institutions to justify spending on heritage conservation for the benefit of society more generally. The Heritage Council has, for example, made the case for the economic benefits of heritage-led urban regeneration, or the health benefits of children’s interactions with the natural heritage. Thirdly, there is ‘Institutional Value’ in State expenditure on heritage. Based on the ideas about the public sector developed by Mark Moore5, this relates to the various forms of positive attributes that the public can derive from the existence of responsible public sector organizations. These include trust, solidarity, stewardship and the strengthening of communities, as well as efficiency or delivering ‘value for money’ in public expenditure. The Heritage Council’s grants and financial support for NGOs have, for many years, supported this form of value. It is not only found in the heritage sector, but heritage places provide distinct aims around which these social processes and benefits congregate. I describe these groups of similar values ‘meta-categories’ of value, because they represent discourses about value that we tend to segregate from each other. The discussions that happen at the level of (what is called) intrinsic value do not influence decisions to allocate money to heritage. The value of heritage as a catalyst for social organization, which it shares with other public goods, gets taken for granted, or is barely noticeable, because it is stitched into the very fabric of our society. What differentiates them is their relationship to power, specifically, the power to allocate fiscal resources, and, again more to the point, public funding. Public value as societal value I contend that ‘Institutional Value’ does not reside only in the institutions of the state, and can be understood as a more pervasive form of social or cultural value in the way that non-state groups of people organise themselves, including around heritage interests. From the residents’ association through tidy towns committees, to archaeological and historical societies, to tourism and business development groups, heritage becomes the catalyst for collective action. This activity, as well as the interaction or dialogue between parties, constitute social relations. This is the essence of citizenship and participation in society. ‘Public’ or ‘Institutional’ value is not confined to the State, but is pervasive in functioning societies. The heritage sector stimulates the creation of this type of value, and it ought to be recognised and supported in a functioning society. Instrumental ways of looking at what heritage ‘does’ The Heritage Council has made the case over many years of the ‘paybacks’ that come from investment in heritage. During the on-going downturn, to get the attention of government budgetholders, requests for public funds had to be couched in terms of their responding only to the most pressing economic and political pressures. Council presented a national conference on ‘Place as Resource’, in October 2011, the publication of ‘Economic Value of Ireland’s Historic Environment’ report in 2012, ‘Heritage as an Engine of Economic Growth in Mid-Sized Towns’ conference in 2012, and launching a report on ‘Assessment of Possible Fiscal Incentives in relation to the Built Heritage in Ireland’s Towns’ in 2014. The use of this form of thinking in Irish heritage policy in recent years has been analysed and critiqued by Maja Lagaerqvist,6 primarily for reneging on the importance of the so-called intrinsic value of heritage.

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Fig. 2 ‘Categories of Economic Values Attributed to Cultural Heritage Assets’ diagram from Ismael Serageldin ‘Very Special Places: The Architecture and Economics of Intervening in Historic Cities’, The World Bank, Washington

Consider figure 2 above, which provides a totalising discourse of how value can be ascribed to a place by putting a price on it. Does the reduction of value to a single metric – money – resolve all issues of valuing, or capture all aspects of the human perception of value? I think not. The psychology of value ascription is fundamentally discursive, and for this reason the reduction of value to a single dimension of measurement does a disservice to the perceptions of value-holders, as well as the concept and process of valuation. Heritage represents a cultural and material resource. The built environment that surrounds us has endured in large percentage from before our lifetimes, and will endure afterwards, providing structure, shelter, ornament and symbolic meaning to our predecessors, ourselves and our descendants. Buildings, gardens and agricultural land in particular are useful, are meant to be useful, and derive their meaningfulness to us through their utility. These places also demand and teach people skills, know-how, stewardship and respect. A pleasing well-made modern masonry wall is a substantial material contribution to our culture and landscape. Inherent value? Philosophers and environmental ethicists are sceptical that value is inherent in the landscapes that we live in, and instead perceive that human beings ‘ascribe’ value to their surroundings, their ‘habitus’7. Values emanate from us. They are subjective, based on structures of cognition in the human mind. Our meaning-hungry brains interpret our surroundings and remember their utility and fruitfulness. The landscapes, places, habituses, worlds that we live in become part of who we are, and our empathy with them lend us our identity. I contend that rather than being inherent in things, places and landscapes, our valuation of our habituses constitute ways that we explore and affirm our identity.

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Identity value Heritage provides us with a means to explore and declare our identities; to answer the question ‘Who are we?’ We may even to discover that sometimes there are multiple answers to this question. Salvador Muños Viñas refers to ‘inter-subjectivity’ and builds a theory of meaningfulness for cultural heritage on the multiplicity and confluence of meanings and values8.Buildings, places and landscapes are meaningful to us, they communicate with us through their symbolism, at a series of different levels, from the unconscious, the phenomenological, the practical to the ideal or metaphysical. Meaningfulness operates through many strands. The durability of those meanings, and their transmission to our descendants, are matters that preoccupy us, and, philosophically, are part of the ‘Good Life’ that we might strive to lead. In this form of meaning, the value a place has for a person is firmly located in the mind of the value-holder, and the question of whether the building, place, landscape or object has intrinsic ‘value’ is by-passed. The use of heritage in cultural identity is not limited to the negative drawing of boundaries around culturally distinct groups. Heritage can be used to explore identity as much as to erect barriers between people. If this were to be expressed by reference to a simple concept that is already available to us, it would be to refer to the impossibility of drawing boundaries to places. More positively, sets of linked places can be used to understand and celebrate difference and connectedness. Consider these lines by Patrick Kavanagh: A swan goes by head low with many apologies, Fantastic light looks through the eyes of bridges And look! a barge comes bringing from Athy And other far-flung towns mythologies. The linear canal connects places, and provides the poet with a mental escape route from the parochial into universal themes and a language that invokes the world of literature or ideas. It carries cultural difference with it, and that difference can be a source of richness9. ‘Landscape’, seen in this way as a proper setting for heritage, can make places (in the plural) a ‘praxis’ of identity affirmation and exploration. The negative use of heritage, as for example in wilful destruction of the heritage of others, emphasises that identity is indeed a dominant way that heritage is understood and valued. In the form of the destruction of the Buddhas of Baniam in Afganistan, or of the ancient Roman remains at Palmyra in Syria, it could be seen to be a retreat from interculturalism, and the world contains many current examples of the deliberate destruction of the heritage of the enemy as an aggressive action. Evidential value. I contend that we should distinguish this identity value from another more particular and more modern approach to ‘inheritance’. This centres on the way we think of the past as different from the present. We develop our understanding of the difference by looking at evidence. The sense of reverence for the past was clearly defined by conservation theorists Ruskin and Morris in the nineteenth century, and carries through the methodologies of history (including art and architectural history) and archaeology and other forms of investigation of the past. The cult of rational objective enquiry has been used to assert the ‘scientificity’ of the conservation approach, with an emphasis on truth in art, integrity of fabric and ‘authenticity’. The interpretation, treatment and presentation of evidence should be considered to be a distinct and separate reason for taking care of special places, for undertaking conservation. The desire to 4

enquire into the qualities of heritage in a manner consistent with scientific method is not the major reason why people like places: it is because they are meaningful to us. If ‘evidential’ value is recognised as separate motivation to the celebration and exploration of intrinsic value, conservationists, be they professionals or amateurs, can give more precise reasons for their motivations.

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In summary, the four types of reason (‘meta-categories ‘) which explain the urge to conserve are: a) to celebrate, explore and affirm the identity of local, regional, national or international groups of people. This is the most familiar to us, but not the most important. Artistic and historical values have been augmented in the last twenty years by broadening and democratising social and cultural considerations. b) to protect evidence of the way things were in the past. This is concealed within the artistic and historic norms, but it is my contention that it resolves some issues to think about it separately. c) to prudently manage landscapes, places and buildings as environmental and economic resources, and d) because the processes of caring for heritage share characteristics with other social activities that build public, social organisation or institutional value. These relate to each other in the sense of each successive type providing a context in which the following can be understood. Contrariwise, the more practical the context the more reliance can be placed on the latter meta-categories. Value ascription is an engagement with the world. It is multi-stranded, subjective, tentative, iterative, and intrinsically demands affirmation from others. In this communicative aspect lies its very purpose. 5

How can this understanding of the values we ascribe to buildings, places and landscapes enhance the ways we conserve places? In the first instance it identifies the role of agency in the process of valuing. Valuing is unequivocally a subjective process. It can be done by individuals and also institutions. This approach requires that statements about the value of places must be understood as having an origin in some person or institution, as representing a point-of-view. Following from this is the possibility – nay, the desirability – of contestation and disagreement. It is from discourses on value that richer agreement or discussion on the meaning of places can be found, and flowing from this, inclusive decisionmaking and management. Secondly, it reinforces the importance of methodologies that search at different levels for value in places as a precursor to action. Conservation Plans (following the Burra Charter methodology) can be limited if they confine themselves to expert-technical forms of value, and can be emancipatory or transformative if they range across the scale of the meta-categories outlined here. A richer praxis of heritage as can emerge from understanding this schemata of values. Thirdly, the reasons for placing values on places can be recognised for the various motivations that could be attached to them, from reverence to exploitation. Fourthly, it provides a context in which to understand the relative importance of ‘identity’ and ‘evidential’ meta-categories of value. In this re-balancing, the ‘scientificity’ of exert-technical modes of valuing can be understood as subsidiary to more general identity affirmation and exploration urges which are validly felt and expressed by larger groups of people who do not have the benefit of training or formal education. Authenticity Authenticity is, according to the most recent description in the cultural heritage context, “A culturally contingent quality associated with a heritage place, practice, or object that conveys cultural value; is recognized as a meaningful expression of an evolving cultural tradition; and/or evokes among individuals the social and emotional resonance of group identity.” (2014, Nara +20)10 A thorough review of the extensive literature on this concept from the last 20 years reveals a lack of transparent meaning11. In contrast, the parallel concept of ‘integrity’ has a well-understood meaning which can be expressed quite succinctly12. Authenticity is a concept that has been given priority by conservation specialists, because it thus makes their activity ‘scientific’ in dedicating the craft to a project of truth-seeking. The Nara Document on Authenticity (1994) says ‘The understanding of authenticity plays a fundamental role in all scientific studies of the cultural heritage’ forging the link between science and conservation. The concept was used in the Venice Charter (1964) to describe ‘historic monuments ... as living witnesses … imbued with messages from the past … [for which we have a] common responsibility … to hand them on in the full richness of their authenticity’. It is notable that in this foundational document, ‘authenticity’ is only mentioned in the context of communication, the transmission of messages from the past. However, the seeking of historical truths is only a small part of the urge to take care of special places. The dilemma for the specialist was described succinctly by Muños Viñas:

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If conservation deliberately alters both the objects and their meaning, instead of actually conserving them; if it does not restore meanings or objects, but it rather adapts them to present-day expectations and needs; if truth is no longer the necessary ultimate goal of conservation, what can a conservator do? What should a conservator do? (2005, p. 147) Conservation does not pursue authenticity. In some sense, the opposite is true: conservation is done because we do not like the authentic state of some objects (the objects that are to be conserved or restored) – because what authentically is does not suit our needs, our tastes, our expectations. (Muños Viñas, 2009, p.3713) Once again, it must be emphasised that societies protect these objects not because of the objects themselves, but because of the intangible, symbolic effects an unwarranted alteration might have on the subjects that make up that society. The widespread legal protection of heritage objects is based upon (and is proof of) the significance those objects have for an important number of people within the society: this protection has been developed in order to prevent unwanted meanings that their free modification might produce. (Muños Viñas, 2005, p. 160) Each time an object is modified, some of its possible meanings are strengthened, whilst others are restricted forever. The principle of sustainability in conservation mandates that future users should be taken into account when decisions are made. The object is seen as a ‘source of meanings’ that can be exploited at different levels. (ibid., p. 195)

In his book ‘The Secret Lives of Buildings’, Edward Hollis eloquently relates the turbulent histories of some of the most iconic buildings in the world, from the Parthenon to Venice (as recreated in Las Vegas)14. Conspicuous by its absence in the cultural life of these 13 iconic buildings was their ‘authenticity’. Their long cultural lives in the minds of people were even independent of their material integrity. What was constant is the powerful meaning that buildings, or the idea of a particular building, has for people. Throughout history this was the grounds for some of the most fervent activity in the name of conservation.

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Alternative version of fig. 3

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Forrest, Craig. 2010. International Law and the Protection of Cultural Heritage. New York: Routledge. Clark, K, 2006, Capturing the Public Value of Heritage, English Heritage, London 3 In Ireland, the National Inventory of Architectural Heritage uses eight terms that have been written into the legislation to protect the architectural heritage These replace a richer, more comprehensive set of criteria used before the year 2000. 4 Council of Europe. 2005. Council of Europe Framework Convention on the Value of Cultural Heritage for Society. Council of Europe Treaty Series 199. Strasbourg: Council of Europe Pub. 5 Moore, Mark, 1995, Creating Public Value: Strategic Management in Government, Harvard University Press, Cambridge (Mass.). 6 Lagerqvist, Maja. 2015. My goodness, my heritage! Constructing good heritage in the Irish economic crisis. Culture Unbound: Journal of Current Cultural Research 7: 285-306. http://www.cultureunbound.ep.liu.se/v7/a17/cu15v7a17.pdf 7 It is this durability which gives the things of the world their relative independence from men who produced and use them, their "objectivity" which makes them withstand, "stand against" and endure, at least for a time, the voracious needs and wants of their living makers and users. From this viewpoint, the things of the world have the function of stabilizing human life, and their objectivity lies in the fact that—in contradiction to the Heraclitean saying that the same man can never enter the same stream-—men, their ever-changing nature notwithstanding, can retrieve their sameness, that is, their identity, by being related to the same chair and the same table. In other words, against the subjectivity of men stands the objectivity of the man-made world rather than the sublime indifference of an untouched nature, whose overwhelming elementary force, on the contrary, will compel them to swing relentlessly in the circle of their own biological movement, which fits so closely into the over-all cyclical movement of nature's household. (Hanna Arendt, 1958, The Human Condition, p. 137). See also Cooper, David E. 1992, ‘The idea of environment’ in The Environment in Question: Ethics and Global Issues, edited by David E. Cooper and Joy A. Palmer, pp. 165-80, London, Routledge 8 Muños Viñas, Dr. Salvador, 2005, Contemporary Theory of Conservation, Elseiver, London, p. 153 9 At the international level of World Heritage Sites, this is acknowledged in the ‘serial nomination’, featuring separate, but linked, places, whose specialness at least in part comes from their relationship across space. 10 Nara + 20: On heritage practices, cultural values, and the concept of authenticity, 11 See Nara + 20: On heritage practices, cultural values, and the concept of authenticity, Muñoz-Viñas, Dr. Salvador, 2009, Beyond authenticity, In Art, Conservation and Authenticities: Material, Concept, Context: Proceedings of the International Conference Held at the University of Glasgow, 12-14 September 2007, edited by Erma Hermens and Tina Fiske, 33-38. London: Archetype Publications Ltd., p. 33 Deacon, H., & Smeets, R., 2013, Authenticity, Value and Community Involvement in Heritage management under the World Heritage and Intangible Heritage Conventions, Heritage and 11 Society, Vol. 6, no. 2, 129-143, at p. 139; Pendlebury, J., Short, M., and While, A., 2009, Urban World Heritage Sites 11 and the problem of authenticity, in Cities, Vol. 26, pp. 349 – 358; Choay, Françoise, 1995, Sept propositions sur le concept d’authenticité et son usage dans les pratiques du patrimoine historique, in Larsen, K.E. (ed.), Nara Conference on Authenticity in relation to the World Heritage Convention, UNESCO, ICOMOS, ICCROM, Paris, pp. 101-20. 12 For example, see World Heritage Committee, 2015, Operational Guidelines for the Implementation of the World Heritage Convention, UNESCO World Heritage Centre, Paris, http://whc.unesco.org/document/137843 13 Muños Viñas, 2009, “Beyond Authenticity”, 2009, in Art Conservation and Authenticities, Archetype 14 Hollis, Edward, 2009, The Secret Lives of Buildings: From the Parthenon to the Vega Strip in Thirteen Stories, Portobello, London 2

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