مقاله انگلیسی رایگان در مورد پیوند بین بخشی بین میراث فرهنگی و امنیت – تیلور و فرانسیس 2022

Abstract

     The understanding of cultural heritage as a growing issue in contemporary security has been described as a heritage-security nexus recognising the protection of cultural heritage as a cross-sectoral topic. It represents an urgent issue in international security politics and in the related field of heritage studies. This article shows how the protection of cultural heritage has found its way into rhetoric relating to security politics, thus placing it on political agendas. This development has had an important impact on the academic field of heritage studies. Therefore, this article seeks to identify the linkage between cultural heritage and security threats and the recognition of it as a new theme in academia during the last two decades. The study argues for a newly defined research field that combines heritage studies with security studies in academic fields such as political science and international relations. Finally, this article argues that the academic field of heritage studies, as well as the heritage institutions and related organisations, needs to have a critical approach to the securitisation process. Involved parties need to consider the intentions and causes of the securitising actors and how they usually benefit from security policies.

Introduction

     Conflict dynamics worldwide have shifted from state-on-state conflicts organised around the geopolitics of national borders and territories to increasingly focusing on cultural references and identity politics orientated towards cultural values. The understanding of cultural heritage as a growing issue in contemporary visions of security can be described as a heritage-security nexus (Rosén 2022). This nexus indicates a mixture of policy areas that used to be relatively separate and calls for a more cross-sectoral approach to addressing security issues related to cultural heritage. To understand this development and enable us to respond adequately to its challenges, this article examines how the discursive construction of cultural heritage destruction as a security threat has strengthened the link between heritage and security within research and in contemporary global politics.

Conclusion

     In this article, the development of the cross-sectoral linkage between cultural heritage and security has been identified. The overview of key events and situations has shown how the tactical value of cultural heritage was exploited in the First and Second World War. This led to the creation of heritage institutions and conventions which established the concept of cultural heritage in the international community, thus using cultural heritage as a soft power platform and as a tool for creating international legal instruments. In the post-Cold War period, influenced by the conflicts in the Balkans and later in Afghanistan, the deliberate destruction of cultural heritage and framing of the destruction of cultural heritage as ‘crimes against humanity’, alongside the reactions and condemnation by international society, defined cultural heritage as an intrinsic concept in human security. Cultural heritage protection was connected to goals of peacebuilding, conflict resolution, tolerance and reconciliation – elements similar to a broader peace and security agenda. The organisation of the field of heritage protection shifted and caused a mixture of sectors to interact around protection. It escalated after the seizure of Palmyra, strengthening the position of cultural heritage in diplomatic relations and in the international community. This caused a number of states as well as regional and international organisations to deploy legal instruments and policy interventions which positioned the role of heritage in global politics and as a political security issue. Resultatively, cultural heritage protection is becoming a transnational security issue in contemporary world politics and armed conflicts. Since the 2000s, this has led to a growing development of a concrete linkage between cultural heritage and security. The purpose of cultural heritage protection has increasingly been connected to the security and protection of society and its people. In that way, securing a society and a population’s cultural heritage has found its way into the political rhetoric, placing it in international relations, framed as heritage diplomacy. It has become an actor in human security and thus a matter of politics for security communities and security policy strategies.