Description
Undertaking heritage recovery in conflict settings is challenging and could lead to unintended consequences and further discord. Is there a way to avoid such an outcome?
Cultural heritage can play a crucial role in promoting peace, democracy, and sustainable development by fostering tolerance, inter-cultural and inter-faith dialogue, and mutual understanding. At the same time, it can also be instrumentalized as a trigger for and target in conflicts.
Council of the European Union, 2021
To better understand the interaction between heritage and the root causes of conflicts, First Aid and Resilience for Cultural Heritage (FAR), a flagship programme of ICCROM, through its capacity development initiatives, has implemented 32 field projects to safeguard cultural heritage in over ten countries affected by cyclic conflicts.
Based on years of research and on-the-ground experience, FAR conceived the Toolkit on Heritage for Peace and Resilience, which aims at building and sharing knowledge on how cultural heritage safeguarding could contribute to fulfilling the targets of the Sustainable Development Goal 16 calls for ‘peaceful and inclusive societies for sustainable development.’
Generously funded by the Principality of Monaco and supported by the ALIPH Foundation, the Toolkit provides field-tested methodologies for assessing and reducing conflict risks for heritage and people, as well as developing indicators for measuring peacebuilding outcomes of heritage projects.
PATH – Peacebuilding Assessment Tool for Heritage Recovery and Rehabilitation forms the first part of the Toolkit. It is a self-assessment tool that engages users in a ‘good enough’ macro-analysis of the conflict settings and builds a deeper understanding of how the attitudes and behaviours of those caught up in the conflict can affect heritage. PATH is meant to assist individuals, institutions, NGOs, and community groups in planning and implementing conflict-sensitive heritage projects.
Going a step further, the second part of the Toolkit - Community-based Heritage Indicators for Peace, aims to provide a methodology for engaging local communities in defining heritage indicators that can help measure peace and social change in conflict-affected settings. This is to ensure that interventions aimed at heritage safeguarding ‘do not harm’ and support sustainable peace.
Building on this work, the webinar has put together an expert panel to talk about how heritage can contribute to peacebuilding and safeguard it from violent conflicts.
Moderators:
- Mohona Chakraburtty, ICCROM
- Michela Masciocchi, ICCROM
Speakers:
- Glen Davis, Cultural attaché of the US Embassy in Ukraine
- Alexandra Fiebig, Project Manager, Aliph Foundation
- Amra Hadzimuhamedovic, Director, Center for Cultural Heritage, International Forum Bosnia
- Elke Selter, Coordinator Heritage in Crisis, Royal Institute for Cultural Heritage, Belgium
- Aparna Tandon, Senior Programme Leader, ICCROM
