Developing the UK world heritage tentative list

Now that the UK has in part complied with Unesco’s call for nomination reduction and addressing gaps in the world heritage list, the government must support the existing sites.

1 Introduction
2 Unesco guidance
3 Gaps and imbalances
4 The review
5 Implementing the list
6 Related articles on Designing Buildings Conservation.

Introduction

The government announced the new UK tentative list for world heritage sites in 2023, following an assessment and selection process undertaken in 2022/2023. Context 176 (June 2023), whose theme was world heritage sites, included an overview of the UK world heritage site designation process, reflections on the role of our world-class industrial heritage and several views from some of our existing world heritage sites. This article explores in more detail the international and national implications of the Unesco tentative list process and how this has influenced the recent selection of sites for the revised UK tentative list.

As a ‘state party’ or signatory to the Unesco World Heritage Convention [1], the UK is committed to its obligations and the related Operational Guidelines [2] which are the framework for the implementation of the convention. State parties are invited to submit a tentative list of potential world heritage sites. Only sites on the approved national tentative list can be progressed by the state party for nomination and inscription on to the world heritage list. This is restricted to one a year for each state party. State parties are advised that they should review their tentative lists, as a minimum, every ten years.

Unesco guidance

The detailed 2020 Unesco Guidance on Developing and Revising World Heritage Tentative Lists [3] acknowledges that each state party will need to choose its particular method of review and assessment. However, it emphasises the need for the tentative list selection process to be open and clear, both nationally and locally. The guidance is comprehensive and provides advice on how to differentiate between the national value of a country’s heritage inventory (both cultural and natural) and the potential global significance derived from a screening of this national inventory.

In selecting sites for the tentative list, the guidance also encourages state parties to establish a preliminary or long list of sites that combines a top-down and bottom-up approach. The top-down review should identify sites with potential ‘outstanding universal value’, derived from a broad screening of the state party national inventories of heritage resources. The bottom-up approach encourages detailed assessments of sites put forward by local interests.

The guidance warns of the possibility of disappointment and disaffection by potential bottom-up tentative list candidates and stakeholders not selected for the initial long list or final inclusion on the list. Managing these expectations is important, given the great effort and resource investment that some stakeholders will have made in promoting their potential world heritage sites. Clear, consistent and regular communication and updates are needed during the whole tentative list review process.

Gaps and imbalances

The number of sites globally on the world heritage list has expanded rapidly, from 84 in 1981 to 1,199 in 2023 with, in recent decades, a similar growth reflected on tentative lists. Since the initiation and nomination of a world heritage site is primarily driven by state parties, the list has become unbalanced regionally and thematically. Some 48 per cent of world heritage sites are in the European and North American regions, and, globally, some 90 per cent of all sites are categorised as ‘cultural’.

Similar imbalances are present on most state party tentative lists. Unesco’s 2021 Analysis of the Global Strategy for a Representative, Balanced, and Credible World Heritage List [4] seeks to influence the over-represented state parties to slow their rates of nomination, to consider an increase in nominations for natural and mixed sites, and to address other thematic gaps. The UK’s response to this has been to bring forward only one site for nomination every two years. The 2023 new UK tentative list also reflects to some degree a better balance of cultural and natural sites.

The review

The 2011 tentative list review assessed 38 applications and originally recommended 11 sites for inclusion. Over the next ten years, six sites were successively presented and inscribed as world heritage sites. In addition, the Flow Country natural site and the Moravian Church Settlement, Gracehill (part of a transnational site led by others), are both proceeding towards nomination in 2023. Seven sites from the 2011 list did not progress towards nomination for a variety of reasons, including being appraised as not being ready, lacking the viability for future management or not being able to demonstrate outstanding universal value.

For the 2023 tentative list review, the DCMS set up an inter-agency steering group to learn lessons from the 2011 review, guide the assessment process, coordinate an open online call for submissions by candidates wishing to be considered for the revised tentative list and run briefings and workshops. The steering group appointed an independent panel of eight cultural heritage, cultural landscape and natural heritage experts to assess the suitability of applications.

Full applications were submitted by 19 candidates from across the UK and its overseas territories. Of these 13 were cultural (C), three natural (N) and three mixed (M). They were Ancient Ulster (M); Armagh Observatory (C); The Barbican, London (C); Bedford and Brentham Garden Suburbs (C); Birkenhead Park, Wirral (C); Bodnant Garden, North Wales (C); Chalk Streams of Southern England (M); Cresswell Crags, Derbyshire (C); Culloden Battlefield, Scotland (C); Eastern Atlantic Way, East Coast (N); Great Baths National Park, Virgin Islands (N); Siccar Point, Scotland (N); Landscape of the White Horse (C); Little Cayman Protected Areas, Caribbean (N); Port Sunlight, Wirral (C); Gibraltar Tunnels (C); Sankey Valley, St Helens (C); City of York (C); and Iron Age Shetland (C).

Each site was evaluated against the following ‘necessary’ and ‘essential’ criteria: clear potential outstanding universal value and demonstrable authenticity; support of principal owners and local authority; and threats to viability for management.

‘Desirable’ criteria included addressing a gap in under-represented categories and supporting UK priority areas (natural, mixed, overseas territory sites); realistic approach to comparative analysis; local community and stakeholder support; and potential to enhance conservation and management of the heritage or site.

In April 2023 the minister for heritage announced the new UK tentative list of two new natural sites and three new cultural sites:

Birkenhead Park, Wirral (C) The ‘people’s park’, a pioneer urban greenspace, was an influential model for municipally funded urban parks throughout the world.
East Atlantic Flyway, East Coast (N) 170,000 hectares of varied and connected wetlands and coastal habitats, forming a globally important corridor for migratory water birds.
Little Cayman Marine Parks and Protected Areas, Caribbean (N) Undisturbed and exceptional reefs, marine ecosystems and coastal habitats along a 45-kilometre shoreline.
City of York (C) The core of the city has been inhabited continuously for 2,000 years. The coherence of its surviving building and townscape, augmented by below-ground archaeology, provides an unparalleled record of the fusion of cultures from the Roman period to the present day.
Zenith of Iron Age Shetland, South Mainland Shetland (C) Three sites demonstrate 1,000 years of human endeavour in a harsh environment at the northernmost limit of iron-age farming.

Added to these are the two sites that are also on the tentative list and are due to be considered by the World Heritage Committee in 2024:

The Flow Country, North Scotland (N) The site includes a large area of peatland that represents the world’s most complete and extensive example of an intact, natural blanket bog ecosystem.
Gracehill Moravian Church Settlements, Northern Ireland (C) A transnational cultural nomination adding to sites in Denmark, the USA and Germany, exemplifying the Moravian Church’s spiritual, societal and ethical ideas.

The World Heritage Committee approved the new UK tentative list in September 2023.

Implementing the list

In bringing sites forward for nomination from the tentative list over the next ten years, the UK government has made it clear that it will give priority to reducing UK nomination numbers and addressing gaps on the world heritage list. The five new sites on the tentative list will be encouraged by the government to further develop their nomination dossiers. The bulk of the very considerable resources needed to progress each of the site nominations will still most likely continue to be the responsibility of local site promoters, agencies and stakeholders.

The Flow Country and Gracehill candidate world heritage sites are currently in the Unesco evaluation process, with a decision on inscription due in September 2024. The preparation of a comprehensive nomination dossier by site promoters, its submission to the Unesco World Heritage Committee and subsequent evaluation by the committee’s expert advisory bodies (ICOMOS, IUCN and ICCROM) usually takes at least two years. Since the UK is now committed to submitting a nomination every two years, it is likely that only two or three sites out of the five on the tentative list will be brought forward for nomination in the next ten years, with perhaps the earliest next submission being in 2026 or 2027.

The DCMS is the focal point for UK world heritage matters and communication with Unesco. The process and development of a nomination dossier includes technical assessment and checks by Historic England and other agencies on behalf of the DCMS. In addition, Unesco’s Operational Guidelines encourages an assessment of the suitability of world heritage candidates at an early stage. The DCMS can request annual ‘upstream’ advice from Unesco, including guidance on interim revisions or changes to the tentative list. The ‘preliminary assessment’ of individual draft nominations, now considered a mandatory part of the process by Unesco, is a thorough check of a draft nomination for outstanding universal value compliance and readiness prior to submission.

The UK Tentative Review has established a new list, but it has also revealed some issues that could be usefully considered for any interim monitoring of the new list and the development of any future lists. The 2023 review, by taking a bottom-up approach to potential site selection for the new list, has responded only in part to the best-practice guidance by ICOMOS and Unesco, which recommends a combined top-down and bottom-up approach. Inevitably this has continued to result in a long list that reflects local desires, initiatives and strengths, rather than a national overview of all our heritage assets that may potentially have outstanding universal value.

A screening of a comprehensive national inventory of cultural and natural heritage sites and assets (undesignated and undesignated) that are potentially of international and global significance needs to be undertaken. This will create a more rational and top-down preliminary listing for future tentative lists when they are established. The criteria for inclusion on such an inventory would need to reflect the wide-ranging and cross-cutting values that underpin the world heritage concept. Once established, the inventory would provide a more enhanced data baseline that would underpin a more consistent and combined approach to tentative list development.

The 2019 national audit of UK world heritage sites, UK World Heritage: asset for the future [5] highlighted that there continued to be very low awareness of the values and importance of world heritage at all levels, from local communities to politicians, and emphasised that this was a key challenge faced by the sector. It called for a national strategy and commitment for awareness-raising to enhance UK world heritage site conservation and sustainability.

The applicants for the 2023 tentative review demonstrated this further in the huge differences in the quality of the applications and great variations in the understanding of the world heritage concept, values, nomination process and terminology. It was particularly obvious in the 61 per cent of expressions of interest that did not go forward to the long list for assessment. Although the review process included briefings and workshops, a longer-term programme of support, training and awareness-raising should be provided during future tentative listing processes. Most importantly, support will be needed during the nomination development period for all candidates on the 2023 list.

World heritage status remains highly sought after across the world. The World Heritage Committee and others, however, remain rightly concerned that the increasing focus globally on implementing tentative lists and pursuing nominations is to the detriment of the responsibilities for management, monitoring and conservation of sites already inscribed. While the UK approach to establishing its tentative list may not be perfect, the UK has in part complied with Unesco’s call for nomination reduction and addressing gaps in the world heritage list. Following some ten years of limited investment in the UK world heritage sector, and increasing challenges to world heritage site conservation, increased support and resources are now critically needed from the UK government. This will ensure enhanced, balanced and sustainable management of the existing individual world heritage sites in the future and any others that may emerge from the new tentative list.

[1] World Heritage Convention 1972 www.whc.unesco.org/en/convention
[2] Operational Guidelines for the Implementation the World Heritage Convention, Unesco World Heritage Centre, 2021
[3] Guidance on Developing and Revising World Heritage Tentative Lists, UNESCO/ICOMOS/ IUCN/ICCROM, 2020
[4] Analysis of the Global Strategy for a Representative, Balanced and Credible World Heritage List (1994-2020), independent report to Unesco World Heritage Centre, 2021
[5] UK World Heritage, Asset for the Future: a review of the state of UK world heritage sites, independent report by World Heritage UK, 2019

This article originally appeared in the Institute of Historic Building Conservation’s (IHBC’s) Context 180, published in June 2024. It was written by Chris Blandford, president of World Heritage UK.

--Institute of Historic Building Conservation