Heritage Component of Sustainable Development

Abstract

Due to the abundance of heritage issues interpretation and in order to facilitate analysis of the transformation of an object or site—through expertise and instrumentation—into a topic open to long-lasting cultural consumption, researchers have recently imposed the concept of patrimonialization. Being able to promote and manage sustainable development by capitalizing both natural segments, as well as the cultural and intangible segments of universal heritage, patrimonialization added—from an interdisciplinary perspective—to social interrogations of heritage interpretation, those specific for the necessity to ensure environmental, economic, and social sustainability. This paper will emphasize the importance of heritage component for sustainable development, as well as the fact that patrimonialization provides to sustainable development the opportunity to become part of the heritage. Following an integrated approach, patrimonialization implies that the implementation of all activities related to heritage will be introduced in the service of sustainable development. Thus, policies, strategies, and measures for conservation, protection, and promotion of heritage should stimulate, on the one hand, civic engagement and critical attitude towards protecting and respecting local and universal heritage values and, on the other hand, transnational cooperation in implementing the most appropriate ways for their integration. Therefore, having the quality of an alternative device for economic recovery, heritage of Southeast Europe must be patrimonialized to ensure sustainable reconciliation between entrepreneurship that reflects emergence of regional markets, and consumption of heritage, between economic development and the limitations of environmental protection and between museological local traditionalism and the expansion of international networks of living heritage interpretation. In the field of climate change, there is a clear opportunity for all sectors linked to sustainability and also for heritage. Many of the initiatives of heritage conservation stated that sustainability strategies and compliance are imposed by respect for the environment and climate change constraints. Despite the fact that identification of heritage items was already resolved by instrumentalization of interpretation process, its placement in the field of sustainable development could be done only by interdisciplinary targeting of correlation elements.