Project facts
Presentation
This project investigates how human rights guarantees, in relation to cultural heritage, are being understood and implemented in the EU and its neighbouring countries.
Acknowledging the changing nature of the right to cultural heritage, the project will map how this rights evolving content affects the forms of protection, access to and governance of cultural heritage.
The added value of the project consists in combining an analysis of the relevant laws, their implementation and enforcement.
It will provide a theoretical re-conceptualization of the right to cultural heritage, focusing non only on positive law and jurisprudence, but also on soft-law rules, diplomacy and cultural cooperation as possible alternative devices for fostering intercultural dialogue and understanding.
In its practical perspective, the project analyses how the technical tools used to manage and protect cultural heritage, in particular digitization processes with the development of databases, virtual museums, etc., are currently considered and how they could be further developed to strengthen the enforcement of the right to cultural heritage throughout the EU, including its external action.
The project will contribute to the development of sustainable strategies for protecting and managing cultural heritage as a means to foster international and intercultural dialogue with the European region.
The project will be based on a collaborative, transnational, interdisciplinary research consortium focused mainly on tangible cultural heritage research, while also including the interlinked aspects of intangible and digital heritage.
Impacts & Results
The outcomes will be twofold :
- A path-breaking contribution to interdisciplinary scholarship in this area, disseminated through various publications.
- The elaboration of recommendations and guidelines, openly accessible via a new online platform, concerning best practices on the use of cultural heritage for the benefit of states and communities which all have an intrinsic interest in its protection and enjoyment.
- To offer an innovative research-based knowledge to promote sustainable use and management of cultural heritage and so to meet societal challenges and contribute to the wider development of society.
- To lead to significant advances in the understanding of cultural heritage across the broader research community and in society within the European Union.
- To promote and transfer its research outcomes to community groups and the general public.
- To contribute to a better understanding of how the significance and the values that cultural heritage holds for individuals and communities are influenced by political, social changes.