The cross-sectoral linkage between cultural heritage and security: how cultural heritage has developed as a security issue?

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.

KEYWORDS:

• Heritage-security nexus
• securitisation of cultural heritage
• armed conflict
• contemporary heritage protection
• cross-sectoral challenges

Acknowledgments

The author gratefully acknowledges the insightful comments and suggestions of Dr Frederik Rosén and Dr Samuel Hardy.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. The Responsibility to Protect is an international doctrine seeking to ensure that states and the international community take special responsibility for protecting civilian populations from mass atrocities such as genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing, and other crimes against humanity. The doctrine provides a coherent framework for preventing and stopping these types of assaults and points out actions for specific actors in the various phases of the conflict.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the The New Carlsberg Foundation’s Research Initiative

Notes on contributors

Marie Elisabeth Berg Christensen

Marie Elisabeth Berg Christensen has MSc in Conservation and Restoration (The Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts Schools of Architecture, Design and Conservation) and MA in Prehistoric Archeology (University of Copenhagen) and is currently a PhD Fellow at the University of Copenhagen, collaborating with the National Museum of Denmark and Nordic Center for Cultural Heritage and Armed Conflict (CHAC). The PhD project is funded by the New Carlsberg Foundation’s Research Initiative.