Heritage management at the local level: rhetoric and results in the case of Gaziantep, Turkey

Abstract

Following international trends, Turkey has recently introduced decentralisation reforms to its highly centralised public administration system. These reforms have also applied to the cultural heritage sector, where innovative laws since 2004 have allowed local administrations and private actors to play new entrepreneurial roles. The Gaziantep Metropolitan Municipality has been a pioneer in this process, promoting policies that promote cultural tourism as an engine of economic growth. Under its leadership, hundreds of historic buildings have been restored, nine new museums and heritage sites opened, and museum visitors increased tenfold. These positive results make Gaziantep an interesting case of successful decentralisation in heritage management. Despite these successes, however, the disconnection between rhetoric and results, and the fragmentation and ambiguity of responsibilities emerging from the decentralisation process raises serious questions about its sustainability and replicability.

Keywords:

• heritage
• decentralisation
• Turkey
• cultural policies

Notes

1. GMM includes three district municipalities (ilçe), Şahinbey, Şehitkamil, and Oğuzeli, which are home to 74% of the population of Gaziantep province. Other municipalities in the province are Nizip (96,000), İslahiye (31,000), and Nurdağı (16,000).

2. Including the Metropolitan Municipality Law of 2004 (TGNA 2004d), the Municipality Law of 2005 (TGNA 2005a) and the Special Provincial Administration Law of 2005 (TGNA 2005c).

3. Vakıflar Genel Müdürlüğü.

4. Koruma Uygulama ve Denetim Bürosu.

5. Toplu Konut İdaresi.

6. Interview with A. Güzelbey, July 19, 2011.

7. Gaziantep’s leads Turkey in textile production and is a major agriculture, plastics, and chemicals producer.

8. In effect, Turkey has two parallel heritage administrations, one for pre-Christian periods (MoCT) and the other (the GDF) for Ottoman Islamic (and to some extent Christian and Jewish) heritage.

9. Interview with A. Güzelbey, July 19, 2011.

10. Interview with M. Aslan and S. Cihan, July 14, 2011; Interview with A. Güzelbey, July 19, 2011. A detailed budget for KUDEB was not available.

11. Interview with M. Aslan and S. Cihan, July 14, 2011. Unfortunately we were unable to examine the plan in detail because our access to documents was limited.

12. Interview with M. Aslan and S. Cihan, July 14, 2011.

13. Interview with M. Aslan and S. Cihan, July 14, 2011.

14. Interview with M. Aslan and S. Cihan, July 14, 2011.

15. Interview with M. Aslan and S. Cihan, July 14, 2011.

16. Interview with K. Görkay, July 14, 2011.

17. Interview with S. Efiloğlu, July 18, 2011.

18. Interview with S. Bayraktaroğlu, May 26, 2011.

19. İpekyolu Kalkınma Ajansı.

20. Interview with F. Barutçu and H. Doğan, July 18, 2011.

21. Interview with F. Hoşukoğlu, June 18, 2011.

22. Interview with M. Aslan and S. Cihan, July 14, 2011.

23. Interview with S. Bayraktaroğlu, May 26, 2011.

24. The Turkish word özel (‘private’ or ‘special’) is used to refer to any institution not dependent on the central state, thus including entities that might be considered ‘public’ in the Anglo-American context, such as universities and city governments. Cf. Bonini Baraldi et al. 2012.

25. A new bridge has recently been built (summer 2012), making the site accessible for the majority of the year.

26. Interview with Kutalmış Görkay, July 16, 2011.

27. The site guard estimates approximately 5000 visitors to Tilmen in 2010 (interview with N. Hacıoğulları, August 26, 2010).

28. Interview with M. Aslan, July 14, 2011.

29. Interview with K. Görkay, August 30, 2010.

30. Interview with K. Görkay, July 14, 2011.

31. Interview with S. Cihan, July 14, 2011.

32. Interview with I. Evrim, July 19, 2011.

33. Interview with A. Beyazlar, August 28, 2010.

34. Interview with I. Evrim, July 19, 2011.

35. Interviews with M.S. Yılmaz, August 30, 2010 and K. Görkay, July 17, 2011.

36. Interview with I. Evrim, July 19, 2011.

37. Some scholars even doubt whether tourism as a whole really creates net economic growth: on Turkey see Katircioğlu 2009.

38. Something similar happened in Selcuk Municipality, near Ephesus, where local government was frozen out of the heritage planning process due to its affiliation with the opposition party CHP.