Lights and shadows over the Recommendation on the Historic Urban Landscape: ‘managing change’ in Ballarat and Cuenca through a radical approach focused on values and authenticity

Abstract

The 2011 Recommendation on the Historic Urban Landscape (HUL) is the most recent incorporation to the global process of heritage production that was triggered by the 1972 World Heritage Convention. Five years since the publication of the Recommendation, it is clear that, despite UNESCO’s efforts, opportunities for the implementation of the HUL on a global level have been scarce. An increasing awareness regarding public participation has provided an additional opportunity for the HUL, due to an enhanced understanding of an ideal urban heritage management that, avant la lettre, disregards traditional up-down decision-making processes. Our paper provides a critical evaluation of the positive and negative aspects which have arisen from the implementation of HUL Recommendation with regards to charters and theory. We have also taken into consideration the risks that are concomitant to its ambitious holistic approach, as well as the ambiguities with regards to the definition of landscape on which the HUL is based. This paper also identifies the opportunities that a renewed focus on heritage values and authenticity management, as reflected in the cases of Cuenca (Ecuador) and Ballarat (Australia), may offer for the successful implementation of the HUL approach.

Keywords:

• Urban heritage
• urban development
• citizen participation
• governance

Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank the ‘6th Research and Transfer Plan’ of the University of Seville for the internationalisation grant awarded to the University Institute of Architecture and Construction Sciences (IUACC) for the editing and revision of this publication.