Heritage in and as diplomacy: a practice based study

ABSTRACT

While heritage has been an important topic in international relations for decades, little attention has been paid to studying and understating its role in diplomacy. Yet, not only does heritage play an important role in cultural diplomacy, but there is also another type of diplomacy, often overlooked by scholars and practitioners alike – heritage diplomacy. Although it isn’t widely acknowledged, activities that constitute heritage diplomacy are important tools in cultivating soft power, and many countries ‘use’ them. Several countries decided to incorporate heritage into their diplomatic relations, thus using it in diplomacy, while others go beyond that, actively using heritage to support their foreign policy, thus using it as diplomacy. Because of that, this article will examine several cases of such practice in order to explore the different uses of heritage in diplomacy, and provide a practice based theoretical framework for understanding these uses.

KEYWORDS:

• Heritage diplomacy
• cultural diplomacy
• soft power
• UNESCO
• TİKA
• US ambassadors fund

Acknowledgments

The author would like to thank Prof. Milan Popadić and Prof. Nikola Krstović from the University of Belgrade’s Museology and Heritology Seminar for their advice and support over the years, and especially for their encouragement to continue researching the use of heritage in international relations.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. There were, however, other international movements that advocated for strengthening national heritage by forming international alliances, even promoting the idea of world heritage, and some of them predated UNESCO (see Swenson 2016).

2. For a detailed overview of the literature on heritage diplomacy see Lähdesmäki’s and Čeginskas (2022).

3. While the Convention concerning the Protection of the World’s Cultural and Natural Heritage was adopted in 1972, the List became official several years later. As 20 UN Member States had to ratify this decision, it was only in 1975 that the Convention came into force, while the first monuments were inscribed on the World Heritage List three years later, during the second session of the World Heritage Committee in 1978.

4. This article will explore later on how the Republic of Turkey restores Ottoman heritage in other countries. By doing so, it is restoring heritage of other countries (example of heritage being used in diplomacy), but also using its heritage abroad since these Ottoman monuments help remind the people of the country that they share a common history with Turkey since they were part of the Ottoman Empire, from which the Republic of Turkey was created (example of heritage being used as diplomacy).

5. Although TİKA was originally created to increase Turkey’s influence on the previously mentioned regions, in time it started operating around the world. For instance, in 2002 it had just 12 overseas offices, but in 2016 it had 50 of them (Ekşi and Erol 2018, 37–38). Today TİKA’s overseas offices span from Colombia and Mexico in the West, to Mongolia and the Philippines in the East, from Ukraine in the North, to South Africa in the South, but TİKA also funds projects in those countries where it doesn’t have an office.

6. The most expensive one in the country was the restoration of the Sultan Valida Mosque in Sjenica. After two years of work, the project was also completed in 2019 and cost over 2 million USD (Todorović 2021b, 392).

7. We have to bear in mind that the situation is probably changing. After all, with the COVID-19 pandemic of 2020, agencies that provide aid, like TİKA, were forced to prioritise projects in the healthcare sector. Not only that, the pandemic exacerbated the Turkish currency and debt crisis, so it remains to be seen whether Turkey will continue to invest in heritage restoration projects abroad and what will be the future of the country’s heritage diplomacy efforts.

8. Heritage intertwining with politics and national identity isn’t anything new. After all, as heritage studies scholars have pointed out a long time ago, our contemporary concept of heritage arose around the same time as nation states, and heritage played an important role in nation-building during the nineteenth century as monuments represented focal points of national pride (Light and Dumbraveanu-Adone 1997, 29).

9. The reason Ram was mentioned as an example is the fact that Erdoğan used it in one of his speeches, thus showing how Turkish diplomacy uses Ottoman heritage as diplomacy. During a visit to Serbia in the fall of 2019, Erdoğan inaugurated TİKA’s projects in Sremska Rača and during his speech stated ‘our historical and cultural heritage is our common wealth. Every work in this land is a monument to our solidarity and cooperation. We will build our future together with inspiration, power, and courage from the past. The last example of this is the Ram Fortress, one of the pearls of the Danube River, whose restoration was completed by TİKA. I believe that this wonderful example of our cultural heritage will contribute to the tourism potential of the region and I hope it will be beneficial’ (TİKAb, 2019a).

10. It is worth mentioning that restoration projects aren’t the only way the United States use heritage of other countries to cultivate soft power. The other use of heritage is by researching it through the work of US overseas research centres; a practice that stretches all the way back to nineteenth century when in 1881 the American School of Classical Studies at Athens and in 1894 the American Academy in Rome were opened. Today such centres exist all around the world, serving as valuable assets to American public diplomacy since they bring together experts from the country they are located in and the US, thus creating direct ties between citizens. Not only that, the centres also help the US show that it cares about the culture and heritage of the country they are located in just like restoration projects because they deal primarily with social sciences and humanities and so, through them archaeological excavations are funded, research is carried out on heritage sites, etc. (Luke 2018, 167–169).

11. Exploring how museum exchanges facilitated cross-cultural understanding, some authors maintain that they are a very important instrument of soft power, even going so far as to categorise these activities as ‘museum diplomacy’ (see Cai 2013; Grincheva 2020).

12. As is stated on the website of the National Museum of American Diplomacy, ‘A gift of state often captures the essence of a nation, chosen for its ability to exhibit pride in a unique culture and people. Gifts of state may showcase traditions of fine or folk arts, crafts or craftsmanship. They may display wealth in precious stones or metals, fine textiles and apparel. Gifts may draw from a rich heritage of antiques and antiquities or an expressive storehouse of cultural icons. This way the gift becomes more than a mere formality, but a reminder of the special alliance between the gift giver and receiver’ (National Museum of American Diplomacy).

13. All of the funds and programs mentioned in this article are of relatively recent origin. As stated, the Ambassadors Fund was created in 2001 and TİKA started undertaking restoration projects in 2008, while the UK’s Cultural Protection Fund was established in 2016. The oldest one mentioned here is Germany’s Cultural Preservation Programme, which was founded in 1981, but the country’s cultural diplomacy activities still predate its heritage diplomacy activities carried out through the Programme.

Additional information

Funding

The author didn’t receive any funding for this research.

Notes on contributors

Miloš Todorović

Miloš Todorović is a transdisciplinary researcher affiliated with the Ronin Institute and a research coordinator at Quadrant Strategies, a Washington DC-based research-driven consulting firm. While his background is in international relations (MA), art history (MA), and archaeology (BA), his current research spans international relations, museum & heritage studies, as well as cultural studies.