Abstract
UNESCO in Southeast Asia: World Heritage Sites in Comparative Perspective is a wide-ranging edited volume offering an overview and critical analysis of key problems facing heritage sites in South East Asia. The book presents a series of well-considered, research-led interpretations of a variety of sites, many of which weigh up the issues carefully. In particular, it examines the processes by which UNESCO World Heritage Sites are identified, managed and bureaucratised. With its 16 chapters and 463 pages, this is a large and complex volume, discussing colonial towns with their historic and global architectural styles (Luang Prabang, Melaka, George Town and Vigan), ancient archaeological parks (Ayutthaya, Angkor, Muara Jambi, Borobudur and Prambanan) and natural parks in Vietnam, Indonesia, the Philippines and Malaysia. Many of these chapters have emerged from Victor King’s research project on World Heritage Sites in Southeast Asia: Cross-cultural Management Perspectives across seven South East Asian countries from 2009 to 2013. The volume includes contributions from 15 academics based in the Philippines, Indonesia, Malaysia, Japan, Austria, Belgium and the UK.
Victor King’s introductory chapter explores some of the key theoretical and ethical issues, and raises important questions about power, authority and decision-making processes. The ensuing six chapters are devoted to heritage townscapes, beginning with two on Luang Prabang in the Lao People’s Democratic Republic, with its combination of traditional and European colonial architecture. Annabel Vallard focuses her chapter on the textile industry in this town, highlighting how fabrics have been commercialised for tourists as part of new concepts of ‘culture’ and ‘tradition’, even transformed into ‘art’. Drawing on interviews with tourists and other stakeholders, in the following chapter, Sigrid Lenaerts assesses how tourism is experienced in the local community, arguing for the importance of such interpretations as a means of developing responsible and sustainable sightseeing. Michael Parnwell’s chapter opens up tensions between the boom in visitors and conservation in the promotion of Hoi An, Vietnam’s best preserved historic port town, which functioned variously between the 10th and19th centuries, and witnessed a ‘golden age’ in the 17th century due to trade with China and Japan. Erik Akpedonu compares the success of Vigan in the Philippines – the ‘best-preserved example of a planned Spanish colonial town in Asia’ (according to UNESCO) – with the more problematic Manila suburb of San Nicolas. The Malaysian town of Melaka, inscribed by UNESCO in 2008, is the subject of Victor King’s chapter. Melaka had been on the Tentative List for some time and, as previous attempts at inscription had been unsuccessful, the town joined with George Town, another historic town in the Straits of Malacca. The following chapter moves on to the companion site of George Town, the 18th century port of call of the English East India Company in Penang. Ooi Keat Gin explores here tensions between the priorities of conservation and tourist development.
The following four chapters discuss archaeological sites – Ayutthaya, Angkor, Muari Jambi, Borobudur and Prambanan. Roberto Gozzoli raises important issues in his discussion of Ayutthaya, the former capital of the ancient kingdom of Siam, exploring the consequences of the 1991 UNESCO inscription. Most indigenous tourists go to Ayutthaya, he notes, for ‘merit-making’, rather than the architecture. Foreign visitors on the other hand are interested in the archaeological complex yet do not usually appreciate differences between the original and restoration. Keiko Miura’s chapter is devoted to sustainable development at one of the best-known UNESCO sites in South East Asia – Angkor – inscribed in 1992. Here, she raises questions about what to develop and how to sustain it. She notes a paradigm shift in 2003 from a decade of emergency conservation to sustainable development. The chapter highlights the consequences of conflicting priorities and the gulf that can exist between ideals and achievements, policies and practices. Fiona Kerlogue discusses the less well-known site of Muara Jambi in central Sumatra – the remains of over 80 ancient buildings dating from the seventh to 14th centuries – which was included in the Tentative List for UNESCO World Heritage Sites in 2009. Drawing on visitor surveys and interviews with officials, the chapter traces the development of the process by which the site went from obscurity to tentative listing. Michael Hitchcock and I Nyoman Darma Putra’s chapter analyses the management of tourism and conservation at two very different sites in Indonesia – the Buddhist temple of Borobudur and the Hindu temple of Prambanan, both from the ninth century. They compare the governance of the two, as well as the many local, national and religious stakeholders.
The final chapters explore more ‘natural’ spaces, starting with a discussion of a rural cultural landscape. Keiko Miura and I Made Sarjana focus on the Subak system in Bali, an association of both irrigated cultivation and religion. The authors studied the site before and after World Heritage nomination in 2012, and explore how this has impacted on local politics and conflicts between tourism and conservation. Vu Hong Lien’s chapter is devoted to the Phong Nha-Ke Bang Nature Reserve of Vietnam, one of the largest areas of intact forest habitat of limestone karst in South East Asia. Here the poaching of rare animals (monkeys and rhinoceroses), indiscriminate quarrying, illegal logging, haphazard buildings and an excessive number of people present threats to the park. Tourism is developing in an almost uncontrolled way in this fragile ecosystem, and the area is now at a critical stage. Janet Cochrane focuses on the management of Indonesia’s four natural World Heritage sites – in Sumatra, Java, Nusa Tenggara (the Lesser Sundas) and Papua – while Johanna Katharina Fross explores two case studies from Palawan, the Philippines – the Tubbataha Reefs Marine Park and the Puerto Princesa Underground River National Park – identifying balancing acts between conservation, expectations from investors, tourism and the needs of local people. The chapter evaluates the efforts made by park management and local NGOs to facilitate support for World Heritage on the one hand, and secure alternatives for those who have lost their livelihoods and homes on the other hand. In the final chapter, Janet Cochrane assesses tourism in Malaysia’s natural World Heritage Sites – Kinabalu Park in Sabah and Gunung Mulu in Sarawak. While there are threats to the biodiversity, she notes how tourism provides employment and adds to the economy. The two sites illustrate classic arguments over the extent to which nature can be commercialised. Michael Hitchcock’s useful postscript weighs up many issues. Notably, he observes how in the book there is a sense that UNESCO World Heritage Sites tend to draw on Western, and especially European, roots, sometimes at the expense of local perspectives. As a result, sites often – problematically – reflect what heritage means mainly in a Western context.
Overall, the volume comprises carefully considered case studies which analyse the many challenges facing these sites. The division into historic townscapes, archaeological sites and natural parks, and the comparison of these, works very well, with chapters reinforcing points and covering similar issues based on distinct case studies. Many chapters draw on detailed primary research, and the multidisciplinary mix of authors – from the social sciences, humanities and the natural sciences – is also a strength. There is a focus on the complexities of governance, and relationships between local expertise and external agencies. The designation of World Heritage Site can result in an influx of tourists, which brings much needed foreign exchange. Yet increased visitor pressure can have severe consequences for the integrity of sites, especially if rapid or unplanned. The volume thus emphasises how tourism is a double-edged sword, and investigates how to mitigate the negative impacts of development in order to protect historic towns, archaeological sites and natural parks. Many chapters note how designation of a World Heritage Site may conflict, in particular, with the needs of local populations, who may become dislocated from ancestral lands or deprived of traditional livelihoods. The volume thus raises important questions about who decides whose needs come first with regards to world heritage.
Some of the chapters might have addressed, in more detail, the complex issue of authenticity, in terms of approaches to developing and reconstructing the sites. In his postscript, Hitchcock identifies the difficulties of adopting standard definitions of ‘authenticity’ across South East Asia. Gozzoli too discusses how tourists often search for ‘authenticity’, and that, with the shifts in tourism from Westerners to Asians, very different notions of the ‘authentic’ will undoubtedly emerge. He also mentions distinctions between Buddhist ideas of impermanence in South East Asia in opposition to the Western obsession with preservation. The volume might have examined culturally constructed and historically specific ideals of beauty and aesthetics in relation to architecture, ‘antiquity’ and natural landscapes. With regards to the latter, the Western romantic idea of seeking solitude in nature versus the Asian, especially Chinese, preferences for mass tourism and group experience may well have powerful impacts on future developments.
Both King and Hitchcock note that the World Heritage Sites discussed in the book represent only a proportion of existing places in South East Asia, yet the volume nevertheless comprises an important contribution due to its comparative approach. The detailed primary research projects illustrate exceptionally well what actually happens on the ground. This is a rich, diverse and detailed volume, which will be of interest to cultural heritage professionals, as well as academics and students of South East Asian studies, heritage studies, tourism, anthropology, archaeology, geography and environmental studies.