UNESCO as a world stage - Innovative implementation of nature and cultural heritage protection on a global level

The archive of the founder of the UNESCO World Heritage Centre and later UNESCO Assistant Director-General, Prof. Dr. Bernd Freiherr von Droste zu Hülshoff, contains fundamental documents and extensive visual material on UNESCO's nature and cultural heritage protection programs. In 1973, he joined in Paris UNESCO’s Department of Ecological Sciences, which laid the foundations for the establishment of biosphere reserves. From 1992, as founder of the UNESCO World Heritage Centre in Paris, together with his staff, and the advisory organizations IUCN, ICOMOS and ICCROM, fundamentally he shaped the protection of natural and cultural heritage on a global basis for more than a quarter of a century. He also introduced aspects of sustainability into the protection of natural and cultural resources as early as the 1970s.

To mark the handover of his extensive archive to the Jiří Toman Center at the University for Continuing Education Krems, this symposium will discuss aspects of his work at UNESCO at the time (which now represent global protection and preservation standards) from different perspectives. New fields of research based on this unique archive collection will also be presented.

The University for Continuing Education has been able to attract a number of speakers: There will be several lectures such as on how the primeval beech forests around Dürrenstein (near Lunz am See/Lower Austria) became a World Heritage site (by em.Prof. Dr Hans-Peter Lang) and on the mechanisms for protecting the Wachau cultural landscape as a World Heritage site (Inge Hödl, MA, World Heritage Management Wachau). Dr Markus Wachter (CEO Römerstadt Carnuntum) will outline the ongoing efforts to achieve a balanced relationship between tourism and World Heritage. Dr Ishwaran Natarajan (formerly UNESCO) will elaborate the effects of climate change on the World Heritage. Prof. Breda Pavlic (formerly UNESCO) will describe the early, worldwide efforts to make World Heritage accessible to children and young people. Prof. Peter Strasser (UWK) will explore the question how the World Heritage Programme could contribute to implementation of democratic and human rights standards. Prof. Akemi Kaneshiro-Hauptmann (Toyama Prefecture University) will examine how World Heritage served as a role model for the Japanese cultural heritage label ‘Nihon Isan’. Finally, Prof. Christina Cameron (Univ. Montreal) will pay tribute to the achievements of Prof. Bernd von Droste zu Hülshoff for the fundamental development of the protection of biodiversity and World Heritage before Bernd von Droste himself will present his library and archive which subsequently will be entrusted to the UWK.

The event will end with a visit to a Heurigen (wine tavern).

The lectures will be held partly in German and partly in English. Admission is free, registration is requested.