ABSTRACT
This chapter takes as its point of departure the basic criterion of ‘outstanding universal value’ prescribed at the 1972 UNESCO World Heritage Convention. The World Heritage Committee has laid down six detailed criteria to assist the International Council on Monuments and Sites (ICOMOS), its professional adviser on cultural heritage, in evaluating this quality, the application of which has been refined and substantially modified since 1975. It goes on to lay stress on the implicit conflict between the perceptions and aspirations of European and certain LatinAmerican and Asian countries, which are well endowed with sites and monuments from acknowledged cultural traditions (classical antiquity, pre-Hispanic cultures of Latin America, Renaissance Europe, imperial China), and those whose cultures are predominantly non-monumental (sub-Saharan Africa, Oceania). It highlights aspects of human achievement that are only slowly beginning to be recognized as of universal significance, such as traditional landscapes, vernacular architecture and the industrial heritage.
