ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on the Cultural Heritage section of United Nations and its Education, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO), founded in the late 1960s. The strict segmentation that exists between the different operational areas facilitates this rather mono-dimensional examination of the organisation's work. Modern preservationism saw the emergence of new types of scholarly activity. The 1972 Convention was adopted a few years after the first major UNESCO campaign in the field of heritage preservation regarding the relocation of the Nubian monuments to Abu Simbel in Egypt. The Egyptian campaign indeed led to the foundation of the World Heritage Centre, a UNESCO-based organisation specifically charged with monitoring the preservation of designated universal cultural heritage sites, monuments, and buildings. The collaboration of UNESCO with the Smithsonian led to significant changes in perceptions of intangible heritage. Community participation is one of the key dimensions of the 2003 Convention and a major point of divergence from the previous UNESCO heritage protection instruments.
