Plural: History, Culture, Society (Dec 2017)
Securitizing the past: a discussion on the connections between heritage and security
Abstract
Are there connections between security policies, peacebuilding, and heritage politics? The first aim of this paper is to discuss how heritage policies sometimes are used to add to and reinforce security policies and practices. This issue is largely unknown and remains to be researched. Secondly, it would also be of importance to try to better understand how security policies may be influenced by notions of heritage and certain interventions on heritage sites. It is argued that it has become necessary to move beyond the study of wars to better understand how heritage affects security and vice versa not only in conflicts but also in peacetime and in “afterwar” periods. The paper builds on a critical reading of previous research mainly on heritage studies and partly on security studies, and on a case study of Swedish-led heritage interventions in the Balkans following the Yugoslavian wars. The case study discusses how issues of security and safety may become relevant in heritage politics in the Balkans following the Yugoslavian wars. It serves to demonstrate how heritage interventions can be seen as either providing security in a community or constituting a threat to its survival.
