Department: University of Technology, Sydney (Australia)

Author: Amy BOTT

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Department: University of Technology, Sydney (Australia)

Institution: University of Technology, Sydney (Australia)

Title: Working towards World Heritage: Examining the Kokoda Track, Papua New Guinea

Abstract:

World Heritage in the Pacific – Where indigeneity is inseparable from heritage

WH in the Pacific is a prime example of the changing nature of WH site management and the new role local residents and resource users have to play. The Pacific region has specifically been identified as underrepresented on the World Heritage List (UNESCO 2010). Therefore, the World Heritage Centre adopted a regionally focused program designed to rectify this underrepresentation and increase the Pacific’s uptake of WH: The World Heritage Pacific 2009 Programme and an associated Five Year Action Plan to establish this program (UNESCO 2004). These endeavours are designed to assist Pacific Island Member States with the challenges they face regarding the uptake of the WHC.

Specifically, issues of governance and ownership are challenges when ‘decisions concerning sites require extensive consultation because most land (and sea) is held under customary ownership’ (UNESCO 2004). This has caused some practitioners and heritage managers in the region to investigate whether there is genuine community engagement. WH in the Pacific is dedicated to building collaboration with local residents and resource owners, however the ideological framework of Western science guiding WH and the traditional and customary legislation governing land in the Pacific results in a contested environment in the planned establishment of a WHA. Further, there is a lack of research within protected area and natural resource management literature to assist managers in developing the genuine dialogue and relationships with locals needed to guide WHA establishment.

The Case of the Kokoda Track – Co-management: managing relationships and resources

From the perspective of a PNG landowner who is not generally concerned with international affairs, ideas of ‘common concern’ and ‘common heritage’ as applied to lands owned by tribal clans are paternalistic and colonial. PNG clans jealously guard their territory and would not be open to international management unless there was some obvious incentive. Mapping an area of ‘common heritage’ in PNG is replete with problems because local PNG villages are not particularly interested in participating in national politics and even less interested in participating in global politics. (Telesetsky 2001, p. 755)

To date, research on WH has primarily taken a diagnostic approach, where consequences of site designation on the environment (Nicholas, Thapa & Ko 2009), tourism (Li, Wu & Cai 2008; Winter 2005) and communities (Evans 2005; Wall & Black 2005) have been identified. Attempts to mediate such issues receive the attention of the global community. Therefore, this study takes a unique approach and is focused on the pre-implementation phase of WH designation. It ask:

(1) How are the local voices heard in the planned development of a WHA?

(2) How are stakeholders organised to facilitate collaborative management of a global commons?

The case study arena, the Kokoda Track and Owen Stanley Ranges, is a Tentative World Heritage Site located in Papua New Guinea (PNG). With a burgeoning tourism industry, specifically an increase in trekking and eco-tourism (Wearing et al. 2009), along with the 70th anniversary of the WWII fast approaching, the national government of PNG have identified the need to find an innovative model for establishing protected areas in PNG (Michael 2011).

Currently, literature on WH offers little practical approaches to engaging with local residents and resource users in the planned establishment of a WHA. Therefore, literature from natural resource and environmental management has been sourced to shed light on the process; the ‘how’, of researching and designing a framework to establishing a WHA. Co-management theory, which has been heralded within natural resource management scholarship as a solution to working out of Hardin’s (1968) Tragedy of the Commons, will be used to explore the human dimensions and social relationships of stakeholders in this case. The study aims to validate process-focused methodology as a research framework that can be applied to other tentative sites in the Pacific facing similar governance and management issues in the pre-implementation stages of WHA establishment

Author Bio:

Amy Louise Bott is currently a PhD Candidate at the University of Technology, Sydney. Amy graduated from Macquarie University with a Bachelor of Business, International Tourism and graduated from the University of Technology, Sydney with a First Class Honours degree in Tourism Management. Her area of research is tourism, community development and protected area management and her PhD is focused on the changing role of local communities in the establishment and management of World Heritgae areas.