|
|
16 December 1991
Doc. 6538
Report
on the situation of the cultural heritage in Central and Eastern Europe
(Rapporteurs: Mr LOPEZ HENARES, Spain, People's Party
and Mr MÜLLER, Germany, CDU/CSU))
Summary
The Assembly is seriously concerned by the situation of the cultural heritage in Central and Eastern Europe. The heritage in Croatia is being massively destroyed, works of art are being illegally exported and the architectural heritage itself is directly threatened by decay, demolition or disinterest. Lack of appropriate legislation and its implementation and shortage of means seem to be the main reasons for this situation.
The Assembly therefore recommends the Committee of Ministers to intensify co-operation with those responsible for the cultural heritage in Central and Eastern Europe. It also recommends the launching of an all-European campaign for the protection of the cultural heritage.
I. DRAFT RECOMMENDATION
1. The Assembly welcomes the possibility, for the first time in its existence, to review the European cultural heritage as a whole. This newly gained perspective leads directly to new opportunities for all the countries involved to enrich their horizons, exchange experience and improve local practice on a reciprocal basis.
2. The Assembly is however seriously concerned by the situation of the cultural heritage in Central and Eastern Europe. It recognises that this situation varies considerably, from advanced conservation practice in such countries as Hungary and Poland to the virtually undocumented areas of the eastern republics of the USSR.
Illegal art trade
3. The Assembly regrets the massive recourse in Central and Eastern Europe to the, often illegal, sale of moveable art objects for hard currency, in particular by individuals who by flooding the market are depriving themselves and their countries of an incalculable richness for little immediate return.
4. Along the lines of Recommendation 1072 (1988) and pending a more detailed study of this question, the Assembly would recommend that the Committee of Ministers urge all the European countries involved, including the receiving countries, to take very urgent measures to stop those involved in this drain of national resources.
Yugoslavia
5. With no less urgency, the Assembly vigorously deplores the deliberate and systematic destruction of the heritage in Croatia by the Yugoslav federal forces, in direct contravention of the Convention for the protection of cultural property in the event of armed conflict (The Hague 1954), the European Cultural Convention (Paris 1954), and the World Heritage Convention (Paris 1972) to which the Yugoslav authorities acceded respectively in 1956, 1987 and 1975.
6. The Assembly recommends that the Committee of Ministers sets up a body of appropriate conservation experts that may be able, in concertation with the Council of Ministers of the Western European Union and other interested parties, to intervene directly in the protection and restoration of cultural property damaged in Croatia the moment circumstances permit.
Architectural heritage
7. More generally the Assembly notes that the architectural heritage itself in Central and Eastern Europe, though still extremely rich and ranging from major monuments to traditional village vernacular architecture, is directly threatened by decay, demolition or disinterest because of the lack of appropriate legislation and its implementation and because of inadequate resources for conservation and repair.
8. In many countries considerable expertise in conservation has been built up within the state administration. There is a real risk that this experience may be lost in changing to cheaper techniques proposed from the private sector.
9. The Assembly fully recognises the difficulties faced by the administrations involved. Following the collapse of totalitarian government, new structures and policies have to be developed for the protection of the cultural heritage and in particular new partnerships established both within government (between central and local authorities), with the general public and with the emerging private sector. Resources are inadequate and it may not be easy to establish a sufficient priority for conservation action.
10. What must be done immediately however is to seek to ensure ways of integrating conservation in overall policies for planning and social reform and to draw up lists of practical priorities for conservation. Conservation legislation is a priority and must rapidly be enacted.
11. Emphasis should be placed on ensuring that no gaps or loopholes are left too long unattended in legislation regarding ownership or concerning the responsibilities that ownership might entail in the case of cultural property.
12. Above all are the principles of integrating conservation in all levels of planning as well as in fiscal, economic and social policy and in spreading the notion of a common, but shared, responsibility, involving public administration at local as well as national levels and extending to individual members of the general public.
13. Principles of conservation have been drawn up by international bodies, including the Council of Europe. These were reasserted most recently in the concluding document of the Cracow Symposium on the cultural heritage.
14. The Assembly recommends that the Committee of Ministers
i. give increased attention to the exchange of experience gained by the Council of Europe and by member states in Western Europe with those responsible for the cultural heritage in Central and Eastern Europe; mistakes made in the West should not be repeated, just as the expertise, traditions and cultural heritage surviving in the East should not be lost;
ii. conduct a systematic analysis of the situation of the cultural heritage in these countries and consult with them in the identification of areas for priority action;
iii. alert the governments of Central and Eastern Europe to the irreparable damage to the cultural heritage by uncontrolled planning, development and tourism unless account is also taken of conservation concerns;
iv. press these same governments, that are for the most part currently engaged in reforming their legislation, to ensure that properly integrated legislation is at the same time prepared and enacted for conservation;
v. urge these governments to encourage private initiatives in the conservation field, in particular through the establishment of companies specialising in restoration and the official recognition of non-governmental conservation societies;
vi. encourage the flow of free information and all forms of
co-operation, whether by the Council of Europe in policy formulation, legislation or technical assistance, by the European Community in direct subsidies for conservation projects, or through bilateral contacts with member governments, twinned towns or non-governmental bodies.
Paneuropean campaign
15. In order to give a new and broader incentive to protection of the cultural heritage in Europe as a whole, and as a gesture of solidarity with Central and Eastern Europe, the Assembly also recommends that the Committee of Ministers launch, if possible in 1993 and on lines similar to the campaign of 1975, an all-European campaign for the protection of the cultural heritage. This campaign should cover all cultural property, including art objects as well as buildings and monuments. The Assembly, the Standing Conference of Local and Regional Authorities and non-governmental organisations (in particular Europa Nostra) should be associated with the organisation of the campaign.
II. DRAFT ORDER
on fact-finding missions with regard to the cultural heritage
1. The Assembly welcomes the first general survey made by its Committee on Culture and Education of the situation of the cultural heritage in Central and Eastern Europe. It is however aware of the considerable variations in the situation in individual countries.
2. Believing that the general provisions of Recommendation . . . can be brought into sharper focus by concentrating on individual countries, it asks this committee, and in particular its Sub-Committee on the Architectural and Artistic Heritage and General Rapporteur, to continue its individual fact-finding missions.
III. EXPLANATORY MEMORANDUM
by Mr Lopez Henares and Mr Müller
Introduction
1. The Assembly has long asserted its concern for the cultural heritage of the whole of Europe. It has pressed for the return of this sector to the area covered by the European Cultural Convention (which finally occurred in 1990) and its Committee on Culture and Education has been keen to take an even wider viewpoint both in launching this report (see Doc.6171), in joining with Europe Nostra in favour of a new paneuropean campaign and in initiating what it is hoped will develop into a series of study-visits to central and eastern Europe by meeting (at the level of its Sub-Committee on the Architectural Heritage chaired by Mr Baumel) in Romania in July 1991.
2. This vision of paneuropean co-operation is not new. Those involved in the European Architectural Heritage Year on 1975 will recall the hopes placed on the active participation of experts from central and eastern Europe. Such hopes were however soon relegated to the field of specifically technical co-operation (Icomos committees) or were apparently inextricably bound up in the balancing act of the CSCE (Third Basket). Subsequent political developments in central and eastern Europe have now laid completely open the field for paneuropean co-operation and the potential role of the Council of Europe has been formally recognised by the CSCE Symposium on the cultural heritage in Cracow.
3. The Assembly has asked for a systematic review to be made of the situation of the cultural heritage in Europe (Rec. 880) and this is currently being updated by the CDCC Cultural Heritage Committee on the basis of information available on the intergovernmental level. The present report is an attempt to encourage the extension of this survey, but is inevitably limited by the available information.
4. Our report is based on general impressions gathered from recent travel in central and eastern Europe and from the rapidly increasing contacts with those responsible for conservation in these countries. We are particularly grateful for the full and open co-operation of those with whom we have been able to make contact in Hungary and Romania. Much is also owed to representatives of Europa Nostra and Ecovast, which among other intergovernmental organisations are actively developing contacts in central and eastern Europe, and supplements material collected in the course of an earlier survey on redundant religious buildings (the first such paneuropean survey to be conducted: see Doc.6032).
5. The report must be understood as indicative, not as exhaustive. Much study remains to be done. Nevertheless, and despite the tremendous variation between the countries concerned, many recommendations can, and must urgently, be made.
The cultural heritage under totalitarian rule
6. Stress on conservation is relatively recent in Europe as a whole and the concept of integrated conservation, that seems now so central, was only launched for the Council of Europe's campaign of 1975. Planning policy in Central and Eastern Europe was comparable with that in the west during the two world wars and also in the period of reconstruction that immediately followed the second. The differences that exist in conservation policy are in fact very recent, but there were more fundamental differences in planning policy.
7. Before the money and the myth ran out, the totalitarian state was devoted to creating its own image: factories in town centres (Moscow being no exception), state ministries in exaggerated palaces, workers housed in platoons of high-rise apartment blocks. There was also a period of iconoclasm: all thought representative of the overthrown bourgeoisie was removed (armorial crests from buildings) or humiliated (mansions turned into homes for the elderly and infirm). In general terms, planning was totally integrated with the ideological objectives of the state: the proclamation and assertion of the socialist revolution by way of the control and subversion of individual independence, whether in town or country.
8. The villages were often the more victimised, being normally self-sufficient and especially in the vital commodity of food. National minorities were another target. The "systematisation policy" in Romania is only the latest, even if one of the more blatant, of such attempts to break the people to the wheel of the state.
9. On the other hand, central and eastern Europe was at the same time experiencing the same social and economic pressures as the west. Industrialisation placed the same stress on the rapidly growing urban communities and led to the same problems of rural exodus. Inevitably, abandoned rural buildings fell into disrepair, and even those of cultural importance found no protection when the resident community had left. In more recent times, as the prospect of modernisation has approached, people in central an eastern Europe have sought first to improve their comfort in terms of central heating, insulation or garage rather than restore the peasant quarters in which they were formerly housed. Exactly the same has happened in the west. Because of the economic backwardness of central and eastern Europe, this process is however only just now beginning in these countries. Their cultural heritage is deteriorated but still amazingly extensive and intact. It is essential that the innumerable and fatal mistakes that have been committed in the west are not repeated.
10. The story is rather different in terms of conservation. Communism, or rather its totalitarian rulers, paid particular attention to the conservation of the prestigious or beautiful for the nationalistic or personal reasons of its leaders. Conservation concentrated on major monuments such as palaces, castles and (paradoxically for a secular state) important religious buildings. By a similar paradox the countryside, the villages, the vernacular and the everyday life context of the urban or peasant worker were neglected - except where this might be presented as folk art or transferred to some open-air museum in the same way as ruins might be constructed for political ends (such as the assertion of Dacian cultural longevity).
11. Considerable means were made available for the conservation of this selected heritage. State funding was provided, surrounding planning controlled, and the supply of necessary craftsmanship and materials assured. No returns were required to justify the sums invested.
12. The result can be seen in the restored centre of Warsaw and its Royal Palace, the monuments of Prague or the Kremlin. In St Petersburg, the 18th century palaces have gilded gates and lavish furnishings while one quarter of the inhabitants of the city are crammed in antediluvian communal flats behind 19th century neo-classical fronts.
13. International co-operation in the technical fields of conservation was not particularly hindered by ideology and a considerable network of largely academic contacts was established through Unesco and related non-governmental bodies, Icom and Icomos. Several monuments and sites from central and eastern Europe were placed on Unesco's World Heritage List and so were able to attract international attention.
14. Many central and east European states drew up lists of major monuments to be protected and individual conservation and study projects for which international funding was sought. Many of these projects were of the very highest technical quality and merit continued support: for example the Boyana Church and associated museum project outside Sofia (Bulgaria), which was visited recently by a committee delegation in October 1991. Such action is entirely divorced however from any overall planning (the official car had difficulty in finding the Boyana Church and the similarly interesting Church of St John The Theologian in Zemen, which were in no way clearly sign-posted).
15. Conservation activity was generally the exclusive concern of the state authorities. Nevertheless certain popular organisations came into being, even if under party control, with an active concern for protection of the cultural heritage. In many villages crafts were maintained and an awareness and pride with regard to the heritage retained in the local consciousness. In Hungary, but also in Romania, the USSR and no doubt in general, when the full picture emerges, due recognition should be given to the efforts made to protect the cultural heritage by those sensitive to its importance within the state apparatus.
16. The other side of the picture should also be recognised. Conservation control could always be overruled, most notoriously by Ceaucescu with his new vision of Bucharest, which involved shifting historic churches out of the line of view (and is still being supervised by the same architect), but also by any local party potentate in his local situation. Conservation work was also often rather superficial (and serious concern has been expressed at the state of the fabric behind the façades of Prague). Above all, however, conservation was very limited.
The new situation - a period of transition and crisis
17. The post-totalitarian situation is in most central and east European countries completely different from that which preceded it and cannot usefully be compared. Again an exception could however be made for Hungary. The essential change is the disappearance of the state as being the sole organ totally responsible for conservation of the heritage. A new order is being created and new responsibilities are in the process of being defined. In many cases a serious legal void has resulted: for example a draft heritage law has been for some time available for consideration by the Romanian parliament, but until it is adopted no transactions concerning the heritage can be carried out. A more general problem has related to land law reforms, with no conservation or even agriculture conducted until redistribution occurs (eg Romania, Albania, Bulgaria). In Romania and Bulgaria certain projects for the development of recently restored monasteries have been halted pending decisions on the return of these properties to the Church. Scientific restoration work is seriously compromised because of the lack of state funds (eg CSFR, Bulgaria, Romania). In Hungary, where decentralisation is further advanced, there is a serious risk that conservation legislation will not be ready in time to prevent newly (re)established owners of culturally important property from claiming compensation from the state for conservation work or other constraints on their use of the property - costs which should really be their own responsibility on becoming owners of the property in question. In the CSFR, where legal transfer of ownership has only been completed in 1991, this gap seems already covered by the existing legislation of 1958 and 1987; the problem is to ensure this legislation is observed; there have also been criticisms that the transfer of ownership has been over-hasty, leaving at risk the art collections in churches, castles and country houses.
18. There is a similar indecisiveness in public opinion, with democracy too often seen as licence and with any regulations regarded as bureaucratic interference. This attitude is widespread throughout central and eastern Europe and presents a very real danger for the heritage when it is threatened by potential modern redevelopment or commercial exploitation (such as brown coal mining in eastern Germany, the Republic of Slovakia , Poland and northern Bohemia; the removal of old cobbles from eastern Germany for relaying in the more properous and conservation-conscious west; office development in central Bratislava) or is simply subjected to the immediate demands of private enterprise (such as the insertion of a shop window in a historical façade in the castle area of Buda).
19. The problems of conservation have yet to be properly linked to the wider economic and social picture, and are even further from being linked to the development of paneuropean strategies in such fields as energy, environment or migration policies. Pending the establishment of such links, only a low priority is currently accorded conservation activity (legislation etc) and little funding made available.
20. A very real crisis therefore exists. The heritage that has survived the totalitarian period is relatively rich. Up to the present, development has not gone ahead at anything like the same rate as in western Europe. But for similar reasons the heritage in central and eastern Europe is in general in a poor state of repair. There is therefore on the one hand an enormous potential for restoration, but on the other there are no funds for restoration, which is perceived as of low priority, and every incentive for new development in the total absence of any integrated planning policies on the central and local levels.
21. A rather different crisis results from the civil war in Yugoslavia. It is clear that the cultural heritage is being used as a target in this conflict and this is to be greatly deplored. It is in direct contravention of the European Cultural Convention and other international agrements to which the Yugoslav federal authorities have subscribed. We would also note, but without further comment, that the Republics of Slovenia and of Croatia have been fast to exploit damage, or the threat of damage, to the cultural heritage as a propaganda weapon.
Priority areas for action
22. Although the situation is extremely varied, the first requirement, that any central or east European country, ministry or conservation authority would indicate, is the need for money. This is undeniably true even if the predicament is not the result of political changes, as is the case in Hungary for example (and we should admit also in most west European countries). This problem should however, and more helpfully, be first translated into a number of other factors.
23. Conservation must be assured a place in the wider context of planning and economic restructuring at all levels. The most urgent message that we feel should be put across is that of integrated conservation. This is essential if central and eastern Europe states are not to commit the same mistakes that the west has come to regret in its post-war period of redevelopment. The Council of Europe has drafted a considerable amount of material containing recommendations in this field: most recently the Convention on Europe's Architectural Heritage, the revised Archaeology Convention, and numerous recommendations of the Committee of Ministers as well as of the Assembly itself. The main thrust of these texts is to ensure that conservation is fully integrated into the planning process (physical planning and related areas such as tourism, social or economic and fiscal policy). Those working with the cultural heritage should be seen as part of a much wider team and not as isolated academics.
24. The authorities, at national but also at local levels in central and eastern Europe, must be made aware of their responsibility for immediate action to protect the heritage. Priorities must be drawn up. There must be legislation and planning rules - and these must be applied.
25. The drawing up of priorities, though obvious, should be underlined as it represents in many cases a change of mentality in central and eastern Europe. The luxury of fastidious restoration work (gilded ceilings, fresco analysis etc) must be abandoned in favour of ensuring that other ceilings do not leak and other buildings do not fall down or are demolished. Preference should be given to restoring buildings that provide accommodation for crowded families rather than rarely visited national museum collections. Particular problems surround the question of appropriate re-use for historic buildings. This applies also to churches, castles and country houses returned by the state to their original owners.
26. Legislation should cover as broad as possible a spectrum of the heritage -including industrial and vernacular architecture and the notion of protection of context, setting or environment (eg in Romania the earlier law listed only a small fraction of what it is now felt should be protected, in particular in the Hungarian and Germanic areas; in Hungary the integrated protection of whole areas of vernacular village architecture has not yet figured in official policy or legislation). Admittedly a balance has to be maintained between what is listed and what can be effectively protected, but this depends on where responsibility is placed (for this reason only about 10,000 heritage items are listed in Hungary, while the proper figure should be very much higher; in Poland however many more are listed than can possibly be restored). The problem is partly lack of funds (for example to protect traditional housing against modern development in Yugoslavia). But there is also evidence of a clear lack of resolute official intervention to prevent restoration sites being turned into play areas for local children (Bucharest).
27. A note should be added here on the need to extend notions of what is to be protected to include monuments of the years of totalitarian rule. Elements of this have considerable intrinsic and historical value. This heritage should not be disregarded or destroyed for ideological reasons.
28. The administration should be adequate to the task in hand both in central policy making and in the implementation of this policy at the local level throughout the country (eg problems arise in Romania, where there is a satisfactory central structure, from the lack of presence locally; a similar difficulty is arising in Hungary, where the decentralisation of planning has gone much further ahead than that of conservation). Concern is being expressed at retaining the levels of expertise and manpower necessary to conduct the proper inventory of the cultural heritage and its documentation (survey, photographic and other recording).
29.The necessary equipment must also assured. This is critically lacking in most central and eastern countries observed (eg paper, carbon paper, copying machines, fax etc).
30. However - and this is a new element - it is not necessary for these authorities to feel that they alone have to carry out the task of conservation. New partnerships in conservation should be actively sought. The public has a vital role to play, whether through the pressure of public opinion, through interested non-governmental pressure groups, through private owners or through the commercial sector (restoration companies should be set up, tourism developed, sponsorship sought). There are indeed a multitude of ways in which western society has spread responsibility for, and involvement in, protection of the heritage, and arguably for the greater benefits of society as a whole, and this sort of example should be passed on to central and eastern Europe.
31. The involvement of the public can be actively encouraged through the media (eg Hungarian TV programmes by Mihaly Raday, now Vice Chairman of the parliamentary committee for building and the architectural heritage) and in schools. One of the most effective means of encouraging public awareness of the heritage in western Europe has been through non-governmental organisations and pressure groups; this is a form of association relatively unknown in most central and east European countries (and also still somewhat suspect, as recalling the former party cell structures - exceptions are the DDR Gesellschaft für Denkmalpflege and similar groups in Hungary), but the trend is developing (eg a heritage association has been set up by the Hungarian Democratic Union in the Province of Brasov, Romania; in the CSFR Havel's Civic Forum set up a Foundation for the cultural heritage with a bank account for contributions; in Budapest a non-governmental organisation is encouraging the photographic recording of the heritage). Much pioneering work is being done by international associations to set up and support local conservation societies (for example Ecovast has set up sections in CSFR, Hungary, Poland and Romania; Förderkreiser alte Kirchen have been established from Marburg in eastern Germany and are planned in northern Bohemia).
32. The commercial sector is as yet far from being conservation-conscious in central and eastern Europe. Conservation work was previously carried out by the state and companies specialising in this work did not exist. Attempts are being made towards privatisation (for example in Hungary and, but with difficulties, in Romania), but the process is severely hampered by the lack of tools, expertise, and funding available for restoration work. West European companies have indicated interest in encouraging change in this area (further to the symposium organised at the Council of Europe in Strasbourg in June 1991.
33. There is a similarly backward approach to the heritage in the fields of sponsorship or commerce in general (contrast the efforts of many west European banks to restore buildings for branches). An exception is the field of tourism, where the tremendous potential of the surviving heritage is recognised. Much care must however be taken, as the former state monopoly structure breaks down, to ensure tourism does not destroy the heritage that the tourists are travelling to see. The possibility of tourism outside certain selected sites seems however very new: recent unannounced visits to major cultural sites by Assembly representatives have been more than once surprised to find access difficult (monuments and museums closed, roads or access routes not signposted both in Bulgaria and Romania). The serious lack of general rather than selective tourist information should also be quickly remedied (reasonable quality postcards, guide books in languages other than the local and Russian, town plans showing more than the principal streets, country maps with villages etc.). All available material is also clearly in need of up-dating. It should however be realised that until very recently town plans, as also typewriters, were restricted material in Bucharest. The relevance of conservation in the context of the development of rural tourism is being stressed by both Ecovast and Euroter (an association with this aim has been established in eastern Germany in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern and is developing contacts in CSFR, Poland and Romania).
34. New methods of financing conservation activity should be rapidly made known in central and eastern Europe. The Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe has recently adopted a recommendation in this field that is backed up by a useful study commissioned for the CDCC's Cultural Heritage Committee.
35. The possibility of foreign investment is a tempting solution to the lack of funding for restoration, but has to be treated very carefully by countries in central and eastern Europe given the enormous currency disparity with the west. The problems of East Berlin, where the original inhabitants have been bought out and then driven into the suburbs, are a sad warning. Considerable interest has been shown by Germans in investing in restoring property in the Germanic villages of Romania, but the legal position is still far from clear in the absence of the new law. It would be useful to have examples of how other countries are approaching this question. Would-be investors from the west should be sensitive to the problem and recognise that there has to be a supplementary price to pay.
36. On the technical level, there is concern that many of the traditional crafts, craftsmen and materials still available in central and eastern Europe may be replaced by inferior, cheaper modern materials and methods unscrupulously marketed by western firms (for example the use of cement instead of lime mortar and recourse to cheap roofing materials). Specific attention has to be paid to ensuring that traditional skills are registered and retained (Ecovast has called for a paneuropean data bank: Working Group on Rural Architecture, Krizevci, Yugoslavia May 1990). Further training is also needed, and new centres should be set up along the lines of the Council of Europe's pilot centre on San Servolo in Venice. The location of such centres should be determined by the need, which seems rather less acute in Hungary for example than in other parts of central and eastern Europe.
37. The international community is very much involved in developing co-operation with central and eastern Europe. For example, the United Nations Development Programme and the World Tourism Organisation are working with the Polish authorities to restore monuments in Cracow; Unesco's World Heritage Fund is particularly solicited (in particular for heritage in danger); the Getty Trust is placing priority on scholarship and conservation; Icomos is sending technical missions of experts. The contribution of European non-governmental organisations such as Europa Nostra and Ecovast has already been mentioned. Individual countries are also actively involved, and France in particular has been seen to be active in assistance programmes for example in Hungary and Romania. Co-operation also continues between central and east European countries and we can note with interest and by way of example the recent bilateral agreement on exchanging archives and post-graduate training between the Hungarian National Inspectorate of Historical Monuments and the Romanian Directorate for Monuments, Ensembles and Historical Sites. This list could certainly be extended. All co-operation on these lines is very much to be encouraged. In particular information (publications etc) should be made available and without cost and subsidies provided by the west for visits of expert groups to central and eastern Europe.
38. The question arises of what specific Council of Europe help can be offered. We are not clear as to the fate of a proposal made by the Secretary General to set up a specific fund. Our feeling is however that the Council of Europe has probably more to offer in terms of general policy (the principles of integrated conservation, the basic points to be covered in legislation etc) than in specific intervention. In particular the Council of Europe should avoid association with the restoration of prestigious monuments - its message is far wider and should reach out to the village vernacular, to the industrial, to the suburban cultures. We should also avoid being drawn into discussion of any so-called "minority" heritage, but concentrate instead on drawing attention to "regional" architectural and cultural traditions. We recognise that this has had, and might continue to have, an effect on where priorities are placed within a country. Broader co-operation should however counteract any negative local effects. We are concerned with the conservation of Europe's heritage and its characteristic diversity and not with the propagation of nationalism or minority movements.
Archaeology, art and museums
39. This report has concentrated on the architectural heritage and its essential relations with the economic and social development of central and eastern Europe, which are undeniably the major issues at the present moment. Archaeology is also closely bound up with planning, as many studies of the Council of Europe have shown, and most recently the revised European Convention. The archaeological heritage is a finite cultural resource that must be treated with extreme care. And just as planning must take considerable care of the archaeological material on which it might be treading, so must economic planning be aware of the asset represented by its artist heritage in terms that range from the attraction of tourism to art galleries to the equally insatiable interest of the same tourists for bargains in the local antique shops.
40. But there are going to be no local antique shops in central and eastern Europe if the current massive exporting of art objects is not checked. Moreover these assets are being wasted; the market is currently flooded by objects that can only realise a fraction of their real value. Obviously the reason for bringing these goods out is the need for convertible currency; but if the art in question is largely from private sources, much is also stolen (in 1991 over 1300 churches were robbed in the CSFR alone, and compares unfairly with about half that number the year before). This, largely illegal, movement of works of art should surely be slowed down, both by the countries from which it comes and by those receiving it. The Assembly raised this question in 1988 in Recommendation 1072 but the Committee of Ministers has given no effective response. In the situation currently facing the cultural property of central and eastern Europe, this apathetic reaction should be reconsidered.
41. A similar observation could be made as to the situation of museums in central and eastern Europe. On the one hand they should be assured safe preservation as the repository of the cultural heritage of many countries, regions, or localities. But they are also a starting point for cultural reawakening and stimulation. The European Museum of the Year Award is open to all countries that have adhered to the European Cultural Convention and can surely add a new dynamic to the vast area newly involved.
42. It has not been possible to investigate these areas in depth in the preparation of this report. They are nevertheless considered relevant and warrant urgent attention.
Towards a paneuropean approach
43. Further analysis of the situation in central and eastern Europe leads increasingly into areas that are also relevant for western Europe. There is the problem of re-evaluating the role of the rural communities. There are the problems of the inner-city areas, of new housing and of new uses (particularly for religious buildings - and see Doc.6032). There are other problems, such as fiscal advantages for conservation, that even western Europe has not yet mastered. These are problems that the whole of Europe faces and we are all trying to improve our legislation and its application in practice.
44. For this reason, but also as a gesture of solidarity with the countries of central and eastern Europe that are perhaps new to the problem (the challenge and the opportunity) of attempting to persuade government and public opinion to do what is in its best long-term interest, we would endorse the proposal for a second, but this time truly paneuropean campaign for the cultural heritage. We see no reason for departing from the proposals already made by the Sub-Committee on the Architectural Heritage and Europa Nostra in September last year and hope that these will be taken up by the European Ministers meeting in Malta on 16-17 January 1992.
Reporting committee: Committee on Culture and Education
Budgetary implications for the Assembly: None
Reference to committee: Doc. 6171, Reference No 1659 of 21 March 1990
Draft recommendation: Unanimously adopted by the committee on
6 December 1991.
Members of the committee: Mr Tummers (Chairman), Mrs Fischer, MM. de Puig (Vice-Chairmen), Arnalds, Berg, Berger, Berti, Cem, Conceição, Dhaille, Mrs Err, MM. Esteves, Faulds (Alternate: Parry), Fillon (Alternate: Baumel), Ghalanos, Mrs Grendelmeier, Mr Lars Gustafsson (Alternate: Stig Gustafsson), Mrs Haglund, Mrs Hawlicek, Mr. Hunault, Sir Russell Johnston, Mrs Just, MM. Karhan, Liapis, Lopez Henares, Mrs Merkouri, MM. Mezzapesa, Monfils (Alternate: Noerens), Müller, O'Keeffe, Mrs Parkanovà, MM. Pawkowicz, Pécriaux, Rauti, Mrs Ryynanen, MM. Schädler, Scovacricchi, Soell, Speed, Ms Szelenyi, Mrs Ugrin,
MM. Verbeek, Zammit Dimech.
NB: The names of those members who took part in the vote are underlined.
Secretaries of the committee: MM. Grayson and Ary