Sustainable Heritage: Challenges and Strategies for the Twenty-First Century

this century. passing generations. What remains is culture, the product of society, having a longer span of life even than human communities, while nature is the setting for all of human activity and is constant through time. Each level is left to operate at its own pace, safely sustained by the slower levels below and itself kept invigorated by the livelier levels above. The total effect of these layers is that they provide feedback into the system, giving it stability and growth. In considering its place in the “order” of these levels (economy, society, culture, and nature), heritage lies nearer to the bottom of the scale in terms of its slow pace of change. In thinking about the challenges and strategies that are emerging as the twenty-first century unfolds, it would seem appropriate to set the scene for sustainable heritage conservation through the prism of the last 40 years by highlighting some key developments in society, in heritage conservation, and in our profession. I will illustrate what these changes mean for heritage conservation using the example of the greatest challenge of our time — climate change and how it might affect how we think and practice heritage conservation.