the impaCts oF the intangible Cultural heritage unesCo poliCies in FranCe

in this paper i would like to build on a report i’ve achieved in 2009 for the French ministry of Culture concerning the impacts of the intangible cultural heritage nominations on tourism (Fournier 2009). the case study i’ll specially focus on will be the “processional giants and dragons in belgium and France” which were first introduced as a “masterpiece of the oral and intangible heritage of humanity” in 2005 and incorporated in 2008 in the “representative list of the intangible Cultural heritage of humanity”. i’ll use this case study first to document the implementation of the unesCo policies in France and to identify the actors who were involved before and after 2005 in the building up of the “processional giants and dragons” application. then i’ll insist on the results of my fieldwork, showing how it helps to compare the views of the different actors, the impacts in the different towns concerned by the label, and the differences between the initial project and its transformations a few years after the nomination. lastly, i will examine the different French candidatures over the period 2005–2011 and compare the implementation of intangible cultural policies in France through these different examples. the analysis of available empirical data will eventually enlighten the impacts of intangible cultural heritage in France. the impaCts oF the intangible Cultural heritage unesCo poliCies in FranCe