Developing Heritage 's 2013; Developing Countries. Ethiopian Nation-Building and the Origins of UNESCO World Heritage, 1960's 2013;1980

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The history of development has paid only little attention to cultural projects. This book looks at the development politics that shaped the UNESCO World Heritage programme, with a case study of Ethiopian World Heritage sites from the 1960s to the 1980s. In a large-scale conservation and tourism planning project, selected sites were set up and promoted as images of the Ethiopian nation. This story serves to illustrate UNESCO's 2019;s role in constructing a useful past in many African countries engaged in the process of nation-building. UNESCO experts and Ethiopian elites had a shared interest in producing a portfolio of antiquities and national parks to underwrite Ethiopia's 2019;s imperial claims to regional hegemony with ancient history. The key findings of this book highlight a continuity in Ethiopian history, despite the political ruptures caused by the 1974 revolution and UNESCO's 2019;s transformation from knowledge producer to actual provider of development policies. The particular focus on the bureaucratic and political practices of heritage, bridges a gap between cultural heritage studies and the history of international organisations. The result is a first study of the global discourse on heritage as it emerged in the 1960s development decade.

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