Safeguarding Intangible Cultural Heritage: Key Factors in Implementing the 2003 Convention

In 2003, at the biennial General Conference of UNESCO its Member States voted overwhelmingly for the adoption of a new international treaty : the Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage. The Convention aims to ensure the survival and vitality of the world’s living local, national, and regional cultural heritage in the face of increasing globalisation and its perceived homogenising effects on culture (Matsuura 2004). Intangible Cultural Heritage (ICH) - a loose English translation of the Japanese mukei bunkazi, is broadly defined in terms of oral traditions, expressive culture, the social practices, ephemeral aesthetic manifestations, and forms of knowledge carried and transmitted within cultural communities. It includes everything from stories and tales to music and celebration, folk medicine, craftsmanship, the culinary arts and vernacular architecture. National governments adopting it would be legally bound by the Convention to designate and empower organisations to document intangible cultural heritage and create inventories thereof, and also to encourage the presentation, preservation, protection, and transmission of intangible cultural heritage by working closely and cooperatively with the relevant communities