In 1959, the governments of Egypt and Sudan made a desperate request to the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization to save their ancient monuments from the rising waters of the Aswan High Dam. This crisis sparked the first international campaign to save cultural heritage, resulting in the relocation of the temple complexes of Abu Simbel and Philae to higher ground. The project cost US$80 million, with about $40 million collected from 50 countries, and it proved that nations could unite to preserve history. To thank the countries that contributed, Egypt donated four temples to other nations, including the Temple of Dendur to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City and the Temple of Debod to Madrid. This success led to other safeguarding campaigns, such as saving Venice and its lagoon in Italy, the ruins of Mohenjo-daro in Pakistan, and the Borobodur Temple Compounds in Indonesia. The project's success led to other safeguarding campaigns, such as saving Venice and its lagoon in Italy, the ruins of Mohenjo-daro in Pakistan, and the Borobodur Temple Compounds in Indonesia. Together with the International Council on Monuments and Sites, UNESCO then initiated a draft convention to protect cultural heritage.
The 1972 Convention
The United States initiated the idea of safeguarding places of high cultural or natural importance, leading to a White House conference in 1965 that called for a World Heritage Trust. The International Union for Conservation Nature developed similar proposals in 1968, which were presented in 1972 at the United Nations Conference on the Human Environment in Stockholm. A single text was eventually agreed upon by all parties, and the Convention Concerning the Protection of the World Cultural and Natural Heritage was adopted by the General Conference of UNESCO on the 16th of November 1972. The convention came into force on the 17th of December 1975. As of November 2024, it has been ratified by 196 states, including 192 UN member states, two UN observer states, and two states in free association with New Zealand. Only one UN member state, Liechtenstein, has not ratified the convention. The convention requires signatory countries to produce and submit periodic data reporting providing the committee with an overview of each participating nation's implementation of the World Heritage Convention and a snapshot of current conditions at World Heritage properties.Ten Criteria for Selection
Until 2004, there were six sets of criteria for cultural heritage and four for natural heritage, but in 2005, UNESCO modified these to create one set of ten criteria. Nominated sites must be of outstanding universal value and must meet at least one of the ten criteria. Cultural sites must represent a masterpiece of human creative genius, exhibit an important interchange of human values, or bear a unique testimony to a cultural tradition. Natural sites must contain superlative natural phenomena, be outstanding examples representing major stages of earth's history, or contain the most important natural habitats for in-situ conservation of biological diversity. A country must first identify its significant cultural and natural sites in a document known as the Tentative List. Next, it can place sites selected from that list into a Nomination File, which is evaluated by the International Council on Monuments and Sites and the World Conservation Union. The Committee meets once a year to determine which nominated properties to add to the World Heritage List, sometimes deferring its decision or requesting more information from the country that nominated the site.