Conserving Common Ground: Exploring the Place of Cultural Heritage in Protected Area Management

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2020-12-08 Conserving Common Ground: Exploring the Place of Cultural Heritage in Protected Area Management

Weller, Jonathan

Weller, J. (2020). Conserving Common Ground: Exploring the Place of Cultural Heritage in Protected Area Management (Unpublished doctoral thesis). University of Calgary, Calgary, AB. http://hdl.handle.net/1880/112818 doctoral thesis

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Conserving Common Ground: Exploring the Place of Cultural Heritage in Protected Area Management

Jonathan Weller

A THESIS

SUBMITTED TO THE FACULTY OF GRADUATE STUDIES

IN PARTIAL FULFILMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE

DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY

GRADUATE PROGRAM IN ENVIRONMENTAL DESIGN

CALGARY, ALBERTA

DECEMBER, 2020

Abstract

That parks and protected areas are places where the conservation of cultural heritage can and should take place has not always been immediately apparent. However, today there is widespread acknowledgement that the management of cultural heritage resources needs to be brought into large-scale planning and management processes in an integrated and holistic manner. This is particularly true in protected areas, which not only contain significant cultural heritage resources, but are also often mandated to conserve these resources and can benefit significantly from the effort. This dissertation aims to address the challenge of integrating cultural heritage conservation into protected area management. Focusing specifically on Alberta, this research employs a qualitative methodology to undertake a broad document analysis and a series of in-depth qualitative interviews with protected area managers to identify the current state of cultural heritage conservation in the provincial protected area system, as well as the strengths, weaknesses, and opportunities that exist. Using this information, a set of policy recommendations are developed. Ranging from high-level policy goals to site-specific tools and resources, these recommendations aim to support more effective cultural heritage conservation in Alberta.

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Table of Contents

Abstract ...... ii Table of Contents ...... iii List of Figures ...... v Acknowledgments ...... vi Chapter 1: Introduction ...... 7 Chapter 2: Research Design ...... 14 Research Purpose ...... 14 Researching Natural and Cultural Heritage – Literature Review ...... 16 Research Framework ...... 22 Methodology ...... 26 Methods...... 27 Alternate Practice Review ...... 29 Document Analysis ...... 30 Interviews ...... 31 Data Analysis and Interpretation ...... 32 Online Survey ...... 34 Data Management ...... 35 Ethical Considerations ...... 35 Research Quality ...... 36 Conclusion ...... 38 Chapter 3: Literature Review ...... 39 Emergence of Natural and Cultural Heritage Conservation ...... 40 Cultural Heritage ...... 43 Natural Heritage ...... 67 The Place of Cultural Heritage in Protected Areas ...... 86 Conclusion ...... 90 Chapter 4: Alternate Practice Review ...... 91 Introduction ...... 91 World Heritage ...... 91 New South Wales, Australia ...... 98 United Kingdom ...... 116 Parks Canada ...... 124 Ontario ...... 138 British Columbia ...... 146 Analysis...... 151 Conclusion ...... 159 Chapter 5: Alberta Parks History and Development ...... 160 Introduction ...... 160 Birth of Alberta's Protected Area System (1930-1950) ...... 161 Growth of Alberta's Parks System (1950-1964) ...... 163 Expanding from Recreation to Preservation (1964-1973) ...... 165 New Directions for Provincial Parks (1973-1990) ...... 166

iv Cutbacks, Coherence, and Special Places (1990-2000) ...... 170 Rising from the Ashes (2000-Present) ...... 179 Conclusion ...... 182 Chapter 6: Cultural Heritage Resource Management in Alberta Parks ...... 184 Introduction ...... 184 Early Developments in Cultural heritage resource Management (1930-1974) ...... 184 From the Centre to the Periphery (1974-2000) ...... 187 Management Planning in the 2000s ...... 197 Interview Analysis ...... 220 Conclusion ...... 245 Chapter 7: Recommendations ...... 247 Introduction ...... 247 Recommendations ...... 248 Survey Results ...... 266 Conclusion ...... 273 Chapter 8: Conclusion ...... 275 Reference List ...... 285 Appendix A: Interview Questions ...... 315 Appendix B: Consent Form ...... 316

List of Figures

Figure 1: The data analysis spiral (Creswell, 2007, p. 150)...... 28 Figure 2: The Burra Charter Process: Steps in planning for and managing a place of cultural significance...... 60 Figure 3: The fundamental components of landscape and the dynamic interaction of them (Stephenson, 2008, p. 134-135)...... 62 Figure 4: The Cultural Values Model (Stephenson, 2008, p. 136)...... 63 Figure 5: An alternate methodology for a values-centered conservation planning process as proposed by the Burra Charter (R. Mason, 2006, p. 39; adapted from Demas 2003)...... 65 Figure 6: Cultural heritage conservation measures. (BC Parks, 2019) ...... 66 Figure 7: Some types of values to be considered in assessing protected area context (Marc Hockings et al., 2006, p. 15)...... 77 Figure 8: Enhancing Our Heritage Toolkit, Worksheet 1a, Identifying major site values and objectives (M. Hockings et al., 2008, p. 23)...... 79 Figure 9: Enhancing Our Heritage Toolkit, Worksheet 1b, Documenting management objectives and their relationship to site values (M. Hockings et al., 2008, p. 23)...... 80 Figure 10: Steps in applying a cultural landscape approach (S. Brown, 2010, p. 13)...... 105 Figure 11: Values of the area, Mungo National Park (NPWS, 2006, p. 8-9) ...... 109 Figure 12: Actions for objective 1.1, Peak District National Park Cultural Heritage Strategy (Peak District National Park Authority, n.d, p. 132)...... 123 Figure 13: Excerpt from the typology of heritage resources (BC Parks, 2018, p. 41)...... 150 Figure 14: Operating and total (operating plus capital) budget of the Alberta Parks Division 1987-2008. (Reeves & Walsh, 2007, p. 50) ...... 171 Figure 15: Types of protected area classifications in Alberta in 1995 ...... 173 Figure 16: Evolution of cultural heritage resource management terminology in Alberta Parks' management plans...... 199 Figure 17: Cultural heritage resource management issues, objectives, and strategies/actions in Cypress Hill Provincial Park (Alberta Tourism, Parks, and Recreation, 2011, p. 25)...... 208 Figure 18: Management guidelines for cultural heritage in Eagle Point Provincial Park and Blue Rapids Public Recreation Area (Alberta Tourism, Parks, and Recreation, 2011, p. 35)...... 210 Figure 19: Combined responses from all recommendations for each survey question...... 267 Figure 20: Survey response for recommendation 8...... 269 Figure 21: Survey responses for recommendations 6 and 7...... 270

Acknowledgments

In justifying my decision to pursue a doctorate I reassured myself that no one comes out the other side a worse person, perhaps less financially secure and no more certain about the future, but without doubt an improved version of oneself. Now, having nearly reached the other side I find myself writing the final entry into a document that has consumed several years of my life with a profound sense of gratitude. Not only for the ways in which I have improved as an individual, although those are multiple, but for the support that has made this opportunity possible. Without the mentorship of David Monteyne, who patiently listened to me as I sought out a path through the muddied and unkempt grounds of my own thinking, I do not know where this work would have ended up. I do know, however, that it would be desperately in need of commas and overflowing with something called a split infinitive. Without the generous financial support from the University of Calgary I likely never would have felt compelled to see this through, much less enjoyed myself as I did. Without the encouragement, distraction, and general bemusement of my friends and family, who gracefully sat through my attempts to explain what I had been thinking about, the perpetual uncertainty that kept me company throughout this process may well have been too daunting. Fortunately, there was always somewhere else to go. And finally, without my partner Emma, it would all be less. The great joy in getting lost in a world of ideas is coming back, again and again, to a world filled with life, love, and connection. It is to her that I owe that place to return.

Chapter 1: Introduction

Starting out from the car park, the trail leading into Glenbow Ranch Provincial Park overlooks the valley of the Bow River. The prairie sky spreads out in all directions, sloping up the foothills and crashing into the mountains to the west, scattering through the towers of the City of Calgary to the east. From this vantage, the valley is expansive and open. But as the trail dips down, that expansiveness is edged in by the undulating landscape of forested coulees and meadows, an intricate web of features that have resulted from thousands of years of water carving away what was left behind by glaciers. In the spring and early summer, when I tend to visit, the seemingly bare land is giving way to new life. The aspen forests are filled with bright green fresh leaves, crocus are shooting up on the sunniest hillsides, and the new shoots of native grass are pushing up through the matted layer of the previous year’s dead stalks. Weeks later, as the winter chill begins to fade, the land races forward, playing catch up to the sun as it nears the end of its northern traverse. Prairie flowers spring up across the fields, grasses shoot up and go to seed, birds return to their summer home, and the wolf willow blooms with its small yellow flowers, layering the land with what Wallace Stegner describes as its “tantalizing and ambiguous and wholly native smell” (1962, p. 18). The benchlands, ravines, and meadows of Glenbow Ranch Provincial Park are remnants of the native landscape, one of relatively few such parcels left along the Bow River west of Calgary. Much of the land in the region has been carved up for development or plowed over for crops, and what is left is under ongoing pressure from the same forces. The protection of these kinds of rare and valued natural landscapes is at the heart of why protected areas emerged over a century ago. Concerned citizens and decision-makers saw the danger in unchecked development and pressured governments to implement measures to set aside tracts of land to be maintained as natural environments. Walking through Glenbow Ranch Provincial Park, it is tempting to think of the land as one more example of such an environment, one that was set aside to allow for the cyclical process of the natural world to continue. Yet, somewhat hidden beneath the prairie ecosystem, Glenbow Ranch Provincial Park is a deeply peopled landscape. For millennia, the Indigenous peoples of the region travelled, camped, hunted, and revered these lands. Countless generations lived their lives surviving and flourishing

7 8 on these prairie landscapes. Since the late 1800s, with the arrival of European settlers and the imposition of control by the Canadian government, these lands were incorporated into an expanding nation. The lands of Glenbow Ranch Provincial Park were originally a part of the much larger Cochrane Ranch, the first government lease ranch in western Canada. Covering over 40,000 hectares, the Cochrane Ranch was an immense operation that ran thousands of cattle over the lush prairie grasslands. In 1881, when construction began on the Canadian Pacific Railway, the Cochrane Ranch found itself at the center of a transnational transportation corridor. This change was initially beneficial as it allowed easier access to markets for cattle but also marked the transition away from the big ranch era of western Canadian history to the homesteading period. By 1888, the ranching lease was surrendered and the lands opened up to settlement. With easier access to the western territories, Dominion surveyors set out to carve the land into segments, ready for claim by hopeful settlers. Due to the rolling terrain and relative isolation, surveyors deemed the lands of Glenbow Ranch “unfit for cultivation,” but this did not deter several early homesteaders who were drawn to the area. Seeing potential, homesteaders like Joseph and Elizabeth Cockbaine, an English couple, filed for patent in 1895, built a log cabin, and started growing their holding of sheep, cattle, and horses. The Cockbaines did not last long at their ranch. Despite the railway running close to the property, the ranch was far from any significant settlements and the steep valley, while beautiful, only served to increase the isolation. Several other homesteaders gave this portion of the valley a try, but it was not until 1908 with the sale of the ranch to two wealthy New Yorkers, Leonard H. Kennerley and Chester Rhodes de la Vergne, that the area began a transition to something different: a quarry, town, and country retreat for the wealthy. Kennerley and de la Vergne joined together on the partnership with the intention of starting a small ranch on the frontier. To this end, they built comfortable new homes on the hillside overlooking the valley. Describing the view, Kennerley noted that “the Rockies are to be seen from both houses. In all kinds of weather, they look magnificent, some days looking at them one can imagine that the whole range of mountains is unreal they look so far away and again at times they look very close and appear almost human in their grandeur” (Stenson, 2012, p. 62). But this was not only to be a quiet retreat along the valley. Kennerley and de la Vergne also saw potential for the area as a new settlement. Parallel to the ranch property, a thriving sandstone quarry had begun operating, employing over a hundred men. At the time, a construction boom was

8 9 underway in the big cities of Alberta, and, due to several recent fires, the cities had made a requirement that all new downtown buildings be made of stone. Sandstone was, at the time, a popular building material, and thus the quarry along the river, next to the railway track, boomed. From 1904 until the closure of the quarry in 1912, this section of the valley buzzed with activity. The village of Glenbow emerged to support those working at the quarry with a general store, a dance hall, and a railway landing. Dozens of miner’s houses were built to accommodate the workers and their families. As well, up the slopes, on what became known as ‘Millionaire’s Hill,’ the Kennerleys and de la Vergnes were joined by several other wealthy families who built large homes overlooking the valley. The families, along with their staff, socialized with the mining community and advocated for a bridge link across the Bow River to the village, a move that would have cemented the settlement as a thriving community in the region. Unfortunately, the quality of sandstone quickly degraded as the miners dug deeper, and the quarry abruptly closed. A small brickworks emerged to fill the gap left by the quarry, but this was short-lived as higher quality products outcompeted the operation. The miners moved on, and the prospects for the community dried up. Several of the ‘millionaires’ carried on living in the valley, but with the outbreak of the First World War this period of activity and potential came to a close. In the years that followed, the property reverted to a cattle ranch, with several families being brought on by de la Vergne to oversee the operation. However, with the collapse of the Global Stock Market in the 1930s, de la Vergne lost much of his wealth and was forced to reorganize his holdings. In this process, ownership of the Glenbow Ranch property shifted to Eric Harvie, a Calgary lawyer and friend of de la Vergne, who oversaw the reorganization. Harvie, who would come to acquire great wealth by being involved in several of the most significant discoveries in the Alberta oil patch, found a welcome retreat in the Glenbow Ranch property. He and his family treated the property as a sanctuary, a place to get away from the city and spend time outdoors. One of Eric’s sons, Neil Harvie, took to the land and through his life operated the property as a working ranch. Alongside his efforts to steward the land through the ranching operation, Neil Harvie became a vocal promoter of conservation efforts in Canada. He advocated for and ultimately saw come to pass, changes to the federal government’s capital gains tax to promote land donations for conservation purposes. In the end, Harvie’s stewardship and commitment to conservation laid the foundation for realizing his desire to see those lands permanently protected and available to the public. Following his death in 1999, the Harvie family sold the land to the

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Alberta Government for below market value, taking a significant tax credit and bringing Neil’s desire to have the lands form a new provincial park to fruition. Although at first glance the lands of Glenbow Ranch Provincial Park appear as untouched native prairie, when one looks more closely, the land tells the story of millennia of human interactions with the landscape. This story can be read in the changes in the grassland ecology to suit the needs of ranching, the overgrown sandstone slabs left behind by the quarrying operation, depressions in the land and hillsides where soil was removed to produce bricks, and countless artifacts and remnants of those who lived and worked on the land. These features are what Wallace Stegner (1989) refers to as the “marks of human passage” that can be found in all parts of the world (Stegner). They are the parts of the landscape that make it a place of connection, attachment, and care for people because, as Stegner maintains, “no place is a place until things that have happened in it are remembered in history, ballads, yarns, legends, or monuments. Fictions serve as well as facts” (Stegner, 1962). When interacting with the landscape of Glenbow Ranch Provincial Park, one is interacting with a primarily native prairie grassland. The birds, plants, and terrain that make up the park are things that have existed and will continue to exist far beyond the touch of humans. Yet, at the same time, one is also interacting with a peopled landscape that can tell a story about how humans and the environment have interacted and evolved in this corner of the world. This landscape, like any, can be used as a lens through which to look at the history of a region. Here, it tells the story of Alberta as seen through the ambitions and exploitations of the big ranch era, the struggles and isolations of homesteading, the speculation and aesthetic influences of wealthy adventure seekers, the spread and role of oil wealth in Alberta’s modern development, the emergence of a stewardship ethic among landowners, and the changing ways that we imagine the practice of conservation. These are important stories to be engaged with, and protected areas offer a unique opportunity to safeguard and present those stories to the public. For much of the history of protected areas, the human legacy on the landscape has been erased. In the conservation field, humans, often quite rightly, are viewed as the greatest threat to the survival of natural ecosystems. Protected areas, in turn, are created to protect the land from humans. Today, however, many in the conservation community are questioning the value of such a strict separation between the natural and human worlds. It is argued that to pursue a genuinely sustainable future our societies need to find ways to live with the natural environment. In the

10 11 context of the effort to conserve relatively intact natural environments, this does not necessarily mean giving up our traditional ideas of protected areas, where nature is left to continue without intervention. But instead, it means recognizing those marks of human passage that exist and taking from them lessons, both positive and negative, that can help inform our future decisions. Moreover, around the world, and in different cultures here in Canada, the notion of parsing apart the land into areas for nature, industry, agriculture, and settlement is antithetical to the way that people understand the world and is often simply impractical where space is limited and people have lived in intensive ways for thousands of years. Finding ways to accommodate these different perspectives and lived realities is essential for pushing forward both the conservation and sustainability agendas. Glenbow Ranch Provincial Park offers one small example of the potential for blending the legacy of human and natural processes, and yet, as with many other protected areas in Alberta and around the world, much more needs to be done to effectively integrate these two domains that, for so long, have been separate. Focusing on the situation in the Province of Alberta in western Canada this dissertation aims to examine the issues associated with undertaking cultural heritage resource management within protected areas and integrating this work into broader management systems. The hope is that the results of this study will support the work of protected area managers to understand and effectively conserve cultural heritage resources. This dissertation is divided into eight chapters. Chapter two addresses the research design, explaining the key questions pursued in this study, how other researchers have approached research in this field, and the process used to develop a more comprehensive understanding of the issues. Chapter three reviews the literature related to the integration of cultural and natural heritage resource management. The review examines the evolution of approaches to both cultural and natural heritage resource management, highlighting key areas of transformation in recent years including a shift to value-based approaches, an interest in larger spatial scales for conservation, and more inclusive methods of governance and decision making that include a far more diverse range of voices. The result of these shifts in both fields of practice has been a blurring of the boundary between the two realms that, in turn, has led to growing calls for their integration. However, despite the often-overlapping approaches and objectives, as well as widespread agreement that cultural and natural heritage should work together, what is lacking is a compelling and clearly articulated case for why protected areas should aim to manage cultural

11 12 resources effectively. In the closing of this chapter, a preliminary response to this challenge is presented. The argument is made that the embrace of cultural resources in protected areas should stem from recognition of several practical benefits that this work offers. These benefits include the facts that cultural resources help to build long-lasting public support for protected areas’ existence; enhance the visitor experience by providing alternate ways for individuals to engage with the landscape; offer an opportunity to work towards reconciliation with Indigenous peoples for whom protected areas often either comprise or contain sacred and culturally significant sites and are an important resource base for traditional practices; and provide historical ecological data that can support traditional management practices. Taken together, these benefits provide a strong case for the importance of integrating cultural resource management into protected area operations, but for many, the more pressing issue is how to go about this challenge. It is this challenge that this study aims to address in the following chapters. Chapter four presents the results of a survey of several approaches to cultural heritage resource management by protected area agencies around the world and within Canada. While the specific institutional, legislative, and historical contexts surrounding cultural heritage resource management are unique in Alberta, the general concern with the integration of cultural and natural heritage resource management is not distinctive. Elsewhere, staff, decision-makers, experts, and communities have grappled with these questions and produced a host of responses. This chapter shows that through a careful analysis of what is occurring around the world, several key elements can be identified as essential components for a successful cultural heritage resource management program in any protected area organization. These elements include the need for coherent and robust legislation, strategic policy, consistent terminology, dedicated staffing, embedded cultural heritage training programs, robust management planning, and commitment to Indigenous engagement. Taken together, these examples offer a useful set of lessons to support improvements in Alberta. Chapter five shifts the discussion to focus on Alberta, giving context to the contemporary situation through an historical overview of the development of the provincial parks system and the changing role of cultural heritage resources within this system. The original conception for provincial parks in Alberta was one that was inclusive of both natural areas and historic sites, an institutional and legislative arrangement that carried forward into the 1970s. At this time, the provincial government decided to split the responsibilities for natural and cultural heritage

12 13 conservation into two separate spheres. Yet, the Alberta Parks Branch remained committed, both in principle and through legislation, to protecting significant cultural heritage resources within the park system. However, despite this commitment, fluctuating political, economic, and institutional conditions, as well as subsequent changes in priorities, meant that a consistent and robust program of cultural heritage resource management remained elusive through much of the twentieth century. Chapter six examines the contemporary approach to cultural heritage resource management within Alberta Parks. Due to a lack of comprehensive policies or guidance documents, understanding how Alberta Parks is currently addressing cultural heritage resource management within the system requires a structured research process. In this chapter, the results of a document analysis exercise, which examined the past twenty years of park management plans and policies, is presented along with the results from a series of in-depth semi-structured interviews with Alberta Parks Branch and Heritage Division staff members. This information was used to identify the current state of cultural heritage conservation in the province, as well as the strengths, weaknesses, and opportunities that exist. Finally, building upon the data gathered in this study and presented in the previous chapters, chapter seven presents a set of detailed policy recommendations for Alberta Parks. These recommendations range from high-level policy goals to site-specific tools and resources meant to support more effective integration of cultural heritage resource conservation. Once the recommendations were complete, they were distributed, along with an online survey, to several Alberta Parks and Alberta Heritage Division staff members who were asked to reflect on the desirability, usability, and viability of the proposals. The results of this survey demonstrate a high degree of acceptance of the value of the recommendations, but also raise several important concerns, ongoing obstacles, and opportunities for further clarification.

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Chapter 2: Research Design

A research design encompasses the overall strategy for a particular study. There are many ways to answer a given question but the purpose of developing a research design is to ensure that the process is clearly conceptualized, articulated, and appropriate for the task. The aim of this chapter is to lay out the overall research design that was used for this study. The first task is to provide a review of the ways in which researchers in the fields of natural and cultural heritage conservation have studied their respective subjects. This review serves to situate the present study by highlighting the need for research that works to bridge the divide between academic and professional researchers. Next, the foundational purpose and philosophical stance for this study are explained, articulating the case for an applied qualitative approach. This is followed by a discussion of the choice of case study methodology as the overarching framework for this study. Finally, the research process and methods are explained along with a discussion around the quality, rigour, and validity of this research.

Research Purpose Prior to coming to any conclusions about the research questions, methods, or overall design, I began this project with a simple set of concerns. I was curious about how cultural heritage conservation can serve as a vital part of building enduring connections to place, how it can support wider community objectives and how the ideas of landscape-scale cultural heritage can be brought into both of these questions. As well, my primary focus in undertaking this project was to ensure that the research be of practical value to communities and those working in the field. For me, the way that I have found to do this most effectively is to conduct research within the region where I am studying. This is not always a common priority for academics. As David Glassberg argues, “unlike many professionals who can choose where they will live and work… [academics] soon learn that they have a slim chance of ever winding up in a part of the country where they want to live.” The reality of this system is that students learn “to regard the places where they will spend their future careers as more or less interchangeable” and this assumption is not only a factor in how we are trained but how we do our work (2001, p. 111). I have sought to resist the impulse to decenter my connection to place. My past and future lives have been

14 15 focused on western Canada and therefore applying my academic interests within this context has always felt important. To move toward clarity and a more focused research project, I began reading widely and set up numerous meetings with individuals engaged in cultural heritage conservation throughout western Canada. While not a formal part of this research project, it feels important to highlight this work because it was through these conversations that I ‘tested’ and explored ideas. Seen through the eyes of those working on these issues, ideas from the literature that often felt innovative and potentially impactful emerged as too abstract or unnecessary. It was through this process that my focus began to narrow, and the issues became more clear. It became apparent that the protected area system in the Province of Alberta was an excellent location to explore how natural and cultural heritage can be effectively integrated and what purpose such a pursuit would serve. In Alberta, I came to understand, there is a growing interest in and desire to address the cultural component of protected areas, but as of yet there has been very little formal work done in this respect. At the same time, I also explored and engaged with the international conservation community where there is a vibrant and innovative conversation going on around the integration of natural and cultural heritage, but a great deal of uncertainty around how this is to be achieved in practice. I could see the excitement from this international conversation trickling into the local community, but a persistent question about what it might mean in practice remained. Moreover, while innovations and approaches may work in other parts of the world, they are not necessarily easy to translate to the local context. Therefore, it made sense to focus my research on the situation in Alberta, bringing together national and international examples to help support the work being undertaken in this area. Focusing on Alberta, I have sought to provide a constructive addition to the fields of natural and cultural heritage conservation. The primary aim here is to work toward a middle ground between theory and practice. The questions that this research aims to answer are inherently practical, focusing as they do on how Alberta’s protected area network can better address cultural heritage conservation, thus placing it in the camp of applied research. However, this project is also firmly within the realm of conceptualization. Therefore, the intention is to bring a theoretically-informed position to my research questions, but to do so in a way that addresses the practical challenges of those working in the field of conservation. To achieve this goal, I have adopted an applied qualitative research approach to address two interrelated questions:

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Researching Natural and Cultural Heritage – Literature Review

Understanding research into natural and cultural heritage conservation is complicated by a division within both fields between conceptual and applied research, sometimes described as a division between academics and practitioners1. Both applied and conceptual approaches undertake research related to conservation theory and practice, but the orientation to the task, including its objectives and outcomes are quite separate. Applied researchers, on the one hand, tend to focus on resolving management related issues, whereas conceptual research is more reflective on the endeavor as a whole. Although this distinction is somewhat simplistic and there has been much debate on its validity and usefulness (Hedrick et al., 1993), recognizing that there are different approaches to research does allow space for important observations and helps one position inquiries going forward. Applied research is understood to be a type of research that aims to address practical questions or challenges and through the process move closer to some sort of solution or resolution (C. R. Kothari, 2004). It is about addressing practical problems and providing direct value to practitioners, but in doing so also furthering knowledge. This does not mean that it is atheoretical. Applied research draws upon different theories to further knowledge, understanding, and find solutions, but it is not primarily engaged in the development or testing of theory. Instead, the central questions are ones concerning how to achieve particular ends. In the fields of natural and cultural heritage conservation these questions look at how to achieve protection and how to effectively manage resources. Being concerned primarily with the

1 Many, such as Witcomb and Buckley (2013), have developed arguments against the pervasive divide between ‘academic’ and ‘professional’ research. While useful as a rhetorical measure this distinction is a challenge to maintain as there are many conceptually-inclined practitioners and professionally-focused scholars. Therefore, I have opted to discuss this distinction in terms of applied and conceptual research. The divide between the two remains, but the professional affiliation of the individual is not a central concern.

16 17 practical issues, applied research tends toward a scientific positivism paradigm — a shared way of making sense of the world (Creswell et al., 2007; 2017). In this paradigm the assumption is that reality exists independent of the knower and knowledge of this reality can be discovered. The epistemological position here is one where through objective observations and aided by methods designed to reduce bias the researcher goes into the world to uncover truth (Crotty, 1998, p. 8). While this orientation is predominant throughout applied research, there has been some shift, encouraged by social scientists (Harmon, 2007), away from this hard realist stance. Most noticeable in the literature is an acceptance of a post-positivist position, which holds similar epistemological and ontological beliefs but, principally, questions the ultimate ability to gain knowledge of the truth. In this view, the world outside of human experience does exist but our knowledge of this reality can only be achieved imperfectly. Therefore, the objective of research is still to work toward a true objective knowledge, but it must be done while accepting the impossibility of the task. In both cases, however, the methodological approaches used by applied researchers are similar in that they are directed at explaining relationships, identifying causes which influence outcomes, formulating laws, and thus providing a basis for prediction and generalization (Creswell, 2014, p. 7). The chosen methods are often geared toward the generation of quantitative data, examples include standardized tests, statistical modelling, description through standardized observation tools, and experimentation (Pring, 2000, p. 34). Examples of this kind of applied research would include parks managers who draw on the natural sciences such as biology to study wildlife populations and their impact on natural ecosystems (Arcese et al., 2014; T. G. Martin et al., 2011). Similarly, in the field of cultural heritage conservation practicing architects, conservators, and engineers would be concerned with how to manage tangible resources such as buildings and artefacts (Appelbaum, 2010; CACCAPC, 2000). Looking at these issues, these individuals may undertake research to understand the impact of relative humidity on material deterioration (Patkus, 2007) or to develop standardized interventions in building preservation (Parks Canada, 2010). In both scenarios, applied research efforts adopt comparable scientific techniques and often rely on technical case study work in pursuit of ever more accurate data. The great strength of the applied research approach lies in its ability to deliver rigorous scientific data that managers can use to make conservation decisions. However, these approaches are not without weaknesses. Although positivism “attempts to reduce the complex to the simple

17 18 by simplifying and controlling variables,” Scotland (2012, p. 11) explains that “this is extremely difficult” to do when working with issues that are enmeshed in a social world. Positivists often consider their work to be value-free collections of objective data; but in ignoring the context of research one is certain to attain limited impact. Such weaknesses have not gone unnoticed by researchers in the conservation fields who have long recognized that there is much beyond the scientific practice of conservation that needs to be studied. Over the past half-century, the role and value of the social sciences in applied research has gained considerable acceptance. Even as far back as the 1930s, Aldo Leopold, observing the field of nature conservation, made the case that ecologists “should not only study how nature works, but also apply their knowledge so that humans could see themselves as part of nature’s inner workings” (Leopold, 1968 quoted in; Schmitz, 2016, p. 9). Since Leopold’s time it has been widely conceded that engagement with the human dimensions of conservation supports more “robust and effective conservation policies, actions, and outcomes” (N. Bennett et al., 2017, p. 94). Yet, despite the growing acceptance of the social sciences, as N. Bennett et al. argue with respect to natural heritage conservation, integration of social science insights into the actual professional practice of conservation remains limited. Applied social science research in conservation amounts to an enormously diverse body of literature, making generalizations of its methodological approach challenging. Research in this area focuses on a variety of social phenomena (governance, politics, finance), social processes (visitor patterns, recreation habits, education, marketing, decision-making), and individual attributes (values, beliefs, knowledge, motivations, preferences, perceptions, and behaviors), and it does so at a range of scales from local to global (N. Bennett et al., 2017). Moreover, the objectives of such research are equally diverse, seeking to understand, describe, and predict. Examples include the persistent efforts to measure the social impact of protected areas (West et al., 2006), examine tourism patterns (P. F. Eagles & McCool, 2002; Orbaslı & Woodward, 2009), and analyze the financial impact of conservation measures (IUCN, 1998; Madden & Shipley, 2012). Much like other applied research projects, the strength of applied social science methods lay in their ability to supply data that operational staff can use to improve the practice of conservation management. By increasing the likelihood of effective and informed decision- making that takes into account the social dimensions of conservation issues, applied social science research offers a valuable contribution to the field.

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Conceptual research on the theories and practices of cultural and natural heritage conservation, on the other hand, are those meta-level inquiries into the foundations of the fields. These questions concern the essence of what is meant by concepts such as cultural heritage, nature, and conservation. In general, the conceptual study of heritage conservation has adopted two, sometimes-overlapping, research paradigms, interpretive and critical. In the interpretive position reality is understood to be relative, that is, subjective and different for each observer (Guba & Lincoln, 1994, p. 110). Proponents work from an epistemological position that there is no objective meaning or truth, at least not one that is identifiable, instead knowledge is situated and constructed as human beings interact with the world beyond them. Culture and nature, in such an account, are inherently social constructs. This is not to say, as only the crudest constructivist account would, that culture and nature do not have an existence, rather that they are a way of making sense of the world that shapes how we see and feel (Bryman, 2008). The terms themselves are containers into which humans pour ideas of what they mean. This process of construction has also been described by the term sedimentation where layers of social interpretation “get placed one upon another like levels of mineral deposit” (Crotty, 1998, p. 59). Moreover, as these theoretical deposits build up over time, “we become further and further removed” from those aspects of our existence and, therefore, it is the task of the researcher to peel back those layers, revealing what was previously unappreciated (Ibid., p.59). The methodologies employed by interpretive researchers are directed toward understanding phenomena from an individual’s perspective, “investigating interaction among individuals as well as the historical and cultural contexts which people inhabit” (Scotland, 2012, p. 12). In general, the research questions are broad and through the research process, theory and knowledge emerge out of the data — becoming grounded — rather than theory being tested by the research. The methods adopted reflect the needs of this type of research process, tending to be highly qualitative and open-ended. Examples include interviews, focus groups, observations and document analysis. The obvious strength of this approach lay in its ability to yield insights into the behavior of individuals and groups, offering explanations for action. However, weaknesses largely result from the ontological rejection of objective knowledge. Interpretive research can only ever be a perspective on an issue, thus bringing into question its validity and transferability (Rolfe, 2006; Scotland, 2012). This raises a practical issue for the use of such

19 20 studies to influence broader policy or management decisions. Despite these issues, elements of the interpretive approach have been used to great effect in conservation research. The second major paradigmatic orientation in the conceptual branch of conservation research has been a critical one. While there is often a great deal of overlap between these two paradigms, it is useful to examine the characteristics of each separately in order to more easily identify them in the literature. A critical paradigm is one that takes an historical realist view, which attests that reality has been “shaped by social, political, cultural, economic, ethnic, and gender values” (Scotland, 2012, p. 14). While these realities may be socially constructed, the historical force behind such values wields great power, thus giving reality a particularly solid appearance. As Crotty explains, “we come to inhabit a pre-existing system and to be inhabited by it” (Crotty, 1998, p. 53). Accepting a view that reality is constructed but also somewhat fixed, the critical paradigm seeks to attack and alter these realities. It is therefore deeply engaged in an emancipatory social justice agenda, which can at times blur the line between activism and research. Some of the prominent theoretical perspectives that inform this paradigm include Marxism, postcolonialism, and feminism (Radcliffe, 2017; TallBear, 2014). Methodologically, critical researchers seek to interrogate values and assumptions, expose hegemony and injustice, and challenge conventional social structures (Crotty, 1998, p. 157; Scotland, 2012, p. 13). The methods used to do this are similar to those of the interpretivist approach, but often include a participatory or emancipatory element that recognizes that research subjects are active agents and beneficiaries in the pursuit of knowledge. Again, this approach shares much of the strength of interpretive research, but also includes a deeper reflexivity on the notions of power, privilege, the role of the researcher, and the value of the research. While this can be essential in pushing forward a critical agenda it also can make it an unfavorable form of research to those who benefit from existing structures as it challenges the status quo. Uncomfortable or not, critical methodologies have been deeply influential in transforming the theory and practice of conservation. As one example, archaeologists show how management in their field has “marginalized Indigenous peoples: distancing them both practically from the everyday management of their own heritage and conceptually by conspiring in the concept of ‘prehistory’ which posits a break in the lives of Indigenous peoples before and after contact” (Harrison & Hughes, 2010, p. 238). Recognizing the damaging colonial legacy of archaeology, scholars in this field have undertaken a deeply introspective conversation about how to right

20 21 historical wrongs and reshape contemporary practice. (Winter, 2007, 2014). Furthermore, in natural heritage conservation, the Indigenous postcolonial critique has challenged the historical understanding and management of protected areas (Stevens, 2014). Studies have shown that many contemporary ‘natural’ areas were traditionally home for Indigenous peoples who actively used and managed those places (Dowie, 2011; MacLaren, 2012). Through forced eviction, intellectual erasure, and controlled access conservationists have artificially constructed natural heritage as something ‘pristine’ and free of human influence. However, as critical research becomes more widely accepted, such notions are more difficult to maintain, and researchers are seeking to address these historic issues. While the categories of interpretivist and critical paradigms offer a useful rhetorical distinction, as noted above they are often difficult to separate in research. This issue is exacerbated in cultural heritage conservation research because there is often a distinct lack of methodological engagement by conceptual researchers. Instead, what can be found in most journal articles is a brief review of existing theory including the ideas developed elsewhere by interpretive or critical scholars, which is either uncritically accepted or modestly refined to provide a conceptual framework for the study. This framework is then demonstrated through one or more descriptive case studies. Scholars who actively set out to employ diverse qualitative research methods to develop conceptual frameworks are rare, and even less common are those who employ emancipatory or participatory methods of critical inquiry. What this has resulted in is a plethora of theoretically engaging concepts and a host of case studies, but a dearth of truly grounded research. This situation, I would argue, is one element that has contributed to the perceived separation between the conceptual and applied branches of conservation studies, with the latter finding little rigour or useable data in the former. Apart from the above concerns with rigour in conceptual research, the most significant weakness of both the conceptual and applied approaches lay, quite simply, in their lack of the other. Criticisms of both sides — of the applied pursuits as overly positivistic and unconcerned with the wider social context; and of the conceptual branch as too negative and critical of industry, while being unwilling to provide practical solutions — are entirely valid concerns. Undoubtedly, the diversity of approaches and studies that are apparent in the conservation fields have been beneficial, creating fertile ground for new ideas and innovations to take root, but this diversity also has faults. This is succinctly put by Winter who argues that “whilst diversity

21 22 facilitates pluralism, it also begets fragmentation, and there is often very little attempt to consolidate or reach across boundaries” (2013, p. 395). Acknowledging these concerns, individuals from across the spectrum have increasingly come to call for the adoption of integrated approaches to conservation research (Harmon, 2007), ones that draw on the strengths of methodologies and methods from both the conceptual and applied branches. The first step in this effort, Witcomb and Buckley suggest, is to begin “thinking about the production of knowledge along a continuum between end points” rather than two separate and foreign realms of endeavor (2013, p. 564). While it may serve as a useful rhetorical device, this oft-repeated separation between the two branches of research is not supportive of future innovation and continuing to work within these categories is ineffective for addressing the big issues facing the world. As such, researchers in the conservation fields need to make a greater effort to engage each other to bridge the gap between practice and theory. This may require shifting the perspectives they are accustomed to in order to be open to new ideas and, particularly for those conceptually-inclined researchers, focusing on offering more constructive ways forward, “rather than only critically describing the adverse outcomes of the frame currently in place” (Witcomb & Buckley, 2013, p. 52). This is not so much a question of finding new, or more effective, research approaches, but learning how to be more collaborative. This remains a challenge, however, because researchers with expertise covering both the natural/material sciences and the social sciences/humanities are few. Moreover, the urgency of the conservation mission, as nature and the historic fabric are destroyed at an alarming rate, suggests to some that the urgency needs to be “on practical problem solving, not abstract theoretical frameworks” (Newing, 2010, p. 27), despite the necessity of both. A first step toward greater integration will be a more explicit discussion of the frameworks — including the paradigms, methodologies and methods — that are being deployed in the fields today.

Research Framework

At its core, this is an applied research project. It does not seek to offer predictions or models about how the world works. Instead, it aims to understand how things ought to work and develop solutions to reach those ends. In order to achieve these two goals this project adopts an iterative and reflective process (Holmström et al., 2009; Schon, 1983). This type of cyclical research process aims to “improve practice by systematically oscillating between taking action in the field

22 23 of practice, and inquiring into it” (Tripp, 2005, p. 2). Through this process, a researcher learns by continually coming back to the central questions, reflecting on the process, and maintaining focus on the practical issues. Although the central focus is on practical issues, theory must form the foundation. Engaging in theoretically informed research does not mean swearing allegiance to any particular theoretical regime but is rather about being aware of the various ways of thinking about the subject matter and seeking ways to use that knowledge to inform and clarify practical challenges. For example, there are conflicting theories about what cultural heritage is and how it is produced. For some, cultural heritage is a purely conceptual discourse, whereas for others it is a dialogical relation between human and nonhuman entities. In this research, neither position is held to be the truth but instead both are used to help explore the different ways that cultural heritage exists for various actors within the Alberta protected areas system. The foundation for this theoretically informed position will be developed in the following chapter which reviews the theoretical literature and aims to use this information to point toward answers to a few key questions such as what is natural and cultural heritage, and what is the value of cultural heritage conservation for protected areas? The underlying paradigm or worldview that informs research is always difficult to fully articulate. The edges of one’s own world, after all, are often difficult to see. Given the lack of an agreed upon research approach within the conservation fields, a reality that stems from the diverse interdisciplinary questions that are being addressed, there is not a firm school of thought within or against which to position this research. Instead, I have found inspiration from a variety of sources. As Joseph Maxwell argues, the idea of a paradigm, a shared worldview or set of beliefs, is a problematic way of thinking about research. The rigidity and dogmatism that often goes along with paradigmatic thinking runs counter to the goal of developing new knowledge. Instead, Maxwell argues, “philosophical stances and assumptions… are lenses through which we view the world… but the views they provide are fallible and incomplete, and we need multiple lenses to attain more valid, adequate, in-depth knowledge of the phenomena we study” (2011, p. 29). In order to see through multiple lenses, he advocates developing a ‘toolkit’ of approaches rather than trying to develop a logically consistent paradigm. This way of approaching research takes on the characteristics of the bricoleur, which was traditionally understood as one who falls somewhere between a craftsperson and an odd jobs

23 24 person. One who is skilled in working with their hands, but who, unlike the craftsperson, does not possess a set of specialized tools, working instead with whatever is available. The bricoleur, then, “spontaneously adapts to the unique circumstances of the situation, creatively employing the available tools and materials to create unique solutions to a problem” (Maxwell, 2011, p. 28; See also: D. T. Campbell & Stanley, 2015; Berry, 2015). Questions of validity, rigour, generalizability, and the like remain crucial, but the tests of these are more flexible, relying heavily on the researcher to remain reflexive, continually “asking for each conceptual model or assumption, what believing this model or assumption enables us to see, and also in what ways this model or assumption is misleading, incomplete, or unhelpful” (Maxwell, 2011, p. 30). Such an approach is well suited to the demands of applied research where the process is continually changing through intervention and reflection. Moreover, in an applied research project such as this one, developing solutions that are practical and useful is the central concern. Therefore, allegiance to any one paradigmatic position is only useful insofar as it produces solutions that achieve the desired outcome. If such a mixed approach is adopted here, what are the pieces that are being brought together to make up the foundational bricolage? At the core is an adoption of a post-positivist stance, largely informed by writings on critical realism that attempt to find a central position between strong positivist and interpretivist positions. Critical realists maintain that it is possible for social science “to refine and improve its knowledge about the real world over time, and to make claims about reality which are relatively justified, while still being historical, contingent, and changing” (Archer et al., 2017). Such a stance implies that there is, indeed, a real world out there to know (ontological realism) but also accepts a degree of epistemological constructivism, recognizing that all knowledge is historically, culturally, and socially situated. Any understanding of social reality, then, needs to be framed within the context of “dynamic social structures which have created the observable phenomena within the social world” (Wahyuni, 2012, p. 71). This does not mean that all knowledge is false, but instead calls attention to the various ways that it is constructed, in turn allowing for conceptual pluralism. The idea of conceptual pluralism works well with the claims being put forward by those involved in the ‘ontological’ turn in various social sciences (Holbraad & Pedersen, 2017), which is another body of work that has come to be quite influential on my thinking, particularly with respect to conceptualizing cultural heritage. While there is a great deal of diversity within these

24 25 debates, one of the central tenets is that ontology is not universal or given, but rather is constructed like the rest of human knowledge. Although, as critical realists say, there may be an external world out there, both our knowledge about that world (epistemology) and the way that we understand its existence (ontology) are enmeshed in human perception. Therefore, I believe it is still possible within a critical realist position to “take seriously” the possibility of ontological pluralism (Viveiros De Castro, 2013). More will be said about this in the next chapter, but one of the important lessons I draw from the critical realist’s acceptance that all knowledge and understanding is contingent upon context and perspective and is the need for methodological pluralism in order to look at a given issue from a range of directions. While the critical realist position underlies my theoretical thinking, it is only loosely adhered to in this study. Since I am undertaking applied research, my approach to designing the process has been largely inspired by a pragmatic frame of mind. Pragmatism, which eschews metaphysical questions of ontology and epistemology as unnecessary complications, focuses on the importance of practicality, emphasising outcomes above all else (Morgan, 2007, 2014). The nature of reality or what we can know about it, a pragmatist would argue, has little bearing on how the Alberta government undertakes cultural heritage conservation, so why should the researcher bother trying to determine an answer to these issues. Pragmatism is useful because it leads to a focus on the research question(s), asking what processes and methods work best to find an answer (Tashakkori & Teddlie, 1998). While I appreciate the emphasis on outcomes, particularly in the context of this project, I do not agree that metaphysical questions should be totally ignored. As numerous scholars have demonstrated, the ontological and epistemological positions that undergird our thinking have very real and practical implications. This will be discussed in some detail later with respect to the fashioning of the world around a series of dualisms including the distinct realms of nature and culture. However, as an approach to designing research I see a great deal of value to the pragmatist’s stance, especially in an applied project where the goal is to design or create solutions, a process that is inevitably messy. Therefore, for foundationally pragmatic and conceptual reasons (as well as technical reasons that will be discussed below) this research has adopted a mix of methods to work toward answers to the research questions. The understanding that is ultimately put forward through this process does not offer any final truth on the matter in question or a logical conceptual framework to explain the situation, but instead is an historically and individually contingent response to the

25 26 contemporary challenge of integrating cultural heritage conservation into protected area management. But, through a rigorous and well-conceived research methodology, the hope is that the results remain robust, valid, and worthwhile.

Methodology

A methodology is an approach to knowledge that influences the tools that are used and shapes an understanding of what can, or should, be researched (Crotty, 1998, p. 3). It is a model of how to conduct research that exists within the context of a specific framework or paradigm. For this project, I have adopted a case study methodology, focusing on the unique circumstances around cultural heritage conservation within the Government of Alberta’s protected area system. Case studies, according to Yin (2011, 2014) are useful in answering ‘how’ and ‘why’ questions, where the goal is to understand a contemporary phenomenon within its real-world context where little control is required over variables. Often case studies involve multiple sites which are studied using a variety of methods and the results are then compared. The benefit of such an approach over a single case study is that it allows for comparisons, which facilitate a more comprehensive, and potentially more generalizable, understanding of a phenomenon. In addition, the purposes for which case studies are used varies. As Schwandt and Gates (2018) explain, there are four primary uses which are not necessarily mutually exclusive: (i) description, (ii) hypothesis generation or theory development, (iii) hypothesis and theory testing, and (iv) development of normative theory. This study employs a single descriptive case study, but couples this with an effort to develop actionable solutions based on these findings. Given that the goal is to seek practical ways forward, it was determined that a single in-depth case was most appropriate. The benefit of this approach is that it becomes possible, within the constraints of a dissertation, to develop a complete, detailed portrait of the situation in Alberta and thus to create specific recommendations. The lack of multiple cases does, of course, pose several concerns for the generalizability and wider application of the findings. However, some of the benefits of a comparative case study approach are achieved here by including in the analysis a review of national and international examples. Although more cursory than the study of the situation in Alberta, these examples do

26 27 provide a measure of comparison, highlighting areas of commonality. Another response to the issue of generalizability is that it is simply not the intent of this project. While this study may have some utility beyond itself, the goal is to improve practice within Alberta. Other jurisdictions may be able to learn from this experience, particularly those within Canada where there is a degree of similarity in the legislative, geographic, and institutional contexts. But for the most part due to the unique circumstances present at different jurisdictions, any solutions will need to be adapted. Ultimately, the value of a case-based methodology is that it facilitates the creation of a certain type of knowledge that may not be universal but is sensitive to context and contingency. This type of practical, site-specific knowledge is indispensable for addressing contemporary challenges. Finally, a word about the choice of the case study itself. As noted before two of the central reasons for choosing the Government of Alberta’s protected area system for this study were (i) a commitment to undertaking research within western Canada and (ii) information received during my preliminary interviews that revealed an interest in and need for addressing these questions within this organization. In addition to these reasons, though, Alberta serves as a useful average for Canada. The cultural and natural heritage conservation systems are relatively well established, but due to funding cuts and minimal resourcing over the past thirty years, little innovative work has been done in Alberta compared to elsewhere in Canada and around the world. This has left the protected area system in Alberta with a strong organizational foundation but many issues that need to be addressed.

Methods

Research methods, in contrast to methodology, are the procedures, tools and techniques that are used to gather and analyse data. They are largely a-theoretical and can be used in different research methodologies. The present study began with a review of international and national approaches to cultural heritage conservation within protected areas in order to identify common approaches and challenges. This was followed by a series of in-depth semi-structured interviews with protected area managers and cultural heritage conservation professionals to identify the current state of cultural heritage conservation in Alberta’s protected areas, as well as the strengths and weaknesses that exist. These insights were combined with a document analysis

27 28 exercise, where I identified, and then analysed, key published and primary materials, including policy documents, research studies, and management plans. Using this information, a set of recommendations, ranging from high-level policy goals to site-specific tools and resources, were developed to support more effective integration of cultural heritage conservation. Finally, to test the validity of these recommendations, an online survey of Alberta protected area managers and decision makers was distributed. The insights and analysis provided by the survey participants allowed for the refinement of the recommendations, which, in turn, lay the foundation for future applied research interventions. Of course, this description offers a far too linear picture of the research process. As Creswell explains “the processes of data collection, data analysis, and report writing are not distinct steps… they are interrelated and often go on simultaneously,” which is one of the reasons why critics argue that qualitative research is “intuitive, soft, and relativistic.” However, while research may jump around throughout the process there is, Creswell continues, a “general contour” to the work, what he calls a “data analysis spiral” (Creswell, 2007, p. 150). Simply put, one enters the spiral with data and exits with an account or a narrative. While the process as a whole may be characterized by oscillation and work on multiple planes, each stage, from data collection to reporting, needs to be planned, articulated, and robust. Below, each of the steps in the present study are described more fully.

Figure 1: The data analysis spiral (Creswell, 2007, p. 150).

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Alternate Practice Review Around the world many jurisdictions are dealing with the challenge of integrating cultural heritage conservation into protected area management, therefore it seems fitting to draw upon these experiences. However, both cultural heritage and protected areas vary considerably around the world and the legislative and institutional arrangements that structure these practices are equally varied. Taken together, these issues make it difficult to offer any universal best practice. Therefore, the aim in this study is not to determine the best practices for integrating cultural heritage conservation into protected area management. Instead, it is simply to bring forward a range of comparable approaches that may shed light on the challenges and opportunities faced in Alberta. This review of alternate practices draws upon the methodological insights and processes developed by best practice research,2 but stops short of trying to establish generalizable best practices. While it is beyond the scope of this project, an effort to create international best practices is currently being undertaken by experts with the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Cultural and Spiritual Values Specialist Group, and is due for publication in the next few years (Bernbaum, 2017). Rather than seeking to identify best practices, examples from around the world were selected to highlight unique, innovative, and well-developed approaches to integrating cultural heritage conservation into protected area management. Several factors played into the decision to include each of these approaches. These include availability, in English, of documentation in the form of published policies, guidance, management plans, or studies. Variability in approach, geographic location/circumstances, and institutional arrangements were also important as these factors inserted greater diversity into the analysis. Finally, recognition by professional and scholarly communities, judged by frequency of mentions in the literature, played a role in determining

2 The use of ‘best practices’ to help shape solutions is common within management and public policy research (Bretschneider et al., 2004). The idea of a best practice grew out of the earlier notion of benchmarking, which industry, in competition with one another, started using to identify “the best practice in relation to products and processes… with the objective of using this as a guide and reference point for improving the practice of one’s own organization” (Law, 2009). A ‘best practice,’ in contrast, is viewed as one that has “been shown to produce superior performance” and its adoption “improv[es] the performance of a process, business unit, product, service, or entire organization” (Druery et al., 2013). The trouble with best practices, though, is that it is quite difficult to determine that any given practice is truly the best. The term itself implies that compared to any alternative course of action, this practice will achieve a desired end. In order to be valid such a best practice must be compared to all other alternatives and those alternatives must be comparable (Bretschneider et al., 2004).

29 30 which approaches to study. Nationally, a similar set of criteria were used to determine alternate approaches for analysis. However, in this situation all the provinces and territories, as well as the federal government, were given a cursory examination to determine which were addressing cultural heritage conservation within their protected area system. Those that were, were chosen for further study. For each study area, a descriptive summary of each approach was developed (see Chapter 4) and analyzed in order identify common features.

Document Analysis Document analysis is a systematic procedure for reviewing or evaluating a range of print and electronic documents. Like other qualitative methods, “document analysis requires that data be examined and interpreted in order to elicit meaning, gain understanding, and develop empirical knowledge” (Bowen, 2009, p. 27). This method is often used in collaboration with other qualitative methods as a means of ‘triangulation,’ which simply refers to the application and combination of multiple approaches to the study of the same phenomenon (Flick, 2018). Documents can serve several purposes in a research project. As Bowen explains, documents can “provide data on the context within which research participants operate,” “suggest some questions that need to be asked and situations that need to be observed,” “provide supplementary research data,” “provide a means of tracking change and development,” and “be analysed as a way of verifying findings or corroborating evidence from other sources” (2009, pp. 49–50). Given the availability of documents, as well as the efficiency and exactness, this data source was an invaluable aspect of this research. For this study, documents were selected using a purposive sampling method to represent the various stages of the protected area management process including overarching policy and legislative guidance, site surveys and studies, management plans, and evaluation. The resulting sample included legislation related to natural and cultural heritage conservation in the province, all twenty-five publicly available Alberta Parks management plans, covering the period from 1996 to the present, corporate plans and policies for Alberta Parks dating back to the mid-1980s, and background park surveys and published reports. Taken together, these documents provide a detailed picture of the past thirty years of protected area management in the province. A number of reports and articles, both news and scholarly, were also reviewed to provide additional context, overviews, and reveal further documents, but were not included in the document analysis as they were not formally representative of the management process.

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Interviews

As with many qualitative studies, interviews are an essential source of data for this research. One of the aims for this research was to develop practical solutions which requires the input of practitioners. Interviews are the primary way that this study engages with these groups. The objective of an interview is to facilitate participants’ sharing of their perspectives, stories, and experiences with respect to a given phenomenon or issue. The interview method encompasses the design of the interview questions, the actual interview procedures, and the management of the information following the interview. In this study, a semi-structured interview was chosen as a flexible means of gathering information (Brinkman, 2018; Creswell et al., 2007; Liamputtong, 2013). Situated between a structured and in-depth interview, a semi-structured interview uses a list of predefined questions or themes to guide a conversation while still allowing space for new questions or insights to emerge. Interview participants were identified through a targeted search for individuals working within the Province of Alberta’s protected area system as well as adjacent organizations such as non-profit conservation groups, cultural heritage conservation professionals, and federal and municipal government employees. This targeted search was supported by a snowball identification technique whereby participants were asked for names of other potential participants. When individuals were identified they were sent an invitation to participate in the study along with a research information package that briefly explained the aim of the project and emphasized the participants rights with respect to confidentiality, anonymity, and the voluntary nature of the study. During the interviews, participants were asked questions based on the themes of the three primary research questions (see Appendix A for the list of guiding questions), focusing on the participants’ own experiences but also probing their knowledge of other efforts and trends. Interviews were conducted in person and over the phone. When participants agreed, the interview was recorded, transcribed verbatim, and returned to the participant for review. When changes to the transcript were made by participants, the revised transcripts were used in the analysis. If the participant declined to be recorded, detailed notes were taken. In the end, twenty-five participants were interviewed for this study. This sample includes ten Alberta Parks employees, five Alberta Tourism and Culture employees, three individuals involved in non-profit conservation work, three cultural heritage conservation professionals,

31 32 three Parks Canada employees, and four unaffiliated individuals with a knowledge or interest in the topic. The original hope had been to conduct approximately thirty interviews, but due to the timing of a provincial election and the subsequent change in government, Alberta government employees were less able to speak, both for reasons of reduced communication and the time demands of facilitating a government transition.

Data Analysis and Interpretation Once selected, compiled, transcribed, or written, the data in each stage of this research was analysed. In this process, the analysis of each of the data sources — alternate approaches, documents, and interviews — fed off the others. While the analysis was largely conducted in a linear manner, with the steps proceeding from and building upon the others, this was not always the case. As explained previously with respect to Creswell’s idea of the research spiral, the gathering and analysis of data through multiple steps often fed back into the process with insights gathered in one category shaping others. The information gathered from the document analysis exercise, for example, helped to identify new questions and promoted follow-ups with certain participants. Moreover, information from interviews was essential for identifying overlooked or unpublished documents. Therefore, it is difficult to trace a direct path through the steps to a culmination in the recommendations, however, despite the iterative nature of the process, the analysis, and later interpretation, of the data did follow a generally prescribed pattern. The primary methods for analysis in this process were content and thematic analysis. Content analysis tends to be understood as a means to examine data by checking the “patterns and trends of words used, their frequency, and relationships” (Liamputtong, 2013, p. 246). This often becomes a process of quantification, counting the number and tendency of usage for certain words or concepts. However, in this project I used a less rigid approach suggested by Bowen that “entails a first-pass document review, in which meaningful and relevant passages of text or other data are identified” (2009, p. 32). This was particularly useful in the document analysis and alternate practice review exercise because of the sheer volume of potential information. Protected area management is a complex, detailed process that considers a wide range of issues and variables. Narrowing this body of information down to the ways in which cultural heritage conservation was addressed was crucial, but also not necessarily straightforward because this

32 33 information tended, particularly when not dealt with in a clear strategic manner, to be diffuse and emergent in multiple realms. With the interviews, the need for content analysis was less prevalent since the information in these discussions was largely guided by the prepared questions. Once the relevant content was identified, this data became subject to thematic analysis. Thematic analysis is the process of developing categories to sort information and then working to interpret the connections between them (Creswell, 2007; Liamputtong, 2013). The researcher returns repeatedly to the data to refine these categories. In this study, analysis began with a set of a priori codes based around the general outline of the research questions and the more detailed list of interview questions. For example, codes include foundational definitions, direct mentions of cultural heritage, and commentary on strengths and weakness. Then, while reading and coding the data based on these initial groupings, emergent, descriptive codes were also developed, for example around discussions of Indigenous or intangible cultural heritage. The resulting codes were analysed and grouped into axial codes, essentially themes and subthemes, to provide clarity for interpretation (Liamputtong, 2013). Finally, following the more prescribed methods of analysis is the task of interpretation. Interpretation involves “making sense of the data,” turning the disparate information that is gathered into an articulate message that addresses the research questions (Creswell, 2007, p. 154). In this stage, the researcher steps back and examines the larger meanings and issues that present themselves through the data. This process is inherently intuitive and relies upon the reflection of the researcher. In this study, the interpretation of the data aimed to answer the two primary questions. For the second of these, which asks how integration can be improved, the goal was to develop a set of recommendations to improve practice within Alberta. Having the results of the alternate practice review available was crucial for helping to reveal possibilities and steps for these recommendations; however, they also created a potential source of bias as the tendency is to do what worked elsewhere, rather than finding solutions that are most applicable in a given context. Recognizing this issue, part of the interpretive challenge was to be continually reflective of the circumstances that gave rise to alternate approaches and how those may not translate to the Alberta context. The additional insights garnered from the document analysis exercise and the interviews were beneficial in grounding what has worked elsewhere in the Alberta context, as well as identifying matters specific to Alberta that need to be addressed.

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Together, the information and understandings developed through each of the research steps were interpreted to produce a comprehensive list of recommendations. However, in order to truly test whether this process worked in creating valuable solutions advice and insight from those in practice was sought in the form of an online survey.

Online Survey Although this project had initially planned to undertake a focus group as a means of evaluating the final recommendations, due to unforeseen issues any in-person meetings were impractical. Instead, an online survey method was adopted to gather feedback. The survey was distributed to a limited set of interview participants who demonstrated a strong understanding of the issues, an interest in the topic matter, and a clear perspective of the existing institutional situation. For the purposes of this study, a survey has two primary benefits. First, enlisting the reflections of a group of knowledgeable practitioners for a focused discussion of the issue is an immensely valuable way of garnering feedback and reflection on the proposed recommendations. Second, reviewing and evaluating the recommendations produced in this project ensures that at least a few of those individuals in decision making positions are made aware of the findings, which may lead to more significant buy-in and institutional support in the future (Wibeck et al., 2007). In this study, a group of six Alberta government employees were asked to provide their feedback on the draft set of recommendations. The participants were chosen from those who had previously been interviewed and demonstrated both a strong knowledge of the subject matter and a deep interest in the project. Further, the participants were drawn equally from Alberta Parks and the Heritage Divisions in order to get a balance between the protected area and cultural heritage conservation perspectives, moreover participants included both field staff and those involved in overall planning and coordination roles. One added benefit of conducting an online survey was that the participants were able to be located throughout the province, providing an added geographic diversity to the feedback. In the survey participants were asked to reflect on the viability of each recommendation using a set of three criteria: desirability, usability, and achievability (Wright, 2010). That the recommendations be desirable means that if implemented, the subsequent result is a desirable outcome. To be viable means that, if implemented, a given recommendation would generate — in a sustainable, robust manner — the consequences that are desired. Of course, whether an

34 35 action is viable is not nearly as straightforward as this implies; various unknown side conditions and changing contexts may impact the answer to this question. Therefore, it is not only a question of whether a given action is viable in the current conditions, but also whether certain external changes may impact the viability. Finally, to consider whether a recommendation is achievable is to move beyond the trap of ‘wishful thinking,’ but again it is not so simple as being achievable or not. Thinking through achievability also opens the door to questions of what must change to make an outcome achievable and what strategies can be put in place to move in such a direction. In this sense, the survey was not solely concerned with evaluating the recommendations as they exist, but also engaging in a future-oriented discussion about what could be. In addition, participants were asked to provide any further comments and reflections in a text box associated with each recommendation. The survey responses were recorded anonymously and collected in an online database. Again, as recommended by Kruger and Casey (2000), thematic analysis was used to examine the text-based comments, and a simple statistical analysis was made of the individual question responses.

Data Management All data collected for this study was organized through a digital database. Most of this data was ‘born digital,’ meaning that it came into being or my possession as a digital document. Paper-based documents, such as old policies and reports were scanned and added to the database. Accordingly, all interview transcripts, research notes, and documents used in this study were managed using NVivo software. Once uploaded to the system, the material was encrypted and password protected to maintain the confidentiality of the interview participants.

Ethical Considerations

Regardless of the method being employed, ensuring that a research study is ethical is an essential responsibility of a researcher. Ethics comprise a range of issues that inform the entire research design process, planning and data collection most obviously, but also the way that data is managed and reported. The ultimate goal for the researcher is to ensure that any potentially harmful effects that may come to human subjects are recognised and avoided (Canella & Lincoln, 2018; Creswell, 2007, 2013; Creswell & Creswell, 2017; Liamputtong, 2013). One of

35 36 the central tenets of conducting ethical research is obtaining informed consent from all participants. When participants were invited to take part in this research study, they were provided with an information package outlining the aims and scope of the study as well as a copy of the informed consent form (see Appendix B). This form outlined the expectations for participants, their ability to choose their form of attribution (confidential, identified by a title, or identified by name and title), and their ability to withdraw at any time. For those who agreed to participate, an interview time was scheduled. Prior to the start of the interview, I reviewed the consent form, ensuring there were no questions or concerns, and then asked the participant to sign. When the interview was conducted over the phone, the procedure remained the same, but the participants were asked to sign and forward (either by mail or digitally) the consent form. Participant anonymity and confidentiality were ensured by keeping all digital files in an encrypted, password-protected folder. All paper forms were kept in a locked cabinet at the University of Calgary. Finally, this research project was reviewed and approved (certificate number RED18-0453) by the University of Calgary’s Research Ethics Board.

Research Quality Qualitative researchers have long been embroiled in discussions about the ‘truthfulness’ of their results. Questions about ‘whether one got it right’ largely revolve around the issue of validity. That is, how can the claims of a qualitative study be said to be valid? Many answers to this question have been put forward. Some approaches try to parallel more positivistic language. For example, Lincoln and Guba (1985) developed a set of alternative terms to the positivist ideas of “internal validation,” “external validation,” “reliability,” and “objectivity,” which have come to be widely used. These terms include the ideas of “credibility” (dealing with the accuracy of data), “transferability” (referring to the level of applicability into other settings or situations), “dependability” (corresponding to the notion of reliability which promotes replicability or repeatability), and “confirmability” (referring to the extent to which others can confirm the findings). Others, such as Wolcott (1990), have sought to do away with the notion of validation altogether, arguing that his goal was to write “plausible interpretations” that accurately reflect the “understanding” he sought to achieve. A concern with validation was merely a distraction from what was truly important.

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In this study, I have approached the issue of research quality in much the same way as Creswell who retains a concern for validation, but sees it as “an attempt to assess the ‘accuracy’ of the findings,” while at the same time acknowledging that “any report of research is a representation by the author.” Such an attempt, he continues, is best understood as a “process,” rather than a means of “verification” (2007, pp. 206–207). Seeing validation as an ongoing effort in turn highlights the ever-shifting nature of knowledge and the ultimate contingency of any conclusions that may be reached. This approach, I would argue, is well suited to the challenge of applied research where the goal is to develop practical solutions to contemporary issues. These solutions inevitably will be temporary and partial answers to a complex issue, and as such, any claim to ultimate validity would seem misplaced. That said, within this study I have sought to produce an understanding of the subject and solutions that are as accurate as possible. The primary means of achieving this understanding has been through the process of triangulation, whereby multiple and different sources, methods, and theories are employed to provide corroborating evidence (Flick, 2018). Validity, while often the central focus in evaluations of qualitative research, is only one element of overall research quality. Creswell, in his review of standards for qualitative research finds a great deal of variety, but for the work of an applied researcher he recommends the standards put forward by Howe and Eisenhardt (1990). These authors suggest five standards that can be applied to all research. • Whether the research questions fit with the data collection and analysis techniques; that is, whether they drive the methods. • Whether the specific data collection and analysis techniques are applied effectively and competently. • Whether the research is alert to, and coherent with, the background assumptions that inform the work, and whether this knowledge is made explicit. • Whether the study has overall warrant, is robust, uses respected theoretical explanations, and discusses alternative explanations. • Whether the study has value, externally, by being able to inform and improve practice, thereby answering the ‘so what’ question; and internally, through being conducted ethically.

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Through this chapter, the overall aim has been to address each of these standards, demonstrating that this study is not only valid, but of quality as well.

Conclusion The aim in this chapter has been to lay out the foundation upon which the remainder of this study rests. With the ever-increasing rate and scale of global change, the conservation of natural and cultural heritage is often seen to be a matter of pressing urgency. The hope with this project is to provide a valuable contribution to the collective understanding of how the work of conservation can be achieved most effectively. In order to provide this understanding, I have outlined an applied research program, bringing together a focused practical approach to improving cultural heritage conservation in Alberta’s protected area system and an effort to engage deeply in the deeper conceptual questions that underpin practice. To further strengthen this foundation, I now turn to an examination of the literature to understand the concepts involved in this study, and to develop a framework for understanding the role of cultural heritage in protected areas.

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Chapter 3: Literature Review

That protected areas are places where cultural heritage conservation can and should take place has not always been apparent. For much of their history protected areas have been considered spaces for nature. This notion of an area set aside for the protection of plants and animals, where wilderness can continue to exist undisturbed by humans was central to the early efforts to establish protected areas. Yet today there is an increasing call to reconsider these ideas and to acknowledge the place of people in protected areas. While this research only looks at the integration of cultural heritage conservation into protected areas, this issue can be understood as one part of a wider effort to embrace humans, in all their complexity, in protected area management. The purpose of this chapter is to present an interdisciplinary review of the literature addressing protected areas and cultural heritage conservation. The conceptual framework developed through this review guides the case study analysis that follows in subsequent chapters. In addition, this chapter aims to develop a foundational justification for this research by addressing the question of why protected areas management should consider cultural heritage conservation and highlight the ongoing uncertainty about how such an embrace should occur in practice. This discussion examines the shared roots of the fields of natural and cultural heritage conservation, and the subsequent separation and development of these two realms. Although they exist as two distinct fields of practice today, each of these domains emerged out of a similar sense of loss and concern for the dramatic changes taking place in, primarily, the western world during the nineteenth century. However, as the effort to conserve elements of the natural and cultural world became more entrenched, the fields of practice became more specialized, focused, and further removed from each other. Internally, however, a great deal of change continued to take place. Within the field of natural heritage conservation, the foundational notions of nature and wilderness have come to be understood as inherently human constructions. This has led to a broadening of objectives for nature conservation, away from strict ecosystem protection to include concerns about social and economic well-being, cultural revitalization, and ecological restoration. In order to facilitate wider objectives, management and governance questions are increasingly focused on giving space to local communities and a variety of stakeholders, sharing

39 40 power and responsibility in order to meet more demands and leverage wider social and economic resources in order to protect the natural world. Similarly, in the field of cultural heritage conservation, there has been a steady expansion of what is included under the framework of cultural heritage, which has in turn had important implications for how it is conserved and managed. Originally conceived as the tangible remains of the past — buildings, monuments, sites — cultural heritage is now understood to include a wide range of intangible resources — traditions, ritual, skills, stories — that are valued and held to be important by contemporary society. The way these resources, both tangible and intangible, are valued is wound up in political and social discourses about the past that continually are contested, altered, and reinvented. What this has meant for the practice of conservation is a gradual move away from definitive conclusions about what is valuable about the past and an embrace of the multiplicity of perspectives and values. As the reach of each area of practice has grown over the past half century the space between their spheres of practice has become blurred. This highlights the ambiguity of the separation between the two realms but also draws attention to the ways in which they can be mutually supportive and contribute to the broader aims of a healthy, vibrant, and sustainable world. Building upon this review of the conceptual and practical developments in each of these fields, this discussion ends by exploring the potential benefits of and rationale for addressing cultural heritage in protected areas. At a practical level, one of the key reasons for addressing cultural heritage conservation is its inclusion in the legal mandate for most protected areas agencies. However, alongside this requirement, there are several important ways in which deliberately managing cultural heritage enhances protected areas. Cultural heritage can be used to enhance visitor experiences, recognise and respect the needs of Indigenous and local peoples, create public buy-in for conservation, and provide an opportunity to examine and perhaps even reconfigure the legacy of humans’ relationship with the natural world. Yet, despite the benefits, questions remain as to how to go about integrating cultural heritage conservation into the realm of nature conservation and it is on these issues that this research is focused.

Emergence of Natural and Cultural Heritage Conservation

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The concept of conservation, whether it is of the natural world or of the built environment, is linked to a host of longer-term, inter-related trends in the cultural, economic, and political spheres of Western society. While the origins of the conservation movement are certainly difficult to place, its most obvious manifestations came in the nineteenth century response to the perceived loss of monumental and irreplaceable testaments to the wonder of the natural and human worlds. As Lowenthal (2005) argues, during this period the Western world was in flux. Still reeling from the effects of the French Revolution and the Napoleonic Wars, along with the rise of nationalism and national identity, individuals and leaders sought stability, connection, and reassurance in relics of a past. In the United States, where the antiquity of human endeavour was less recognized, commentators such as George Perkins Marsh began to highlight the environmental destruction that was taking place as settlers cleared forests and turned the land over to agriculture (1864). Expanding these observations to other parts of the globe where the destructive impact of humans was readily apparent, Marsh laid the foundation for a call to preserve the natural world as another aspect of humankind’s collective inheritance. As the pace of industrialisation and urbanisation mounted through the 19th century, pressure to preserve the remains of past human endeavour and the natural world gained urgency, converging into a well-established movement by the turn of the century. Several authors have documented the rise and entrenchment of the conservation movement around the world (Glendinning, 2013; Jokilehto, 2017; Swenson, 2013; D. E. Taylor, 2016), highlighting both its parallels, but also its regional distinctiveness. Conservationists in Europe, for example, finding themselves bereft of vast tracts of wild forests but rich in monumental architecture and a legacy of intensive human settlement, focused their attention on the preservation of ancient monuments and traditional landscape patterns. The large scale, nature-focused national parks that became the defining feature of the American and Canadian conservation movements never materialised in Europe. Despite these differences, the conservation fields did progress in a steady and uniform manner. One of the principal elements of this evolution was that the fields underwent a process of increased state control and manipulation. Moving away from early approaches that relied on wealthy individual benefactors, states became the principle financial and institutional force behind conservation efforts. This is part of what sociologist James C. Scott has identified as a wider trend toward government managerialism that sought to impose legibility on the nation- state through a process of simplification and standardization (1999). Extending this argument to

41 42 the conservation movement, Denis Byrne proposes that the complex and variable worlds of nature and culture became standardized through processes of inventorying, categorization, and universal management policies (2013, p. 597). This process was also central to the increased professionalization of the conservation fields that saw amateurs and generalists being replaced by experts (Pannekoek, 1998). Since the beginning of the twentieth century increased government control and subsequent standardisation of the conservation movements can be seen most readily in the tremendous growth in the number of charters and conventions that shape and regulate practice as well as the nearly ubiquitous passage of national and regional conservation legislation. While these have allowed for fruitful collaborative conversations and learning through shared experience, they have also, as Smith argues with respect to heritage, led to the emergence of an “authorized” version of practice that naturalizes certain Western assumptions (Smith, 2006). While the “authorized” version of practice often appears static, it has evolved over the past century. In their early formulations, the fields of cultural and natural heritage conservation were characterized by strict preservationist principles. In natural heritage, this era is described as that of “fortress conservation” in which effort was directed at saving prestigious or charismatic pieces of nature through the exclusion of people (van Oudenhoven et al., 2011, p. 156). Similarly, in cultural heritage, Ashworth explains, the movement began firmly entrenched in a “preservationist paradigm,” dedicated to hard boundaries that would prevent change in order to maintain the essential values of heritage in perpetuity (Ashworth, 2011). But even in these early approaches there was a recognition that simply putting up walls to prevent further deterioration was not adequate. After all, how can preservation be justified if there is no benefit to those doing the preserving? In natural heritage conservation, this concern has led to an ongoing tension as a branch of the field became dedicated less to the preservation of nature than to the conservation of natural resources for future use (Hays, 1999; Worster, 1994). This utilitarian approach saw value in the preservation of nature, but that value was not inherent, it was tied to the ongoing and future benefit to people. While this anxiety over the competing need for use and preservation has remained a fixture of the conservation movement, since the 1960s a great deal of further development and concerns have emerged, radically reshaping the conservation movement. It is to this era of change that the remainder of this review is dedicated.

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Cultural Heritage

What is Cultural Heritage? While difficult to pin down, cultural heritage today is a big container into which a broad domain of tangible and intangible resources, and associated values all fit. Since its inception the concept of cultural heritage has continued to be redefined and adapted in ways that mirror the complexities of surrounding social, political, and economic forces, but more than any other time in the past, the period since the Second World War has seen an exponential growth in concern for cultural heritage. A key landmark in the evolution of the cultural heritage movement was the passages of International Charter for the Conservation and Restoration of Monuments and Sites, more commonly known as the Venice Charter (ICOMOS, 1964), which focused on establishing a common set of international guidelines for identifying, documenting, restoring, and conserving objects and buildings. Principally focused on providing direction during the reconstruction effort following the Second World War, the Venice Charter, through its subsequent influence on the shape of the World Heritage Convention and national and regional heritage legislation that came to be widespread in the 1970s, was deeply influential in giving shape to a global cultural heritage conservation system. The charter laid out what was to be considered the focus of cultural heritage conservation through its adoption of the term “historic monument,” which was defined as “not only the single architectural work but also the urban or rural setting in which is found the evidence of a particular civilization, a significant development or a historic event” (1964, p. 1). This was later adapted in broader terms by the World Heritage Convention into a definition of cultural heritage that included monuments, groups of buildings, and sites. What is important to note about these early definitions is that they were entirely focused on the tangible manifestations of the past, and were largely concerned with the technical and practical aspects of conservation. It was not until the late 1980s that researchers began to consider the notion of cultural heritage as a matter of interest in and of itself. In part, the emergence of a critical inquiry into cultural heritage was a response to the growing fascination with the subject outside of academia. Through the 1980s, the Western world saw what is often termed a heritage “boom” (Lowenthal, 1985). The number of historic sites, museums, and other interpretive facilities grew significantly, visitor numbers rose, and the past became a ubiquitous part of many commercial pursuits, as a draw for theme parks and a tool for marketing. The reasons for this boom were multifaceted. Rodney Harrison (2012) argues that factors such as

43 44 rapid technological change, deindustrialisation, reconfigurations in civic government, widespread commercialisation, and market transformations created a population that was at once uprooted from traditional moorings, but also experiencing time and place in an entirely novel way. As Paul Virilio argues (1986), through the combined transformations brought on by advancements in transportation and communication, people in the late twentieth century came to experience an overwhelming acceleration of time. In the midst of this rapidly changing world, the past became something to grab on to, something that could provide definition and certainty to one’s identity. Some scholars have complicated this narrative of a late-twentieth century emergence of a widespread interest in the past as a means of collective and personal identity formation. Research on the use of the past by governments and nation-states to establish a sense of national identity, for example, suggests that this phenomenon has a much deeper history. Prominent in these discussions is Eric Hobsbawn who, in his co-edited book with Terence Ranger The Invention of Tradition, developed the argument that modern nation-states largely “invented” their national traditions in order to compensate for a relatively shallow history, thereby solidifying and establishing themselves as modern entities (1983). Regardless of its historical development, what can be said with certainty is that the late twentieth century witnessed a significant increase in interest in cultural heritage, efforts to conserve and present that heritage, and academic reflection on these changes. In 1985, David Lowenthal published The Past is a Foreign Country, which drew attention to the divergence between what was presented as cultural heritage and the idea of history as understood by historians. A recognition of the varied motivations behind decisions about what to present to the public was integral to Lowenthal’s argument that cultural heritage is often the veneration of a particular historical narrative rather than an encompassing and nuanced historical understanding. Building on Lowenthal’s arguments, Robert Hewison (1987), in his work The Heritage Industry, presented a rather damning portrayal of what he believed to be the rise of a commercialized industry devoted to producing and presenting cultural heritage. Instead of encouraging individuals to become critically engaged with the past, the heritage ‘industry,’ Hewison argued, simplified and sanitized history as popular entertainment. These early debates about the practice of cultural heritage were critical accounts of the field as it existed at the time,

44 45 but where they raised concern around its presentation, they did little to explain precisely what cultural heritage is, how it functions and how it could be better understood or practiced. In the 1990s, scholars from a range of disciplines, inspired by the wider critical turn in the social sciences, offered a more nuanced understanding of cultural heritage. Raphael Samuel (1994), applying a Marxist analysis to the question of cultural heritage production, argued against the idea that cultural heritage was in line with primarily elite (and often conservative) interests. Instead, Samuel showed how a range of political positions and interests often used cultural heritage with potential emancipatory effect. Moreover, the growth of a cultural heritage industry had served to democratize the overall experience through an increased emphasis on the lives of ordinary people. In a similar way, Dolores Hayden, in her influential book The Power of Place (1995), demonstrated how cultural heritage could be used to better represent the stories of working classes and ethnic minorities. Where Hayden and Samuel showed how cultural heritage was being used by ‘ordinary’ people, John Urry (1990), drawing on Foucault’s concept of the gaze, demonstrated that this group could not be understood as blind, uncritical, or passive consumers. Rather, he argued, cultural heritage should be seen as being co-produced through the active engagement of people with the stories being presented. With the growing awareness that cultural heritage could belong to many different groups, and that even within those groups there was little uniformity, Ashworth and Tunbridge focused on the issue of heritage dissonance (1996). They suggested that heritage dissonance, the lack of agreement about the meaning of heritage, could be a destructive force, but also may be a necessary condition for the construction of a pluralist, multicultural society where differences are accepted and respected (Graham et al., 2005). Accepting that there is generally little agreement about the value, significance, or meaning of cultural heritage also highlighted questions about the actual make up of cultural heritage. As noted before, throughout its evolution, cultural heritage has largely been focused on the tangible remains of the past, but for many people around the world, Western and non-western alike, much of their cultural inheritance is not physical. While concerns about this issue have been raised since the early 1980s (Ahmad, 2006), one of the most significant official re-evaluations of cultural heritage came in 2003 with the UNESCO Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage. The convention defined intangible cultural heritage as the “practices, representations, expressions, knowledge, skills — as well as the instruments, objects,

45 46 artefacts and cultural spaces associated therewith — that communities, groups, and in some cases, individuals recognize as part of their cultural heritage” (UNESCO, 2003). This effort has been successful in recognizing the diversity of cultural heritage and has helped spread the concept of intangible cultural heritage around the globe. But it has also added some conceptual confusion to the field and in some circumstances created a parallel designation and management system alongside the more traditional approach. This topic will be returned to below, but in short, the confusion emerges from overlapping understandings, mixed usages of the terms, and the effort, as seen in the definition above, to fold tangible resources into an understanding of the intangible. One of the areas where this confusion becomes apparent is in the work of Laurajane Smith who argues for seeing “heritage not so much as a ‘thing’, but as a cultural and social process, which engages with acts of remembering that work to create ways to understand and engage with the present.” In order to do this, one must start from the “premise that all heritage is intangible” (2006, p. 2). Using this as a starting point, Smith aims to unsettle the dominance of what she terms the “authorized heritage discourse”, which “validates and defines what is or is not heritage” (2006, p. 11). Within the authorized heritage discourse, cultural heritage is defined as “innately material, if not monumental, aesthetically pleasing and as inevitably contributing to all that is ‘good’ in the construction of national or group identity.” It is universal and should be “preserved unchanged” along with the values it somehow embodies (Waterton & Smith, 2010, p. 12). Examining the authorized heritage discourse allows Smith to chart the ways in which cultural heritage is used to construct, reconstruct, and negotiate identities and values in the contemporary world. But, again, central to Smith’s argument is a belief that rather than physical objects having inherent value, cultural heritage is a mental construct that is applied to the material world. Smith’s work has been widely recognized in the field of cultural heritage studies, and is central to what Harrison has framed as a broad “discursive turn” (2012, p. 9). Those who have taken a discursive approach to cultural heritage recognize that there are tangible resources that are a part of the process, but the significance and value that is placed on them is an entirely human creation. While this notion has been an important effort in better theorizing the field of cultural heritage studies, it has not gone unchallenged. Responding to the work of Smith and others, Harrison argues that the discursive turn in heritage studies has served to distance the field

46 47 from the material ‘things’ that were traditionally the primary focus. Along with Denis Byrne, Harrison has sought to challenge this idea of the immateriality of heritage (D. Byrne, 2014; Harrison, 2012, 2015). Drawing on a rich interdisciplinary literature dealing with the ‘material turn’ and nonmodern or nonfoundational ontologies, topics which will be discussed in greater detail below, Harrison argues that far from either the material inheritance of the past or a set of dematerialized social processes, heritage should be understood as a dialogical or relational process. The basic premise of the material and ontological turns is that the demarcated realms that are conventionally understood as ‘human’ and ‘non-human’ (alternatively nature/culture, material/nonmaterial) need to be ‘folded’ together in complex ways in order to most effectively understand the world. This means that instead of a world of separate realms, often hierarchically ordered, there only exists a flat plane upon which entities (actors/actants, nodes) and groups (networks, assemblages) of entities interact. In this sense, cultural heritage is not produced through the process of inscribing “meaning on blank objects, places, and practices,” but is instead

produced as a result of the material and social possibilities, or ‘affordances’, of collectives of human and non-human agents, material and non-material entities, in the world. It is not primarily an intellectual endeavour, something that exists only in the human mind, but is one that emerges from the dialogue, or practices of people and things. (Harrison, 2012, p. 212)

Conceptually innovative, Harrison’s arguments lay the groundwork for future theoretically exciting research in the field, work that fundamentally challenges the ontological division of natural and cultural heritage and would radically rethink the division between tangible and intangible resources. Ultimately, for the purposes of this project, what can be concluded from this discussion of the shifting understanding of cultural heritage? First, given the varied and continually evolving understanding of cultural heritage described above it is necessary to remain aware of varying ways of defining the concept. This is necessary when analysing management and planning documents from a range of historical periods, as well as in talking to individuals who may hold varying understandings of cultural heritage. But, at the same time, consistency in language and conceptualization are key to moving forward and providing clear recommendations for the future. Therefore, the definition of cultural heritage adopted here follows from the work of

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Harrison by understanding that it is produced through the interactions of “human and non-human agents, material and non-material entities, in the world” (2012, p. 212). Within the container of cultural heritage there exists cultural heritage resources, which are the tangible and intangible things that are assigned cultural heritage value. Tangible cultural heritage resources can be both movable and immovable and includes the built environment, archaeological sites, as well as parts of the natural environment such as waterfalls, mountains, forests, and vistas. Intangible cultural heritage resources quite often, but not necessarily, are linked to and associated with tangible resources and the continuity of intangible resources relies on the material existence of those spaces and objects — for example, myths and legends that are based in landscapes. However, in other situations intangible cultural heritage resources can be entirely separate from the material world, as with cultural practices like dance and song. While anything could be a cultural heritage resource, it is through the assignment of cultural heritage value by a group or a community that these resources become significant. The production of these values occurs, as Harrison argues, through a dialogical process between the tangible resources themselves and humans, and must be understood to be diverse, dynamic, and layered. Accepting these definitions, the next critical question that emerges is how cultural heritage is to be managed and conserved?

Cultural Heritage Management and Conservation The terms cultural heritage management and conservation are often used interchangeably, but there is an important distinction between these two activities. Conservation, as used here, encompasses the measures taken to maintain cultural heritage resources in the condition for which they are held to be significant. This includes a broad range of measures from intensive to hands off. Management, in contrast, is a broader concept that includes conservation and can be understood as all the actions necessary to achieve certain objectives (Borrini-Feyerabend et al., 2013, p. 11). In this sense, management includes the broad scope of activities taken around cultural heritage resources including conservation, interpretation, engagement, research, and policy-making. The goal of this section is to review some of the pressing contemporary issues in cultural heritage management and conservation, in particular those that bear on the challenge of cultural heritage in protected areas. In the first section, I look at the rising utilitarian impulse in the cultural heritage field, exploring how the objectives within cultural heritage management have

48 49 expanded over the past half century and today have brought the field into the realm of sustainable development. Secondly, I explore the growing scale of heritage management, focusing particularly on the shift from site-based to landscape-scale approaches to thinking about cultural heritage. Third, I highlight the shift to values-based approaches to management and the varied challenges that such a move creates. Then, finally, I look more closely at the practice of cultural heritage conservation to explain the ways that contemporary researchers and practitioners conceive of this process.

Rising Utilitarianism and the Sustainable Development Agenda As discussed above, the traditional approach to cultural heritage management was focused primarily on the narrow concerns around conservation, especially the preservation and rehabilitation of tangible remains. This type of management concentrated on having experts define the historical period of significance for a given resource and pursue interventions, such as stabilisation, rehabilitation, reconstruction, to ensure that a resource was either returned to or kept in a state that was authentic to the chosen period. In this approach, cultural heritage resources had value in and of themselves. That is, conserving cultural heritage resources was the end goal. But as the thinking and practice around cultural heritage evolved, practitioners in the field, along with those who owned the resources or funded conservation efforts, came to recognize the broader value of protecting cultural heritage resources. Over the past half century, with increasingly austere government budgets and the rise of neoliberalism, there has been an even greater move toward the instrumentalization of heritage. Rather than simply focusing on the preservation of a resource, these buildings and sites are being tasked with a multitude of other purposes. As Strange and Whitney explain, cultural heritage management is moving from “being an act of preservation towards being characterized as part of a broader vehicle for urban regeneration and economic development” (2003, p. 219). This trend is highlighted in an annotated bibliography prepared for the Heritage Resources Branch of the Government of Saskatchewan in 2006, entitled The Economic, Social and Environmental Benefits of Heritage Conservation. In this report, 110 publications were reviewed and of these 58 dealt specifically with economic value, many more dealt with tourism, an area with direct association to the economic justification, and less than ten dealt specifically with environmental or social impacts.

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At its core, this argument that cultural heritage management can and should have a wide range of impacts outside of the strict preservation function does not run counter to much of the writing in heritage studies. It is widely recognized that cultural heritage is an important part of modern life and much work has been done to conceptualize the importance of its connection to place and tradition in building strong, vibrant, and resilient communities. The issue that arises with the utilitarian argument is the prevalent focus on economic valuation and impact. Again, this is not unique to cultural heritage management. One of the most articulate critiques of this tendency has come from the Indian economist Amartya Sen who made the case against standard development approaches that saw value only in the economic improvement of individuals (1999). Instead, Sen argues, development should be viewed as an effort to advance the real freedoms that individuals enjoy, this requires a focus on human development, judged according to whole range of capabilities, political, economic, social, and spiritual, that allow people to lead the lives they value. Since the publication of Sen’s work there has been a great deal of progress made in building more holistic measures of valuation and generally a trend toward the embrace of a broad sustainable development agenda. In the area of cultural heritage management, in part as a result of the ongoing pressure to demonstrate broader value and the critique of the narrow ways in which this is often defined, as well as the recognition of plurality and multiple perspectives, the objectives of conservation efforts have broadened to account for the impact on people’s overall well-being. The message has been reiterated within the field, largely with regard to the environmental importance of conserving historic buildings and structures (Hall et al., 2016). More recently a broader link has been articulated, for example, the Council of Europe’s Faro Convention on the Value of Cultural Heritage for Society argued strongly that “sustainability itself is cultural and social, not merely a process of environmental protection” because it involves peoples’ relationships with the world (Council of Europe, 2005; Fairclough, 2013, p. 11). This case was formalized in 2015 with the adoption of the Policy on the Integration of a Sustainable Development Perspective into the Processes of the World Heritage Convention by the World Heritage General Assembly (Resolution 20 GA 13). This policy, Kari and Rössler explain, “represents a major opportunity… to develop and test new approaches that demonstrate the relevance of heritage for sustainable development” (2017, p. 136). Ultimately, this means that the challenge for cultural heritage management is to not only integrate the varied manifestations

50 51 of cultural heritage, but also “to contribute significantly to tackling the pressing challenges facing our planet, including climate change, human migration, and food security/sovereignty.” (N. J. Mitchell et al., 2017, p. 126).

Expanding Scale Apart from the wider scope of objectives that cultural heritage management is being called upon to achieve, over the past half century there has been an effort to recognise cultural heritage at a larger scale, including the relationships and linkages between various sites. While concern for the ‘setting’ of buildings and sites has long been recognized as an important aspect of conservation work (Goetcheus & Mitchell, 2014; ICOMOS, 1964; UNESCO, 1962) it has really been the emergence of the concept of the cultural landscape that has propelled this discussion forward. Usage of the term ‘cultural landscape’ goes back nearly a century (Sauer, 1925) and is linked to a broader engagement with the idea of landscape as a framework for analyzing the world. This broad conceptualization of landscape finds its roots in the eighteenth-century work of Alexander von Humboldt who applied the idea to encompass the sum total of the character of a region (Antrop, 2013; Kwa, 2005; Mathewson, 1986). In the twentieth century this idea was revived by geographers such as Carl Sauer who modified the idea by introducing the term "cultural landscape" into American geography. For Sauer, “the cultural landscape is fashioned from the natural landscape by a culture group. Culture is the agent, the natural area is the medium, the cultural landscape is the result” (1925). Going forward from this definition, Sauer and others set out to identify, document, and describe the diverse ways that cultural groups have shaped the land. In doing so, John Wylie notes, “a picture emerges of landscape studies as the empirical description and discussion of the material traces — artefacts, patterns, settlements — left upon the land by bounded and coherent cultural groups” (2007, p. 23). One of the issues with this, James Duncan argued, is that the central concept, culture, became isolated and reified as the central causative entity, a swing too far toward cultural determinism (Duncan, 1980). Moreover, there was a focus on detailing the manifestations of this interaction, which resulted in an approach that was best equipped to describe, but offered little for explanation of landscape patterns and relationships. Despite the challenge, an interest in the cultural aspect of landscape has remained popular. J. B. Jackson, working through the middle of the century focused attention

51 52 on an idea of "‘landscape’ as the material world of ordinary everyday life" (Wylie, 2007, p. 43). These, 'vernacular landscapes' were “ones that people inhabit and work in and they are landscapes that people produce through routine practice in an everyday sense” (Cresswell, 2003, p. 274). Jackson also drew attention to the symbolic dimension of landscape, bringing to the fore “those issues of myths, memory and meaning which invade landscape’s material existence” (Cosgrove & Daniels, 1988, p. xv). These ideas have been expanded upon over the decades so that landscape, as seen by cultural geographers today, is a symbol, icon or myth, that mirrors the cultural and social structures of human societies (Cresswell, 2003; Herrington, 2013; Ingold, 2002; Tilley, 1994; Tress & Tress, 2001). At the same time that academic usage of the term landscape was becoming more sophisticated, practitioners in the cultural heritage field began employing the term cultural landscape (Cameron & Rössler, 2016; Fowler, 2002, 2004; Jacques, 1995; Plachter & Rössler, 1995; Rössler, 2002, 2006). Following the landmark signing of the World Heritage Convention in 1972, concerns arose with respect to the division between natural and cultural heritage. In the early 1980s, site nominations came forward, such as the Lake District in the UK and the French countryside, where both natural and cultural features were seen to be equally important and impossible to separate when determining significance (Cameron & Hermann, 2014; Gfeller, 2013). It was noted that the structural separation found in the World Heritage system was inadequate for properly recognizing the value of sites where neither nature nor culture were preeminent. This issue became increasingly evident with the rise of Indigenous and non-Western critiques, which were part of a wider critical paradigm in academia. These perspectives saw the dualistic cultural heritage management system as an outgrowth of a particular Western worldview that was not present in, or compatible with, alternate ontological framings (Basso, 1996; Descola, 1996, 2013; Haraway, 1991; Viveiros de Castro, 1996). From the mid-1980s into the early years of the following decade a series of international committees were struck to address these challenges. Ultimately, an Expert Group on Cultural Landscapes was called upon by the World Heritage Committee (WHC) to redraft the cultural heritage criteria of the Convention to include cultural landscapes as an additional category of site. These revisions to the Operational Guidelines were adopted by the WHC in Santa Fe in December 1992 (UNESCO, 1992). Through this process cultural landscapes came to be defined as the “combined works of nature and man” and further categorized as either designed (formally

52 53 shaped spaces such as gardens), evolved (being either relict or continuing examples of ongoing change through inhabitation), or associative (areas with significant spiritual importance) (Ibid. 1992, p. 4). Apart from creating a new and inclusive avenue for recognition, these revisions also marked, as Aurélie Gfeller argues, a shift away from a continental European focus in heritage conservation to an “Anglo-North American agenda,” coming from places like Canada, Australia, and New Zealand (2013). It is also in these parts of the world where much of the subsequent enthusiasm for the concept was found. As Paulette Wallace notes, “Australia and Canada hosted two of the formative World Heritage cultural landscapes meetings,” the September 1994 Heritage Canals meeting in Canada and the Asia-Pacific Workshop on Associative Cultural Landscapes in Australia in 1995 (2014, p. 91). Yet, despite the initial optimism and energy behind the emergence of the cultural landscape concept, much work was needed to translate the ideal into reality. As Randall Mason explains, “it is a sizable leap from understanding landscapes to preserving and managing them. But it is a critically important leap” (2008, p. 182). The challenge of making this leap results from a range of factors, not least the site-based approach embedded in legislative and professional systems that were designed in response to an earlier, and more limited, conception of cultural heritage. In these systems, the traditional methods of managing cultural heritage resources — legally recognizing particular sites with varying levels of significance and associated degrees of protection — was, Graham Fairclough argues, “until recently the only significant theory in historic conservation” and it “worked well during the 20th century, albeit at the price of great selectivity and exclusion” (2008, p. 412). Sites, in this system were not only exclusive, but also tended to be quite small, encompassing a single building, monument, ruin, or a group of these. Cultural landscapes, by contrast, could be sprawling, difficult to define entities. In order to make the cultural landscape concept usable, the World Heritage system adopted an approach that incorporated cultural landscapes as a separate cultural category. A cultural landscape thus became a bounded entity, within which management approaches and conservation efforts could be developed and applied, a compromise of sorts, but one stemming from an obvious practical necessity. The hope was, as Lennon et al. explain, that this practical approach would be prescriptive enough to be useful, yet flexible enough to encompass the diversity of cultural landscapes around

53 54 the world. Moreover, its wide applicability would allow it to “be picked up in the immediate future by nation states who are signatories to international conventions, treaties, and agreements concerning heritage conservation and protection” and, in turn, these ideas would “filter down to other levels of government” (Lennon et al., 1999 quoted in; Wallace, 2014, p. 95). But, in the time since cultural landscapes became an official category of designation, scholars have expressed skepticism that such an optimistic agenda has been borne out in practice, explaining that “while there is no longer a need to convince people of the value of cultural landscapes for heritage management, the incorporation of cultural landscape ideas and practices into our property-based 'heritage frame'… appears to have stalled” (Wallace & Buckley, 2015). In his article looking back on the early years of the World Heritage cultural landscapes program, Peter Fowler contends that “far from being a liberating mechanism, the cultural landscape category was avoided” (2002, p. 22). The reasons for this, he continues, were largely a matter of perception that such a nomination was both more challenging and required greater sophistication in management structures. This unwillingness, inability, or uncertainty of how to make effective practical use of the concept has, in turn, shaped the academic and professional conversation over the ensuing decades (Agnoletti, 2006; Longstreth, 2008; K. Taylor et al., 2014; K. Taylor & Lennon, 2012). While efforts to spread the concept of a cultural landscape designation around the world have shifted the needle considerably with regards to the awareness of cultural landscapes, management remains a challenge. Recently, scholars have pointed out that owing to the structural separation of the fields of natural and cultural heritage, the standard, bounded approach to cultural landscapes has resulted in a focus on the tangible aspects of a site. The critique of this outcome is that it is simply a scaled-up version of traditional approaches. Such a “site-based approach is an ‘easy’ concept for land managers, heritage practitioners, and archaeologists” (S. Brown, 2007, p. 33) because it treats cultural landscapes as a collection of “discrete and dispersed ‘sites’” held together by their proximity (D. Byrne & Nugent, 2004, p. 73). Doing so, however, often “fails to do justice to the diverse, overlapping and irregularly spread values that are present in landscapes” (Stephenson, 2008, p. 128), and can ignore the connections, relationships, and wider context that can — and often does — define a landscape. That is, the broad innovation and promise of cultural landscapes, as “a concept on paper,” to bridge “the traditionally demarcated fields of natural and cultural heritage,” has not been achieved to its fullest potential (2014, p. 92). This is particularly

54 55 problematic when it comes to Indigenous communities where the tangible evidence of their heritage can be scarce, and the dichotomy of natural and cultural heritage is seen as the source of significant past and contemporary misrepresentation. The irony is that the cultural landscape concept was, as Harrison contends, introduced “in part to answer an Indigenous critique of the nature/culture dualism” but it actually “continues to reinforce this dualism through its maintenance of the separation of cultural and natural landscapes” (2012, p. 206). The issues with a site-based approach highlight that the conceptual challenge of cultural landscapes is not only to see individual sites as part of a broader historic fabric, but also to see the entire landscape as the result of long, shifting traditions of intertwined human-environment influence. Therefore, the cultural landscape concept creates a formidable challenge. On the one hand it requires a serious engagement with the broader context of any given site. But it also suggests that all areas are the result of long-term human interactions with the environment, a notion that opens all landscapes up to be considered as possessing cultural heritage value, and potentially in need of conservation and management. However, such a truly holistic approach to cultural landscape conservation is both immensely difficult and likely impractical. This inherent tension in the concept has led to an ambiguity that continues to surround the term and has frustrated efforts to conserve cultural heritage at a landscape-scale. But has also led to the growth of a less prescriptive way of thinking about cultural landscapes. An alternative to the bounded, designation-focused version of cultural landscape conservation focuses on the concept as an expression of the intertwined relationship between humans and the environment. As Steve Brown proposes, one way to take this idea forward is to employ a “cultural landscape approach… [which] offers an opportunity to move away from a focus on objects and sites as ends in themselves” (2007, p. 33). Rather than focusing on the cultural landscape as a designated site, with defined boundaries, a cultural landscape approach can instead be thought of as a framework for thinking about the overlapping and multilayered world that is being managed. Action that is informed by a cultural landscape approach can more successfully consider the wide relationship between humans and the environment over time, allowing space for alternative ways of valuing and connecting to spaces, and can be applied in a diversity of situations, not only where a landscape is formally designated as a cultural landscape. Thinking about a cultural landscape approach, in contrast to a formal designation, serves as a useful way of clarifying contemporary debates on the topic and making sense of practice, but the

55 56 strict separation is, of course, artificial. Formal cultural landscape designations and the conceptual framework frequently overlap, operate in parallel, and reinforce one another in a complex constellation of thinking and practice.

Values-based Approaches

That cultural heritage resources have value is not a new idea, nor is it a new notion that they have multiple values. It was recognized in the Venice (1964) and Athens Charters (1931) and was even articulated by the art historian Alois Riegl in the early twentieth century when he proposed a framework for conservation based on age, historical, use, and newness values (Arrhenius, 2004). What has changed over the past half century is the understanding of what value(s) are to be considered. Values can be thought of, most broadly, as enduring conceptions of what human beings see as preferable. These can be distinguished in two ways, first are held or inherent values, those principles and ideas that are important to people such as behaviours (honesty, empathy), end states (freedom, happiness), or desirable qualities (beauty, equality, historicity, patina). Second are assigned values, which pertain to particular ‘objects’ or ‘things’ that are valued — landscapes, places, activities, plants, etc. (T. C. Brown, 1984; Lockwood, 1999). What has become increasingly accepted in the conservation field is that cultural heritage resources do not simply have value, but instead are assigned value. The older and more established of these two mindsets focused on the materials involved, adopting a pragmatic/technical approach to their management. Such an approach relied on expert knowledge of what is valuable and the ‘right’ technical solutions for conservation. The challenge for management was to identify the inherent value of a building or site, and then make management decisions to maintain, respect, or restore that significance (R. Mason, 2006, p. 28). However, acknowledgement that values are assigned to a resource by individuals or groups complicates this process. By linking a site’s or building’s significance to the values of diverse populations, those working toward conservation must acknowledge the multiple, valid meanings of a particular place, in turn giving up their privileged place as experts. The release of the Burra Charter: The Australia ICOMOS Charter for Places of Cultural Significance in 1979 (Australia ICOMOS, 2013) is often pointed to as a turning point for the

56 57 emergence of the contemporary values-based approach to management that has come to be accepted in many parts of the world. The Burra Charter introduced the concept of “cultural significance,” placing it as the primary goal of management, as opposed to some form of material integrity that was previously used. Cultural significance was defined as “the aesthetic, historic, scientific, or social value for past, present, and future generations” (2013). Any cultural heritage object, place, or landscape would be understood as possessing some or all of these values and taken together they comprise an understanding of a place’s significance. The cultural significance of a resource should be defined, and all management decisions be made to support and enhance the values. Significance, the Burra Charter contends, cannot be determined by experts or according to pre-defined criteria; instead it requires a relative approach, which necessitates the inclusion of stakeholders and acknowledges that values are not universal but subjective and open to change (Poulios, 2010). A relative approach, Harrison notes, “constituted a major shift from the canonical approach to heritage, which insisted on absolute standards of significance… particularly around tangible heritage and aesthetic value” (2012, p. 145). While the Burra Charter itself was penned with the intention of addressing the divergence of settlers and Indigenous peoples’ views on the significance of cultural heritage resources in Australia, its inclusion of a pluralist vision for cultural heritage has given it far-reaching implications. Miles Glendinning writes that the Burra Charter was “a Trojan horse, projecting the values of postmodern relativism into the heart of the authoritative, Western-dominated” cultural heritage management structure (Glendinning, 2013, p. 403). Indeed, as will be seen in Chapter 4, around the world a values-based approach to management has become common in the cultural heritage field (De la Torre et al., 2005). Although conceptually clear, focusing the management of cultural heritage on perceived values makes the practical process more complicated. Expert assessments are no longer privileged in the way they traditionally were as public participation has become a central element of any evaluation process. But, despite the complications of a values-based approach, there are many benefits. In making the case for the importance a values-based approach, Mason (2002) lays out four principles:

1) Values-centered preservation enables the holistic understanding of sites. In a simple, empirical sense, this principle acknowledges and addresses the reality that heritage places have a whole range of values—they are not just

57 58

old or beautiful—and that the success and relevance of preservation will be judged against this reality. 2) Values-centered preservation leads to an acknowledgement and inclusion of a greater range of stakeholders by accounting for all the values of a site. As a corollary to understanding site values holistically, site stakeholders also have to be fully recognized. Inclusion of stakeholder concerns is quite clearly a political imperative in contemporary society; handling cultural activities such as preservation in normative ways is simply untenable—not because it is unfashionable, but because the politics of public culture have fundamentally changed. Recognizing the range of stakeholders thus builds political and potentially economic support. 3) Values-centered preservation is based on comprehensive knowledge about a site's values, which is essential to support the long view of stewardship that is one of the most basic contributions of historic preservation thinking. Abiding by the previous two principles invokes a third, which is absolutely foundational to the historic preservation field. Holistic and broadly supported preservation helps ensure the long-term viability of preservation schemes. 4) Values-centered preservation reveals serious gaps in knowledge about the historic environment and how the historic environment is used. Professionals in the preservation field are generally uncomfortable talking about what they do not know and too often tend to narrow their field of responsibility when challenged. Knowing what we do not know enables us to conduct research on the balancing of values, about how preservation functions as part of civil society, about real and potential sources of political and financial support for preservation. It also amounts to a recipe for continued research, learning, and professional development for the field of preservation as a whole and for individuals working within it. (2006, p. 35)

The Burra Charter leaves the question of management and conservation in an interesting position. Values-based conservation and management, as it is widely understood today, is a process that is far from universal, instead it is contingent and relative (Kalman, 2014). Management decisions should embrace the plurality of values and significance as well as accept that these are all subject to change over time. Far from an objective question of significance, decisions about cultural heritage conservation require an engagement with those individuals and groups for whom a resource is significant. However, this does not mean that the practice of conservation is a blank slate to be inscribed upon by anyone with an interest in the resource. In the Burra Charter, the acceptance of plurality rests alongside a reaffirmation and commitment to the principles and responsibilities imposed by international charters and agreed upon guidelines

58 59 for conservation practice. Which is to say that there remains some agreement on what constitutes best practice within the field of cultural heritage management and conservation. Apart from advocating for the acceptance of multiple values, the Charter lays out a flexible process of planning for and managing places of cultural significance that has come to serve as a guide for many in the conservation field around the world. The process begins with an effort to understand a place. This often includes research to identify potential cultural heritage resources, to understand the history of the place, and develop a clear picture of the wider context for the resources and the conservation action. Identification processes often rely on typologies or frameworks as a guide. For example, the World Heritage system employs a set of six cultural heritage criteria, such as being representative of a unique artistic or aesthetic achievement, or to be unique, extremely rare, or of great antiquity, which form the basis of a nomination (UNESCO, 1972). In Canada, the Standards and Guidelines for the Conservation of Historic Places (Parks Canada, 2010) put forward a typology of cultural heritage features, such as evidence of traditional practice and evidence of historical land uses, buildings, and structures, which are similarly meant to assist in identifying and categorizing cultural heritage.

The Burra Charter Process Steps in planning for and managing a place of cultural significance 60 The Burra Charter should be read as a whole. Key articles relevant to each step are shown in the boxes. Article 6 summarises the Burra Charter Process.

! Figure 2: The Burra Charter10 — Australia Process: ICOMOS Steps Incorporated in planning for and managing a place of culturalThe Burra Charter, significance 2013 .

Once the heritage resources or features are identified it is necessary to evaluate cultural significance. While there may exist a great many heritage resources and features, a values-based approach to conservation is predicated on an understanding of which of these are significant and why. As compelling as the notion of values-based conservation is, it is here, at level of implementation, that it becomes challenging. If one accepts that cultural heritage resources have values and these values should form the basis of conservation decisions, how can one determine what those values are? Generally, the answer to this question relies on the use of value typologies, which are often used to help guide the evaluation of values, not in an overly

60 61 prescriptive way but rather as a means of giving order to a complex, amorphous set of understandings. While there are dozens of typologies that have been developed to support this work (Darvill, 1995; Heritage, 2008; Lertcharnrit, 2010; Lipe, 1984; R. Mason, 2006), most are adaptations of the typology put forward by the Burra Charter which suggests that significance is determined according to different categories of value — aesthetic, historic, scientific, social, and spiritual (Australia ICOMOS, 2013). However, the hope that such typologies can capture the range of values that exist is misplaced, several scholars have argued (Poulios, 2010, 2014; Rudolff, 2010; Walter, 2014). Rudolff goes so far as to state that due to the range and disparity of proposed typologies, “any attempt to categorize all values is determined to fail” (2010, p. 60). For Poulios, in contrast, the issue is not so much the inadequacy of the entire values-based approach, but rather its inability to address certain circumstance such as cultural heritage sites where there is a living tradition (Poulios, 2014). The limitations of the existing values approach are also recognized with respect to cultural landscapes where current methods for landscape value identification often fail to capture the complexity and scale of values that exist. Often, Janet Stephenson argues, what happens is that instead of a holistic evaluation of values, experts undertake separate discipline- specific studies that result in “a static model of significance — a map of ‘aesthetic’, ‘historic’, and/or ‘ecological’ values, for example — with no way of conceiving of the landscape’s cultural dynamics as a whole” (2008, p. 128). Ultimately, the outcome, as Susan Dakin notes is “the acceptance and reinforcement of an impoverished understanding” (2003, p. 190). To overcome these issues researchers have put forward a number of innovative approaches. Janet Stephenson’s work developing the Cultural Values Model is one of the most robust efforts in this respect. In response to the need to step away from the limitations imposed by traditional identification and valuation methods, Stephenson developed her model to capture how both experts and non-experts perceive the landscape, both what is there that is of value and what it is about those features that is valuable. She divides the culturally valued aspects of landscapes into three components. Forms encompass the physical, tangible, and measurable features of the landscape including natural and human made elements. Relationships include those connections generated by people-people, people-landscape, and within landscape interactions (Figure 3). Finally, practices are inclusive of both human practices and natural processes in the past and

61 62 present. But these components do not operate in isolation, rather they are continually interacting to create the landscape.

Figure 3: The fundamental components of landscape and the dynamic interaction of them (Stephenson, 2008, p. 134- 135).

In addition to being continually interacting, these components have a further dimension — temporality. Therefore, in the final model Stephenson attempts to place the landscape on a continuum, “bearing within it the forms, relationships, and practices of the past that influence those of the present” (2008, p. 135). In doing so, she is able to further clarify the notion of values by creating a distinction between surface and embedded values, that is those that are a response to the directly observable forms, relationships, and practices, and those that arise out of an awareness of past forms, relationships, and practices (Figure 4).

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Figure 4: The Cultural Values Model (Stephenson, 2008, p. 136).

Although created to understand landscapes and their associated values, the Cultural Values model offers a conceptually detailed framework for understanding a wide range of cultural heritage categories. While its applicability in other scenarios has yet to be widely tested, in the context of this research, where much of the cultural heritage resources are made up of or encompassed within landscapes this model offers a great deal of potential. Stephenson’s work is not the only example of efforts to reconsider the traditional values typologies being used in cultural heritage evaluations. Nigel Walter (2014), for one, sees little hope that any new values system or model will be able to adequately capture the significance of cultural heritage resources. Instead, Walter argues, conservation needs to find a way “to communicate the broader message [of a cultural heritage resource] in less abstract theoretical terms,” which he believes requires a narrative approach. Such an approach acknowledges that the “story” of a resource has not yet reached its conclusion, it engages people in the need and responsibility to take that story forward while understanding how the plot has developed thus far, and “how to drive that plot onwards” (2014, p. 645). The appeal of such an approach over the values-based alternative has several components: it helps explain the process of change and continuing identity and as a communal practice it goes beyond the “meaningful for me” question by opening the discussion up to the community. These reasons led Walter to conclude that such an approach would “transform conservation theory,” turning the Statement of Significance into a “voyage of discovery capable of transforming our self-understanding” (2014, pp. 646–647). There is little in Walter’s work detailing how such a narrative approach should be undertaken.

63 64

Questions quickly arise as to how the dynamics of power and control over a narrative are to be negotiated, but the notion that cultural heritage resources can be understood as stories is an intriguing one. When coupled with more robust conceptualizations of values and resources, and a strong commitment to plurality, telling the story of a resource may offer potential inspiration and engagement. In the end, regardless of the method employed, a values-based conservation approach must find a way to establish what is significant and valued about a cultural heritage resource. Once the values or significance of a cultural heritage resource are established, albeit in a potentially limited and flawed way, these findings tend to be articulated in some form of report. Often known as a statement of significance, the purpose of these documents is to be a succinct articulation outlining all the cultural heritage values. The statement of significance serves as the foundational guide for management and conservation measures going forward, which vary depending on the resource, intended use, funding, and priority. In general, however, the statement of significance will support the development of conservation policy, plans, or statements, which lay out the known information about a resource and the desired action or treatment going forward. The Burra Charter, for example, calls for the creation of a management plan to guide further actions, whereas other models (Figure 5) are less prescriptive about what those next steps should be.

64 39 THEORETICAL AND PRACTICAL ARGUMENTS FOR VALUES-CENTERED PRESERVATION 65

FIGURE 9 PLANNING PROCESS METHODOLOGY This diagram shows a values-centered 1.0 Identification and Description preservation planning Collecting Information process. 1.1 Aims (Adapted from Demas, What are the aims and expectations of the planning process? in Management Planning 1.2 Stakeholders for Archaeological Sites Who should be involved in the planning process? 12002], 30) 1.3 Documentation and Description What is known about the site and what needs to be understood?

2.0 Assessment and Analysis Taking Stock 2.1 Cultural Significance/Values Why is the site important or valued and by whom is it valued? 2.2 Physical Condition What is the condition of the site or structure; what are the threats? 2.3 Management Context What are the current constraints and opportunities that will affect the conservation and management of the site?

3.0 Response Making Decisions 3.1 Establish Purpose and Policies For what purpose is the site being conserved and managed? How are the values of the site going to be preserved? 3.2 Set Objectives What will be done to translate policies into actions? 3.3 Develop Strategies How will the objectives be put into practice? 3 4 Synthesize and Prepare Plan

Periodic Review and Revision

Figure 5: An alternate methodologyIdentification forof stakeholdera values-centereds is a critica conservationl part of th planninge initial phas processe of goa as lproposed setting by the Burra and project scoping. Though it is represented in the diagrams as a discrete Charter (R. Mason, 2006, p. 39; adapted from Demas 2003). exercise in the initial phases of a project, it ought to be an ongoing task. Often, as a project unfolds and detailed research on the various values is prosecuted, There are a rangeadditiona of conservationl stakeholde rmeasures groups com thate to lightcan. Becausbe undertakene there is alway dependings the on the context potential for learning something substantially different and new from a new of the resource (funding,stakeholde supports,r or interest usage,, one abidinetc.) gand task the is t ooverall be on th eobjectiv lookout foes,r them which. makes it difficult to be too prescriptive about how the conservation process will proceed. The Burra One of the traditional strengths of preservationists, site documentation and Charter calls for thedescriptio developmentn remain ofs a policies fundamenta andl typ ae manage of researcmenth and plan,analysi sbut activit iny many in situations, this could be an excessivevalues-centere amount ofd preservationwork and .less Characterizatio intensiven stepsand assessmen may bet otaken.f values Below are is a diagram critical and particularly difficult because they require potentially many different illustrating the rangemethod of measuress and man thaty collaboratin may beg desiredprofessionals as .they For epistemologica progress froml reasons less, to more intensive. Clearly, notdifferen all tmea typesuress of valu wille ar ebe susceptibl suitablee t ofor differen eacht methodsresource,: Quantitativ but throughe a robust methods are ill-suited for articulating a place's historic value, for instance, research and planning exercise, the appropriate measures can be adopted. Fundamentally, the

65 66 decisions must be in line with the statement of significance and work to protect and enhance the values of the resource.

Recording/documenting Monitoring Maintenance Minimal intervention Mothballing Low impact on fabric Repair Interpretation y t i v i t c

a Managed decline

Minimal intervention r Deconstruction or salvage o

High impact on fabric Symbolic conservation n o i t n e

v Stabilization r e

t Consolidation Moderate to high n

i Preservation intervention g Restoration n

i High respect for fabric

s Rehabilitation

a Adaptive re-use e r c n I Reconstruction Replication High intervention Renovation High impact on fabric Modernization

Figure 6: Cultural heritage conservation measures. (BC Parks, 2019)

Following a decision on the appropriate measures for a given resource, these measures will be undertaken either at the time or a plan will be put in place for the long-term conservation of the resource. Finally, a process of monitoring and review is called for in order to ensure that the conservation plan and measures remain appropriate. These monitoring and review processes ensure that changes to the tangible fabric of the resource, as well as its valuation and significance, are continually reflected upon as these are subject to change over time.

Conclusion

This section has aimed to develop a conceptual framework for understanding what cultural heritage is and to explore some of the contemporary challenges for its management and conservation. With cultural heritage being subject to an expanding definition and increasing calls

66 67 to serve a greater range of objectives at ever larger scales, conservation efforts have been forced to adapt. The move toward a values-based management approach that recognizes the plurality of meaning and significance in cultural heritage has proven to be the most effective conceptual and practical vehicle to achieve the multifaceted goals of conservation, yet it remains a challenge. What this means for the integration of cultural heritage conservation within protected areas is that it is not a simple task of protecting significant historic resources that are easily defined and subject to expert evaluation. Instead, it is a question of contemporary valuation by diverse groups over a wide range of resources, both tangible and intangible. Given the added complexity of addressing cultural heritage conservation, it is pertinent to ask how one can justify such an effort within protected areas. Within the realm of natural heritage conservation, there have been a range of parallel developments that have brought about significant changes to the understanding of the objectives and management approaches for protected areas. As these changes have emerged, the role and value of cultural heritage conservation has become more clear. It is to these developments that this review now turns.

Natural Heritage

What is Natural Heritage? Since its inception in the 19th century, the subject matter of natural heritage conservation has been usefully defined in opposition to the realm of the human. The term natural heritage itself is not widely used. Instead, ideas of nature, wilderness, ecosystems, and biodiversity have been employed to delineate what it is conservation efforts are aiming to protect. It was not until 1972, with the adoption of the World Heritage Convention, that the term natural heritage gained currency. The intention behind the Convention was to officially bring the two domains of natural and cultural heritage ‘together,’ but this was largely a symbolic gesture and, although there was some recognition of overlap, the distinct realms of concern remained solidly delineated (Leitão, 2017). Traditionally, those involved with natural heritage conservation such as John Muir or George Perkins Marsh, advocated for the inherent value of the natural world and rallied against the

67 68 destructive impact of humans (G. P. Marsh, 1864; Worster, 2008). Efforts to conserve spaces of nature that were wild and free of human impact were necessary, these conservationists argued, to ensure the long-term survival of the world’s flora and fauna, to retain places of great natural beauty, to provide for an ongoing resource base for people, and, paradoxically, to offer opportunities for recreation and retreat from the human world. However, over the past century and a half the understanding of what constitutes the natural world and our knowledge of it has shifted considerably (Merchant, 1990; Worster, 1994). While a full review of the evolution of the concepts behind natural heritage is beyond the scope of this project, an examination of some of the more recent shifts is valuable for understanding the growing concern for the human dimension in natural heritage conservation. Since the 1980s, researchers have been drawing attention to the important role of ideas and images in shaping how the environment is valued and transformed (Demeritt, 2002; Braun, 2009). Turning to social theorists like Antonio Gramsci and Michel Foucault scholars from a range of disciplines brought "more attention to cultural practices, scientific knowledge, and discursive relations that were equally important constitutive elements in political struggles over the environment and development" (Braun, 2004, p. 164). As such, the discourses through which concepts, issues, or debates about nature are framed become essential points of study because they serve to constitute, construct, mediate, and regulate the human world and in turn shape the material surroundings. Language could no longer be thought of as the “mirror of nature” but instead needed to be seen as constitutive of what counts as nature (Rorty, 2009). The result of this work was a growing body of literature arguing that nature or wilderness are socially constructed or invented (Bargatzky & Kuschel, 1994; Braun & Castree, 1998; Eder, 1996). For instance, Donna Haraway (1991), a key figure in this debate, “drew a simple, but controversial, conclusion from her readings of poststructuralists: that what counts as nature could not exist separately from the practices through which it was rendered as a legible or knowable domain” (Braun, 2004, 166). That "nature cannot pre-exist its construction" was, for Haraway (1992, p. 296), not a denial that a material world exists, as it was widely thought, but rather a forceful recognition of the power and importance of language and conceptualization, as well as their material implications. Accepting that nature is socially constructed holds a number of significant implications. First, it becomes possible to see the ways in which nature is produced as an historical process, one that

68 69 emerges and may one day pass. This forces one to take responsibility for the ongoing remaking of nature, which means rethinking the processes through which this construction, perception, or classification is established (Braun, 2002, pp. 11–15; Roepstorff & Bubandt, 2003). Additionally, it “demands a different politics… one that does not traffic in purity but instead understands responsibility or ethics in terms of relationality” (Whatmore, 1997). These notions were captured in William Cronon’s call to rethink the idea of “wilderness” (1996). His conclusion, that a focus on ‘wilderness’ took people to the wrong nature, was at the time a radical argument. But for Cronon, such considerations were essential for a truly ethical approach to nature conservation: “to the extent that we celebrate wilderness preservation as the measure with which we judge civilization, we reproduce the dualism that sets humanity and nature at opposite poles. We thereby leave ourselves little hope of discovering what an ethical, sustainable, honourable human place in nature might actually look like” (Cronon, 1996, p. 11). More recently, scholars have argued that an understanding of nature as being socially constructed does not go far enough toward building an accurate and progressive relationship with the world. Despite the radical rethinking implied by these arguments, it is argued that there remains a persistent attachment to the view of the world as made up of two distinct ontological realms of ‘culture’ and ‘nature.’ However, over the past three decades, a body of research has called into question the ontological presuppositions that underwrite these arguments and much of Western thinking in general. For Bruno Latour, natural heritage conservation, along with the rest of Western society, is guilty of accepting the terms of what he called the “modern constitution.” Through the enactment of a series of dualisms — human/nonhuman, science/politics, God/world — the constitution brings into being “a separation between scientific power charged with representing things and the political power charged with representing subjects” (Latour, 1993, p. 29), essentially dividing the world into two groups, nature (science) and culture (politics). While these acts of ‘purification’ prove to be an immensely effective way of structuring knowledge, and in the case of natural heritage conservation achieving a particular goal, he argues they are achieved at a great cost to our ability to understand the world. To overcome the limitations imposed by traditional dualistic ways of conceptualizing the world and better explain existing phenomena, scholars have developed a range of theoretical frameworks and methodological projects. Collectively referred to by Braun (2004, 171) as “nonmodern” or “nonfoundational” ontological

69 70 approaches, these projects aim to articulate alternatives to what is taken as the modern ontological status quo, laddering their observations into larger conceptual frameworks understood variously as “assemblages”(DeLanda, 2006, 2016; Deleuze & Guattari, 1987), “actor networks” (Latour, 2005; Michael, 2017), ‘biosocial becomings’ (Ingold & Palsson, 2013), ‘naturecultures’ (Haraway, 2008), or multi-naturalism (Kohn, 2007). However these ideas are framed, the intellectual and practical challenge of nonmodern or nonfoundational ontological approaches is significant. It is no longer unproblematic to propose that it is the relation between nature and culture that presents a puzzle to be solved. Instead, it is the division of the world into these ontological domains, and the implications of such divisions, that needs explanation. As Braun suggests, “we find ourselves facing a new analytical task: no longer that of determining which direction the arrow of causation points - nature to culture, culture to nature, or some 'middle ground' that combines the two -- but instead something more modest and more pragmatic -- the interrogation of networks and their consequences” (2004, p. 171). Where this leaves the field of natural heritage conservation, however, is a challenge that scholars and practitioners are still working out. Although moving beyond an institutional system predicated on the separation of nature and culture may not be viable, or necessarily desirable, for the field of natural heritage conservation it is also no longer possible to value and conserve the ‘natural’ world without conceptual reflection. The challenge implied by nonmodern ontological approaches is that it is not enough to just recognize and account for the ways in which human perceptions and structures shape the natural world. Instead, there must be an effort to overcome the inherent dualism that is continually recreated through the work of nature conservation. This has become most clear with respect to the growing call for recognition of and reconciliation with Indigenous peoples. The question that is raised is how can those working in natural heritage conservation respect and work with groups for whom the dualist structuring of the world does not exist? Surely a starting point for such work must be a recognition of the “marks of human passage” (W. Stegner, 1989) that pervade the world and an embrace of ontological plurality, because conservation does not happen upon a blank slate, nor is it value-neutral. Natural heritage conservation is, inherently, the enactment of a particular ontological position and the very real, significant, and human consequences of this process must be recognized.

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Ultimately, though, despite its complexity natural heritage exists. The flora, fauna, land, and water that humans rely upon for their survival remains and is under continual pressure as the population grows and expands. In this sense, the focus of natural heritage conservation has remained stable over the past century. But as questions about how to live in the world in an ethical and sustainable manner become more pressing, engaging with these changing conceptions of how we understand natural heritage is needed. For the practice of natural heritage conservation, these conceptual developments have been one element motivating significant changes within the field and is particularly true within protected area management.

Defining Protected Areas Although the modern protected areas systems are a relatively recent innovation, the notion of protected natural areas has long been a part of the human tradition. For millennia around the world cultures have designated areas for sacred and ceremonial purposes, creating islands of rich biodiversity (Verschuuren, 2010). Historically, conservation was linked to wealth and power. Nearly 2000 years ago in India, for example, royal decrees set aside tracts of land to protect forests and wildlife. Similarly, in Europe rich and powerful people established game reserves to protect hunting grounds. However, as noted earlier, it was not until the late nineteenth century that the modern protected areas movement began to emerge in North America, Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa. The motivations in each, of course, varied from a concern for protecting pristine and scenic lands to establishing game parks to preserving wildlife. With such varied motivations, it is no wonder that the global protected area system that has emerged hosts a diverse assortment of protected areas. Protected areas cover terrestrial and marine habitats in uninhabited corners of the world and in long-settled landscapes, and have been given different names by all levels of government. In order to bring consistency to and foster understanding in this global network, the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) has tried to develop a classification system to categorize different parks and help facilitate best practice guidelines and knowledge sharing across the spectrum (Dudley et al., 2010). In 1978, IUCN’s Commission on National Parks and Protected Areas (the predecessor to the World Congress on Protected Areas (WCPA)) published a report laying out ten categories of protected area. This list was encompassing but suffered from a number of issues including the lack of a specific definition of a protected area,

71 72 the inclusion of international designations such as Biosphere Reserves and World Heritage sites that often overlap with other categories, and its primary focus on terrestrial spaces. Recognizing these limitations, in 1994 the IUCN reworked the system to develop a more succinct and workable list of categories. This categorization system began with the basic idea of a protected area, which was defined as “an area of land and/or sea especially dedicated to the protection and maintenance of biological diversity, and of natural and associated cultural resources, and managed through legal or other effective means” (Dudley & Stolton, 2008, p. 9). Further clarity then came through the definition of six categories of protected area, which offer a spectrum of human impact and use:

Category Ia: Strict nature reserve/wilderness protection area managed mainly for science or wilderness protection – an area of land and/or sea possessing some outstanding or representative ecosystems, geological or physiological features and/or species, available primarily for scientific research and/or environmental monitoring. Category Ib: Wilderness area: protected area managed mainly for wilderness protection – large area of unmodified or slightly modified land and/or sea, retaining its natural characteristics and influence, without permanent or significant habitation, which is protected and managed to preserve its natural condition. Category II: National park: protected area managed mainly for ecosystem protection and recreation – natural area of land and/or sea designated to (a) protect the ecological integrity of one or more ecosystems for present and future generations, (b) exclude exploitation or occupation inimical to the purposes of designation of the area and (c) provide a foundation for spiritual, scientific, educational, recreational and visitor opportunities, all of which must be environmentally and culturally compatible. Category III: Natural monument: protected area managed mainly for conservation of specific natural features – area containing specific natural or natural/cultural feature(s) of outstanding or unique value because of their inherent rarity, representativeness or aesthetic qualities or cultural significance. Category IV: Habitat/Species Management Area: protected area managed mainly for conservation through management intervention – area of land and/or sea subject to active intervention for management purposes so as to ensure the maintenance of habitats to meet the requirements of specific species. Category V: Protected Landscape/Seascape: protected area managed mainly for landscape/seascape conservation or recreation – area of land, with coast or sea as appropriate, where the interaction of people and nature over time has produced an area of distinct character with significant aesthetic,

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ecological and/or cultural value, and often with high biological diversity. Safeguarding the integrity of this traditional interaction is vital to the protection, maintenance and evolution of such an area. Category VI: Managed Resource Protected Area: protected area managed mainly for the sustainable use of natural resources – area containing predominantly unmodified natural systems, managed to ensure long-term protection and maintenance of biological diversity, while also providing a sustainable flow of natural products and services to meet community needs (IUCN, 1996). The categories were not originally intended as a template for use around the globe, but as a means of making common sense of the diverse systems in existence. Therefore, national park systems tend to retain their pre-existing naming systems, as these systems are often laid out in legislation, but also affix an IUCN category label to that area to help facilitate management and communication. For the purposes of this project, a protected area will be understood as it is described by the IUCN.

Protected Areas Conservation and Management

Discussing the evolution of protected areas over the past forty years, Adrian Phillips argues that we are currently seeing in this field a distinctly new paradigm (2003, p. 8). The changes he discusses, including shifts in governance, calls for participatory management, a concern for the wider context surrounding protected areas, and a growth in the scope of objectives are not unique to natural heritage management; rather, they parallel turns that were discussed above with respect to the field of cultural heritage management. As with cultural heritage management, those working to conserve natural heritage are increasingly looking to expand the spatial scale of management efforts, implement values-based approaches to management, engage with a broader range of stakeholders, and demonstrate the instrumental value of protecting natural heritage. This section reviews these specific shifts within the field of natural heritage conservation, focusing on how these are shaping protected area management and leading to the greater inclusion of the human dimension.

Governance

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Governance concerns “the structures, processes and traditions that determine how power and responsibilities are exercised, how decisions are taken, and how stakeholders have their say” (Lockwood, 2010, p. 754). It is, in short, the question of who decides. This is distinct from the concept of governments, which are the traditional organizations of governance. Governance can be considered a social function that can be performed by governments, but also by a “variety of other organizations, networks, institutions, and decision-making processes working individually or in combination” (Robinson et al., 2012, p. 572; Young et al., 2008). Traditionally, in both natural and cultural heritage conservation, a state-based ‘top-down’ approach dominated the governance of these resources. Over the last few decades such models have been replaced, or supplemented, by more diverse forms that involve a greater range of stakeholders, including different tiers of government, local communities, and other organizations. The reasons for these changes include the demand to respect local and Indigenous rights, a more informed citizenry who are pressing for greater say in decisions, weak government structures in some developing countries that make top-down models problematic, and the pursuit of neo-liberal agendas by governments around the globe that have led to a pull-back of state involvement in many areas (Lockwood, 2010, p. 755). These changes also have come about due to critiques of the way conservationists have “failed to see that protected areas are not value-free inscriptions on the landscape” but rather “politically charged attempts” to define human behavior in a location (Harmon, 2007, p. 382). As already noted, there has been a powerful questioning of the idea of nature as space apart from humans. Acknowledging human presence in the landscape inevitably opens the door to a rethinking of governance arrangements that incorporate the diversity of rights, knowledge, values, and understandings of nature. No longer can local people be seen as “passive recipients” of conservation policies, but instead should be viewed as “active partners, even initiators, and leaders in some cases” (Phillips, 2003, p. 21). This has meant, for example, the valuing of traditional knowledge (Berkes et al., 2000), community perceptions (N. Bennett, 2016), and the recognition of community conserved areas (Berkes, 2004, 2007; A. Kothari, 2006). Community involvement in governance, however, can still introduce inequalities (Brockington et al., 2008). Certain assumptions about the identification of a community may result in inclusions and exclusions that are as problematic as top-down approaches. Moreover, in some cases, the devolution of governance to communities may be framed as simply asking the

74 75 community to achieve predetermined objectives. As Byrne argues, even an approach that is determined to be open to the varied ways in which communities value and perceive heritage tends to obscure the fact that the conservation discourse: is itself a ‘value’ or a system of valuation in terms of which value is produced. The sleight of hand involved here is that a process presenting itself as disinterested and objective, in other words value-neutral, has already off- camera carried out a massive act of valuation in constructing the thing in question as heritage. (D. Byrne, 2014, p. 7) With respect to Indigenous communities the potential governance issues are even more pronounced. Historically, nature conservation has been an exclusionary force for many Indigenous peoples, pushing them off of their traditional lands (Dowie, 2011). However, in the modern conservation movement, protected areas can also “be the instruments by which Indigenous peoples win control over land and resources” (Brockington et al., 2008, p. 114). Given these challenges, the move in the conservation fields to inclusive governance models is not a straightforward task, but it is one that offers great opportunity. Complicating the governance question even further are the implications of nonfoundational and materialist approaches (J. Bennett, 2010; Smart & Smart, 2017) that question the human- centric bias of Western thought. In the fields of natural heritage conservation, these calls come under the banner of ‘giving nature a voice;’ that is, acknowledging the inherent right to exist and the agency of the natural world. The approach may seem too abstract to be of value, but it is not without precedent. As Caillon et al. note, for example, the Ecuadorian government has given full legal rights to nature. Similarly, in New Zealand, Te Urewera National Park was declared a ‘legal entity,’ along with the Whanganui River being designated a ‘legal person’ (Caillon et al., 2017). Such radical moves raise challenging questions for the governance of natural heritage with respect to the ability of nature or the material world to speak for or represent itself. However, as with efforts to establish a greater range of human voices at the table through participatory dialogue, scholars have begun searching for methods to push governance beyond the human. Caillon’s (2009) ‘hybrid forums’ and Latour’s (1993) ‘parliament of things’ are two examples of ambitious conceptual ideas for arenas where diverse actors come together to negotiate and produce new knowledge and in which democracy is “extended to things themselves” (Latour, 1993, p. 142). While these arguments remain highly theoretical, they do highlight the innovative and exciting dialogue that is occurring within the conservation fields with respect to governance and the implications of more inclusive approaches.

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Management Another important area of interest in the conservation literature is the changing nature of management. Where governance is the question of who decides what the objectives are, management is about “what is done in pursuit of objectives” as well as the “means and actions taken” toward achieving these goals (Borrini-Feyerabend et al., 2013, p. 11). Two key shifts are worth highlighting in this context, the adoption of values as a guiding principle and the embrace of adaptive management. Natural heritage conservation has traditionally relied on an evidence-based approach management, which tends to be seen as a value-free pursuit. However, a recent growth of the “social science critique,” which has challenged the conservation movement to take greater account of human dimensions (N. Bennett et al., 2017), has made apparent, such evidence-based approaches privilege “certain types of knowledge, methods, and information” (N. Bennett, 2016, p. 583). Moreover, these approaches are most often focused on achieving another value, that of conserving ‘nature,’ in itself a value-laden term. The result of such critiques has been twofold. First, there is a growing inclusion of alternative forms of evidence to support management decision making, such as community perceptions, traditional knowledge, and fuzzy logic ( Berkes et al., 2003; Zadeh, 1973). Second is a move toward values-based approaches to management and evaluation. As in the field of cultural heritage conservation, a values-based approach to management focuses on the reasons why a resource or site is significant to people, rather than on the inherent value of the resource or its features. This requires a holistic understanding of the values that are associated with a resource and consideration of how management decisions may impact those values. Since there are a multiplicity of values, the main challenge for management is trying to set priorities for which values are to be protected, particularly when they come into conflict. Unlike in the field of cultural heritage, the conceptualization of values and a values-based approach in natural heritage conservation is not widely discussed. One of the principle vehicles for promoting a values-based approach in natural heritage conservation is the Protected Areas Management Effectiveness (PAME) framework. Originally the PAME framework was developed by researchers working with the IUCN to provide a methodology for assessing “management effectiveness,” which was defined as “the assessment of how well protected areas are being managed — primarily the extent to which management is

76 77 protecting values and achieving goals and objectives” (Marc Hockings, 2003; Marc Hockings et al., 2006, p. vii). Because protected areas, as well as their values, goals, and objectives are diverse, the framework does not lay out a prescriptive set of parameters that must be met in order to qualify for effective management. Instead, the intent is that the framework “provides a consistent basis for designing assessment systems, gives guidance about what to assess and provides broad criteria for assessment” (Marc Hockings et al., 2006, p. viii). Values, the framework document maintains, are a “slippery, subjective concept” but also a principle reason for establishing protected areas and thus crucial for management (2006, p. 14). There are multiple values, however, and therefore managers are required to select and prioritize those that are deemed essential for conservation measures. In some management systems, these critical values are determined and used as “conservation targets” or “focal management strategies” (2006, p. 15). But the authors’ framework also recognizes that there are more than just “wildlife or scenic values” to consider — protected areas are also “recognised for their role in providing social, economic, and environmental benefits,” and thus the values must extend to the human realm (2006, p. 15). In keeping with the desire to remain flexible and nonprescriptive, the framework does not issue guidance apart from these broad comments on how to assess values for a given protected area, but a list of potential value types is provided to aid in consideration.

Figure 7: Some types of values to be considered in assessing protected area context (Marc Hockings et al., 2006, p. 15).

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Putting the PAME framework into practice has been the goal of a range of toolkits that have been developed to assess management effectiveness in various protected areas around the world. The Enhancing Our Heritage (EoH) Toolkit is widely recognised as the most comprehensive assessment process available (M. Hockings et al., 2008). Using a set of ‘tools,’ each of which includes a series of worksheets, managers are guided through the assessment process. The first of these tools, focusing on identifying site values and management objectives, provides a detailed commentary on how to determine the values that are associated with a site. Recognizing that the values are many and varied, the tool encourages managers to seek out a wide range of information, studying nomination and inscription documents, scientific literature, field surveys, maps, discussions with local communities and other avenues. However, once this detailed understanding of a site is compiled, the challenge for those undertaking the assessment will be to narrow these values into categories that is include biodiversity, other natural, cultural, economic, educational, and other social values. Once defined in this way these values are linked to the principle management objectives.

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Figure 8: Enhancing Our Heritage Toolkit, Worksheet 1a, Identifying major site values and objectives (M. Hockings et al., 2008, p. 23).

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Figure 9: Enhancing Our Heritage Toolkit, Worksheet 1b, Documenting management objectives and their relationship to site values (M. Hockings et al., 2008, p. 23).

While certainly a valuable resource, the EoH Toolkit’s primary focus is on the management of natural heritage resources and values, making its applicability for cultural heritage conservation somewhat limited. As well, much like the typological approach described earlier, the values assessment put forward in this toolkit is limited by its inherent inability to capture the full breadth and range of any of the values, particularly those that fall under the cultural category. Nevertheless, the PAME Framework and associated toolkits have had considerable impact on the management of protected areas around the world, increasing awareness and adoption of a holistic values-based approach.

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Expanding Scale and Context Another development in the overall approach to conserving natural heritage, which parallels shifts in cultural heritage conservation, is the need to see and manage conservation interventions in wider contexts. In both fields, it has been recognized that integrating resource conservation into larger landscape, region, or national systems, tends to be more effective. In the natural heritage field, the conversation is, however, slightly different. As natural heritage resources have tended to be geographically larger than cultural sites, the issue of managing large spaces has always been a concern. More recently, though, there is an emerging consensus that such natural sites cannot function effectively if they are reduced to islands. This trend is related to a broader set of ideas that developed over the twentieth century, reconceptualizing how the natural world operates and how we can effectively think about and manage these spaces. One of the major developments in this field has been an understanding of the natural world as a complex system. Recognition that the biological world is an interdependent ecosystem is not new; for most of the twentieth century this has been the predominant way of thinking. But ecosystems were often quite simplistically and hierarchically conceived as independent organic machines. However, in the 1960s and 70s it started to become clear that these systems were far from orderly. This came about at a time when interest in systems thinking and processes was prevalent, providing inspiration and motivation for calls to understand the natural world in a holistic manner. Complexity theories portray systems not as deterministic, predictable and mechanistic, but as process-dependent organic ones with feedbacks among multiple scales that allow these systems to self-organize (Folke, 2006). One of the early advocates of this way of thinking was C.S Holling, whose paper “Resilience and Stability of Ecological Systems,” is considered one of the foundational pieces of contemporary ecology (1973). In it, Holling is critical of static approaches to understanding ecological systems, whereby, in a perfect state, all organisms exist in equilibrium. Instead, he argues, ecosystems are continually changing, adapting, and responding to external influences. Such an understanding of ecosystem dynamics, Holling argues, demanded adaptive management solutions. Using modeling techniques reliant on new computer methods, Holling and his colleagues were among the first scholars to develop detailed models of ecosystem fluctuations and advocate for the application of these models in policy discussions.

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While these insights radically shifted research on ecological systems, they also presented a challenge to the managerial approach that traditionally prevailed in natural heritage conservation. This approach was characterized by a belief in the ability to understand, predict, and control nature (Loo, 2004, p. 168). Ecological systems that were always changing, adapting, and shifting to new states of stability frustrated such managerial impulses. As Bavington (2011) has shown with respect to cod fisheries of Eastern Canada, managerial approaches were not only inadequate for the problem, they were tremendously destructive. This need to manage within a context of uncertainty has pushed scholars and professionals to develop new methods of adaptive management (Berkes et al., 2003; Folke, 2006; 2005; Tyler & Quinn, 2010). As well, when the complexity of ecological systems is fully acknowledged it becomes difficult to overlook the inescapable role of people. Building upon the idea of the natural world as a complex system, researchers have sought to capture the inherent human dimension of these systems through the conceptual exploration of ‘social-ecological systems.’ As Folke explains, the early inclusion of humans as agents of ecosystem change distinguished this ecosystem-oriented branch of ecology from the mainstream ecology profession. The main stream excluded humans or treated human actions as external to the system and consequently the interdependencies and feedbacks between ecosystem development and social dynamics, and their cross scale interactions, were not on the table (2006, p. 262) Recognizing that both natural and human systems are complex and that their interaction is even more so, those working with social-ecological systems highlight that making decisions about social and environmental problems is immensely challenging. Traditional disciplinary approaches do not do justice to the complex interweaving of human and natural elements, and therefore a framework based on understanding the system dynamics is required (Berkes et al., 2003; Fikret Berkes & Berkes, 2009; Davidson-Hunt & Berkes, 2003). Another major influence on the calls for seeing natural heritage conservation in a wider context is the concept of landscape, which has played a particularly important role in European conservation practice but is increasingly being applied in the North American context. The idea of landscape differs markedly from notions of the land, nature, or wilderness in that it tends to be inclusive of human modification, which helps explain its use as a focal point of conservation practice in Europe where vast tracts of ‘wild’ nature are non-existent. Alongside this interest in the subjective qualities of landscape is a stream of physical geography where the notion of

82 83 landscape has been employed to better conceptualize the interconnected workings of the natural world. Landscape ecology, as it has come to be known, draws upon general ecological theory but seeks to place the standard units of that field, ecosystems, populations, species, biomes, etc. into a landscape context, often linking it to the human component of landscape change (Naveh & Lieberman, 2013; Turner et al., 2001; Wiens, 1992). This has proven to be a valuable framework, particularly in the European context where lived-in, working landscapes are common. Seeing natural heritage conservation in terms of landscape recognises that ecosystems are not only complex, interconnected entities, but they are also intertwined with human use and modification of the land. Doing so shifts the conversation around conservation from one of setting aside distinct areas for ecosystem protection or even linking these areas together, to one of broad-based sustainable landscape management (Antrop, 2006; Selman, 2012). This idea of managing the whole landscape was the focus of the European Landscape Convention (ELC), which was passed in 2000 by the Council of Europe (Council of Europe, 2000). Responding to the threat of urbanisation and countryside decline that was threatening the viability and character of European landscapes, the ELC advocates for landscape-scale planning and management across the continent. This does not entail a strict set of measures and policies for all landscapes, but instead it encourages an adaptable approach based on holistic principles. What was especially innovative about the ELC was that its call to recognize the importance of landscapes was not restricted to small, classified areas that were considered highly valuable. Instead, it applied to the entire land base. Although the ELC was a nonbinding convention, it has seen widespread acceptance throughout Europe and has had a considerable impact on thinking around the world as well (De Montis, 2014; Dovlén, 2016; Pedroli et al., 2013). In North America, one of the impacts of the ELC and the wider interest in landscapes has been a growing call over the past twenty years for ‘landscape-scale’ conservation (McKinney et al., 2010; B. Mitchell, 2016; NLC, 2018). Initiatives such as the Man and the Biosphere program, as well as organizations such as the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) and the Network for Landscape Conservation (NLC) are pushing for linking separate ecosystems through wildlife corridors, adjoining conservation areas, buffer zones, and cooperative arrangements between various jurisdictions (Barrett, 2014; Curtin, 2015).

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Objectives

Often in the history of conservation efforts there has been a strong conservationist sentiment, which is described as “fortress conservation” in which efforts to save prestigious or charismatic pieces of nature were achieved through the exclusion of people (van Oudenhoven et al., 2011, p. 156). However, as with cultural heritage management, in the contemporary nature conservation field there has been a greater interest in the achievement of multiple objectives. Interest in such a pursuit is due, in part, to the rise of neoliberal governance principles over the past forty years that call for reducing governmental budgets and services, which in turn forces natural heritage conservation efforts to fight for funding and prove the broad value of the investment. Such an effort is seen most clearly in the shrinking budgetary commitments for natural heritage conservation around the world and efforts to raise funding for these projects from a wide variety of sources. The growing breadth of objectives is not, however, simply an opportunistic bid for survival and a case for relevance, it is also a positive acknowledgement that protected areas serve a wide range of purposes beyond the protection of natural heritage and cannot be readily separated from their surrounding contexts. As Phillips argues, the objectives of natural heritage conservation now include social and economic goals alongside the more traditional conservation and recreational ones. The fortress conservation mentality has come under particularly strong pressure in developing countries where the luxury of setting aside areas of land solely for conservation does not exist. Not only is the land in these countries imprinted with thousands of years of human activity, it is often an ongoing resource base for local communities. Therefore, conservation efforts come face to face with the requirement to address issues such as the needs of resident communities, consumptive use of natural resources, and cultural and spiritual connections to place. In North America, similar issues have arisen due to the growing call to recognize and respect Indigenous rights (Borrini et al., 2004; English & Lee, 2004; Stevens, 2014). Apart from the inclusion of social and economic interests, conservation is no longer solely concerned with protecting existing areas and systems, but instead has expanded its focus to include restoration and rehabilitation of ecosystems. Traditionally, within ecological restoration work ‘historical reference points,’ which were equated with ‘pre-disturbance’ states, were established to guide efforts. However, as the above discussion of the changing notions around

84 85 nature and ecology showed, it is now accepted that “every natural environment, past and present, is the product of disruption and change” and therefore “there has never been an original balance of nature to return to,” which means that it becomes “erroneous [to] assum[e] that there is only one ecologically legitimate or ideal reference system for every restoration site” (Higgs et al., 2014, pp. 15–16). Therefore, restorationists have had to rethink their practice, goals, and measures of success. As Balaguer et al. note, “contemporary restoration ecologists and practitioners do not aim to ‘recreate’ the past—something clearly impossible— but rather strive to re-establish the historical trajectory of an impaired ecosystem as it was developing before it was deflected by human disturbance” (2014, p. 14). An important part of this historical trajectory, Higgs notes, is the “continual interplay between human activities and ecological processes,” meaning that the objective of restoration work is not only to re-establish healthy ecosystems but also to build healthy human relationships with the land (2003, p. 260). Ultimately, what this changing perspective of natural heritage conservation objectives shows is that these efforts serve a wider range of purposes than have been traditionally acknowledged and their impacts resonate more broadly than within protected natural areas. But this expansive view of natural heritage conservation’s role has not come about without concern. There is criticism on the part of traditionalists who resist what they see as a weakening of the primary focus, the protection of natural heritage. Critics are skeptical of efforts to justify or allow human presence in natural areas, arguing that such measures could “legitimize ecologically destructive land use practices” (N. Mitchell & Diamant, 1998, p. 43). In the mid-1990s, shortly after the emergence of the social construction of nature argument, a reaction set in against the move to greater community inclusion. This “back to the barricades” critique reaffirmed the “need for more hard-bordered, nationally administered conservation areas actively defended against human intrusions in order to protect biodiversity” (Harmon, 2007, p. 383). Locke and Dearden, for example, see the inclusion of protected area categories that acknowledge human presence and use, such as IUCN Category V Protected Landscapes/Seascapes, as being antithetical to the foundational definition of protected areas, which is “to protect all non-domesticated elements of living nature and the processes and places they depend on” (Locke & Dearden, 2005, p. 2). Such additions to the system, they note, threaten to “lower the bar” making it more difficult to establish strict protected areas, divert attention away from the damaging impact of human action, and inflate protected area figures (Ibid. 2005, p. 6). Despite such tempering criticisms, the

85 86 current trend in the field is toward broader objectives, greater collaboration with community, more flexible, values-based management approaches, and greater scale.

The Place of Cultural Heritage in Protected Areas

As the above discussion has highlighted, in both the fields of natural and cultural heritage conservation the past thirty years have been witness to a dramatic shift in how the concepts, along with the practice of conservation, is understood. The result of these changes is a blurring of the boundary between the two realms. In cultural heritage conservation it has come to be accepted that cultural heritage is the product of a complex interaction between people and the world around them; while it is a cultural identifier that is imposed upon the world, it is also very much a material, tangible reality. Moreover, for many individuals and communities the natural world itself is the most important cultural heritage resource. Similarly, in the field of natural heritage conservation, it has come be understood that the ‘natural’ world is not all that natural after all. While the external world exists independent of humans, the ways in which people perceive and interact with that world is mediated by a host of cultural, social, and political structures that are by no means universal or free from the issues of power. Moreover, conserving the natural world can no longer be understood to be a simple matter of ecosystem protection because people, in all their diversity, rely upon and connect with places in vastly different ways. Looked at together, it becomes clear that these two domains are difficult to parse. That cultural heritage resources and associated values exist within protected areas is widely accepted, but an effort to articulate what purpose these resources serve, both inherently as resources in and of themselves, as well as for the overall goal of protecting natural heritage, is lacking. Given the conceptual developments reviewed here, what can be concluded about the benefits of embracing cultural heritage within protected areas? While certainly not an exhaustive list, several points can be made. First, protected areas rely upon public desire for the conservation of nature to exist, but such a desire is inherently culturally based. There is a widely held recognition — in heritage studies, as well as in environmental psychology and human geography, for example — that it is a universal trait of humans to become attached to or interconnected with places. The tangible resources within a protected area are clearly an essential aspect of the development of place attachments,

86 87 but “the reasons why people care deeply about protected areas ultimately have little or nothing to do with [the material resources]” (Harmon, 2004, p. 9). Instead, it is in the arena of cultural values, those messy, contingent individual and group perspectives, that lie at the heart of the modern desire to conserve natural heritage. As Bernbaum argues, in order to gain “the lasting support of the general public as well as local communities, protected areas need to ground their programs of interpretation, management, and conservation in not only solid scientific research and practice, but also in deeply held spiritual, cultural, and aesthetic values and ideas that will engage and inspire people to care for nature over the long term and, when necessary, make sacrifices to protect the environment” (2017, p. 168). Without this kind of enduring support, the viability and future of protected areas will come under threat if governments reduce the funding needed for their operation and existence. Therefore, addressing the issues around cultural heritage conservation becomes an essential part of creating deep-seated, long-lasting buy-in by the public for protected areas. Second, cultural heritage conservation efforts enhance the visitor experience, in turn helping to broaden the visitor base for protected areas. The experiences that individuals are seeking when they visit protected areas are diverse, for some it is purely nature-based appreciation, for others it is recreational activities, but these only scratch the surface of motivations (P. Mason, 2005; McCool, 2006). The challenge for protected areas is how to provide the widest range of experiences while remaining true to the core goal of nature protection. This challenge is complicated by the increasingly diverse make up and lifestyles of modern society, but also the need to engage with a more diverse visitor base in order to build the kind of support needed for protected areas to continue. In fact, one of the key threats to ongoing support for protected areas is the lack of diversity in their visitor base. Most visitors to US national parks, Bernbaum notes, “are middle-class white Americans and foreign tourists” (2017, p. 168), an observation that can be made in many other parts of the world (J. Byrne & Wolch, 2009; Floyd, 2001). Finding ways to engage with different demographics is essential for proving the relevance and value of protected areas. Conserving cultural heritage and presenting these stories is one part of this process, but this challenge also highlights the need to engage with a wide range of cultural experiences. A third, and related point, is that cultural heritage conservation offers an avenue to respect and engage with Indigenous peoples for whom protected areas often comprise or contain sacred and

87 88 culturally significant sites, and are an important resource base for traditional practices. Protected areas have had two different consequences for Indigenous peoples. The first is that, like other large-scale development projects that are carried out or directed in a top-down manner by states, they have been “instrumental in dispossessing people of land and resources.” Even more than physical displacement, the fixation on notions of ‘pristine’ or ‘wild’ nature often end up erasing the legitimate legacy of Indigenous peoples as users and stewards of those places. On the other hand, protected areas have also come to serve as “instruments by which Indigenous peoples win control over land and resources and defend themselves against the transformations of modernity,” while at the same time protecting the land (Brockington et al., 2008, p. 113). By recognizing that protected areas are part of Indigenous peoples’ traditional territory and imbued with cultural meaning, managers can play a critical role in reconciliation and cultural revitalization. Documenting and engaging with traditional knowledge is both beneficial to management as it brings forward a deep well of place-based understanding, but also provides an opportunity to reengage and share information amongst the community (Borrini et al., 2004; Olson et al., 2016; Stevens, 2014). While Indigenous traditional knowledge of an area can be immensely valuable to protected area managers, it is not the only source of information provided by engaging with cultural heritage. As environmental historians have demonstrated, an examination of the entire historical record offers protected area managers a deeper understanding of the ecosystems under their care (Louter, 2003). History, by bringing to light the range of different situations and human responses in the past, “offers a wide array of alternative models of ecological integrity” (Balaguer et al., 2014, p. 14). These alternatives serve a number of functions: as reference information, they help to provide baseline data for restoration projects that show “how ecosystems functioned in the past, and how they might operate under new conditions;” as examples, they provide experiments and potential scenarios from which to develop a greater understanding of possibilities, pitfalls, and challenges; and, as narratives, they help to shed light on the multitude of meanings, values, and legacies that exist and have existed in a space over time (Higgs et al., 2014, p. 504). Taken together, this understanding of history offers a guide that managers can work with to develop conservation efforts that are historically grounded; that is, respectful, accurate, and proper to the ecological and cultural uniqueness of any given space. A thoughtful and thorough engagement with the history of a site helps to develop information about

88 89 the particular place, but also fosters humility and awareness toward one’s actions. Actions that should be understood more modestly as one more step in a larger historical trajectory of an ecosystem. Finally, in addition to supporting a holistic approach to decision making, recognizing the cultural and historical legacies of protected areas, and the way these form the foundation for peoples’ connection to the land, creates an opportunity to reconsider and reflect upon the human relationship to nature and model more sustainable patterns of behaviour. Protected areas find themselves in a unique position because they are able to curate peoples’ experiences and in turn are able to interpret the history and stories that are told about these places. The cultural heritage resources that exist within protected areas are unique opportunities to talk about how people have related to the land over time, whether responsibly or not, how ideas of conservation have evolved, and how we continue to make decisions about how to use the land in ways that are historically grounded and ultimately tied to our very human ideas about the world. Telling these types of stories is important because it can help shift wider thinking about how to live responsibly in the world. In making the case for the importance of seeing nature as socially constructed, Bruce Braun provides a compelling argument for how this shift in thinking “forces us to take responsibility for how this remaking of nature occurs, in whose interests, and with what consequences (for people, plants, and animals alike)” (2002, p. 13). Taking responsibility for this remaking demands a different approach, one that does not “traffic in purity but instead understands responsibility or ethics in terms of relationality” (Braun, 2002, p. 13). People, in this kind of thinking are understood as being encompassed in webs of relations (assemblages and networks) with animals, plants, and ecosystems. What taking responsibility for this remaking means for protected areas is certainly more complicated than protecting nature from humans. Instead, it is about engaging in the question of how humans are and have been a part of the landscape in an effort to restore and create a new and enduring relationship between humans and the natural world. How this process unfolds will, of course, be different depending on the unique circumstances of any given protected area. A largely untouched forest ecosystem raises different questions than a former ranching landscape or an area that has seen significant industrial disturbance over time, but in each scenario it is possible to place people into the frame and cultural resources are an essential part of this picture.

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Ultimately, however, efforts to conserve both natural and cultural heritage can be understood as integral parts of a vibrant, deep, and enduring connection to land. Looking at either in isolation is to adopt a narrow view of the complexity that makes up the world, and does a disservice to the management of both. Conserving cultural heritage within protected areas is thus a necessary and valuable task. It enables protected areas to be more than mere holdouts in an increasingly disturbed landscape. They can become enduring sources of understanding and models for personal and collective transformation.

Conclusion

Over the past half century there have been many significant changes to how natural and cultural heritage are conceptualized and conserved. This chapter has sought to explain how natural and cultural heritage are currently conceptualized and how these contemporary ideas have reshaped the approach to managing these resources. Today, there is a growing recognition that the two domains are intricately interlinked, and that successful conservation efforts on either side require a full, robust, and honest engagement with the other. Despite a growing recognition of the importance of addressing cultural heritage conservation within protected areas, there remains uncertainty about how to go effectively about this task. In the past few years, this practical challenge has come to be a matter of growing interest. While more remains to be done to understand the mechanisms and processes that are necessary to integrate effectively cultural heritage conservation into protected area management, particularly in localized contexts, there is a great deal to be learned from the experiments and innovations that are taking place. In the following chapter, I will look at some of the practical solutions that have emerged in recent years around the world to address cultural heritage conservation within protected areas.

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Chapter 4: Alternate Practice Review

Introduction For many protected area organizations around the world, cultural heritage resource management is a pressing concern. Responding to demands to demonstrate broad value for nature conservation, incorporate Indigenous and local communities in decision-making processes, and view the landscape as an interwoven legacy of human and natural forces, organizations are developing innovative and progressive management approaches. This chapter examines several key examples from around the world, and within Canada, of how protected area organizations have responded to the issue of cultural heritage resource management. As noted in Chapter 2, the intention in this chapter is not to determine a definitive list of best practices, but rather to draw broad lessons from each of these jurisdictions. Because of the unique circumstances — legislative, political, geographic, cultural — that each jurisdiction faces, the approaches to cultural heritage resource management are necessarily contingent. However, through a careful analysis of what is occurring around the world, several key elements, including the need for strong and coherent legislation, strategic policy, consistent terminology, dedicated staffing, embedded cultural heritage training programs, robust management planning, and commitment to Indigenous issues, can be identified. Having these elements in place are essential components for a successful cultural heritage resource management program in any protected area organization. Although none of the following examples are perfect, taken together they offer a useful set of lessons to support improvements in other jurisdictions.

World Heritage At the international level, the most prominent venue for the conservation of natural and cultural heritage is the UNESCO Convention Concerning the Protection of the World Cultural and Natural Heritage (World Heritage Convention). Given that the World Heritage system is not a protected area network, it does not provide a straightforwardly comparable example for this study. However, as it is the most significant venue for understanding and debating conservation practice, it would be a mistake not to understand how the integration of natural and cultural heritage conservation has been approached in this context.

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As noted in the previous chapter, the World Heritage Convention (WHC) was passed in 1972, becoming the first international instrument that brought together the fields of natural and cultural heritage conservation (Cameron & Rössler, 2016; Denyer, 2014). The central idea behind the WHC was to get nations around the world to cooperate in the conservation and protection of cultural and natural heritage sites. Part of the WHC was a set of broad directives that called upon signatory states to protect their heritage by establishing general policies, services, and programs to ensure this occurs. More prominently, however, the WHC established a set of international instruments to protect highly valuable sites, those that were determined to be of “outstanding universal value.” These instruments include the List of World Heritage in Danger, the World Heritage Fund, and the World Heritage List. The World Heritage List is a collection of properties that are voluntarily nominated by state parties and determined by the World Heritage Committee (a group of representatives from 21 signatory countries) to be adequately protected and meet the criteria for outstanding universal value. Originally, in order to be inscribed on the list, a property needed to be categorized as either a natural or cultural property and the nomination package needed to demonstrate how the property met one or more of the criteria for significance (a choice between four natural and six cultural). Where elements from both sets of criteria were present, a site could be inscribed as a ‘mixed’ site with priority given to either the natural or cultural significance and the other serving a supplementary role (Rössler, 2006). International Council on Monuments and Sites (ICOMOS) and IUCN were selected to play a central role in the evaluation of these nominations with each being responsible for the assessment of either the cultural or natural property nominations, respectively. Therefore, despite the rhetorical and institutional combination of natural and cultural heritage, the original structure of the Convention retained a distinct separation between these two types of properties. Attempts have been made over the years to better integrate these two domains but, Leticia Leitão argues, they “have never been able to fully break down the division… because the ideological changes that were introduced always conformed to the dichotomy” (2017, p. 195). One of the first attempts to integrate the domains of nature and culture was the recognition of mixed sites, those sites nominated as both a natural and cultural property, with respective natural and cultural criteria. Structurally, this worked as essentially two separate nominations, but in the final inscription, the site would be declared as either a natural or cultural property with the other

92 93 aspects noted as associated or supporting elements. In this respect, the World Heritage Committee was fairly forthright in recognizing the cultural value of nature, and vice versa (Denyer, 2014); although this was never without fine-grained debate and consideration. Where the use of mixed sites failed, and where the World Heritage Committee was less certain about how to proceed, was with respect to sites where the links between culture and nature were more nearly equal, or where there were few monumental structures that could be tagged as the cultural elements of a site. The debates that emerged out of this challenge, as discussed in the previous chapter, resulted in the emergence of the cultural landscape as an additional category of World Heritage Site. Briefly, again, a cultural landscape was defined as the “combined works of nature and man” and further categorized as either designed (formally shaped spaces such as gardens), evolved (being either relict or continuing examples of ongoing change through inhabitation), or associative (areas with significant spiritual importance) (Ibid. 1992, p. 4). With this amendment, a site can now be nominated as either a natural, cultural, mixed, or cultural landscape property. Since its adoption, the cultural landscape category has proven to be, practically and conceptually, an adaptable vehicle for addressing interweaving nature and culture in the World Heritage system. More than its obvious impact in allowing for new designations, the inclusion of the category has had several significant impacts. For one, there have been shifts in the way that properties are interpreted and presented, to include more information about context and connection. Principally, though, the cultural landscape concept has made people aware that heritage sites are not isolated islands. Instead, all sites need to be seen as part of the entire landscape (Rössler, 2006, p. 336). There has been considerable work done to support the conservation and management of World Heritage cultural landscapes (N. Mitchell et al., 2009; R. Mason, 2008; K. Taylor & Lennon, 2012; K. Taylor et al., 2014). The most comprehensive guide to cultural landscape management is the World Heritage Cultural Landscapes Handbook for Conservation and Management published by the World Heritage Centre in 2009. This handbook offers a detailed picture of the history and thinking behind cultural landscapes, but also practical guidance for management and conservation. The management guidance is based around six foundational principles: i. People associated with the cultural landscape are the primary stakeholders for stewardship

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ii. Successful management is inclusive and transparent, and governance is shaped through dialogue and agreement among key stakeholders iii. The value of the cultural landscape is based on the interaction between people and their environment; and the focus of management is on this relationship iv. The focus of management is on guiding change to retain the values of the cultural landscape v. Management of cultural landscapes is integrated into a larger landscape context vi. Successful management contributes to a sustainable society (N. Mitchell et al., 2009, pp. 35–36) Building upon these principles, the handbook goes on to recommend a step-by-step management process that is similar to the standard conservation management plan process discussed in the previous chapter, but offers specific advice on how to address the unique challenges of cultural landscapes. For example, step two is to “understand the cultural landscape and its values,” for which the handbook recommends several further steps including work to “gather and analyze data about the landscape and its values and describe landscape characteristics – both tangible and intangible,” “document existing site conditions and management,” “define landscape boundaries and identify linkages to the regional context,” and “establish a Statement of Outstanding Universal Value” (N. Mitchell et al., 2009, p. 42). Each step is supported by a brief description, case study examples, and references to more detailed explanations. However, despite the value in shifting the conversation, and the flexibility to accommodate a wide range of sites, the adoption of cultural landscapes has not been without challenge. The core issue is that a site remains, primarily, a cultural landscape. Sites nominated as cultural landscapes, in contrast to a mixed site, are treated as entirely cultural properties. This means that they are only evaluated by experts from ICOMOS. Although those in the IUCN are expected to be consulted, there is no mechanism to recognize the important natural heritage values of a site in the official inscription. The Orkhon Valley Cultural Landscape in Mongolia, for example, was inscribed in 2004 under the cultural criteria (ii), (iii), and (iv). The site is a large area of pastureland along the banks of the Orkhon River, which includes several significant archaeological sites including the remains of Kharkhorum, the capital of Genghis Khan’s empire. As the inscription states the site was recognized for: Criterion (ii): The Orkhon Valley clearly demonstrates how a strong and persistent nomadic culture, led to the development of extensive trade networks

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and the creation of large administrative, commercial, military and religious centers. The empires that these urban centers supported undoubtedly influenced societies across Asia and into Europe and in turn absorbed influence from both east and west in a true interchange of human values. Criterion (iii): Underpinning all the development within the Orkhon valley for the past two millennia has been a strong culture of nomadic pastoralism. This culture is still a revered and indeed central part of Mongolian society and is highly respected as a ‘noble’ way to live in harmony with the landscape. Criterion (iv): The Orkhon Valley is an outstanding example of a valley that illustrates several significant stages in human history. First and foremost it was the centre of the Mongolian Empire; secondly it reflects a particular Mongolian variation of Turkish power; thirdly, the Erdene Zuu monastery and the Tuvkhun hermitage monastery were the setting for the development of a Mongolian form of Buddhism; and fourthly, Khar Balgas, reflects the Uighur urban culture in the capital of the Uighur Empire. (UNESCO, 2004, 28 COM 14B.35 ) What is missing in this overview is the importance of the Mongolian grasslands. Since the grasslands, as an ecological entity, are not of global significance, there is no way within the existing system to acknowledge the value of this natural feature. Concern with respect to the wording and organization of the criteria for significance has resulted in numerous attempts to modify the criteria since the original inception of the Convention. Coinciding with the changes that came out of the adoption of cultural landscapes, experts in the early 1990s worked to remove references to cultural dimensions from the natural heritage criteria, arguing that such wording did not correspond to the definition of natural heritage (Thorsell, 1992; Denyer, 2014). Then, in a 1998 expert meeting held in Amsterdam, it was argued that the categories of natural, cultural, mixed, and cultural landscapes were confusing and created unnecessary complications for recognizing the interconnections between nature and culture. As a means of reinforcing these connections and shedding the institutional baggage of separating properties into categories, the group recommended that the criteria of significance be amalgamated into one list. The hope in taking this action was that all World Heritage properties would come to be seen as forming a “continuum, from the Taj-Mahal to the natural sites, including those which combine in endless variation the natural and cultural” (UNESCO, 1998). Achieving this goal took a further seven years, but in 2005 the revised version of the Operational Guidelines were presented. In this new list the wording did not change at all, but the criteria were grouped together with criteria (i) to (vi) corresponding to the previous cultural criteria and (viii) to (x) corresponding to the natural criteria. Not surprisingly, given the lack of other substantial

95 96 change in the way that nominations are evaluated, this largely symbolic effort has had little effect on the overall integration of natural and cultural heritage. Since the late 2000s, however, there has been a renewed push to work toward greater integration within the World Heritage system. This has been spurred on, in large part, by the growing academic call to recognize the complex links between nature and culture. One of the major venues for this effort has been the joint IUCN-ICOMOS Connecting Practice Project (IUCN–ICOMOS, 2015, 2018; Leitão, 2017; Leitão et al., 2018; Leitão & Badman, 2014; N. J. Mitchell et al., 2017). This project, the first jointly managed project in the history of IUCN and ICOMOS, aimed “to explore, learn and create new methods of recognition and support for the interconnected character of the natural, cultural and social value of highly significant land and seascapes” (IUCN–ICOMOS, 2015). The project was conducted in two phases. The first phase focused on the ways in which IUCN and ICOMOS work to support the World Heritage Committee. As noted before, most of the World Heritage-related work carried out by IUCN and ICOMOS is around the evaluation of new site nominations. However, when undertaking this work these organizations traditionally have worked separately. Therefore, this project sought to explore “how to undertake missions that are truly joint activities, which follow the same terms of reference and which produce a single, integrated report” (Leitão et al., 2018, p. 153). Using three case studies of existing World Heritage Sites, the project team engaged a group of conservation experts from both natural and cultural backgrounds to work together on a joint review exercise. From this study a series of lessons were drawn including the need for collaborative and dialogue-based workflows, a consideration of the entire range of values in a particular site rather than only focusing on those that are identified as being of Outstanding Universal Value, and a group-based report writing process. In the second phase of the project, the research team sought to look beyond the evaluation process by translating the lessons learned into “practical interventions aimed at strengthening governance and management arrangements for the protection of sites — including through integrating a consideration of natural and cultural heritage as mutually interdependent” (Leitão et al., 2018, p. 154). To achieve this, two case studies were selected for more intensive examination. In each case, the expert participants worked with site managers to explore two areas: (i) the interconnected character of the natural, cultural and social values of the property and affiliated biocultural practices; and (ii) the governance and management systems of the

96 97 property. The hope was that the governance and management systems should effectively address the varied values of a site. With respect to evaluation of the interconnected values, one of the main objectives of the project was to explore whether the IUCN’s Protected Area’s Management Effectiveness (PAME) toolkit could be adapted to evaluate cultural and social values. Through this process, several conclusions were reached, including the need for integrated governance models that include those with responsibility for both cultural and natural heritage conservation and improvement on “values-based management approaches that recognise and protect the overall significance of a site” (Leitão et al., 2018, p. 160; IUCN–ICOMOS, 2018). While this project has not led to substantial revisions in the way that the World Heritage List is administered, it has created a vibrant conversation highlighting the importance of practical research that focuses on the specific details of working in an integrated manner. Since it was launched, both the IUCN and ICOMOS have held dedicated sessions at their international meetings around the theme of the “Nature-Culture Journey,” which have in turn spurred several regional symposia on the same topic. What these conversations demonstrate is that articulate, high-level recognition of the interconnection of nature and culture is only a first step. “Results will only come through the work of ground-level efforts… and policies that recognise and empower a diversity of approaches while working towards a common goal to protect the world’s most treasured places” (Leitão et al., 2018, p. 162). Thus, the World Heritage system remains structurally separated into efforts to conserve natural and cultural heritage. However, by virtue of the Convention’s innovative move to bring both cultural and natural heritage properties together under the banner of World Heritage, an avenue was opened to consider how these two realms can work together. While a frequent challenge and the source of considerable confusion, this need to recognize and manage the interconnections of nature and culture has spurred a great deal of practical advancements such as the development of the notion of a cultural landscape and the ensuing work around conserving and managing this type of property. As with the cultural landscape concept, the recent effort to integrate natural and cultural heritage evaluations further, as well as to support more integrated management and governance arrangements at World Heritage Sites, has provided inspiration far beyond the confines of the World Heritage system. It is in this respect that the World Heritage system continues to be an essential venue for exploring and advocating the most innovative approaches to heritage conservation. Therefore, while not directly applicable to protected area

97 98 networks, as they are understood here, the work that has been going on within the World Heritage system to integrate cultural and natural heritage offers considerable guidance and inspiration to support ‘ground-level’ changes.

New South Wales, Australia Australia, like Canada, is a federation, meaning that legislative powers are spread across national, state, and local governments. What this means for the conservation of natural and cultural heritage is that there is a great deal of diversity in approaches across the country. However, unlike Canada, at the national level the Commonwealth of Australia is only modestly involved in heritage conservation work. While some large protected areas are located on Commonwealth property, most of the country’s protected areas are under the jurisdiction of state and territorial governments. While a review of the various approaches to cultural heritage conservation and protected area management across the country would be valuable, it is beyond the scope of this study. Instead, this review focuses on the state of New South Wales (NSW) in southeast Australia, which has been particularly active in its efforts to manage cultural heritage resources effectively across the entire landscape and, in particular, within protected areas. The NSW National Parks and Wildlife Service (NPWS) was established with the passage of the National Parks and Wildlife Act 1967 (NPW Act).3 In addition to creating the NPWS, the NPW Act established a mechanism to set aside national parks, nature reserves, state parks, and “historic sites,” which were defined as “areas that are the sites of buildings, objects, monuments or events of national significance” (NPW Act, s.6 [4c]). Over the years since its creation, the NPW Act has been amended several times to clarify, refine, and broaden the scope of work, for example by including Aboriginal ‘relics’ and ‘places’ into the definition of historic sites and modifying the category of state parks to be state conservation areas. Central to these changes, though, has been a gradual move toward greater integration of natural and cultural heritage conservation objectives. As amended in 2002, the current objectives of the National Parks and Wildlife Act are twofold, first the conservation of nature, including habitats, ecosystems,

3 The use of the ‘National Parks’ terminology in the NSW system can create some confusion as the NPWS is not a ‘national’ agency but rather a state department with jurisdiction over areas of national and state level significance. Part of the reason for the adoption of this terminology, along with the overall structure of the NPWS was the heavy influence of the U.S National Parks Service on those who created the legislation.

98 99 biological diversity, landforms of significance, and landscapes (NPW Act 1974, s.2a (1a)). Second, is “the conservation of objects, places, or features (including biological diversity) of cultural value within the landscape (NPW Act 1974, s.2a (1b)). What this demonstrates is the centrality of cultural resources and values in the legislated mandate of the NSW parks system. But getting to this point was a lengthy process. Understanding how it unfolded is a valuable illustration of how cultural heritage conservation can be incorporated into protected areas. From 1967 to 1977, the NPWS was the sole government organization in the state with responsibility for cultural heritage conservation, therefore, quite early on it began hiring specialist staff to oversee and guide work on these issues. However, as the cultural heritage conservation movement gained momentum through the 1970s with widespread and vocal calls for preservation of the country’s historic fabric, a parallel body of legislation and institutional structures began to take shape. The first of these was the establishment of the Australian Heritage Commission (AHC) by the Federal government in 1975, which created a register of places of national significance. Although the register did not provide strong protective measures for listed sites, it did serve to raise awareness for properties of high value. Two years later, the NSW Government passed its own heritage legislation, the Heritage Act 1977. This legislation established a state-level equivalent to the AHC called the Heritage Council of New South Wales, which was “empowered to make recommendations to the Minister in relation to the conservation and display of, access to, and information about items of the environmental heritage, and to conduct research and organise conferences. The Council also advises on the allocation of National Estate funds in New South Wales, advises on nominations to the World Heritage List, and keeps a register of places subject to conservation instruments or other orders served under the Act” (Pearson & Sullivan, 1995, p. 57). Although the establishment of the AHC and Heritage Council were significant for raising the profile of cultural heritage and putting in place mechanisms and guidelines for the conservation of these resources, in NSW the responsibility for the actual management and maintenance of historic sites remained with the NPWS. However, throughout its history the NPWS did not concern itself solely with the management of cultural heritage in historic sites. It always was recognized that cultural heritage did not only exist within the bounds of designated ‘historic sites,’ but was also widespread throughout park properties. By the mid-1980s, this recognition, coupled with steady advocacy and conceptually innovative work by the heritage specialists

99 100 employed by the NPWS had resulted in the service “taking an active role in conserving historic heritage within the whole park system as opposed to simply managing historic sites” (Ford, 2009, p. 26). However, while there was a desire for an integrated approach, challenges persisted. One of the key issues that hampered efforts to find a balance between the needs of nature conservation and the need to manage cultural heritage resources was the lack of shared training and knowledge between staff who were responsible for each area. According to one commentator, this issue was most apparent when park managers “removed evidence of European land use (for example old huts) in an attempt to restore ‘virgin bush and wilderness’” (Ford, 2009, p. 9). A solution that emerged was to develop new training programs for park rangers. Michael Pearson and Sharon Sullivan, two of the early cultural heritage staff members, developed a course for Charles Sturt University in the late 1970s, which aimed to train new park rangers in cultural heritage conservation skills. As Sullivan recalled: We just said that from now on we want rangers to have qualifications in the natural environment but we also need them to have qualifications in the cultural heritage. But the thing you have to remember is there weren’t any courses for that so we had to go and write the courses. Because if you sent them off to do history, they’d get a background in history but they wouldn’t get a background in anything else ... Cultural heritage management courses were not around at all. I think the one that Mike and I wrote was one of the first ones (Sullivan, quoted in Ford, 2009, p.18). Training programs like this, along with the growing body of guidelines and recommendations being put forward at the time by groups such as the AHC, Heritage Council, and Australia ICOMOS — including the Burra Charter — helped raise awareness for the importance of cultural heritage management and conservation. However, despite increased awareness of and concern for cultural resources, conservation and management remained an issue. A lack of field level resources and dedicated funding for cultural heritage conservation within the parks system persisted, and made it difficult to conduct any adequate and serious work. Things began to change in the late 1980s, though, when amendments to the Heritage Act pressured the department to take their role in protecting cultural heritage resources more seriously (Zilber, 2001). In 1987, the government of NSW amended the Heritage Act, introducing section 170 which mandated that all government agencies that owned and managed property were required to establish and maintain a Heritage and Conservation Register. The Register was to “contain details of each item of environmental heritage that is on the State

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Heritage Register; is subject to an Interim Conservation Order; or is listed in an environmental planning instrument (i.e. is a local heritage item).” The Register also needed to include details about “those items which could be considered as items of State heritage significance” in the future. Moreover, it was not enough to list an item on the Register, these lists also needed to be endorsed by the Heritage Council and agencies needed “to maintain a minimum standard of care for those items” (Context Pty Ltd., 2008, pp. 64–65) More recently, the Heritage Act was strengthened further when the NSW Heritage Office issued a series of guidelines entitled State Agency Heritage Guide: Management of Heritage Assets by NSW Government Agencies (2005). These guidelines laid out a requirement that all NSW government agencies must establish a heritage asset management strategy, which would be prepared and approved by the Heritage Council. The goal with this effort was to “introduce a common and integrated approach among State agencies” (Context Pty Ltd., 2008, p. 65). While this move helped to standardize and encourage activity in the early 2000s, since the early 1990s the NPWS aimed to take the requirements laid out in section 170 seriously. Several developments emerged since the 1990s to address the enlarged responsibility toward cultural heritage brought on by section 170. The first was a shift in focus from historic sites to an emphasis on landscape. Traditionally, Brown (2007) argues, the cultural heritage management program in the NPWS was underpinned by a material-focused paradigm that focused on sites. However, this began to shift with the emergence and spread of the cultural landscape concept, which was being discussed in the World Heritage arena. Staff in the Historic Resources Unit of NPWS were early and enthusiastic adopters of the cultural landscape concept, using it to identify and conserve historic sites more effectively as early as the 1980s (Ford, 2009). However, using the idea of a cultural landscape to conceptualize the historic resources and land uses across an entire park area was slower to emerge. In 1995, Bill Nethery prepared one of the first reports arguing that the NPWS needed a cultural landscape policy (1995) and although this did not result in any proper policy development it did begin to shift the conversation. Evidence of this shift was seen in the development of cultural landscape management guidelines for the Australian Alps national parks, a set of eleven protected areas that covered parts of the Australian Capital Territory as well as the states of New South Wales and Victoria (Lennon & Mathews, 1996). These guidelines did not only assist in identifying and managing cultural landscapes as bounded historic sites, but also sought to explore the landscape character of the whole region. As a result

101 102 of these efforts, momentum for a cultural landscape approach to protected area management grew, so much so that by 1999 the NPWS annual report recognized that: Conservation and management of historic heritage in NSW has continued to benefit from a growing recognition of the advantages of an integrated ‘big- picture’ landscape approach that considers cultural values of historic and Aboriginal heritage within their natural context. This recognition was carried forward into action in the 2002-2006 Cultural Heritage Research Plan for the department (NPWS, 2002), one part of which aimed to “set the framework of developing models for, and links between, history, society, landscapes, and culture-nature” (S. Brown, 2008, p. 20). This study concluded that a cultural landscape framework for the NSW protected area system might include: • Understanding history (including shared history), and larger patterns of land use at a whole-of-landscape scale. That is, understanding the history represented in reserve landscapes within local, State and national contexts. For example, the documentation and analysis of the meta landscapes of grazing and recreation linking places within and outside of the conservation reserve system. • Documenting the histories of communities that have historic and contemporary attachments to the cultural landscapes of the NSW conservation reserves. This requires an understanding of the mobility of people across landscapes, the way in which people, places and landscapes are connected and the ways people have formed attachments to landscape. • An emphasis on the spatial aspects of cultural landscapes, including spatial patterns or connectivity that can be mapped (S. Brown, 2007, pp. 37–38)

Building upon this work, the 2006-2010 Cultural Heritage Research Plan (Department of Environment and Climate Change, 2007) identified a Cultural Landscape Research Project as a priority. In response to this call, Brown produced a Cultural Landscape Management Handbook for the department (S. Brown, 2010), one of only a few such guides developed for protected area agencies around the world. The goal of the Handbook is to be a practical guide to help park managers incorporate “effective landscape-level cultural heritage planning into planning documents based on adequate information and assessment.” This is an innovative way of approaching cultural resource management because typically in the NPWS, as in many agencies, cultural resources are assessed and conservation measures are planned by heritage specialists, either from within the

102 103 department or by consultants. Instead, however, the Handbook makes two key points, recognizing that “the park manager (not a consultant) is responsible for planning” and that “the goal is to effectively manage cultural heritage rather than simply to make plans.” Therefore, it does not suggest a separate cultural landscape conservation plan, independent study conducted by a heritage specialist, or anything of the sort; rather, it advocates a ‘cultural heritage approach’ that incorporates cultural heritage considerations into the foundational Plan of Management (POM) that is required for each park under section 72 of the NPW Act. The Handbook, then, provides guidance on considering how to set objectives for cultural resource management that are in line with wider park management objectives and how “cultural heritage information will be identified, documented, and assessed, both for preparing the POM and as an ongoing park management activity” (S. Brown, 2010, p. 2). To effectively integrate cultural resource considerations into parks management, Brown argues for applying a cultural landscape approach. Underlying this approach are five general principles that summarize some of the key concepts behind cultural landscapes and help give shape to the approach. 1. Landscape is a living entity, and is the product of change, dynamic patterns and evolving interrelationships between past ecosystems, history and cultures. 2. The interactions between people and landscape are complex, multilayered and are distinctive to each different space and time. 3. Community engagement and dialogue, where all people’s values are noted and respected, are characteristic of a cultural landscape mentality. 4. All parts of Australia’s landscape have community connection and associated values and meanings. 5. A key element of cultural landscapes is the continuity of past and present. The general acceptance of these principles is central to, and will underpin, a practical approach to cultural landscapes. (S. Brown, 2010, p. 5).

Informed by these principles, Brown explains, park managers working at an operational level need to consider three basic questions: 1. What is the history of this place or area of land? 2. Who has social attachment and historical connection to this landscape? 3. What impacts will my management action have on the place/area of land and its cultural values? (S. Brown, 2010, p. 5).

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In order to answer each of these questions, Brown lays out a six-step process, which closely parallels the heritage management process advocated by the Burra Charter (see chapter 3) but with a focus on landscape scale concerns. The steps begin with the establishment of management objectives and then move on to information gathering activities, including community engagement, before working through a standard heritage assessment process. Two features of Brown’s process that stand out as unique, and merit further discussion, are the commitment to a mapping exercise and the effort to integrate cultural heritage considerations into the park planning framework.

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Figure 10: Steps in applying a cultural landscape approach (S. Brown, 2010, p. 13).

Due to the complexity and distribution of cultural heritage in landscapes, Brown argues, some form of representation is necessary in order for park managers to effectively plan for cultural heritage resources. Traditionally, managers dealt with heritage as a series of spatially separate material remnants, using a point-based approach for spatial representation. Such an approach identifies a spot of interest and attaches geographic detail to it in order for it to be incorporated into a database. However, the issue that arises is that this disconnects a resource from its spatial

105 106 and historical context. Not only do such representations fail to do justice to the complexity of landscapes, they present a simplified and, by virtue of their quasi-quantitative foundation, an authoritative narrative that overshadows alternative ways of understanding spaces. Speaking to this issue in a separate co-authored paper, Brown notes that such a database “returns a group of points that do not communicate the historical connectivity in the landscape. Connections… will be difficult to identify, and therefore unlikely to be incorporated into management decisions” (Moylan et al., 2009, p. 449). Therefore, Brown argues in the Handbook for the development of a more complex representation of the cultural landscape, what he labels a “cultural landscape atlas,” which is “a comprehensive and meaningful spatial representation of a cultural landscape” (S. Brown, 2010, p. 45). Once created, this tool could be used as an inventory of all cultural heritage information, and provide park managers with a data set that parallels and is compatible with the GIS-based ecological data that is routinely generated. Drawing on a case study from Culgoa National Park, the Handbook provides guidance on how to create such an atlas. However, while certainly a valuable resource and an innovative concept, the Handbook has little reflection on the resource-intensive nature of creating such an atlas, a concern that raises questions about its practicality. Once park managers have identified cultural resources, assessed their value, and made a plan to manage each of these, the challenge becomes how to integrate these efforts into the wider park management operations. As discussed in the previous chapter, there has been a great deal of work dedicated to identifying, assessing, and conserving cultural heritage, but the issue of aligning this work with wider objectives is where it becomes complicated. While the Handbook does not offer a definitive solution to this issue, it does offer some practical guidance. Drawing on the NPWS Plan of Management (POM) Manual, Brown reviews the overall management process, noting that the process for preparing a POM closely parallels the one he argues for in a cultural landscape approach. For a POM, the Manual requires managers to: • identify what is important about a park – the ecological, cultural, recreational, educational values, their level of importance and why we are seeking to protect those values • determine what we are actually trying to achieve in the long term for a park (the purpose/vision/ desired outcomes) • identify what is impacting on the values and what issues are likely to prevent achievement of the desired outcomes

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• identify and evaluate a range of management options to achieve the purpose/vision/desired outcomes • develop appropriate strategies and actions for the management of a park • prioritise the management actions. (S. Brown, 2010)

Therefore, Brown argues, inserting a cultural landscape approach alongside the standard management planning exercise should be relatively straightforward. Rather than complicating the process, a greater focus on landscape scale cultural heritage could help clarify some of the elements already being addressed. However, Brown concedes that the management of ecosystems and cultural heritage are not entirely compatible, and conflicts will inevitably arise. One of the bases of this conflict is in the fundamentally opposite trajectories that natural and cultural heritage follow, with the former continually regenerating and the latter deteriorating over time. In addition, human activities that have created cultural heritage often have had detrimental impacts on ecological systems and damaged natural values. Landscapes modified by cultural activities such as forestry, pastoralism, agriculture, township development, and conservation present a persistent challenge for park managers on how to establish a balance between natural and cultural conservation objectives. Ultimately, Brown does not provide any clear rules for how this balance is to be achieved, instead he recognizes the inherent complexity and situational diversity of these challenges. He concludes that “the park manager(s) must ultimately make an informed and justifiable decision on how to manage large-scale culturally modified landscapes.” This decision will require negotiation with different parties, trade-offs, and ongoing engagement. Although these decisions, ultimately, will be context dependent, Brown does offer some basic guidelines, explaining that decisions will need to be based on: • a clear understanding of all landscape values (ecological, social, cultural, educational, economic) • the level of significance of all landscape values • the management objectives of the relevant park category (thus management decisions regarding culturally modified landscapes are likely to be different for nature reserves and historic sites) and the individual park

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• management options to achieve management objectives, including options that integrate long-term ecological, social and economic sustainability • risks associated with each management option (e.g., ‘what values are compromised?’) • resource constraints and opportunities. (S. Brown, 2010, p. 67) As a whole, the Cultural Landscape Management Handbook offers detailed guidance for parks managers and in the time since its publication has served to enhance the visibility of, and dialogue around, the idea of conceptualizing the entire park land base as a cultural landscape. The implications for the management of cultural resources have been significant as well. By providing a framework for understanding the diversity of resources and values in the parks system, the cultural landscape approach has allowed for more widespread acknowledgement and experience sharing throughout the NPWS. Paralleling the growing emphasis on landscape within the NPWS in the 1990s and 2000s was a move toward holistic or multi-value approaches to cultural heritage management. In keeping with the ideas put forward in the Burra Charter, parks managers recognized that park landscapes held multiple values including ecological, cultural, recreational, and education. Effective management needed to assess each of these values and make planning decisions that were supportive. With respect to cultural heritage values, the NPWS “undertook a number of ‘model’ cultural heritage assessments of protected areas that sought to integrate community/social, historical (including post-contact Aboriginal) and archaeological values, generally in a landscape context” (S. Brown, 2008, p. 20). From the early 2000s, such multi-value approaches were used in essentially all management plans. This can be seen, for example, in the plan of management for Mungo National Park (NPWS, 2006). Located nearly 900km west of Sydney in the southwest edge of New South Wales, Mungo National Park is a large tract of desert and bush land at the heart of the Willandra Lakes World Heritage Area, a system of several dry lakes. The area is well known for its ancient archaeology, such as the discovery of the Mungo Lady and Man, the two oldest ritual burials in the world, and a set of 20,000-year-old footprints. In addition, the area has been a place of great significance to the Ngyiampaa, Mutthi Mutthi, and Southern Paakantyi people for millennia. By drawing on a range of assessments, the management plan for the park aims to capture the breadth of value that exists in this area, highlighting the cultural heritage values, but also the biodiversity, recreation, research, and landscape values.

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• Key cultural heritage values include: o Continuous Aboriginal occupation for at least 40,000 years from the Pleistocene to present day o Contains evidence of traditional Aboriginal culture o Involvement of traditionally affiliated tribal groups in management o Has great spiritual significance for Paakantyi, Mutthi Mutthi and Ngyiampaa o Contains significant pastoral heritage values in the form of 19th century buildings and other infrastructure developed by early European settlers o Strong links from the pioneering pastoral era to present day lessees of surrounding properties

• Key landscape heritage values include: o Relict Pleistocene lake system o Record of past climate change and interactions between human societies and a changing natural environment o Example of salinity in landscape evolution o Palaeontological evidence - the Mungo Geomagnetic Excursion – evidence of significant changes in the earth’s magnetic field

• Key biodiversity values comprise: o Flora and fauna associations more typical of Victoria and South Australia than of other regions of NSW. o A high level of vegetation cover and integrity for the region. o Survival of rare and threatened species of flora and fauna

• Major recreation and tourism values include: o Camping and nature based tourism opportunities for private parties and commercial tour groups. o Outstanding opportunities for educational tourism centred on unique world heritage values o Regionally significant landscape values such as the Mungo lake bed and the Walls of China o Opportunities for contemplation and spiritual experience

• Research and educational values: o Landscape and natural resource evolution and human response to same o Human physical and cultural evolution o Study of present ecosystem dynamics o Endangered species management o Insights into contemporary aspirations and culture o Opportunity to educate the wider community in scientific methodology in various fields and the management application of that information

Figure 11: Values of the area, Mungo National Park (NPWS, 2006, p. 8-9)

Finally, alongside the growing emphasis on landscape and multiple values, another major shift that occurred in the 1990s was a move to address the chronic underfunding of historic heritage conservation. The turning point on this issue came with the introduction of the Historic Asset Maintenance Program. This program was an annual $2 million allocation for the maintenance and conservation of cultural heritage within the NPWS protected area system.

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Although modest when compared to the potential maintenance and conservation needs of cultural resources, the creation of a dedicated funding stream ensured that some money would be directed away from natural heritage programs. Moreover, in 1999, the NPWS decided to tie this funding to the creation and implementation of conservation management plans, which laid out broader conservation goals, further shaping and emphasizing the importance of these resources (Ford, 2009, p. 37). With an acceptance and embrace of its enlarged responsibility toward cultural heritage, the NPWS from the early 2000s to the present has embarked on a sustained effort to refine and better integrate cultural resource management into its operations. As already discussed, a big component of this was the move to encourage a cultural landscape approach to park management, but there were several other structural changes over this period that have influenced management. Under its current structure, at an operational level the Parks and Wildlife Group (hereafter referred to as NPWS for consistency) manages cultural heritage in a relatively defined manner. As noted before, the starting point for managing cultural heritage resources is through effective assessment and integration with the Plan of Management, or alternatively in a Statement of Management Intent, which serves as an interim document before a more comprehensive POM is developed. Using the cultural landscape framework and a multi- value assessment process, park managers can identify, assess, and plan for the conservation of cultural heritage resources and values. In addition to the overarching planning process, all known cultural heritage resources managed by OEH are contained on the Historic Heritage Information Management System (HHIMS), currently over 10000 heritage items and sites, which is managed by the CHD. The items and sites that are included on this inventory are varied, including 15 formal ‘historic sites’ that were acquired specifically as such, as well as thousands of significant historic places and items. The vast majority of listings on the inventory, therefore, were not deliberately acquired, but instead were simply a part of the land base that was acquired and originally valued for its natural heritage. Overlapping this register of historic sites and places of historic significance are the two additional levels of recognition, the state and national heritage registers, which are important because they have additional management implications for the NPWS. Inclusion on the National Heritage List does not provide strong legal protection, but does recognize and draw attention to

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“places of outstanding heritage significance” (Ford, 2009, p. 47). In contrast, listing on the State Heritage Register has a strong protective requirement, providing legal protection to a site, making the site eligible for financial support from the Heritage Council, and compelling the NPWS to develop a conservation management plan (CMP) for each site. A CMP “provides a framework to facilitate decision-making” about a site by detailing the significance of items and places setting out guidelines for conservation and management, including interpretation, recreation, and tourism (NPWS, 2018). In situations where little or no major work is proposed, or where the CMP is unlikely to be controversial, the NPWS can approve the plan. In other situations, the plans need to be approved by the Heritage Council. The benefit of a dedicated CMP over the more general POM is that it provides more in-depth detail about a site and how it is to be managed. Normally, a CMP is aligned with the POM, further articulating and refining the broad objectives placed by the overall plan, however, the additional study and review by cultural heritage experts can also reshape the overall plan. Mimosa Rocks National Park provides a useful example of this possibility. Mimosa Rocks is a large coastal park encompassing a variety of forest, lagoons, islands, and shoreline in the southeast corner of NSW. Although primarily reserved for its natural heritage, the park contains several cultural heritage resources including remnants of early settler communities, Aboriginal relics, and twentieth century vacation properties. One of these vacation areas, a 220-hectare piece of land known as the Penders Precinct, was donated to the government in 1976 when the park was being created. Along with a second private donation, this property was critical in establishing the core area of the park. However, one of the stipulations of the donation was that the owner retained usage of a 20-hectare area for a vacation retreat. In 2011, when the lease on this 20-hectare area expired, the NPWS took control of the property, which included several buildings and structures that had been designed by the owner, the prominent architect Sir Roy Grounds. Given the changing circumstance, the NPWS undertook a review of the existing POM. The resulting POM (OEH, 2011) laid out several policies and actions, including a plan for the reuse or destruction of the various structures on the Penders properties. Of note were recommendations for the: 1. Ongoing conservation of the “Barn” and investigation into the financial viability of its adaptive re-use as paid holiday accommodation. If shown not to be viable, adaptive re-use of the structure as the key interpretive node for the site.

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2. Adaptive re-use of the Myer House, and supporting infrastructure such as the tennis court, as paid holiday accommodation pending the findings of a feasibility study… 3. The site of the two buildings to be adequately secured, with a preference for an on-site presence. 4. The site to be made available at fixed times each year for use by community groups. 5. Recording followed by removal of all other built structures, with building foundations retained for interpretive purposes. 6. Breaching and rehabilitation of the existing dams without cultural significance unless breaching will result in the creation of unacceptable environmental disturbance, in which case these will be retained as will any dams required for management purposes. 7. Allowing the golf course to naturally revegetate. 8. Recording and removal of the gardens and orchards; and recording and interpretation of remaining miscellaneous items. (Urbis Pty Ltd, 2011, p. vii) Following the release of this plan, the park managers commissioned the feasibility study called for in these recommendations and a review/update of the existing CMP for the park. The resulting CMP challenged the existing POM on a number of matters, recommending a different course of action. For example, the 2011 CMP was concerned with the recommended recording and destruction of many of the structures at the site, arguing that many of them were significant cultural heritage resources. Instead of destroying the structures, this plan called for the “conservation and/or adaptive re-use of the Geodesic Dome, Covered Orchard, Main Dam, Shed/Bathroom Pod, Windmill Tower remains, slab seats and the former timber Treatment Plant (if there are no contamination issues), and to ensure controlled use of the interior of ‘The Barn’ with interpretation to be provided external to the building” (Urbis Pty Ltd, 2011, p. viii). These recommendations were subsequently accepted by the department and the POM was amended to reflect these changes. What this example demonstrates is the value of additional planning and assessment for cultural heritage resources and the way that the CMP can provide greater detail and reflection on overall park management objectives. Taken together POMs, CMPs, the various Registers and their legislated protection measures, and general departmental policies and guidelines, such as the Cultural Landscape Guidelines for the Australian Alps National Parks, amount to a comprehensive framework for cultural heritage management within the parks system of the NPWS. However, so far this discussion has focused

112 113 primarily on what the NPWS labels ‘historic heritage,’ that is the cultural heritage that is created by and associated with non-Aboriginal groups. Therefore, as a final component of this review, it is necessary to examine the way in which Aboriginal cultural heritage is incorporated into this framework. The reason that Aboriginal cultural heritage is dealt with separately here is because Aboriginal cultural heritage, traditionally, has been dealt with by the NPWS as a separate matter. Moreover, the NPWS’s responsibilities to Aboriginal cultural heritage, unlike ‘historic’ non- Aboriginal heritage, are not limited to properties owned and managed by the service. Therefore, the changes around approach do not line up directly with the wider approach to cultural resource management discussed above. Originally, the NPW Act of 1967 did not include any reference to Aboriginal heritage. However, it soon became apparent that such recognition was necessary, resulting in the inclusion of Aboriginal ‘relics’ as a management responsibility for the department, and the addition of archaeological staff members. The NPWS, therefore, was mandated with the protection of Aboriginal heritage across the entire territory of NSW, not only on property owned or managed by the department. As in many places around the world at this time, rules were put in place to regulate development and require archaeological survey work, as well as mitigation or compensation. It quickly became apparent yet again that this archaeological approach was inadequate to deal with the diversity and continuing importance of Aboriginal heritage. Therefore, in 1974, further amendments were made to the NPW Act to enable the NPWS to “protect sites and areas of particular traditional significance to Aborigines by gazetting them as Aboriginal Places” (NPWS Annual report, 1975, p14, quoted in Ford, 2009, p. 12). The acknowledgement of Aboriginal places of significance marked a shift away from the traditional approach to ‘relics’ which saw this heritage as evidence of a vanished or ancient way of life. Instead, working with Aboriginal communities to identify, protect, and manage places of significance through programs such as the NSW Sites of Significance Survey, which ran in the 1970s, allowed staff in the NPWS to begin taking account of a wider range of places. Through the 1980s and 1990s, the structural approach to Aboriginal cultural heritage conservation remained mostly the same, but as the conservation community became more aware of, respectful toward, and ready to recognize Aboriginal worldviews and conceptions of significance and value, concern for these matters

113 114 began to permeate more widely. This is most apparent in the work around cultural landscapes, which was in large part a response to calls from Aboriginal communities for mechanisms that acknowledged their understanding of the world as an intertwining of the human and natural. This understanding is often captured in Australia through the use of the term country to describe the landscape. Country, in this sense, is the land as it is perceived and experienced by Aboriginal peoples through deep cultural and spiritual relationships and attachments. At present, Aboriginal cultural heritage in NSW is managed by the Cultural Heritage Division of OEH. While this management has always been done in accordance with the NPW Act, since 1997 the department has also published standards and guidelines to ensure that work with Aboriginal communities is undertaken with the greatest respect and in a way that is desired by those communities. The original NPWS Aboriginal Cultural Heritage Standards and Guidelines Kit (NPWS, 1997) was replaced in 2011 with the OEH Operational Policy: Protecting Aboriginal Cultural Heritage (OEH, 1997). This policy applies to management on all Crown lands in NSW including those owned and managed by OEH, such as parks and protected areas. In this policy, Aboriginal cultural heritage is defined as: • Aboriginal cultural heritage consists of places and objects that are of significance to Aboriginal people because of their traditions, observances, lore, customs, beliefs and history. It provides evidence of the lives and existence of Aboriginal people before European settlement through to the present. • Aboriginal cultural heritage is dynamic and may comprise physical (tangible) or non-physical (intangible) elements. It includes things made and used in traditional societies, such as stone tools, art sites and ceremonial or burial grounds. It also includes more contemporary and/or historical elements, such as old mission buildings, massacre sites and cemeteries. Tangible heritage is situated in a broader cultural landscape and needs to be considered in that context and in a holistic manner. • Aboriginal cultural heritage also relates to the connection and sense of belonging that people have with the landscape and with each other. For Aboriginal people, cultural heritage and cultural practices are part of both the past and the present and cultural heritage is kept alive and strong by being part of everyday life. • Aboriginal cultural heritage is not confined to sites. It also includes people’s memories, storylines, ceremonies, language and ‘ways of doing things’ that continue to enrich local knowledge about the cultural landscape. It involves teaching and educating younger generations. It is

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also about learning and looking after cultural traditions and places, and passing on knowledge. It is enduring but also changing. It is ancient but also new. • Aboriginal cultural heritage provides essential links between the past and present: it is an intrinsic part of Aboriginal people’s cultural identity, connection and sense of belonging to Country. The effective protection and conservation of this heritage is important in maintaining the identity, health and wellbeing of Aboriginal people. (OEH, 1997, p. 2)

In addition to clarifying the government’s approach to dealing with Aboriginal cultural heritage within the parks system itself, the NPWS has sought to give greater control over lands back to the communities. In 2004, the NPW Act was amended to allow for the establishment of cooperative management arrangements for national parks and conservation areas, which can fall under one of three tiers of arrangement: aboriginal-owned parks, crown-owned parks managed by a co-management board, or crown-owned parks with a co-management advisory structure (Leaman, 2014). Finally, with respect to the NSW protected areas, it is important to reiterate that a major component of the changes discussed previously, such as the embrace of multi-value assessments and a cultural landscape framework, was a desire to better acknowledge and manage the resources and values of Aboriginal communities. This desire was premised on an understanding of a “shared landscape” (Harrison, 2004), one that had significant value for a diverse range of groups. The challenge, then, was to find ways of conserving cultural heritage for all groups, but doing so with a great deal of awareness of the ways in which the conservation agenda has traditionally overlooked, misrepresented, and appropriated Aboriginal heritage. This has meant that there has been a distinct approach to Aboriginal cultural heritage, with particular policies and mechanisms, but also an effort to ensure that the entire cultural heritage framework for the parks system is able to identify and manage the range of resources and values that are present in the landscape. Looked at as a whole, the NPWS today has developed a sophisticated approach to addressing cultural heritage conservation within the parks system. This has meant drawing on advancements within the fields of both natural and cultural heritage conservation to refine processes. Initiatives such as staff training, multi-value assessments, landscape scale thinking, and an acknowledgement of the importance of all cultural heritage resources, not just those that are held

115 116 on registers or specifically acquired, have been propelled forward by strong cultural heritage legislation. Although structurally separated within the OEH today, the NPWS and CHD continue to work closely and an ongoing effort to further integrate heritage management ensures future innovation and advancement on this front.

United Kingdom Unlike Australia, the United Kingdom has a long history of dense human habitation. Evolving settlement patterns have led to the widespread exploitation of the land and natural resources, resulting in nearly the entire land base being subject to intensive human use for thousands of years. Currently England has a population of approximately 60 million, making it one of the most densely populated parts of Europe. Scotland, in contrast is less densely populated, with some remaining wild and remote landscapes, but even these are subject to regular use by multiple groups for agricultural and recreational purposes. In the UK, the impossibility of conserving areas of ‘wilderness’ or even large tracts of relatively untouched nature has required a different approach to natural heritage conservation. The protected area system that has developed in the UK is, therefore, one that is focused primarily on lived-in landscapes, areas that are important for a range of reasons beyond their ecological functions including their traditional land use patterns, biodiversity, history and archaeology, cultural significance, and recreation. Currently, the IUCN only recognizes two protected area management categories in the UK: IV (Managed Nature Reserves) and V (Protected Landscape/Seascapes), both of which are understood to include significant human presence (Phillips & Partington, 2005, p. 1119). The UK has been developing its approach to protected areas since the mid-twentieth century. However, each of the countries within the union have made somewhat different decisions along the way. The National Parks and Access to the Countryside Act, passed by England and Wales in 1949, provided the legal instrument for the subsequent establishment of the individual national parks, along with Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB). Scotland created legislation for Regional Parks in 1967 (Countryside (Scotland) Act 1967) and for National Scenic Areas in 1980. Only in 2000, did Scotland pass its own national parks act (National Parks (Scotland) Act 2000), which has subsequently led to the creation of two National Parks. At present, Northern Ireland has still not passed any national parks legislation, but it did adopt the AONB designation

116 117 in 1965 (Amenity Lands Act (Northern Ireland) 1965). Despite their varying designations, all of the protected areas share the characteristic of being lived-in landscapes. According to Phillips and Parrington, almost 300,000 people live in the UK’s National Parks (2005, p. 119). The majority of the land in the protected areas is owned privately, but there is also a portion of the parks that are owned by public or non-governmental organizations. Due to the higher profile, better resourcing, more robust policy, and greater availability of information, this review focuses on the National Parks system in the UK, rather than the local and regional parks, AONBs, or National Scenic Areas, which are legislatively weaker and have fewer policies and resources in place. In England and Wales, National Parks originally were conceived as entities falling under the control of local county councils (apart from the Peak and Lake Districts, which had their own planning boards). However, with amendments to the Environment Act (c. 25) in 1995, separate National Park Authorities (NPAs) were established and assigned statutory planning responsibilities, essentially becoming the formal planning authority for each National Park area. Therefore, today, “National Parks are a special kind of local authority, administered through a central/local government partnership, and subject to national guidance… [with power] to control land use, influence the management of land and water, and promote public understanding of the area and appropriate forms of recreation. For this, they are well resourced and receive nearly all their net funding from the central government (though they can ‘earn’ additional income through trading operations such as sales of books, maps and other merchandise in Visitor Centres; and through fees for processing planning applications as well as rentals or concessions)” (Phillips and Parrington, 121). As a result, the NPAs are required to prepare both a park management plan and a statutory local plan for the area within the national park boundaries. In addition to the establishment of NPAs, the Environment Act of 1995 revised the original 1949 legislation to identify two statutory purposes for National Parks in England and Wales: “(a) Conserve and enhance the natural beauty, wildlife and cultural heritage, and (b) promote opportunities for the understanding and enjoyment of the special qualities of the national parks by the public.” In carrying out these primary responsibilities, the NPAs also have a duty to foster the economic and social well-being of local communities within the National Parks (s. 62.1). If conflict between any of these purposes arises and cannot be resolved, the Act stipulates that priority is to be given to conservation (s. 62.2).

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In Scotland, the development of the National Parks (Scotland) Act in 2000 was viewed as an opportunity to create an innovative approach to managing parks. Keeping much of the same structure as in England and Wales, including the establishment of National Park Authorities and the priority of conservation over other objectives, the Scottish Act revised the statutory responsibilities for National Parks to: (a) conserve and enhance the natural and cultural heritage; (b) promote sustainable use of the natural resources; (c) promote understanding and enjoyment of the area’s special qualities; and (d) promote sustainable social and economic development of the area’s communities. (s. 1) The clear articulation and inclusion of sustainable use of natural resources and the promotion of development within National Parks, creates a more robust requirement for addressing these concerns. While they operate largely independently as local planning commissions, the National Park Authorities in England, Wales, and Scotland are overseen by national agencies including the Countryside Agency in England, the Countryside Council for Wales, and Scottish Natural Heritage. “These bodies play a major role in the establishment of protected areas… [and] also have continuing advisory, promotional and funding roles after the areas are set up, but they do not have a direct role in management” (Phillips and Parrington, 122). Cultural heritage, as reflected in the explicit statutory requirement for its conservation, is an integral aspect of National Parks in the UK. This inclusion is telling for the importance placed on cultural heritage within park settings, but is also reflective of the central place of cultural heritage in all UK land management legislation. As an old and intensively developed region, the UK has a great many historic structures and sites, which are held to be important by many individuals and groups, therefore it is unsurprising that the conservation of this historic fabric is a well- developed and prominent area of work. Much like the Australian system, the UK relies on a values-based approach to cultural heritage conservation, albeit with a more strongly materialist focus. Cultural heritage, according National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF), which sets out the UK Government’s objectives and policies for the historic environment, is made up of the “inherited assets which people identify and value,” which include such tangible entities as buildings, monuments, sites, areas, and landscapes (Ministry of Housing, Communities & Local Government, 2019, p. 67).

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Alternatively, the term heritage asset is sometimes replaced by the concept of historic places, which as Historic England’s Conservation Principles explain, “goes beyond physical form, to involve all the characteristics that can contribute to a ‘sense of place’. It embraces the idea that places, of any size from a bollard to a building, an historic area, a town, or a region, need to be understood and managed at different levels for different purposes; and that a particular geographical location can form part of several overlapping ‘places’ defined by different characteristics” (English Heritage, 2008, p. 14). Irrespective of the label, heritage assets or places exist within what is termed the historic environment. The historic environment is defined as: the physical evidence that we see, understand and feel for past human activity. It is the cultural product of human interaction with nature and the evidence of all past human activity. It includes sites, monuments, landscapes, buildings, settlements and intangible heritage, as well as our appreciation and perception of them. (Natural Resources Wales et al., 2015) One can see in these definitions the intertwined desire to recognize the material assets that make up cultural heritage, but also acknowledge and respect the immaterial attachments that make these important. In order to understand the importance of heritage assets and places, the conservation process in the UK focuses on the concepts of significance and value, whereby significance is the sum of all the heritage values attached to cultural heritage, whether it is an asset, place, or site. Conservation Principles acknowledges that people can value cultural heritage for many different reasons, but in order to support a systematic and generalizable approach it advocates grouping these values into four categories: evidential (the potential of a place to yield evidence about past human activity), historical (the ways in which past people, events and aspects of life can be connected through a place to the present - it tends to be illustrative or associative), aesthetic (the ways in which people draw sensory and intellectual stimulation from a place), and communal (the meanings of a place for the people who relate to it, or for whom it figures in their collective experience or memory) (English Heritage, 2008, pp. 27–32). Similarly, the NPFF notes that significance emerges from an asset’s ‘heritage interest,’ which may be archaeological, architectural, artistic, or historic (Ministry of Housing, Communities & Local Government, 2019, p. 71). Finally, once significance is established, the goal becomes to conserve the heritage asset or place in a manner that is in keeping with the standards set out by national professional organizations such as Historic England.

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Given that National Parks in the UK extend across large tracts of land and encompass countless heritage assets and places, the challenge is not how to conserve any specific element of the historic environment, a matter for which there is a great deal of experience and expertise. Instead, the issue is how to effectively integrate cultural heritage considerations into the large- scale management processes. This challenge is complicated further by the fact that National Parks are required to implement their agenda on lived-in and working landscapes. Given that these are landscapes with ongoing use, their cultural heritage is not only made up of the tangible evidence of culture on the landscape, archaeological sites, historic building, and field patterns, and the associated value with these assets, but also the means of livelihood of the local populations, which often involves traditional foods and arts and crafts that have strong cultural connotations. As a recent brochure explains: The United Kingdom’s National Parks are amongst its finest and most treasured landscapes, rightly recognised for their tranquillity, special wildlife and unique habitats. They are also cultural landscapes, shaped by human activity over thousands of years. These living, working landscapes have, in turn, influenced local and national identity, inspiring writers, poets and artists and contributing significantly to the nation’s rich cultural legacy. (National Parks England, 2018) Managing this complex, multifaced historic environment, then, has been one of the big challenges for the UK National Parks. This management challenge has been undertaken through a range of responses, but two areas deserve specific exploration: the adoption of a range of innovative tools and the development of a strong planning framework designed to acknowledge and conserve the historic environment. One of the effective tools for integrating cultural heritage information in regional planning processes has come from English Heritage, which is the national agency dedicated to protecting and promoting cultural heritage in England. Since 1994, English Heritage has been advancing a program of historic landscape characterisation (HLC), which is a GIS, map-based survey of entire regions aimed at preserving the “landscape character” of the English countryside. It uses a desk-based review of existing survey data, contemporary and historical aerial photography, and historical research, combined with field proofing exercises, to develop detailed cartographic data layers that show historic resources and land patterns (Dobson & Selman, 2012; Fairclough, 2008; Fairclough & Herring, 2016).

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Focusing on regions with multiple values, rather than areas of outstanding universal value like those covered by the World Heritage Program, the HLC program’s central aims “are to increase understanding, and to use landscape as a vehicle to bring together disconnected information and different disciplines.” Doing so “teaches a great deal about the historic depth of the present-day landscape, and equally important it puts this into formats that are more accessible to other landscape disciplines.” In addition, it demonstrates the wider meaning of landscapes and shows how the patterns of change and survival, those very human processes, make landscapes work (2008, p. 418). Seeing cultural heritage from this kind of landscape perspective insists that one view it not as a collection of static cultural resources, that exist independently of one another, but as an ongoing process whereby humans and the material/natural world are continually interacting. This attitude shifts the goals of management away from a focus on preventing change to learning how to manage it and live with it. Therefore, landscape character, which is such an important aspect of the overall cultural heritage of an area, cannot simply be held in stasis, but needs to be continually supported and adapted through appropriate land use decisions, along with effective conservation of historic resources themselves. HLC is an effective tool for supporting these types of complex decisions. However, HLC can, quite fairly, be criticized for its inherent simplification of complex, dynamic landscapes for the purposes of effective communication (Caquard & Cartwright, 2014). Nevertheless, the HLC remains one of the most robust attempts around the world to integrate cultural heritage data into existing planning systems, both in parks and beyond. While English Heritage has been the primary driver of the HLC program, the approach has also been transferred to Scotland and Wales (Millican et al., 2017). For National Parks in the UK, this tool is particularly important because it provide an essential foundation to guide ongoing conservation work across the entire landscape and to seek balance between the varied requirements placed upon them. Apart from an innovative tool such as the HLC, the UK National Parks approach to managing the historic environment also has focused on clear planning and policy documents. Since 1995, there has been a Joint Statement on the Historic Environment in the National Parks that has committed the oversight agencies, as well as the National Park Authorities, to a course of action for cultural heritage. This Statement has been reviewed and updated on a five-year cycle with the most recent being published in 2015 (Natural Resources Wales et al., 2015). In general terms the Statement commits the signatory parties to working collaboratively to ensure that the historic

121 122 environment is effectively studied, conserved, and promoted, striving for the highest professional standards (see box for details). Although lacking in detail on how the work will be undertaken, a high-level commitment such as this goes a long way toward increasing awareness of and consideration for the historic environment. Individually, the National Parks rely on a hierarchical set of planning documents starting with an overall management plan, which sets out a vision for future work and identifies overarching objectives and actions to achieve the statutory purposes and duty. Supporting this management plan are a series of detailed plans addressing various components of the management agenda, including cultural heritage, which are prepared by dedicated staff teams. The Peak District National Park offers a useful example of how this system works. The Peak District National Park, established in 1951, is the oldest national park in the UK. It is situated close to the middle of the country to the southeast of Manchester. Through the medieval and early modern eras, it was primarily an agricultural landscape dedicated to upland pasture holdings for sheep and other livestock. With the industrial revolution, the area became increasingly important for mining and quarrying, both of which have since declined. Today, the area is modestly populated with only one town within the park boundaries. The current Cultural Heritage Strategy (Peak District National Park Authority, n.d) was published in the mid-2000s and lays out a detailed action plan based around seven overall objectives. These goals are illustrative of the breadth of the approach to cultural heritage conservation, tying these considerations to a wide range of park work including biodiversity conservation, interpretation, economic development, and tourism. Take, for example, the first overall objective, which is “to develop an integrated approach to the sustainable management of the cultural heritage of the Peak District National Park, to be reflected in the strategic and other policy documents and actions of the National Park Authority and other partner and stakeholder organisations.” For this overall objective, a list of specific objectives is provided, which reads as a checklist of actionable, achievable steps to make this goal a reality. Moreover, each of these specific objectives is then broken down into a set of required actions, responsibilities, timeline, desired output, and final outcome (Figure 12). Such a detailed planning exercise allows for efficient and effective review and monitoring of the plan.

122 CULTURAL HERITAGE STRATEGY PART 2 123 ACTION PLAN 1. STRATEGIES Overall objective: to develop an integrated approach to the sustainable management of the cultural heritage of the Peak District National Park, to be reﬂected in the strategic and other policy documents and actions of the National Park Authority and other partner and stakeholder organisations.

Objective 1.1 Provide input to the development and implementation of all Authority and partner/stakeholder strategic and other documents and initiatives to ensure that the sustainable management of the cultural heritage of the National Park, and its contribution to social, economic and environmental development, is taken appropriately into account.

Action Required Lead / partners Timescale / milestones Output Outcome

(a) Ensure that the full PDNPA, EH, Govt Depts, 2006-07 and beyond (inc. NPA and others’ Sustainable management range of cultural heritage Govt Offices, RAs, EA, Nat Park Mgt Plan, LDF, LAAs policies fully reflect of the cultural heritage duties, responsibilities and RDAs, SSPs, LSPs, statutory etc) issues addressed in the firmly embedded in a wide opportunities under the undertakers, LAs, highway Environment Act 1995 range of policies, ensuring Environment Act 1995 (esp. authorities, stakeholders and other legislation, less damage to the cultural Secs. 61 & 62) and other and others guidance and advice heritage as a result legislation and guidance are taken into account in policy development and implementation

(b) Liaison with PDNPA PDNPA, EH, constituent 2006-07 onwards, inc NPMP, All appropriate NPA Sound NPA policy base for Policy and Partnerships, LAs, Trusts, DCMS, DCLG, LDF, SPDs, Promoting policies, strategies, sustainable management of Development Control and Govt Offices, RAs, SSPs, Understanding Strategy etc. guidance etc. reflect the cultural heritage of the other appropriate Teams/ LSPs the importance of PDNP, ensuring less damage Services the cultural heritage; to the cultural heritage production of as a result, e.g. reflecting appropriate cultural Government guidance heritage SPDs embodied in PPS 7

(c) Ensure that all PDNPA, EH, constituent LAs, 2006 onwards All sustainability Sustainable management sustainability initiatives and RAs, Govt Ofﬁces, SSPs, LSPs appraisals take of the cultural heritage appraisals take the cultural appropriate account of resulting in reduced heritage into account potential impacts on the damaging impact on the cultural heritage cultural heritage

(d) Ensure that the PDNPA, Defra, EH, LAs 2006 and annually thereafter Importance of the Enhanced positive cultural heritage appears cultural heritage management of the appropriately in future BVPP recognised through cultural heritage as a result corporate priorities BVPP corporate of implementing BVPP priorities corporate priorities

(e) Ensure that all PDNPA PDNPA, LAs, statutory 2006 onwards PDNPA and others Cultural heritage assets and others’ property/asset undertakers, stakeholders demonstrate best recognised and valued and management plans take practice in dealing with receiving high levels of account of the cultural the cultural heritage conservation management heritage through property/asset through property/asset management management plans

Figure 12: Actions for objective 1.1, Peak District National Park Cultural Heritage Strategy (Peak District National Park Authority, n.d, p. 132).

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Although only one example, the Peak District does provide a characteristic case for how cultural heritage conservation considerations have been incorporated into the UK National Parks system. The strong approach to conservation that can be found across this system has been achieved through the combination of a well-developed national heritage conservation program, innovative tools for landscape scale land-use planning, an embrace of ongoing land-based cultural traditions, and detailed overall planning frameworks. As the UK’s National Park system overlays a land base that is in active and continually in use by a range of groups, the integration of cultural heritage conservation into parks management has not only been challenged by the need to balance competing natural and cultural conservation goals, but also the demands of ensuring sustainable livelihoods. In both the UK and Scotland, where parks legislation stresses the importance of social and economic well-being, parks have been forced to grapple with understanding how to make cultural heritage ‘work’ to support the populations who live within park boundaries. This ongoing conceptual and practical challenge has placed UK National Parks at the forefront of an evolving conversation about the role of cultural heritage in sustainable development and offers a robust example of how integrating these considerations into large-scale planning can support broader aims and outcomes.

Parks Canada In 1911, with the passage of the Dominion Forest Reserves and Parks Act (later replaced by the National Parks Act 1930), Canada established the world’s first national parks service. From its beginnings as a small collection of parks in the Rocky Mountains, the Canadian national park system has since grown into a national network encompassing 39 National Parks, 8 National Park Reserves, 3 National Marine Conservation Areas, and 2 National Marine Conservation Area Reserves (Parks Canada, 2018a, 2019). In addition, since 1914 the original act was amended to included places with significant historical ties, which were commemorated as National historic sites (Lothian, 1976). Today, the system of national parks, reserves, and historic sites exists under the auspices of the Parks Canada Agency, an arms-length agency created by the federal government in 1998 with the Parks Canada Agency Act. This effectively separated what had been a department within various federal ministries over the previous century. The Parks Canada Agency Act established the agency with a mandate to meet the requirements of two foundational pieces of legislation, the Canadian National Parks Act (2000) and the Historic Sites and Monuments Act

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(originally passed in 1953, but amended in 1985), as well as several other specific pieces of legislation, such as the Saguenay-St. Lawrence Marine Park Act 1997 and the Heritage Railway Stations Protection Act 1985. The Canadian National Parks Act provides the federal government with the legislative authority to create national parks and reserves, something that has existed since 1911, either as an Order-in-Council or in the previous version of the act. In 1988, amendments had been made to the act to insert strong preservationist language that ensured natural heritage conservation was the top priority for national parks. This was a response to a long-standing debate around the dual mandate of Canada’s national parks, one that called for both use and conservation (C. Campbell, 2011; J. Marsh & Hodgins, 1997). As the original National Parks Act of 1930 had stated, “parks shall be maintained and made use of so as to leave them unimpaired for the enjoyment of future generations” (s. 4.). This mixed mandate resulted in an oscillating focus within Parks Canada over the past century as different political and managerial priorities shifted the emphasis between developing visitor services, such as ski hills, golf courses, and other recreational infrastructure, and preserving ecosystems. The Canadian National Parks Act retained this dual mandate as the central purpose for parks but also placed ‘ecological integrity’ as the top priority. The concept of ecological integrity was originally conceived and used in the 1980s in response to debates around the inadequacy of ‘nature’ as a baseline for conservation work. Striving to return an ecosystem to its ‘natural’ state, it was argued, overlooked and deleted the history, as well as ongoing existence, of human impacts and relationships with the natural world (Woodley, 2010). The Canadian National Parks Act defines ecological integrity as the “condition that is determined to be characteristic of its natural region and likely to persist, including abiotic components and the composition and abundance of native species and biological communities, rates of change and supporting processes” (s. 2(1)). Since its adoption as the central priority for national parks, ecological integrity has become a key management tool, guiding policy and planning decisions throughout the park system. Apart from the inclusion of ecological integrity, the Canadian National Parks Act lays out clear regulations and allowances for parks, as well as managerial obligations including the development of management plans. As the act states, the Minister shall, within five years after a park is established, prepare a management plan for the park containing a long-term ecological vision for the park, a set of ecological integrity objectives and indicators and provisions for

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resource protection and restoration, zoning, visitor use, public awareness and performance evaluation. (s.11 (1)) What is important to note for the purposes of this review is that unlike the Australian or UK parks legislation, the Canadian National Parks Act does not have a legislative requirement for national parks to conserve cultural heritage resources, nor to include these in a management plan for any park. Instead, the designation and conservation of cultural heritage is addressed by separate legislation, which the Parks Canada Agency is also tasked with administering. Since 1919, the Historic Sites and Monuments Board of Canada (HSMBC) has met to provide recommendations to the government on the designation of nationally significant historic places. In 1953, this arrangement, which had been operating under an Order-in-Council, was formalized with the passage of the Historic Sites and Monuments Act. The 1953 act clarified the role of the board and gave the minister statutory responsibility for developing and carrying out a commemoration process for each place, which has included the creation and maintenance of an inventory and the placement of plaques at each location (Lothian, 1976). Since designated places are not necessarily owned by the government, the act does not provide any statutory protection for nationally designated historic places. However, it does require the minister, at least, to make arrangements with the owners of a place to ensure commemoration and encourage proper care of the place. In addition, the act gives the minister power to acquire any historic place and, if acquired, be held responsible for the administration, preservation, and maintenance of that place. Once designated by the minister all historic places become known as National historic sites. Although Parks Canada provides professional and administrative services to support the work of the HSMBC, for the purposes of this review, the management of national historic sites (with a few exceptions of overlapping designation) will not be addressed. Instead, the focus is on how cultural heritage is managed within national parks and reserves. Of course, since Parks Canada is responsible for overseeing both of these programs there is a great deal of overlap, particularly as it relates to overarching policy. As the Parks Canada Agency Act stipulates, the agency is meant: • to protect the nationally significant examples of Canada’s natural and cultural heritage in national parks, national historic sites, national marine conservation areas and related heritage areas in view of their special role in the lives of Canadians and the fabric of the nation, • to present that heritage through interpretive and educational programs for public understanding, appreciation and enjoyment, both for international visitors and the Canadian public, thereby enhancing pride,

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encouraging stewardship and giving expression to our identity as Canadians, These elements of the mandate are important to highlight for the ways in which it addresses the limitations of the other pieces of legislation. Specifically, for the purpose of this review, the act mandates that Parks Canada protect and present both “natural and cultural heritage” in all designated areas. Therefore, although there is no legislative requirement in the Canadian National Parks Act for consideration of cultural heritage, the agency itself is required to look at both natural and cultural heritage in an integrated manner. Today, how this mandate is achieved is addressed through several policies, including the 1994 Guiding Principles and Operational Policies (Parks Canada, 1994) and the recently updated Cultural Resource Management Policy (Parks Canada, 2013). The Guiding Principles and Operational Policies develops an overall conceptual framework for understanding Parks Canada’s assets and lays out the essential philosophy that is to direct action within the system. First, the framework begins from a premise that Parks Canada manages a collection of protected heritage places, which includes national parks, national historic sites, and national park reserves. This language is useful because it allows Parks Canada to commit to an integrated vision of nature and culture, where all units in the system, whether they are National historic sites or National parks, to be treated similarly. As one of the ten guiding principles, entitled ‘Human- environment relationship,’ explains, …though a distinction is often made between places that are of cultural heritage significance and places of natural heritage significance, people and their environment cannot be separated. Therefore, protection and presentation of natural areas recognize the ways in which people have lived within particular environments. Likewise, efforts to protect and present historic places recognize where biophysical factors have been influential in Canada's development and history(Parks Canada, 1994, pp. 17–18). It is further recognized that “in addition to their natural features, many national parks contain areas which have cultural and historic significance” that are to be managed according to the Cultural Resource Management (CRM) Policy, as discussed below (p. 24). One of the central mechanisms for achieving all the objectives detailed for the agency are park management plans. As noted already, management plans are required for every park in the system. The intent of these documents, the guidelines argue, is to serve as essential direction for park managers, but also important “commitments to the public… regarding the use and protection of national parks.” In addition to important background and contextual information,

127 128 management plans primarily focus on statements of management objectives that “specify the type and degree of resource protection and management needed to assure the ecological integrity of the park and the management of its cultural resources (Parks Canada, 1994, p. 29). These objectives, then, provide the foundation for decision making throughout a park. To supplement the Guiding Principles and Operational Policies, the CRM Policy provides specific detail on how cultural resources are to be managed across the system of protected heritage places. This policy reaffirms the importance of an integrated and holistic approach to the management of cultural resources and lays out a detailed, yet succinct process for CRM. Much like the Australian system, effective CRM for Parks Canada is, at its core, “based on knowing the heritage value of cultural resources and taking this value into consideration in all actions that can affect them (s. 3). Of course, achieving this goal is somewhat more complex. The starting point for implementation is to provide a clear articulation of what is covered under the policy and how these resources are to be conserved. First, the policy explains that a cultural resource is “a human work, an object, or a place that is determined, on the basis of its heritage value, to be directly associated with an important aspect or aspects of human history and culture” (s. 5). Within the park system, and within national parks themselves, there are two categories of cultural resource (a) cultural resources of national historic significance, which are those “that have a direct relationship with the reasons for designation of a national historic site;” and (b) cultural resources of other heritage value, those “that do not have a direct relationship with the reasons for designation of a national historic site but that relate to important aspects of the human history or cultural significance of a Parks Canada protected heritage place” (s. 5). According to these definitions, regardless of category, a cultural resource must have heritage value, which is defined as “the aesthetic, historic, scientific, cultural, social or spiritual importance or significance for past, present or future generations” (s. 5). The heritage value of a cultural resource is, furthermore, embodied in its character-defining elements, which are “the materials, forms, location, spatial configurations, uses and cultural associations or meanings that embody the heritage value of a cultural resource, which must be retained to preserve that value” (s. 5). In brief, what this means is that within any given national park there are cultural resources, and these resources can be associated with either a national historic site, if such a designated place exists within a park, or more broadly with human history. Regardless,

128 129 each of these resources has heritage value, which is made visible by its character-defining elements. For cultural resources associated with a national historic site, the guiding principle for all actions with respect to that site is commemorative integrity, which “refers to the condition or state of a national historic site when the site has retained the heritage value for which it was designated.” Such a state is achieved when: 1. the resources directly related to the reasons for designation as a national historic site are not impaired or under threat; 2. the reasons for designation as a national historic site are effectively communicated to the public; 3. the site’s heritage values (including those not related to the reasons for designation as a national historic site) are respected in all decisions and actions affecting the site. (s. 5) For other cultural resources, decisions are made based on detailed interdisciplinary research and understanding, with an emphasis on the interests and values of Indigenous communities, but there is no end goal, like commemorative integrity, toward which to work. Based on these foundational ideas, the approach put forward by the CRM Policy focuses on identification through evaluation, setting priorities, conservation, assessment of impacts of interventions, monitoring and keeping records and documentation, as well as considerations for sharing heritage values. First, in order to be considered a cultural resource, a process of identification and evaluation must be undertaken to ensure that a given resource has enough heritage value to be included. This process is laid out in the Parks Canada guide Identifying Cultural Resources through Evaluation (s. 7.1.1). Within a national park, and outside of places designated as national historic sites, cultural resource identification and evaluation tends to occur in a reactionary, site-specific manner when it is required due to one of several circumstances. Either “an intervention or an activity is planned that could adversely affect a resource that may have heritage value, there is accidental discovery of resources during an intervention; or there is evidence that a resource that may have heritage value may be adversely affected by human or natural processes” (s. 7.1.3). Alternatively, identification and evaluation work can be undertaken proactively at a broad scale to identify cultural resources that contribute to the heritage value of an entire protected heritage area. There are several reasons why this may be done, including the belief that this type of study will help to meet the overall management objectives, for example by supporting cooperative management agreements with Indigenous peoples or providing

129 130 information for more diverse visitor experience programming (s. 7.1.3). When a study of the cultural resources within an entire park area is done it results in a document known as a Cultural Resource Values Statement (CRVS). A CRVS, according to the CRM Policy is meant to include: a) definition of the overall heritage value of the place, related to its human history; b) identification of the cultural resources that convey this heritage value and assist with the selective identification of cultural resources in the future; c) reference to the values and cultural resources of a national historic site, if one is included in the boundaries of the protected heritage place; d) essential information to support the sustainable conservation of these cultural resources by identifying their heritage value and character-defining elements. CRVSs are a new idea, only coming into effect with the adoption of the revised 2013 CRM Policy, and as such have not been widely implemented. There are, however, a few examples for existing national parks. Terra Nova national park, located on the east coast of Newfoundland, recently completed one of the few CRVSs in the country. This document provides a detailed historical context for the park and then aims to highlight overall heritage values for the park territory. The values that are listed include human influences, Indigenous activities, fishery activities, forest-related activities, and nature and recreation activities, all of which fit poorly into the definition of heritage values put forward in the CRM Policy. The CRVS then moves onto a description of known cultural resources, providing a brief description, a summary of heritage values, and a list of character-defining elements. These resources are grouped into the larger categories (landscapes, archaeological sites, objects, etc.) that are used in the Standards and Guidelines. For example, under landscapes, an historic cemetery that is located within the park is listed, being noted as of heritage value for its “cultural and spiritual significance as the resting place of inhabitants of Minchin Cove.” This place is characterized by such elements as “the presence of human burials” and “the setting of the cemetery within a clearing in the forest” (s. 7.1.1.1-2). As it is not required by the CRM Policy, there are no specific recommendations for how to manage each of these resources. The document does end with a short list of key messages for communicating the heritage value of the park to the public, but again there are no actionable recommendations for how this is to be achieved. What this example highlights is that while the concept behind the CRVS is valuable, in practice, the documents are little more than an inventory of cultural resources within a park and the hard work of integrating this information

130 131 into management remains to be done. Fortunately, for this task, there is a general process put forward in the CRM Policy. Once cultural resources are identified and evaluated, decisions regarding their management must be made. The CRM Policy calls for a three-step process to management that begins with setting priorities. Setting priorities aims to ensure “that the cultural resources that convey the heritage value of Parks Canada’s protected heritage places are conserved for the benefit and appreciation of present and future generations.” Moreover, priorities help to “determine which cultural resources will be maintained, will receive conservation treatment, will be monitored regularly and will be included in the visitor experience and external relations programs and activities of the place” (s. 7.2.1). In order to help managers make decisions about priorities, the CRM Policy provides a tool in the appendix with a set of four criteria to consider when determining importance. Once cultural resources are identified, evaluated, and prioritized the next steps deal with the practical management of cultural resources including conservation, assessing impacts from other actions, and monitoring. Conservation, the policy states must follow recognized conservation standards as articulated in the Standards and Guidelines for the Conservation of Historic Places in Canada (Parks Canada, 2010), that take into consideration heritage values and strive to protect character-defining elements. Apart from actions that are directly applied to conserve a cultural resource, managers must also consider how broader interventions, such as new infrastructure development within parks and even adjacent developments, will impact the heritage value of resources. For example, replacing a guard rail or widening a road in a national park may negatively impact on the sight lines and viewscapes that were intended with the original road design. Therefore, managers must take into consideration the value of these views and strive to mitigate adverse effects. Finally, the condition of cultural resources must be monitored to provide “the necessary information to make informed decisions in support of Parks Canada objectives to maintain or improve the condition of cultural resources, to assess the outcomes of management actions and investments against heritage conservation objectives, and to communicate the state of cultural resources to decision-makers and Canadians” (s.7.2.4). How this monitoring process unfolds is guided by a standard approach for Parks Canada that is laid out in the Guidelines for Monitoring the Condition of Cultural Resources (Parks Canada, n.d).

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In addition to the CRM Policy, there are two further developments within Parks Canada that deserve attention for the way in which they impact and guide the conservation of cultural resources. First, is the growing emphasis on recognizing and addressing the needs and values of Indigenous peoples. Throughout the history of Canada’s national park system, the primary position toward Indigenous peoples has been one of neglect and outright exclusion. In the earliest parks such as Banff and Riding Mountain, local Indigenous peoples were forcibly evicted from the territory in order to return the ecosystems to a ‘natural’ state (C. Mason, 2014; Sandlos, 2008). However, this approach has obviously given way to something far different. Today, the approach taken by Parks Canada is based on reconciliation, insuring full, respectful, and ongoing engagement with Indigenous communities and recognizing the unique relationship these groups have with the land. Concern with reconciliation is, of course, much broader than simply conserving cultural resources. Work in this respect is linked to several areas of focus within Parks Canada and beyond, including targets around health outcomes, economic development, ecosystem protection, fulfilling legal treaty obligations, and capacity development. However, when working toward reconciliation, Parks Canada has come to recognize that it is impossible to separate issues around cultural heritage from broader social concerns and the overall well-being of the land. For Indigenous communities, cultural heritage is deeply intertwined with the management, use, and stewardship of ecological resources, remaining on the land and practicing traditional livelihoods and skills is essential for cultural continuity. Recognizing the nature of these relationships, Parks Canada has sought to affirm the rights of Canada’s Indigenous peoples and integrate the needs of these communities into all aspects of parks establishment and management. This effort begins with inclusion during the park establishment process and respect for the legal obligations defined through treaties and other agreements. As the Guiding Principles and Operational Policies state: “when establishing new national parks or reserves, and national marine conservation areas, or acquiring national historic sites, Parks Canada works within Canada's legal and policy framework regarding Aboriginal peoples' rights, as recognized and affirmed by Section 35 of the Constitution Act, 1982. Accordingly, Parks Canada will consult with affected Aboriginal communities at the time of new park establishment and historic site acquisition, or as part of an Aboriginal land claim settlement” (Parks Canada, 1994, p. 15). Moreover, once established, the Guidelines stipulate that the exercise of Aboriginal or treaty

132 133 rights must be respected, which means that in some national parks “traditional activities by Aboriginal peoples will continue as a result of rights defined by land claim agreements and treaties, or by specific agreements negotiated during the process of park establishment” (p. 24). To ensure that treaty rights and the obligations arising from other agreements are met, Parks Canada has taken several steps, which are pursued in a dedicated manner by the Indigenous Affairs Branch. The first, as discussed earlier, is to establish national park reserves prior to full park establishment. This allowance was introduced in 1994 as a means of forging strong relationships early in the park creation process and ensuring land is protected from development during the land claim process. Another important initiative from Parks Canada has been the establishment of cooperative management arrangements with Indigenous communities. In the Parks Canada context, cooperative management takes many forms, but can be best “described as a spectrum of decision-making influences.” Cooperative management bodies “range from informal structures that provide ad hoc advice to those that are established through formal agreements such as park establishment agreements” (Langdon et al., 2010, p. 225). Although power dynamics and formal structure varies considerably, what is consistent across the spectrum is that final decision-making power remains with the minister in charge of Parks Canada. Despite this power imbalance, significant effort has been made to ensure truly cooperative management. In this light, cooperative management bodies share several common goals and responsibilities including: • Ensuring equal Aboriginal and government representation; • Providing advice to the minister on cultural matters and other issues of importance to the Aboriginal partners; and • Providing input into park, site, or national marine conservation area management plans. (Langdon et al., 2010, p. 230) The first, and most powerful, example of this kind of cooperative management arrangement is the Gwaii Haanas Agreement of 1993, which established the Archipelago Management Board to oversee the management of Gwaii Haana National Park Reserve and Haida Heritage Site on the northwest coast of British Columbia (Hawkes, 1996). Through this agreement, the structures for the involvement of the Council of the Haida Nation in the planning, management, and operation of the reserve were established. This included a commitment from both sides for maintaining and making use of the archipelago in a sustainable manner, a focus on using the reserve as a means of sustaining the continuity of Haida culture, provisions for the harvesting of traditional

133 134 resources by the Haida people but also an assurance that this will not be done for commercial purposes, and employment agreements that ensure Haida members are on staff. One of the interesting aspects of this agreement is that it is structured in such a way that there is no agreement on ownership of the land, instead the two parties agree to disagree on ownership, yet still enter into a partnership to cooperate on the area’s management. Despite the disagreement, this model for cooperative management has proven to be successful for both parties and has been an avenue for considerable work around cultural resource management and programming, including Haida-led interpretive programming and resource harvesting regulations. Given the success of this case, Parks Canada, since 1993, has aimed to establish some form of cooperative management authority in every national park in the northern territories and has been pursuing similar initiatives in some southern parks as well, such as the newly established Torngat National Park in Labrador (Parks Canada, 2018b). The importance of cooperative management arrangements for cultural resource management is that they ensure that a representative voice from Indigenous communities is at the decision- making table. This enables Indigenous communities to speak for themselves with respect to how their cultural heritage is to be managed and integrated into wider park objectives. Moreover, it ensures, through formal and clear requirements, that this voice is heard and has power over decisions. For example, these management bodies can help identify sites of cultural significance, can encourage and clarify regulations around the use or removal of flora and other natural objects for traditional livelihood or ceremonial uses, and they can encourage the development of programs that “reconnect Indigenous communities with traditionally used lands, thus reestablishing cultural links with the land and passing on knowledge and traditions to younger generations” (Langdon et al., 2010, p. 226). Management bodies can also push for wider institutional changes that can result in further cultural consideration within the management structure. These efforts include a drive for employment equity to encourage a larger percentage of Indigenous staff members within Parks Canada. For example, the Guardians and Watchmen programs employ Indigenous community members to undertake regular monitoring and on the ground management (Swinnerton & Buggey, 2004; Thomlinson & Crouch, 2012). Another initiative is the push for recognizing the existence, validity, and practical value of Indigenous traditional ecological knowledge (TEK), which can support and even supplant Western scientific knowledge that currently provides the foundation for ecosystem management within parks (

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Berkes et al., 2000). At the same time, recognizing TEK can support the perpetuation of this vital element of Indigenous cultural heritage (Langdon et al., 2010). Coupled with the robust CRM policies described above, this commitment to reconciliation with Indigenous peoples has created an important avenue for the conservation of cultural heritage across the park system. Another aspect of the overall CRM program in Parks Canada, and one that is associated with the recognition of Indigenous interest, is the emergence and application of the concept of cultural landscapes. Most of this work has occurred with respect to the designation of national historic sites, where, in order to be nominated, a historic place needs to be categorized as a certain type of place, but the idea and terminology of cultural landscape has transferred into national park management as well. Concern with landscape conservation within Parks Canada dates to the 1960s, but over the following thirty years the concern evolved from a narrow focus on reconstructing period gardens, to a wider concern for conservation and rehabilitation of vernacular and Aboriginal cultural landscapes (Buggey, 2009). The term was first adopted in 1994 in the agency’s Guiding Principles and Operational Polices where a cultural landscape was defined broadly as “any geographical area that has been modified, influenced, or given special cultural meaning by people” (Parks Canada, 1994, p. 146). What this definition did was create cultural landscapes as a particular type of historic place, and thus a large, complex cultural resource in its own right. But, at the same time the overarching vision was for cultural landscapes to encompass a range of resources both within designated sites and outside of them. As the Guiding Principles state, “when individual national historic sites do not constitute cultural landscapes in their own right, they form part of a larger cultural landscape” (p. 72). This approach offered openness and flexibility, but it also inserted a degree of ambiguity. On the one hand, it recognized that cultural landscapes exist as potentially definable, bounded entities, as cultural resources. But on the other hand, it also contended that historic sites “are not islands” (Ibid., 15), they are part of a wider cultural landscape that has no bounds. While understandable as a concept, this approach proved challenging to apply in practice. The HSMBC in particular sought greater clarity on how to evaluate nominations for national designation where the significance of the landscape was identified as a defining element of the nomination. This led to specific guidelines for types of cultural landscapes including rural districts, cemeteries, and Aboriginal territories (Buggey, 1999; HSMBC, 2008; Prosper, 2007; Scazzosi, 2018). There are, however, no guidelines for using the concept outside of nationally designated historic sites.

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Despite a lack of firm guidelines and policy with respect to cultural landscapes, Parks Canada has, in a few instances, tried to use this concept to support integrated, broad-based CRM within national parks. Kejimkujik National Park offers a valuable example of this effort. The Park is a 426 square kilometer protected area in the south shore region of Nova Scotia on Canada’s east coast. Originally established in 1974, the Park is divided into two parcels, an original inland area and a smaller section along the coast that was added in 1988. Apart from protecting two distinct and important ecosystems, the Park is also a place of significance for the Mi’Kmaq people, featuring a wide range of petroglyphs, heritage artefacts, and a legacy of four thousand years of cultural and spiritual connection. What is unique about this Park is that the largest portion, the inland territory, also was designated as a national historic site. Consultations to submit a nomination for national designation began in 1993 but were focused narrowly on the petroglyphs themselves. However, with a growing international interest in the cultural landscape category, the focus was shifted to a broader commemoration (Buggey, 1999, p. 22). In 1995, the area was officially designated as a national historic site for being a significant cultural landscape. According to the Commemorative Integrity Statement, Kejimkujik was designated because “its cultural landscape attests to Mi’Kmaq occupancy of this area since time immemorial, and includes petroglyph sites, habitation sites, fishing sites, hunting territories, travel routes and burials… [These] cultural features serve as a testament to, and record of, the long-term relationship between the Mi’kmaq and the natural environment of their land” (Parks Canada, 2000). The adoption of a both a national historic site and national park designation for the area was a means of working within the confines of the existing system and seeking an innovative way to protect the intertwined natural and cultural heritage values. The commitment that motivated this parallel system has translated, in the most recent management plan, into a formal acknowledgement of the inseparability of the area’s ecological and heritage integrity and an effort to design overall management to fully embrace this notion (Parks Canada, 2010a). Despite this success, the approach used in the joint Kejimkujik National Park and Historic Site has not been repeated. This is, in large part, because of the development of a system-wide CRM policy in 1994, which created a new requirement in all parks to address cultural resource management in a formal manner.

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Today, the cultural landscape concept continues to be used in the dualistic way that it was originally conceived, as a category of cultural resource (as defined in the Standards and Guidelines for the Conservation of Historic Places) and as a conceptual approach to understanding entire park landscapes. This latter approach is seen in some recent management plans, particularly those in the northern territories that have strong Indigenous connections, and where it is clear that there is a strong commitment to recognizing the intertwined heritage of humans and the environment across the entire landscape (Murray, 2012). These plans refer to the entire park as a cultural landscape, as in Torngat Mountains National Park where the management plan sets out the overall objective as being to “protect and present a spectacular Arctic wilderness and a magnificent Inuit cultural landscape” (Parks Canada, 2018b, p. 5). However, this does not translate into any specific managerial decisions, which are instead dictated by the CRM Policy. In other cases, such as Rouge National Park, a large urban park located in the Toronto suburb of Scarborough, the management plan recognizes both approaches to cultural landscapes, acknowledging that there is a broad cultural landscape but also that “there is a striking array of archaeological sites, built heritage features and cultural landscapes that are both locally important and quintessentially Canadian” (Parks Canada, 2014, p. 4, emphasis added). Given the international engagement with the concept of cultural landscapes over the past thirty years, Parks Canada has been deeply influenced by the thinking and work behind this idea. This can be seen in the guiding principles for the agency that speak to the intertwining of humans and their environment. However, in a formal sense the concept of the cultural landscape has not been widely used as a management tool in national parks apart from designating and managing specific resources. Taken as a whole, the approach to CRM within Parks Canada is a detailed, comprehensive means of conserving cultural resources across the park system. Despite the differences in statutory requirements for each category of protected heritage area, Parks Canada has been able to develop a standardized approach to CRM that applies across the system, albeit with varying requirements based on the type of resource being considered, and whether they fall under the requirements of a national historic site or not. The greatest strength of this system is the CRM Policy, which is a sophisticated and clear document outlining the importance of cultural resources and how they are to be managed within the various heritage places that fall under the jurisdiction of Parks Canada. While it is yet to be seen how effective the CRVSs called for in

137 138 national parks will be, and how they will influence the overall management of cultural resources, they offer potential for more effective planning and will certainly open the door for wider acknowledgement and consideration of cultural resources.

Ontario The Ontario protected areas system is one of the oldest and largest state or provincial level conservation organizations in North America, with a long history of innovative and effective approaches to management and planning (Killan, 1993). The Provincial Parks and Conservation Reserves Act 2006 (PPCRA), which replaced and updated the original 1952 Provincial Parks Act, currently serves as the legislative foundation for this system. (Moos, 2006). The system is separated into two categories of protected area, provincial parks and conservation reserves, which function in a similar manner but with a greater emphasis on ecosystem preservation and minimal visitor infrastructure in reserves. For both provincial parks and conservation reserves, however, the stated objectives recognize the inherent intertwining of the human and natural worlds. The first objective for both categories, for example, is “to permanently protect representative ecosystems, biodiversity and provincially significant elements of Ontario’s natural and cultural heritage” (s. 2.1.1- 2.2.1). The PPRCA takes this a step further for provincial parks by including a visitor experience component to emphasise that it not enough to simply conserve cultural heritage, parks must also provide “opportunities for residents of Ontario and visitors to increase their knowledge and appreciation of Ontario’s natural and cultural heritage” (s. 2.1.3). Although the purpose of protected areas in Ontario is to protect both natural and cultural heritage, as well as provide opportunities for visitors to use, enjoy, and learn from these places, the top priority is for ecosystem preservation. To clarify this potential conflict, the PPCRA copied the approach put forward by Parks Canada, placing ‘ecological integrity’ as the central management function for parks and reserves (s. 3.1). Apart from the different priorities placed on parks and reserves, the legislation also recognizes that there is a great deal of diversity within the system and as such, management objectives may differ. To provide further clarity and direction on the management objectives, the act adopted a system of classification for provincial parks, whereby each park is designated under a particular category, entailing a specific set of objectives. These parks classes include:

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1. Wilderness Class Parks. 2. Nature Reserve Class Parks. 3. Cultural Heritage Class Parks. 4. Natural Environment Class Parks. 5. Waterway Class Parks. 6. Recreational Class Parks. (s. 8.1) Cultural heritage class parks, not surprisingly, are those with the strongest focus on cultural heritage conservation. Their objective is “to protect elements of Ontario’s distinctive cultural heritage in open space settings for their intrinsic value and to support interpretation, education and research” (s. 8.4). With respect to the other park classes, wilderness and nature reserves have no stipulation for addressing cultural heritage, focusing instead on the protection of ecosystems. For both natural environment and waterway class parks, the PPCRA adopts a middle ground, stating that the objectives are “to protect… provincially significant elements of Ontario’s natural and cultural heritage” (s. 8.5-6). One concern that becomes evident with this piece of legislation is that a problem could arise when ecological integrity is the priority for all park classifications, including cultural heritage class parks. This situation, Eagles points out, could “lead to cultural heritage conservation values being compromised when ecological concerns are given a higher priority.” Such an outcome would be problematic “given that cultural heritage is a non-renewable resource, while biological features are renewable” (2007, pp. 8–9). However, there is no evidence to suggest that this issue has arisen yet. Apart from the legislative direction provided by the PPCRA ensuring cultural heritage conservation takes place, Ontario Parks, the agency responsible for implementing the act and managing the protected area system, has also developed a set of internal planning and management policies to guide conservation work. The framework that these documents provides has developed progressively over the past half-century through a dedicated and professional planning branch within the organization. Since the late-1970s, Ontario Parks has established itself “as a leading figure in parks planning in North America” as a result of its “second to none” master planning program (Forest History Society of Ontario, 2017, p. 8). This meticulous, ambitious program was both inclusive and collaborative, bringing together diverse voices and

139 140 views. Although certainly complex, this planning approach has proven successful and as such remains in effect today. The central features of this planning approach can be found within Ontario’s Protected Areas Planning Manual (Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources, 2014b), which, along with other supplementary guidelines, templates, and tools, provides the agency with a uniform planning framework. While the planning approach laid out in this manual is rather complex, the basic goal involves “identifying and analyzing values and pressures to determine management priorities and actions” for any particularly significant natural area (Forest History Society of Ontario, 2017, p. 20). Achieving this requires an extensive amount of information collection and analysis. When developing any management plan or direction, “various experts first work together to compile extensive inventories of an area’s natural and cultural features in order to assess its potential as a provincial park” and then a “regional interdisciplinary team… issue[s] a tentative statement of policy which set[s] out the proposed park’s purpose and associated management guidelines” (Forest History Society of Ontario, 2017, p. 8). Following the release of a tentative management statement, the public and government are invited to review the proposal, creating a venue for various stakeholders to come together to determine how best to create and manage a park. The final master plan, once approved by the minister, is given a twenty-year life span, with a review and potential update every five years. Another feature of the planning framework that is important to highlight is the use of internal park zoning. The PPRCA allows for the creation of zones within protected areas as part of the process of developing a management plan. Zoning, the Planning Manual explains, is “essential to allow for orderly and effective management of the park” (Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources, 2014b, p. 13). The potential zones vary between different classes of parks, but for those that have protection of cultural heritage resources as part of their objectives, an historical zone is available. Historical zones “generally focus on a specific site and that site’s relationship to the surrounding landscape, so they may include a protective buffer around the main feature in the zone” (Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources, 2016 s. 8.2). These zones are identified in the management plan and specific policies and procedures are articulated. The management plan for Quetico Provincial Park, for example, designates a three kilometer stretch along the French River shoreline as an historical zone due to its long use as a portage route for Indigenous peoples and fur-traders. The management intent for this zone is to use it as a day-use area where interpretive

140 141 displays and joint programming with the Seine River First Nation explore the history of the site (Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources, 2018 s. 6.3). While historical zones are useful to delineate a specific area with high cultural heritage value and have that area be subject to different management direction, these zones do not override the overall management objective of addressing cultural resources throughout the park system. Therefore, they serve as one more tool, alongside legislation, policies, standards and guidelines, and planning processes that ensure cultural heritage is adequately recognized and conserved within protected areas. With a park system that encompasses 335 provincial parks and 295 conservation reserves, undertaking this level of planning for each unit is no small task. However, despite the challenge, Ontario Parks has remained steadfast in its commitment to this process. Currently, there are 330 management plans and directions available for provincial parks and a further 248 for conservation reserves (Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources, 2019), making it one of the most extensive collections of planning documents in any North American protected area system. This approach to planning is important for the conservation of cultural heritage in two ways. First, the strong commitment to consultation and engagement ensures a diversity of voices and perspectives on what is valuable about a protected area. This is particularly true for Indigenous communities who, the document recognizes, “have an intrinsic connection to the land that includes social, cultural, spiritual, economic and ecological aspects… and important information about the values and pressures in protected areas” (Holder, 2015, p. 27). By working directly with Indigenous and other stakeholder communities, the manual argues, the government can gain a better understanding of the community’s interests and develop approaches that are respectful of local knowledge, values, and science. Second, one of the central tenets for protected area planning is the use of diverse and comprehensive information, which includes studies of cultural heritage resources and values, to inform planning decisions. This information, the manual contends, needs to cover areas such as cultural and natural heritage values, but also outdoor recreation value, traditional outdoor heritage values, social and economic benefits, to create a full picture of the park (Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources, 2014b, p. 12). From the 1970s until recently, the effort to identify and evaluate cultural resources within Ontario’s protected areas drew heavily on what was called the Historical Systems Plan, captured in the 1973 document, A Topical Organization of Ontario History (Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources, 1975). This plan provided “an organizational approach to historical resources as they

141 142 relate to outdoor recreation and land management programs” (Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources, 2014a). Relying on a defined methodology to categorize and evaluate historical resources, this plan aimed to support decision making around whether and how to conserve historic resources. Historical resources were first categorized as fitting under one of three overall conceptual areas: economic and social, military, and political history. Next resources were determined to be representative of particular ‘themes’ in Ontario’s history, such as ‘northern hunters and fishers,’ “post-contact tribes and band,” or “fur-trade and fur-trading communities,” which were further subdivided into more specific subthemes. Finally, historical resources were evaluated based on a complex system of indicators and scores that ultimately resulted in an overall score out of 100, which was nonbinding, but provided a rationalized justification to support final decision making by the minister charged with designation choices. Originally, this approach was developed by the Historic Sites Branch, which until 1975 was located within the Parks Division of the Ministry of Natural Resources. Thus, for a period, Parks’ concern for how to manage cultural heritage within the protected area system dovetailed with a wider concern for a standardized approach to provincial historic site establishment and management as required by the 1954 Heritage Act. However, in 1975 the Historic Sites Branch was separated and placed within the newly formed Department of Culture and Recreation, creating an institutional divide that persists to this day. Nevertheless, the Historic Systems Plan remained, and provided the foundation for cultural resource management within the parks branch for most of the next four decades. However, as Alan Gordon argues, the systems plan had several issues. For one, the hubris of structuring a diverse provincial history into specific themes “reflected the degree to which the government believed that authenticity was measurable by technical expertise.” Moreover, the whole plan “was so Byzantine that only a seasoned bureaucrat could admire it or, for that matter, navigate its labyrinthine structure. However, its intent was to inject a degree of objectivity into the highly subjective process of selecting historic sites for development” (Gordon, 2016, p. 227). Fortunately, over the past two decades, there has been an effort to renew and standardize the approach to cultural heritage management in all government departments, getting rid of the categorization system and simplifying the evaluation process. This process began in the early 2000s as the result of a newly appointed Minister of Culture who was enthusiastic about heritage conservation. With ministerial support, the long-delayed

142 143 overhaul of the 1975 Ontario Heritage Act gained momentum, eventually resulting in an approval in 2005 (Schneider, 2015). The amendments to the act made several important changes including the addition of an entirely new section called the Standards and Guidelines for Provincial Heritage Properties (s. 3.1). This section created the legislative authority for the minister to develop standards and guidelines that would apply to all ministries and to other ‘public bodies’ on how to address the conservation of cultural heritage properties owned and managed by the government, thus placing a responsibility on government departments to effectively address cultural heritage conservation. Developing these standards and guidelines took time, but the final version was approved by cabinet in 2010 (Ministry of Tourism, Culture and Sport, 2010). The Standards and Guidelines for Provincial Heritage Properties document is built upon several key concepts. First, is the idea of a ‘provincial heritage property,’ which is understood as “real property, including buildings and structures on the property, that has cultural heritage value or interest” and is owned by the province (2010, p. 13). A provincial heritage property can also be of ‘provincial significance,’ meaning that it has been evaluated, found to be of a higher level of value, and designated for this purpose. The Standards and Guidelines apply to both types of properties. Second, is the concept of ‘cultural heritage value or interest’. To be of heritage value or interest a property, either general or provincially significant, must meet criteria described in Ontario Regulation 09/06 or 10/06, respectively. These criteria offer a detailed list of potential reasons for significance, including considerations of aesthetic design value, historical association, and contextual value. Third, are the concepts of cultural heritage resources and attributes (which are also occasionally called features). Provincial heritage properties are made up of cultural heritage resources, which are the tangible material remains where heritage value or interest is ascribed. These resources are, in turn, made up of attributes, the physical features or elements, “that contribute to a property’s cultural heritage value or interest, and may include the property’s built or manufactured elements, as well as natural landforms, vegetation, water features, and its visual setting” (Ministry of Tourism, Culture and Sport, 2010, p. 12). Moreover, these resources can be understood as falling within three categories: • Built heritage resources means one or more significant buildings (including fixtures or equipment located in or forming part of a building), structures, earthworks, monuments, installations, or remains that have cultural heritage value.

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• Cultural heritage landscape means a defined geographical area that human activity has modified and that has cultural heritage value. Such an area involves one or more groupings of individual heritage features, such as structures, spaces, archaeological sites, and natural elements, which together form a significant type of heritage form distinct from that of its constituent elements or parts… • Archaeological site means any property that contains an artifact or any other physical evidence of past human use or activity that is of cultural heritage value or interest. (Ministry of Tourism, Culture and Sport, 2010, pp. 3–4) Using this conceptual framework, the Standards and Guidelines lay out a set of general principles for the identification, evaluation, protection, maintenance, use, and disposal of heritage properties. For example, in setting out the general provisions for conservation, the document states that all government agencies must “base decisions affecting a provincial heritage property on appropriate studies and research (including analysis of physical, documentary, and oral evidence), aimed at understanding the property’s cultural heritage value, including its level of significance (e.g., local, provincial, etc.), the impact of proposed activities on its cultural heritage value and heritage attributes, and measures to mitigate these impacts” (2010, pp. 5). In order to do so it is required that each agency develop a methodology for identifying and evaluating heritage properties. Details around how this process is to be conducted has since been clarified through a second Standards and Guidelines document that was approved in 2014 (Ministry of Tourism, Culture and Sport, 2014). The information that is gathered through this identification and evaluation process is to be summarized in a Statement of Cultural Heritage Value, a description of the resource’s heritage attributes, and a Cultural Heritage Evaluation Report. Taking this information forward, the Standards and Guidelines encourage agencies to develop a Strategic Conservation Plan for each provincial heritage property. With strong research and plans in place, the hope is that decisions around the use, maintenance, and potential disposal of a heritage property can be made in a respectful, informed manner. Like many cultural resource management policies, the Standards and Guidelines do not attempt a detailed description of the actual conservation process, instead they focus on the overall conservation management approach to ensure adequate information is available to support decision making. As the Standards and Guidelines are a relatively new initiative, it is yet to be seen how they will be translated into practice in the various departments, including Ontario Parks. In the

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Standards and Guidelines themselves, it is recognized that the transition to this new approach will take time because “many ministries and public bodies already take steps to protect the cultural heritage resources in their care” (2010, pp. 3). Therefore, it will require time and effort to merge the existing approaches, but the hope remains that pulling these together will “bring consistency and uniformity to the management of provincial heritage assets” (2010, pp. 3). The most significant parallel policy dictating Ontario Parks’ approach to cultural heritage conservation is found in a document entitled A Technical Guideline for Cultural Heritage Resources (Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources, 2006). Approved in 2006 by the Ministry of Natural Resources (which oversees Ontario Parks) this guideline was developed to support environmental assessments undertaken in compliance with the Environmental Assessment Act 1993, where cultural heritage resources were included in the definition of the environment. The Technical Guideline document adopts a similar conceptual framework to the Standards and Guidelines (S&Gs), with the only difference being the lack of focus on ‘provincial heritage properties,’ which had not fully come online at the time that this report was written. The implication of this lack of concern for ‘properties’ is that in evaluating heritage significance for a particular resource, this guideline draws upon the Parks Canada approach to heritage value and bases decisions around significance on whether a resource can be found to have aesthetic/physical, historical/associative, contextual, informational, or public resource value, as well as having value to a community (2006, p. 24). With respect to the actual conservation and protection of cultural heritage resources, the Technical Guideline advocates a mitigation strategy based on avoidance of impact through project design alterations, protection measures such as fencing, covering, imposing buffer zones, and other physical barriers, monitoring to ensure measures are working, and detailed documentation of all research and measures that are taken. Since the approval of the S&Gs, Ontario Parks has sought to ensure that all assessment and evaluation processes undertaken as part of park management operations are consistent with these guidelines. However, both documents continue to influence the approach to cultural resource management within protected areas. This is due to the unique legislative mandate for Ontario’s parks that gives it statutory responsibility for both natural and cultural heritage, in all its variations, as well as having protected areas subject to the regulations around environmental assessment. This overlapping direction for cultural resource management is reflected, for

145 146 example, in the recent management plan for Holland Landing Prairie Provincial Park (Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources, 2015) where it states that cultural heritage resources will be protected, maintained, used and disposed of in accordance with the protected areas mandate (legislation and policies) and the evaluation process developed by MNRF consistent with the Standards and Guidelines for Conservation of Provincial Heritage Properties (Ontario Heritage Act, 2005). Staff will also consult MNRF's Technical Guideline for Cultural Heritage Resources. (s. 9.3.11) The overlapping direction is not always as clearly laid out, however. As the even more recently updated Quetico Provincial Park Management Plan (Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources, 2018) explains: The management of cultural heritage resources in Quetico Provincial Park will be directed towards protection, heritage appreciation and research. Where cultural heritage resources may be impacted by any park projects or activities, MNRF will follow requirements as outlined in A Technical Guideline for Cultural Heritage Resources (2006) or other relevant cultural heritage policy. (s. 7.10) This is, however, a minor matter of confusion. As a whole, the Ontario park system is well served by comprehensive legislation and multiple policy documents that, despite their varying origins, are quite consistent. Coupled with the sophisticated and dedicated approach to parks master planning, cultural resources and values are addressed successfully in the policy framework, which as the Quetico example demonstrates, is having an impact on decisions at the individual park level.

British Columbia In British Columbia (BC), several areas of the provincial government share an interest in or jurisdiction over cultural heritage resources including the BC Heritage Branch, BC Archaeology Branch, and BC Parks. While this separation, over time, has resulted in a divergence of approach to conservation, staff in all three branches have recently sought greater cooperation. This is particularly true when looking at cultural heritage conservation in the parks system. Although there is no formal mandate in the Parks Act (RSBC 1996) to address cultural heritage conservation, BC Parks has sought to acknowledge cultural resources. Since 2013, the Branch has put in place a high-level strategic policy on management planning that made management plans mandatory for each park and protected area (BC Parks, 2013, 2016a). These

146 147 plans, the policy states, are to include statements about the care and protection of cultural values within the park unit and a zoning plan to delineate management zones, one of which could be a cultural zone (BC Parks, 2012). While the language is inclusive, covering cultural values broadly, the emphasis is on ensuring that First Nations voices are heard and incorporated into the park management planning process. In this vein, there is discussion about how to identify cultural use sites, known and unknown archaeological sites, and how to determine visitor access to areas that may be considered sensitive or sacred for various communities. Pushing for inclusion of and protection for First Nations cultural sites is a significant step for BC Parks and one that has resulted in some fairly innovative management plans. Take, for example, the recent management plan for Mquqwin/Brooks Peninsula Provincial Park, which as a result of the planning process was renamed in the Nuu-Chah-Nulth language. The plan represents a significant effort to identify places of cultural importance, including former village sites, hunting grounds, campsites, and features linked to important stories. This awareness is further supported by the implementation of a cultural zone in one portion of the park, which is meant to “reflect the importance of the Hisnit (Power) watershed in Che:k’tles7et’h’ First Nation culture,” providing space for cultural learning opportunities and harvesting of monumental cedar and cypress (BC Parks, 2016b, p. 49). While strong management planning is an essential first step, staff have acknowledged that it does not go quite far enough. With their focus on cultural values, there is little in the policy and planning documents on how to identify cultural heritage resources themselves, particularly non- First Nations cultural resources, nor any information on how to physically protect these resources once they have been identified. Over the past two years, staff within the Parks Branch have been actively working in partnership with counterparts in the Archaeology and Heritage Branches to develop a handbook for cultural resource management that addresses the gaps in the existing policy framework. The aim of BC Parks Cultural Heritage Conservation Handbook (BC Parks, 2018), which remains in draft, is to provide a practical, how-to guide for all BC Parks staff and management on cultural resource management. As the handbook states, its key objectives are to: • To provide clear theoretical and practical guidance for identifying, assessing, managing and interpreting cultural heritage values and resources in BC Parks • To identify the role BC Parks staff can play in improving heritage site conservation

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• To provide information on managing potential impacts on heritage resources thereby reducing the potential for conflict and damage to a park’s heritage values • To create a document with ease of use by park operations staff, planners, managers and others who may be operating within the constraints of limited resources (BC Parks, 2018, p. 4) This document is the most contemporary and targeted address of cultural resource management within a provincial park system in Canada and, as such, offers an immensely valuable example for this study. The handbook hinges on a modern understanding of cultural heritage, one that is inclusive of both tangible and intangible elements but, for the purpose of practicality, places an emphasis on the material resources themselves. This is achieved by focusing on the conservation of “cultural heritage features,” which the handbook defines as a “physical component of the landscape that is considered to have heritage significance to a community, region, or the province, and which contributes to the well-being and integrity of the protected area, enriching the visitor experience… Cultural heritage features can be structures, buildings, groups of buildings, districts, landscape, archaeological sites or any other places that have been recognized for having heritage value” (BC Parks, 2018, p. 6). Each of these features, in turn, must hold value for BC Parks, communities, or individuals. Moreover, these resources are not to be understood as separate or distinct from the rest of a park’s land base. Instead, the handbook frames its approach as an integration of natural and cultural resources. This integration is articulated by applying the “cultural landscape concept,” which “emphasizes the landscape scale of B.C.’s protected areas, their history, and the connectivity between people, nature, places and heritage features” (BC Parks, 2018, p. 10). The hope is that by understanding the entire landscape as an interconnected product of human history, park management activities can be “used alongside heritage conservation tools to undertake everyday work such as re-establishing historic trails, developing park infrastructure, providing recreational experiences, and balancing the protection of natural and cultural resources” (BC Parks, 2018, p. 10). Taken together, the aim of cultural heritage conservation is to care for, develop, and manage the entire landscape in such a way that the value of the features is retained or revealed. Although well-articulated, the conceptual framing of the handbook is not unique when looked at in conjunction with the previous examples; it is simply the presentation of the conceptual and

148 149 practical approach developed and accepted around the world. What is particularly innovative about this handbook, however, is that it strives to be a very practically focused and usable set of guidelines for parks staff. It is one thing to say that the entire landscape should be managed to care for, retain, and reveal cultural heritage; it is an entirely other challenge “to set out how that aim may best be achieved” (BC Parks, 2018, p. 8). The way that this is achieved is by framing the text around a series of key questions that one could ask while working through a series of predefined steps in the cultural heritage conservation planning process. Questions include issues like, “How do I know if I have a cultural heritage feature in my protected area that has heritage value and may need conservation?” or “How do I know the status of the heritage sites or features in the protected areas that I manage?” (BC Parks, 2018). Each of these questions are answered with a series of illustrative examples from the park system. For example, the question of how to identify cultural heritage resources is addressed with a typology of resources along with examples from both within BC and beyond (Figure 13).

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Figure 13: Excerpt from the typology of heritage resources (BC Parks, 2018, p. 41).

The handbook continues in this manner, providing detail in a largely usable, although at times prolix and repeating format.4 At its core, the handbook is an excellent introduction to the process of cultural heritage conservation, regardless of audience or the particular setting in which it is happening. But again, in this way it is not unique. There are several well-established and widely used manuals for heritage conservation such as the Standards and Guidelines for the Conservation of Historic Places in Canada (Parks Canada, 2010). What makes this handbook effective is that it is peppered with examples that drive home the ways in which cultural heritage

4 As the handbook remains in draft, it is possible that through ongoing revision and feedback this may be condensed and refined over time.

150 151 conservation can be integrated into regular parks management. For example, in one section the handbook highlights several overlapping concerns such as invasive species management, which tends to be seen as an entirely natural phenomenon. However, the handbook notes, “plants and animals that are considered invasive from an ecological perspective may have heritage value” (BC Parks, 2018, p. 38). Another example is a discussion about interpretation and how cultural resources, such as remnants of a mining operation, can be used to tell a whole range of stories. These stories include those about natural processes, such as glaciation, mineral deposits, and forest regeneration, as well as human stories about prospecting, technological evolution, and Indigenous adaptation to colonial expansion (BC Parks, 2018, pp. 84–85). What these examples do is demonstrate to parks staff how the resources that they see every day and the processes they are regularly engaged with, can be viewed through an alternate lens, one that reveals the inherent humanness of the landscape. The handbook provides a structured framework for making sense of these revelations and putting them to use to support the general management program. Overall, the BC Parks Cultural Heritage Conservation Handbook is an extremely valuable resource for anyone, within the parks system and beyond, who is seeking to understand what cultural resources are present in a given landscape and how to conserve them effectively. While the project is still too recent to determine the impact it will have on the actual conservation of resources within BC Parks, the existence of this handbook speaks to the high-level commitment of the endeavor and ensures that any efforts that are undertaken are likely to be done in a thoughtful and well-informed manner. Moreover, it provides an excellent template for other jurisdictions to work from in building their own policy and guidelines for parks staff.

Analysis Although this review of alternate practices is far from comprehensive, a detailed look at how various jurisdictions have tried to address cultural heritage conservation within protected area systems reveals several key lessons for other organizations grappling with the same challenge. Despite their differences, between each of the above examples there is a baseline of commonality. Steeped in western conceptualizations of conservation, cultural heritage, and nature, each of the jurisdictions covered here offers a response to a similar cultural preoccupation, the maintenance of and care for some remnant of a past world. As such, in each case the conceptual challenge of how to most effectively conserve cultural heritage and how to

151 152 achieve this within a protected area is essentially the same. However, the specific routes that were taken and the legal and policy frameworks that were built are necessarily contingent, emerging as they did from the variable historical, political, cultural, and environmental conditions in each location. Nevertheless, a great deal of transferable lessons can be drawn from these efforts. Some of the key lessons are discussed below.

Legislation Effective integration of cultural heritage conservation into protected area management begins with strong, clear legislation that explains the purpose of protected areas, clarifies priorities, and acknowledges the presence of cultural heritage as well as the necessity of conserving it. The National Parks and Wildlife Act in NSW offers a strong example of how legislation can be formulated. The NPW Act begins by establishing a clear dual mandate to conserve nature, and “objects, places, or features (including biological diversity) of cultural value within the landscape” (NPW Act, s.2A(1)). For each of the two priorities, the legislation follows with a list of specific elements and actions that are to be included in these efforts, such as the “landforms of significance, including geological features and processes” and “fostering public appreciation, understanding, and enjoyment.” What this does is make the work of the NPWS rather less ambiguous and has certainly helped propel ongoing innovations and experiments to achieve this mandate. In contrast, the legislation for protected areas that guides Parks Canada does not specifically address cultural heritage. Instead, the conservation of cultural resources is covered by a separate piece of legislation that Parks Canada is also tasked with administering. Although Parks Canada has found a way to work around this separation through high level strategic policy, the relative lateness of the effort to acknowledge cultural resources and values within park units is indicative of legislative priorities. Strategic policies do not, necessarily, carry the same weight as a legislative mandate, so it is yet to be seen whether the approach taken by Parks Canada eventually will lead to the same level of integration as can be found in the NSW park system. Apart from well-defined parks legislation, another legal mechanism that has proven effective is a government-wide requirement for all ministries to care for historic properties, whether they are officially designated or not. Again, this can be seen in Australia where the NSW Heritage Branch issued the State Agency Heritage Guide: Management of Heritage Assets by NSW Government Agencies (2005), which required all state agencies to develop a heritage asset management strategy. Similarly, amendments to the Ontario Heritage Act gave the minister

152 153 authority to develop standards and guidelines for cultural heritage conservation that would apply to all ministries and public bodies. In both cases, the result has been a raised awareness within parks organizations and across the government, that cultural heritage is widely present and needs to be addressed. Growing awareness, a legislative requirement, and standardized approach are essential for effective integration of cultural resource conservation.

Strategic policy and operating procedures The best examples of cultural heritage conservation in protected areas demonstrate a clear link between the legislation and operational activity. Too often there is inconsistency in planning and implementation, which can lead to ad-hoc decision making, loss of cultural resources, and confusion among staff. In order to avoid these outcomes, strategic policies or operational manuals can be employed. This type of document also can be used, as is the case with Parks Canada’s CRM Policy, to address the shortcomings and ambiguities of the legislative framework, or to operationalize an existing mandate. Critically, strategic policy serves as a concise summary of values and principles, that can be consistently applied throughout a park system and be used as a litmus test to determine how well the organization is performing. Forming the backbone of the UK protected areas’ ongoing commitment to cultural heritage conservation since 1995, the Joint Statement on the Historic Environment in the National Parks is perhaps the strongest example of this kind of policy. Operational policies, such as the Parks Canada CRM Policy and the BC Handbook, serve a similar purpose by laying out the overarching vision, but taking this further by providing clear guidance for staff on how to implement that vision.

Terminology One of the primary benefits of having clear legislation and a strategic policy for cultural heritage is that the terms describing the elements of the endeavor are clearly established and consistent across the organization. Too often when dealing with cultural heritage conservation, organizations become lost in competing terms and definitions. Outside consultants, inadequately trained staff, and documents from different time periods result in terms being used incorrectly or interchangeably. Even at the highest level, as seen in the agonizing debates over definitions by the World Heritage Committee, the challenge of agreeing on what words mean, and which terms are to be used is significant. In order to facilitate a consistent approach throughout an

153 154 organization, one that staff can discuss and share lessons from, an agreed upon set of terms must be in place. Even if these terms remain complicated and uniquely defined by the field of conservation, such as heritage values, having a baseline understanding goes a long way toward a shared, productive conversation. Organizations such as the National Park Service in America have used their guiding documents, the NPS Management Policies and CRM Guidelines, to define the preferred terms. These terms can vary across jurisdictions; for example, the use of “cultural resources” and “cultural heritage features” by Parks Canada and BC Parks respectively, but so long as they are clearly defined and used, it is possible to share common experience and practice. A good example of the importance of terminology is the use of the concept of cultural landscapes. Although innovative and responsible for stretching peoples’ thinking about the scale and form of cultural heritage, pushing them to see the entirety of the landscape as a product of human construction and manipulation, the concept of cultural landscapes has created terminological confusion. As noted in the literature review, there are two ways to see a cultural landscape, as a unit of cultural resource designation (a period garden or homestead property, for example) and as a frame for looking at the entirety of a landscape. Having both versions of the concept remains beneficial, but employing the two definitions needs to be clearly articulated lest it breed confusion. Within Parks Canada, for example, cultural landscapes tend to be used as a means of denoting specific resources but are, on occasion, employed to describe a protected area in its entirety. A simple and elegant solution to this issue is seen in the BC Parks Cultural Heritage Conservation Handbook, which reserves the term cultural landscape as a means to frame the entire approach to cultural resource management and discusses the specific heritage features simply as landscapes. While these semantic issues may seem insignificant, clear terminology is simply a marker of clear, thoughtful intention, something that is essential when seeking to achieve the integration of cultural resource management into protected areas.

Dedicated staffing Having expertise dedicated to cultural heritage resources is, perhaps unsurprisingly, a necessary precursor for any effective conservation of these resources. In all the examples discussed above, one of the common denominators was there being individuals who understood the nuance of cultural heritage resources and were in positions where they could advocate for the importance of conserving these resources within a park system. Bringing a concern for cultural

154 155 heritage resources to the planning and management table is essential when the reality that managers face is one of limited resources and ever-mounting priorities. Dedicated cultural resource staff positions can help to clarify an organizational approach to cultural resources, formulate strategic policy, undertake surveys, manage contractors, and train other staff in the steps needed to identify and conserve cultural resources. In most cases, having dedicated staff for cultural resource conservation emerged as a result of the legislative arrangement. When the legislation makes an agency or organization responsible for the conservation of both natural and cultural heritage, the only means to fulfill such a mandate is to have staff dedicated to the respective pursuits. Being under the same organizational umbrella, however, goes a long way toward harbouring integrative conversations. As a result we see in those jurisdictions where natural and cultural heritage conservation is controlled by the same entity a more robust program of cultural resource conservation within the park units. Having cultural resource specialists within the park agency is not, however, an absolutely necessary requirement. As the British Columbia example demonstrates, staff from three separate government agencies, BC Parks, BC Heritage Branch, and BC Archaeology Branch, can quite effectively work together to develop an approach to conservation. But separation, to date at least, significantly has slowed progress toward effective integration, the relative newness and novelty of the work in British Columbia being a case in point. When separation does exist, it is important, as the World Heritage Connecting Practice project demonstrated, that some form of formal governance sharing arrangement or clear policy be developed and signed on to by the respective parties. Such measures ensure that the roles and responsibilities are well-defined, and some form of accountability is in place to ensure that the agreement is honoured. In the end, however the arrangement is structured, the conservation of cultural heritage resources within parks is simply yet another job that needs to be done alongside countless others, and the only way to truly ensure that it gets done effectively is to have people tasked with that job.

Agency-wide training While having dedicated staff to oversee and advocate for the conservation of cultural heritage resources within a park system is essential, these individuals simply cannot do everything or be everywhere. Other staff members, whether they be front-line maintenance workers, interpreters, asset managers, or biologists all interact with cultural resources on a regular basis. The day to

155 156 day work and decisions that these staff members undertake is often as important than any dedicated conservation efforts for the long-term stewardship of cultural heritage resources. As such, one of the lessons learned from other jurisdictions is how effective agency-wide training and awareness-raising efforts can be for ensuring the integration of cultural resource conservation. Training for non-specialists needs to raise awareness of what cultural resources are and how to manage them, as well as how to integrate this work into daily operations of a protected area. Much like the NSW Park Ranger training program that was developed in the 1970s, Parks Canada has recently implemented a mandatory cultural resources training program. This is a rather small step because, as one Parks Canada CRM specialist explained in an interview, the training program “was very simple… very basic. It was an online PowerPoint.” But it is an important first step and one that can be built upon. As the interviewee further explained, “I personally took it to the next step because I had that latitude. I had the buy-in from our management team here to actually hold… group sessions where we basically did the online [course] together, but then I could answer questions and elaborate on what the slides were showing. [I also] developed my own PowerPoint after the formal training component with on the ground Banff examples” (Interview 7). This type of in-person training can also be complemented with handbooks like the NSW Cultural Landscape Handbook or the BC Parks Cultural Heritage Conservation Handbook, which are designed to walk staff who are unfamiliar with the field through the decision-making process. Taken together, there is a spectrum of resources and training opportunities that can be developed to inform and guide staff across a park agency to support their day to day work and ensure effective cultural heritage conservation.

Management planning Long recognized as an essential tool in caring for protected areas and cultural heritage resources, site-specific management plans are the foundation for what happens in a protected area. Organizations that are the most effective at integrating cultural resource conservation into overall park management are those that have a robust management planning process in place and have ensured cultural heritage considerations are included in this formal process. In order to be effective, protected area management plans need to be consistent, both in form and structure. Templates and guides to writing, such as BC Parks’ Guide to Writing Management Plans, are useful in ensuring consistency. Plans also need to be comprehensive, that is they need to cover

156 157 all of the parks in the system. Haphazard plans that are updated irregularly lead to inconsistency and confusion, reducing the overall impact of the effort. Finally, in order to integrate cultural heritage conservation, management plans need to explicitly address cultural resources. What addressing cultural resources looks like in a specific protected area will vary, but in general the plan must accomplish three things. First, the plan must identify what is present. Knowing what resources exist within a given protected area is essential for making any proper decisions about management and conservation. Examples such as the Cultural Landscape Atlas in NSW and the Historic Landscape Characterization program in the UK are two of the strongest efforts to fully document the range of resources in a landscape and provide that information to decision makers. Second, a management plan must determine why the resources are important. This is accomplished through some form of assessment that takes into account the entire range of values that exist in a particular site. Finally, a plan needs to determine what measures will be taken to conserve the resources. In areas with limited cultural heritage significance or few resources, this section may be a very brief part of the management plan. In other areas, where there are more significant historic values or multiple, geographically-linked, heritage assets, the overall management plan may need to take a more granular approach to the topic or call for the formation of a dedicated historic area plan or statement of cultural heritage value like the Cultural Resource Value Statements being used by Parks Canada. When particularly complex or significant resources exist within a park, there may also be a need for dedicated cultural resource management plans that are prepared for individual resources. These plans would be tailored to specific circumstances and provide a highly detailed conservation plan for the resource or site. An example of this was discussed with Mimosa Rocks National Park in Australia where a dedicated CRM Plan was developed for an old homestead site with a range of significant structures. A useful tool that is often employed to assist with determining areas that need more specific CRM guidance are internal park classifications or zones. In Ontario, the use of cultural heritage class parks and historical zones helps to differentiate areas, respectively, within the park system and within parks, that are of cultural heritage significance. Ultimately, what is important is that management planning is done consistently, comprehensively, and in such a way that it is flexible to the diverse realities and dynamic nature of cultural heritage resources. There is no one-size-fits all solution, but there are ways to work with the inherent ambiguity to ensure ongoing, thoughtful decision making within a protected area.

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Policy and guidelines for addressing Indigenous cultural heritage One of the most challenging aspects of dealing with cultural resource conservation within protected areas is fully, respectfully, and adequately accounting for the ways in which Indigenous communities value the land. Due to an historical legacy of ignorance, neglect, and active destruction of their cultural traditions by colonial governments, Indigenous peoples’ perspectives have not been recognized and the different ways in which they value the land and their cultural resources are not adequately addressed by Western conservation practices. Therefore, protected areas need to find ways to bring these Indigenous peoples into the decision- making process and to work toward understanding what conservation means for these communities. In order to do this, parks agencies need to put in place formal policy and guidelines to ensure this work happens and to formalize how it will happen. The policy and guidelines should be developed in consultation with Indigenous communities, but in general they need to recognize and acknowledge several key points. First, that Indigenous peoples are the primary determinants of the cultural significance of their heritage. That they are the primary source of information about the value of their heritage, and how it is best protected and conserved. Indigenous peoples must also have an active role in any Indigenous cultural heritage planning process, including early input into the assessment of the cultural significance of their heritage and its management, so they can continue to fulfill their obligations toward their heritage. Finally, they must control the way in which cultural knowledge and other information relating specifically to their heritage is used. In some protected area agencies, this work is being done through formal co-management arrangements, such as those being put in place by Parks Canada, which vary in their make-up and responsibilities, but in general aim to ensure the above- mentioned requirements are met. Ultimately, though, policy and guidelines for including Indigenous communities in the decision-making process will be one part of the effort. In order to effectively manage Indigenous cultural heritage, in whatever way that term’s usage is determined, the work will need to occur at an operational level. This will require all of the previous points —clear terminology, strategic policy, training, dedicated staff, management planning — to be designed to support and interweave with the needs of Indigenous communities. No small task, but one that is crucial for protected areas.

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Conclusion Around the world many jurisdictions are dealing with the challenge of integrating cultural heritage conservation into protected area management. It is not only a matter of conceptual interest, bridging the nature/culture divide, but one of practical concern as organizations work to address the perspectives of Indigenous communities respectfully and meet the expectations enshrined in their mandate to conserve both the natural and cultural heritage of their areas. Given the effort being undertaken in these areas to make sense of this challenge and develop practical solutions that achieve integration, it is fitting to draw upon these experiences to understand how Alberta’s protected area system can be improved. While there is certainly much more in the way of granular detail that can be drawn from each of these examples, the preceding survey and analysis has sought to highlight some of the most salient and overarching elements that have been successful elsewhere around the world. Contingent and emergent from their own geographic and political contexts, each of the above case studies is, in its own way, an innovative solution to the challenge of recognizing and integrating cultural heritage conservation into protected area management. But below their uniqueness is a common foundation, one that relies upon clear intention and dedicated action, one that draws upon the strengths of well-established cultural heritage conservation practice but does so by adapting these methods to the realities of protected areas. There is no singular example, best practice, or final success story for how to integrate cultural heritage conservation into protected area management, but through clear well- defined legislation, strategic policy and operational guidelines that define the terms of practice, dedicated expert staff, wide-ranging training, comprehensive and consistent planning, and a real, respectful effort to engage Indigenous communities, protected area agencies have worked to find a path that is continually building toward success. It is a process that, like cultural heritage itself, is contingent, dynamic, human, ever evolving, and continually being defined. But that is what conservation is, not an end state, but a practice. How this practice can be achieved in the Alberta Parks system is the challenge that will be taken up in the next chapters.

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Chapter 5: Alberta Parks History and Development

Introduction

Since the emergence of Alberta’s first parks in 1930, the system of protected areas managed by the provincial government has expanded in scale and scope. Originally conceived as small- scale reserves to beautify the rural landscape and provide recreational space for rural workers, provincial protected areas, today, cover a significant portion of the province’s territory and serve a wide range of functions, from recreation to the protection of biological diversity. Currently, with 473 units, the provincial protected area system protects 27,500km2, which is just over 4% of Alberta’s total land area. This system is made up of small recreational sites, as well as large and intact wildlands found throughout the province. Achieving this type of coverage has not been without challenges, as administrative and political issues have complicated the process, but the outcome is a large, growing, and diverse system of protected areas. The story of how the Alberta protected area system evolved over the past century provides an important context for understanding how the provincial parks department currently practices cultural heritage resource management. Since the establishment of the protected area system, staff overseeing its management have acknowledged the overlap between cultural heritage resources and provincial protected areas. However, the shifting political, scientific, and cultural forces that have guided protected area management and expansion over the century have alternately intensified or reduced the importance placed on cultural heritage resource considerations. In recent years, there has been an upswing in interest for cultural heritage matters by staff with Alberta Parks,5 but this current trend needs to be understood in the context of the longer-term development of the

5 Alberta Parks, the government agency responsible for managing the provincial protected area system, has undergone countless name changes in its history. Beginning as the Provincial Parks Board, the agency subsequently held the designations of Branch, Division, and Department. Sometime in the 1990s, the Alberta Parks Division started to be colloquially known as Alberta Parks. The Division itself underwent a series of name changes as a result of continual government reorganizations in the 2000s, including Parks and Protected Areas Division, Parks, Conservation, Recreation and Sport Division, and back to the Parks Division. It is unclear when exactly the rebrand occurred, but in the midst of this the Division began public operations as Alberta Parks. Formally, for example in management plans and policy, the official division name remains, but elsewhere Alberta Parks is used. Generally, in this chapter, the agency title that applies to each historical period will be used.

160 161 protected area system. The purpose of this chapter is to provide a brief history of the Alberta protected area system from its inception in the late 1920s to the present, focusing on the structural, managerial, and political changes that have occurred. The following chapter will then focus specifically on how cultural heritage resource management has evolved and shifted against this backdrop.

Birth of Alberta's Protected Area System (1930-1950)

Following a tour of the UK in the late 1920s, Premier J. E. Brownlee returned to Alberta with a new-found interest in and commitment to beautifying the rural landscape of the province. Experiencing the intact, productive, and picturesque British countryside, Brownlee was convinced that Alberta needed a dedicated effort to make rural life in the province more attractive and to provide opportunities for recreation and respite from farm labour. To push this objective forward, Brownlee appointed a special advisory committee and directed the deputy minister of works to have the district engineers identify “likely bathing beaches, popular picnicking grounds, fishing holes, and natural beauty spots adjacent to the provincial highways” (Armstrong et al., 2014, p. 304). Based on these findings, the committee put forward several recommendations in late 1929 for potential park locations, and in 1930, the government passed the Provincial Parks and Protected Areas Act to enable the creation of new parks. In justifying the establishment of provincial parks, the Act laid out a broad purpose that went beyond mere beautification. The authors of the Act, anticipating a grand role for provincial parks in the future, stated that provincial parks were to be: a) For the propagation, protection, and preservation therein of wild animal life and wild vegetation; b) For the recreation and general benefit of the inhabitants of the Province; and c) For the protection and preservation therein of objects of geological, ethnological, historical or other scientific interest. (Mason, 1988, p. 55) The Act also established the Provincial Parks Board to oversee the establishment, development, and overall management of the parks. In addition, the Parks Board was to appoint local, volunteer-run, advisory committees to look after the daily operational activities of each park. This administrative structure worked well, initially, because all the original parks the government

161 162 established in the early 1930s were small, and relatively easily managed, bathing spots such as Aspen Beach Provincial Park. Trouble arose later with the establishment of large parks and increased visitor traffic, but in the beginning, the advisory committees were crucial to developing and maintaining the initial infrastructure for the parks at little cost. Although all the original parks were small roadside bathing and picnicking spots, the Parks Board recognized the possibility of larger park units in the future. In the early 1930s, the Board adopted a three-tier classification system to guide their ongoing work around park establishment: • Class “A” Parks – Large areas of scenic beauty, historic and scientific importance. • Class “B” Parks – Recreational areas of which the main feature is a bathing beach, together with other recreational facilities. • Class “C” Parks – Auto parks, picnic grounds, beauty spots, or natural beauty viewpoints. (Mason, 1988, p. 58) The hope was that the classification system would allow the Board to undertake at least some level of systemic planning and cohesive management. However, the Board also felt that due to the establishment of the large national parks — Banff, Jasper, Wood Buffalo, and Waterton — there was likely little need for many Class “A” parks and therefore focused their initial efforts on the latter two categories. The 1930s were not an ideal time to institute a new and ambitious government program. With the onset of the Great Depression and the Second World War, the government was preoccupied, and financial capacity was limited. But, despite the weak financial position and the difficulties of the war years, there was some development in Alberta’s protected area system during this period. As Mason notes, “through an informal and somewhat haphazard method of land annexation, over a dozen new areas came under the jurisdiction of the Provincial Parks Board” (1988, p. 70). For this study, one of the sites set aside at this time, which has become particularly important from a cultural heritage resource perspective, is Writing-on-Stone. What was novel about Writing-on- Stone was that, at 800 acres, it was the first tract of land set aside as a Class “A” park. In addition to being the largest provincial park at the time, it was the first instance of the Parks Board seeking to fulfill the third clause of its mandate — to preserve areas of geological, ethnological, historical or other scientific interest. In a 1935 report, the parks superintendent highlighted the geological and archaeological importance of the rock formations and Indigenous drawings, as well as the historical value of both the drawings and the old North West Mounted Police post.

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These elements became the basis for setting aside the area as a provincial park (N.E Turner to W.A Fallow, October 24, 1942, quoted in Mason, 1988, 86). Despite the progress that was made through the 1930s toward reserving new areas for provincial parks, the Parks Board’s finances were severely constrained, which was a reality that significantly hampered the ability of the Board and local advisory committees to build up the system in any sizable manner. Nevertheless, the fact that a network of parks, which was in its infancy, not only survived but managed to expand through the Great Depression and Second World War is a testament to the dedication of the staff and volunteers, and to the growing support that these areas found among citizens. It would not be until after the war, with the improved financial and social conditions of that time, that the Alberta protected area system would come into its own.

Growth of Alberta's Parks System (1950-1964)

Starting in 1951, with the passage of a comprehensive new Parks Act, the Alberta protected area system entered an era of maturation and professionalization. The primary impact of the new Parks Act was a rearrangement of the oversight and management of parks. A new three-member Parks Board was established, which, apart from the makeup of its members who came from the Department of Lands and Forests rather than the Department of Public Works, was functionally the same as the previous board. More importantly, the Act gave the Parks Board the authority to appoint individuals to assist the board in fulfilling its mandate; in other words, to hire full-time parks staff. The new legislation maintained individual park advisory committees; however, the growing popularity and subsequent demands on the land base, and the installation of professional staff, led to a decreasing role for the committees. These volunteer-run committees were unable to care for the resources they were responsible for, and, as such, the Parks Board began to rely less and less on them. Although the advisory committees were not removed from parks legislation until 1974, the 1950s effectively saw the replacement of the committees with a more professional and dedicated staffing structure (Mason, 1988). A second, but equally important result of the new Parks Act, and the revamped Parks Board, was that the process for establishing new parks was consolidated and somewhat clarified. Over the previous decades, the Parks Board had reserved a large quantity of land, but little else was done to further park creation. Therefore, one of the first steps the new Parks Board took was to

163 164 review the existing reservations and make recommendations for areas to receive park designation. Once this work was complete, they were able to move ahead with identifying new sites and expanding the network of parks. In total, between 1951 and 1964, thirty four new provincial parks were established, adding considerably to the total coverage. The majority of these new parks, as in the past, were roadside campgrounds and recreation sites — areas meant to provide opportunities for fishing, picnicking, boating, and swimming. However, there was also an increasing focus on preserving and managing land for reasons beyond recreation. In addition, beginning in the 1950s, the Alberta Forest Service became involved in something akin to park establishment in two ways. First, the Forest Service started constructing forest recreation areas, which created spaces for camping and picnicking, but, more importantly, also helped to control and localize environmental impact, as well as reduce the risk of forest fires associated with random camping. Second, the Forest Service established three new wilderness areas, which were similar to what the Parks Board envisioned with Class “A” parks, but with fewer restrictions on boundary reductions and resource development. The first of these wilderness areas was created through a unique piece of standalone legislation, the 1959 Wilderness Provincial Park Act (later renamed the Willmore Wilderness Park Act), which set aside over 2000 square miles of land near Grande Cache for the “conservation and protection” of natural resources and the “preservation of its natural beauty” (Statues of Alberta, 1959, Ch. 95, Sect. 4). However, as Mason argues, this was a provincial park “in name only,” due to the strange legislative formation of the park and the lack of formal protection against mining and other resource development (1984, p. 116). The Forest Service reserved two other wilderness areas in 1961 on lands bordering Banff National Park. What became known as the Siffleur and White Goat Wilderness Areas were protected more securely from resource development than the Willmore area, but were again not originally placed under the care of the Parks Board through a formal park designation. Instead, the Forest Service withdrew development options from the land for ecosystem protection, and it was not until 1971, with the passage of Wilderness Areas Act, that the lands were designated as formal wilderness areas. The motivation behind the establishment of these wilderness areas was mixed. In part, the existence of the Willmore Wilderness Area was the result of its location within the riding of the Minister of the Department of Lands and Forests, N.A. Willmore, for whom the park was later named. Apart from crass political calculations, the wilderness areas were also a response to

164 165 pressure from conservationists who were advocating for protections on large parcels of land. Fish and game associations and outfitters, especially, were worried about the increasing loss of wildlife habitat due to resource development, and the subsequent impact such a loss would have on hunting. In addition, a budding environmental movement was becoming more vocal, calling for better protections for intact wild lands. Both groups saw a lack of action by the Parks Board to establish adequate reserves, but found a receptive audience in the Forest Service (Mason, 1988, p. 116). Although action on wilderness areas came from outside the Parks Board, the addition of large- scale reserves to the provincial protected area system marked a moment of evolution in thinking about the purpose and role of protected areas, one that would come to have significant implications in the following decades. Ultimately, despite the hesitant steps toward large-scale protected areas, the Alberta protected system through the 1950s and into the mid-1960s remained much the same as it had been in previous decades. Parks coverage expanded, and the period was marked by increasing professionalism, but at the same time, the new Parks Board continued to create new parks in an ad hoc manner with little overall coherence or system-level planning, and a principle focus on small recreation sites. Nevertheless, the popularity and importance of parks in the province were clear, and there was an obvious need to enhance the network further.

Expanding from Recreation to Preservation (1964-1973)

In 1964, responding to the increased significance of provincial parks, both in terms of land base and popularity, the Alberta Government upgraded the Parks Branch to a Division within the Department of Lands and Forests, giving the group more resources and power. In addition, the government again revised parks legislation. The principle change with the 1964 Provincial Parks Act was to broaden the mandate of the Parks Division, making park administrators formally responsible for the management of natural areas and wilderness areas (which, as noted before, lacked official legislation until 1971). However, what the new act did not do, as Mason argues, was “address the purpose of parks and parks-related areas nor stipulate a policy for their development” (Mason, 1984, 131). To address this gap, the Parks Division felt that it was necessary to establish a clear and comprehensive policy statement on the management of park areas.

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The 1967 Provincial Park Policy Statement, for the first time, formally articulated a management approach for Alberta’s protected area system. The policy statement laid out the responsibilities for parks administration, a classification of park types (provincial park, recreational area, historical site, natural area, wilderness area, and roadside campsite), and their purposes (Mason, 1984, 132). Most significantly, the policy statement marked a shift in government policy away from the original people-centered aim of “providing active and passive recreation in a setting of natural beauty” to an environmentally-focused objective of “providing recreational facilities in harmony with the preservation of specific geographical, geological, biological, or historical features but always to minimize impairment” (Quoted in Armstrong et al., 2014, p. 317). The policy statement also ushered in a new level of professionalism in the Parks Division. In the late 1960s, the Division began hiring dedicated park planners, landscape architects, and engineers to oversee the build-out of park infrastructure. Planners implemented sophisticated technical and planning processes that allowed them to complete park master plans and extensive resource inventories to guide decision-making and future development. Moreover, as will be discussed further in the next chapter, the Parks Division diversified its services to address the management and protection of historical resources and sites by hiring a museum display artist and instituting an archaeological inventory program (Mason, 1984). Seeing these actions as a whole, the overall focus from 1964 to1973 was to put in place the systems, and build the knowledge base of what existed in parks, to make management decisions more effectively. Parks staff were, in effect, playing catch up after the significant growth in the system in the early 1950s and 60s. However, despite the effort toward new planning methods and improved park services, “two decades of rapid, essentially reactive development, and a lack of a comprehensive and systematic planning strategy had left several major flaws in the provincial park system” (Mason, 1984, 147). These flaws were identified and articulated in the early 1970s by a newly elected government, who not only sought to correct the errors of the past but to create a new and more central place for protected areas in Alberta.

New Directions for Provincial Parks (1973-1990)

The election in 1971 of Peter Lougheed’s Progressive Conservatives was a sea change in Alberta’s political landscape. With the new government came a broad province-led strategy of

166 167 economic and social transformation, a central feature of which was parks policy. Lougheed created a new Department of the Environment “to bring focus to previously scattered government initiatives;” “created a high-profile Environment Conservation Authority to advise the government on land use, resource development, and planning, in particular on the eastern slopes;” and, more broadly, pushed government departments “to think in terms of a comprehensive strategy.” In seeing as valuable the environment, and environmental protection specifically, the new government pushed forward a whole new way of thinking, one that saw “water, parks, outdoor recreation and environmental protection become as important as oil in a more nuanced and sophisticated provincial development strategy” (Armstrong et al., 2014, p. 317). However, despite the renewed and central focus for parks, it was not a time free of challenges. As Mason argues, the period after 1973 was, on the positive side, characterized by growth and innovation, but also “an almost continuous process of administrative reorganizations” as the new government sought out an institutional framework that could achieve its goals (1984, p. 150). The growth, innovation, and significance of parks were established in 1973 with a significant position paper, Position Paper No. 13, where the Minister of Lands and Forests, who was then still responsible for parks, stated, quite bluntly, that the existing park system was inadequate. The position paper argued that the parks system needed more land, the existing park lands were badly in need of upgrading, there were serious resource development conflicts in some parks, and Albertans in metropolitan centres, particularly seniors and the poor, lacked opportunities to visit parks (Government of Alberta, 1973). To address this situation, the Government set out a seven- point statement of park policy. 1. The parks system was to be expanded with financial commitment tripled over three years. 2. Parks were to be developed according to ecological characteristics and should preserve the natural setting in perpetuity. 3. Parks were to be made more accessible, closer to major population centres, and public input into the planning process was to be sought. 4. Where resource development conflicts existed these were to be dealt with and strictly supervised going forward. 5. The private sector was encouraged to develop the recreation market to complement provincial parks.

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6. Larger provincial parks were to be established and appropriate recreational zoning created within them. 7. An integrated planning system related to the development of recreation land bases was to be developed. Specifically, the Government suggested that a coordinated policy for national and municipal parks, forest reserves, and public land management, and historical, cultural, and wilderness values was essential. (Government of Alberta, 1973; summarized in Mason, 1988)

The Parks Department subsequently pursued these seven points over the following decade and a half with a relatively high level of success. While only nine new parks were added to the system, the total area of parks in the province more than doubled. This growth was largely attributable to the development of the Kananaskis area and the establishment of Fish Creek Provincial Park, Canada’s largest urban park. The government’s financial support for provincial parks went from just under $3 million in 1973 to over $46 million in 1983. The administration of the park system was consolidated through departmental reshuffling, which culminated in the creation of a dedicated government department for parks in 1975 as the Department of Recreation, Parks, and Wildlife (subsequently the Department of Recreation and Parks from 1979-1992). A revised Provincial Parks Act in 1974 also helped clarify the role of the department by succinctly stating that parks were to be developed and maintained: a) For the conservation and management of flora and fauna; b) For the preservation of specified areas and objects therein that are of geological, cultural, ecological, or other scientific interest, and; c) To facilitate their use and enjoyment for outdoor recreation. (Statues of Alberta, 1974, Chpt 51, Sec. 3) This new mandate maintained, but simplified, the dual mandate of parks to preserve the landscape and provide recreational opportunities that had existed since the system’s establishment. However, despite all this work, the legacy of ad hoc development and legislation persisted and, if anything, was intensified during this period with the creation of two new types of park, Ecological Reserves and Recreation Areas, which were added to the existing system of Wilderness Areas, Natural Areas, Provincial Parks, and the separately legislated Willmore Provincial Park. Despite the legislative and structural discontinuity, the Department did make a concerted effort toward more comprehensive planning and greater integration with the other land use management functions of the government.

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In 1977, the Department published the first comprehensive plan for the park system. Putting the Pieces Together: An Alberta Provincial Park System (Alberta Parks, 1977) was a fascinating document in the way it anticipated the discourse around sustainable development that would gain traction through the 1980s. The overall goal of the system was premised around a notion, which was first laid out in Position Paper No. 13, that protected areas were only one part of the broader provincial system of resource use, planning, management, and utilization (Kennett, 2006). As one component of a more extensive resource system, protected areas were considered to be integral to ensuring “a sustained conservation level which would yield to Albertans now and in the future a living environment representative of the potential which exists” (Quoted in Swinnerton, 1985, p. 52). Part of this was to plan and manage the various uses within the parks more effectively. In this vein, the system plan called for the development of two planning layers, a classification system for provincial parks and a complementary zoning framework, which were formally established in 1979. The classification system put forward four classes: 1) Preservation, 2) Woodland, 3) Natural Environment, and 4) Recreation. Within each class, planners could divide individual park land into six zones including natural, cultural, primitive, outdoor recreation, facility, and restricted resource (Ministerial Order 6/79, 1979). Despite the ambition of the plan, however, the inherent challenges of implementing an integrated approach to resource management across the province were significant; challenges that were compounded by growing fiscal concerns in the next decade. Nevertheless, the system plan was a notable move toward instituting a professional, widespread planning process for the park system that would be carried forward into the 1980s. In 1982, the Department of Recreation and Parks reorganized internally, which involved the creation of the Planning Secretariat that amalgamated all the planning functions of the department in one office. One of the results of the new dedicated planning section was a significant review and consolidation of the Department’s policy statements. In the middle of the decade, a series of draft policy statements were published (Alberta Recreation and Parks, 1986), culminating in the 1988 document Foundations for Action: Corporate Aims for the Ministry of Recreation and Parks (Alberta Recreation and Parks, 1988). There is far more in this document than can be unpacked here, but some of the details, particularly as they pertain to cultural heritage resource management, will be returned to in the following chapter. For now, it will suffice to say that the corporate plan laid out a comprehensive vision for the park system

169 170 including a mission statement, eight guiding principles, and eight general ministerial goals, which were then operationalized through a series of chapters on various aspects of implementation (Alberta Recreation and Parks, 1988, p. 3). The scope and detail of the 1988 corporate plan were unmatched in the history of the Alberta Parks Department and, to date, have not been repeated. However, the thoroughness of the document speaks to the ambition and growing professionalism of the department in the 1980s. Unfortunately, the changing economic climate of the decade ultimately stifled much of this work. With a sharp decline in provincial resource revenues, the province’s economic position changed dramatically by the end of the decade, and the government entered a phase of austerity. The park budget was cut for the first time since the 1950s, staff were laid off, and much of the focus for the department shifted to caretaking rather than expansion and innovation. It was the end of a promising era of park development in Alberta, one that was replaced by perpetual understaffing and political controversy. But, over the succeeding twenty years, the general framework developed by the 1988 corporate plan continued to shape the way staff operated in the Alberta Parks Department.

Cutbacks, Coherence, and Special Places (1990-2000)

The 1990s are remembered by most in Alberta as a period of intense fiscal austerity. Despite the measures taken by the Progressive Conservative government through the 1980s to reign in government spending, oil prices declined, in turn depriving the province of significant revenue income. Led by former Calgary mayor Ralph Klein, the Progressive Conservatives were returned to power in 1993 with a clear mandate to reduce public spending and debt. Over the next 12 years, Klein focused government efforts on paying off public debt through deep cuts to the public service and the sale of publicly owned companies. The Parks Department was by no means immune to these cuts. From 1988 to 1999, the annual budget for the Parks Division declined from $76.1 million to a low of $21.1 million (Figure 14). The reductions were achieved through staff layoffs, campground closures, and privatization of park services. As one of the interview participants who worked with the department through this period recalled, it felt akin to a badly lost battle. “I called it the slaughter on Jasper Avenue, where our headquarters group… went from 300 employees … to, like, 30 or 40. So a lot of the

170 171 planning expertise or knowledge… was gone or some of it trickled down to the regions, but a lot of that expertise and knowledge disappeared” (Interview 16).

90 Total Budget 80

70 Operating Budget

Budget (millions) 30

1987-88 1988-89 1989-90 1990-91 1991-92 1992-93 1993-94 1994-95 1995-96 1996-97 1997-98 1998-99 1999-00 2000-01 2001-02 2002-03 2003-04 2004-05 2005-06 2006-07 2007-08 Figure 14: Operating and total (operating plus capital) budget of the Alberta Parks Division 1987-2008. (Reeves & Walsh, 2007, p. 50)

As part of the significant cuts to the Parks Department, in the early 1990s, the provincial government felt that a substantial reworking of the bureaucratic machinery was necessary to streamline government operations and reduce spending (Government Organization Act, S.A. 1994, c. G–8.5, Schedule 5). This impulse, coupled with a recognition that the government’s work around environmental issues somewhat lacked coherence, resulted, in 1993, in the consolidation of several government departments into the Department of Environmental Protection. Founded on an integrated resource management philosophy, the objective of the Department of Environmental Protection was “to ensure a quality environment for Albertans by providing clean air, water, and soil; protecting wildlife, forests, parks, and other natural resources; and ensuring that the development of these resources is sustainable” (PAA, GR0053). By embedding the work of parks within a departmental structure focused more broadly on environmental protection, the government signaled two things. First, the restructuring was a downgrade of importance for the Parks Division, which had hitherto been a department on its

171 172 own; and second, a shift away from a concern with recreation toward one of ecosystem protection. Ironically, however, while the Parks Division was fiscally hobbled and reorganized, the government also decided to embark on an effort to expand the system significantly, catalyzing a process that exposed some of the fundamental issues facing Alberta’s protected area system. The expansion of the protected area system in Alberta in the 1990s was part of a broader conversation emerging in Canada, and around the world, about the need to create more representative protected areas. Conservation advocates argued that the world needed to set aside large tracts of intact ecosystems in the various natural regions to stem the tide of biodiversity loss and create a sustainable future for the natural world (Dearden & Rollins, 2009). In Canada, this position was advocated by the World Wildlife Foundation and the Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society, who established the Endangered Species Campaign in 1989 to call for the protection of representative samples of Canada’s natural regions by the end of the decade (Barnett, 1992; World Wildlife Fund Canada, 2010). In November of 1992, the Alberta Government signed on to Canada’s Statement of Commitment to Complete Canada’s Networks of Protected Areas, which called for the completion of a network of protected areas covering Canada’s natural regions by the year 2000. In 1995, this commitment led to the announcement of a made-in-Alberta approach to expanding the Province’s protected area network through a strategic initiative called Special Places. The government intended the Special Places initiative to be a process for creating a network of protected areas that represented the entirety of the province’s environmental diversity. Having been built up over decades without a comprehensive plan for what was to be protected, the Alberta protected area system in the 1990s was a hodgepodge of different ecosystems. As such, the Special Places initiative “focused on establishing new protected areas in ‘natural regions’ that were under-represented in the province’s protected area network,” a process that was to be based on both a scientific survey of public lands and public nominations (Alberta Parks, 2018). To oversee the program, a multi-stakeholder Special Places Provincial Coordinating Committee (PCC) was appointed and tasked with reviewing public nominations, providing direction to the program, and submitting final recommendations for candidate sites. In several important ways, the initiative was a success, in the first year twenty-nine new protected areas were designated, more than 400 nominations were submitted for review, and when the initiative concluded in

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2001, a “total of 81 new and 13 expanded sites added 2 million hectares to Alberta’s protected area land base” (Alberta Parks, 2018). However, the initiative also revealed the underlying weaknesses in the protected area legislation and initiated a legislative review process that proved to be highly controversial. As David Poulton, a lawyer for the Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society, explained, within the first few months of its mandate, the Committee concluded that the protected area system in Alberta was deeply flawed. The committee “advised the Minister of Environmental Protection that their collective experience led them to believe that legislative reform respecting protected areas was long overdue. With the blessing of the Minister, a sub-committee of the PCC was established to embark on outlining what reforms were needed” (2001, p. 5). Also, the Minister commissioned a review and critique of the legislation from the Environmental Law Centre. What each of these reviews saw, when they looked at the provincial protected area system, was a network of different sites linked together through a mix of incoherent legislation that was lacking a clear rationale for the protection of lands in the province. As noted previously, three different acts created seven distinct types of protected areas (Figure 15).

Legislation Designations Established Wilderness Areas, Ecological Reserves and Wilderness Areas Natural Areas Act Ecological Reserves Natural Areas Provincial Parks Act Provincial Parks Wildland Provincial Parks Recreation Areas Willmore Wilderness Park Act Willmore Wilderness Park Figure 15: Types of protected area classifications in Alberta in 1995

Each of the seven types of protected areas served a different function and offered various degrees of protection from human use and development. Poulton offers a useful summary of the types of designation, which remain in place today. Described in order of declining intensity of protection, Alberta’s protected area network consisted of:

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1) Wilderness Areas - This is the highest level of protection available in Alberta, essentially prohibiting all human activity with the exception of foot access. There are only three such areas, all in fairly remote mountain areas on the eastern boundaries of Banff and Jasper National Parks. These were established at the time their legislation was passed in the 1960s and none have been established since. 2) Ecological Reserves - Carrying the rather vague legislated purpose of “preserv(ing) public lands for ecological purposes,” this designation places a high level of protection, most often for purposes of protecting particularly sensitive landscapes. Ecological reserves are generally very small areas with some outstanding characteristics, such as the key habitat of an endangered species. 3) Willmore Wilderness Park - The Willmore Wilderness Park is a single protected area, passed under “stand-alone” legislation in 1959. Within its approximately 46,000 km2, hunting, fishing, and some limited amount of trapping are allowed. By amendments to its legislation in 1995, industrial activity was categorically prohibited from this park. 4) Wildland Provincial Park - Within the general category of Provincial Park, wildlands are a special sub-category established by a set of regulations established in 1996. Based closely on the Willmore model, this was intended to allow for the establishment of large protected areas where a wide variety of nature-based recreation could be enjoyed. 5) Provincial Park - The Provincial Parks Act contains very few restrictions or prohibitions on the uses which may be made of lands designated as parks, referring much of that work to regulations. Because of the flexibility which regulations provide, the activities allowed vary widely from one site to another. The designation itself can mean virtually everything from a highly commercialized and developed beach resort, to a roadside picnic area, to a remote and highly-protected wilderness. 6) Natural Area - Likewise, the designation of an area as a Natural Area carries with it a minimum of substance. The legislation provides only that the responsible Minister of the Crown (i.e., Environmental Protection) may prescribe what uses may be made of land so designated. This is usually done by the development of a site-specific management plan, though many Natural Areas do not have such management plans in place. Again, therefore, the character of such areas varies widely. 7) Recreation Area - This category holds no promise of the protection of nature. These areas are established solely for the purpose of facilitating their use and enjoyment for outdoor recreation. (Poulton, 2001, p. 4) As discussed in the previous sections, each of these categories was brought in at different times, by different governments, within different institutional contexts. As such, it is no surprise that there was little coherence or high-level rationale for how the system was put together. There

174 175 was a great deal of overlap and inconsistency, as well as a lack of definite purpose for protected areas. Witnessing this situation, both the Special Places sub-committee and the Environmental Law Centre reached the same conclusion: that “Alberta needed a single consolidated statute that would set out a comprehensive and cohesive law of protection for natural lands” (Poulton, 2001, p. 5). Not only would such a consolidated legislative arrangement create coherence and efficiency, but it would also build certainty by imposing clear rules around who was allowed to do what on the land, and what the process was for establishing and maintaining protected areas. In addition, the Environmental Law Centre report highlighted another serious issue, which was the existence of many pre-existing development dispositions, and a lack of a coordinated process for extinguishing them, or the political will to carry out such work. The presence of pre-existing dispositions would become an ongoing source of frustration for the Special Places Committee as they tried to find sites with intact and representative ecosystems, “only to find time and again that these sites had several layers of undeveloped dispositions already granted upon them.” As Poulton explains, the government’s policy had been to “to grant priority to these development rights, meaning that good quality sites would likely have new industrial development taking place upon them even after having been designated as protected areas” (Poulton, 2001, pp. 5–6). The potential allowance of industrial development within protected areas was a contradiction that created significant push back from conservation advocates and ultimately tarred the Special Places initiative. Accepting the recommendations of the sub-committee and the Environmental Law Centre, the Alberta government took up the task of creating new and unified protected area legislation. In March of 1999, the government introduced the Natural Heritage Act as Bill 15. The public, after having read a previously released policy brief outlining the key elements of the new legislation, knew what to expect with the new act and were ready to greet it with a storm of protest. The central issues raised by conservation advocates and industry was the government’s position on pre-existing dispositions and the discretion permitted to the Minister. However, when one looks past the controversy, which will be returned to below, there was a great deal in the new act that was progressive and aimed to modernize the existing protected area system. The Natural Heritage Act began with a preamble identifying Alberta’s six natural regions, focusing on the natural landscapes, ecological processes, and biological diversity that exists in

175 176 each. It then set out the overall purposes of the Bill, and subsequently of the protected area network, which was to: • Designate certain lands that are representative of the natural regions, • Designate certain lands that contain unique or special natural features, • Safeguard these lands from impairment caused by human use and activity, • Preserve diversity, • Provide lasting legacy for future generations, • Provide opportunities for present and future generations to understand, appreciate and experience Alberta's natural heritage, • Create different categories of areas based on the level of protection required to ensure preservation of ecological processes and biological diversity, and • Provide opportunities for outdoor recreation, tourism and experiencing of Alberta's natural heritage (Environmental Law Centre, 1999). To achieve the declared purposes, the Natural Heritage Act aimed to streamline the system of protected areas by establishing six classes of parks and protected areas that would roughly align with the protected area types that already existed. These classes, in order of the strictness of their protection, were ecological reserve, wilderness reserve, wildland park, provincial park, heritage rangeland, and recreation area (Government of Alberta, 1999, p. 7). Of these, the only one that was particularly novel was the heritage rangeland classification, which was one of the more innovative proposals to come out of the Special Places Planning Committee. The idea behind the rangelands was to protect areas of native grassland that had evolved in tandem with herds of bison. Large populations of grazers, moving across the landscape, had shaped the native biodiversity of the grasslands but also created a dependent relationship. With the loss of the bison herds, domestic cattle have come to fulfill a similar ecological function in parts of the province where some of the continent’s largest and most well-preserved native prairie grasslands continue to exist. The Heritage Rangeland classification was meant to acknowledge the important conservation work that Alberta’s ranching community was undertaking and provide a different model for stewardship than the prohibition of human use that was typically employed in protected areas (Government of Alberta, 1999, p. 12). There was also an important cultural aspect to Heritage Rangelands in that they would support the preservation of a cowboy/ranching heritage. Although the Natural Heritage Act ultimately failed, the merit of the Heritage

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Rangeland concept was well-established and eventually adopted in a 2000 amendment to the Wilderness Areas, Ecological Reserves and Natural Areas Act. Apart from establishing a new guiding vision for protected areas and a more cohesive classification system, the Natural Heritage Act also established mandatory provisions for management planning. It stated that there was a “duty to complete a management plan for an area reasonably soon after it is designated,” the objective of which was to “ensure, through the preservation and protection of the environment, that the structures and functions of the ecosystems in the area are maintained” (Quoted in Environmental Law Centre, 1999, p. 14). This provision, alongside the clarified intentions of each classification, would have been a major step forward for the protected area system by ensuring that there was clarity within each park unit about what was allowed and what the intended management direction was. In addition, the Act required mandatory public consultation processes, a new zoning system to manage large areas, and more clearly defined offences and associated penalties. In short, it would have brought Alberta’s protected area system in line with contemporary best practices. However, the Act also doubled down on the government’s commitment to respecting pre-existing development dispositions, which set the stage for a controversial battle that eventually scuttled the bill. While the Natural Heritage Act formally prohibited “granting or renewing dispositions or other industrial or agricultural interests, or access in respect of such interests” in a provincial protected area, this prohibition was subject to several exceptions, including the paradoxical allowance for granting sub-surface interests and ministerial flexibility in allowing pre-existing rights to be developed. “The exceptions,” a review of the Act by the Environmental Law Centre concluded, “are numerous” and amounted to an “overwhelming amount of activity” being potentially allowed in the “so-called protected areas” as such actions would be dependent merely on Ministerial approval (1999, p. 33). Unsurprisingly, conservation advocates and environmentalists who were worried that protected areas would not be adequately protected from new industrial development greeted the Natural Heritage Act with fierce opposition. However, perhaps more surprising, the forestry and petroleum industries were also in opposition as they did not want to be put into positions where they would become the focus of public controversy. Instead, the conservationists and industry groups came together to ask for some means of compensating those holding dispositions, such as land transfers or royalty incentives, to allow for the dispositions to be withdrawn from the land before designation occurred (Poulton, 2001, p. 7).

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The provincial government, unsure of how to proceed and facing public outcry, allowed Bill 15 to die at the end of the spring sitting of the Legislature and then sent the Natural Heritage Act back to an MLA committee to work toward some solution. The MLA Committee’s objective was to “develop and oversee a public review of key issues related to the proposed Natural Heritage Act” (Government of Alberta, 2000, p. 1). Through a public consultation process, the committee examined several contentious issues, including hunting allowances, recreational off-highway vehicle usage, and, most importantly, petroleum and mining exploration and development, before developing a set of recommendations aimed at strengthening the protective measures in the Act. These recommendations included a reiteration not to grant any new surface access rights, although they did allow for further subsurface permits so long as they were accessed from outside the park by directional drilling. Most consequential, though, was a recommendation to put in place a “mandatory requirement for the Minister of Environment and Minister of Resource Development to review existing oil and gas [and mining] dispositions in all areas and to develop a transition plan for the management and ultimate phase- out of the activity over time, in situations where existing rights exist that have no restrictions on surface access” (Government of Alberta, 2000, p. 4). The report also upheld the need for ministerial control and flexibility, effectively allowing a veto on the more robust protective requirements, but at the same time reiterating the belief that industrial development had no place in protected areas, and that there needed to be a transparent and responsible way of ensuring that existing dispositions be phased out. Unfortunately, the government’s efforts to translate these recommendations into a more robust piece of legislation were scuttled again, although not by any protest from the public. Instead, media reports emerged that a dispute between the Environment Minister Gary Mar and Natural Resources Minister Steve West had effectively halted the process. Reportedly, West refused to consider any plan that would remove oil, gas, or mineral rights from protected areas (Hryciuk, 2000). Outside observers saw it as a power struggle between an “old minister who has a lot of power in the cabinet and a young rookie who wants to take his place" (Allyson & Hryciuk, 2000), an assessment that proved somewhat true as Mar was subsequently shuffled out of the Environment portfolio later that year (Martin, 2000). In the end, the conflict between the two ministers was an anticlimactic finish to the whole debate. After years of public controversy, negotiation, consultation, and review, the Natural Heritage Act was allowed to die over a disagreement between two ministers.

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In the end, the 1990s came to a close with an expanded protected area system as a result of the Special Place initiative, more limited resources and staff due to the extensive cuts over the decade, and nothing, apart from the addition of the Heritage Rangelands designation, done to give coherence and clarity to the overall legislative framework. Moreover, the political controversy created by the attempted Natural Heritage Act would dissuade future governments from tackling the issue in any meaningful way.

Rising from the Ashes (2000-Present)

In the years since the Natural Heritage Act debacle, and the closure of the Special Places Initiative, the Parks Division has worked to catch up and rebuild. As one long-time park employee interviewed for this project explained, “we kind of rose from the ashes in the early 2000s… we staffed up again” (Interview 16). Nevertheless, the effects of personnel reductions lingered. By 2006, staff levels were still only 52% of what they had been in 1992, leaving the division with a serious lack of human and financial capacity (Reeves & Walsh, 2007). Despite the limitations, the division undertook a considerable amount of work through the 2000s. However, much of the work was focused on putting in place the infrastructure and operational requirements for the new protected areas added to system in the 1990s. Operational efforts took place amidst another round of administrative restructuring that started with the division being moved out of the Department of Environment in 2001 and into the Ministry of Community Development. This was a notable move for this research because the latter ministry also housed the Historical Resources Division, marking the first time since the early 1970s that the two divisions had been together administratively. This arrangement did not last long, however, as the government reorganized the Ministry to be Alberta Tourism, Parks, Recreation, and Culture from 2006-2008, and the Historical Resources Division was moved to Community Development in 2008 when the Ministry became simply Alberta Tourism, Parks, and Recreation. This structure remained until 2014 when the Parks Division was again placed within the Ministry of Environment, which became the Ministry of Environment and Parks, as it remains today. Despite the constant changes to the stationery, there was some effort toward system-wide planning during this period. Alberta’s Plan for Parks (Alberta Tourism, Parks, and Recreation, 2009) was released in 2009 as a strategic blueprint for managing the system over the next ten

179 180 years. In a move that was reflective of the ministerial partners, which focused on community development, recreation, tourism, and culture, the plan focused on improving visitor services. It called for, among other things, the creation of an online system for campground reservations, an improved trail network, an effort to bolster winter recreation opportunities, and the development of clear guidelines for new park creation. However, the plan was criticized for not going far enough toward environmental protection and being too heavily focused on promoting recreation and user experience, rather than ecosystem protection. Environmentalists argued that the plan would lead to better access and use of the parks, but without a strong commitment to putting nature first, issues around overuse would certainly arise. As a spokesman for the Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society said at the time, “when you have unfettered use, you’ll have unfettered damage” (D’Aliesio, 2009). The criticism picked up little steam, however, and the Plan for Parks remained central to the Parks Division’s work over the next decade. Apart from the 2009 plan, the division remained quietly focused on operational activities over these years. A slight ripple in the waters appeared in 2010 when the Stelmach government tried to reopen the conversation around consolidating parks legislation. Without consultation or warning, the government proposed a new unified Alberta Parks Act that would reduce the number of park classifications from seven to two, provincial parks and heritage rangelands, and eliminate the specific restrictions afforded to the different categories under existing legislation. Instead of legislated regulations, the government proposed using a system of zoning for each park unit to determine what activities and uses were to be allowed (Gerein, 2010). Critics were quick to denounce this proposal, arguing that zoning regulations were not a sufficient substitute for legislated regulations (Environmental Law Centre, 2010). The government quickly backed down on the proposed act, leaving in place the existing patchwork of legislation that had been a challenge for the division over the previous decades. While the administration was in flux and little was being achieved in creating system-level coherence, the Parks Division continued to pursue new park establishment, but with a greater emphasis on collaboration with local communities and partner organizations. In 2005, for example, the provincial government worked with the cities of Edmonton and St. Albert, Parkland and Sturgeon counties, and the family of former Lieutenant Governor Lois Hole, to re-designate the Big Lake Natural Area on the west side of St. Albert as the Lois Hole Centennial Provincial Park, building up new infrastructure and visitor services in the process. In southern Alberta, as

180 181 another example, the Parks Division partnered with the Harvie family, who owned a significant parcel of former ranchland along the Bow River between Cochrane and Calgary, to establish the Glenbow Ranch Provincial Park in 2008. These parks, two of the largest created over the past two decades, were opportunities that emerged naturally, rather than being actively pursued by the government, but they also filled a recreational need for Alberta’s growing urban centres. Passivity in parks creation ended in 2015, though, with the election of the New Democrat Government (NDP). In 2017 the Alberta government announced a $239 million plan to expand and revitalize the provincial park system. Largely dedicated to revitalizing ageing infrastructure in existing parks, the plan also pushed ahead with new park creation, including the establishment of Castle Provincial Park and Wildland Provincial Park in southern Alberta and several Wildland Provincial Parks in northeastern Alberta (Graney, 2016). This push for expansion was part of a larger movement across Canada to achieve what are known as the Aichi Targets, which are a set of twenty biodiversity goals adopted by the international community in 2010 (Secretariat of the Convention on Biological Diversity, 2011). One of the most important of these targets is a commitment to conserve at least 17% of terrestrial areas and 10% of marine and coastal areas in each country by 2020. In 2015, the Canadian federal, provincial, and territorial governments agreed to work toward these goals. Jointly, these governments released the 2020 Biodiversity Goals and Targets for Canada (Government of Canada, 2016), which included the goal of expanding the protected area network to meet the Aichi vision. The Alberta Parks Division, along with Parks Canada, agreed to co-lead the conservation initiative for the terrestrial and inland water component, thus expressing their commitment to the targets and providing an impetus to establish new large protected areas in the province (Government of Canada, 2016). In 2018, in the run-up to the provincial election, the NDP Government announced plans to establish another series of protected areas along the eastern slopes in central Alberta. The proposal for the Bighorn region included three new provincial parks, four recreation areas, a wildland provincial park, and a new public land use zone (Bellefontaine, 2018). The NDP was unable to push the proposal through before being defeated in the 2019 election by the United Conservative Party (UCP), who subsequently declined to carry the idea forward (The Canadian Press, 2019). In addition, since being elected, the new government has retreated on much of the conservation-focused work put forward by the NDP, including the commitment to achieving the Aichi Targets. At the time of writing, the renewal of Alberta’s park system that began between

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2015 and 2019 appears to be in serious trouble as the UCP government announced significant cuts to the provincial parks budget, as well as the intent to privatize or delist 164 sites in the provincial network (Weber, 2020). Despite recent announcements, the last two decades were relatively positive for the provincial protected area network. The network saw a considerable increase in its land base, increased visitation, a modernization of some of its management systems, and ongoing operational successes. However, these successes were limited because of ongoing human and financial resource challenges that created a continual struggle to catch up to the ever-growing demands of an expanding system and user base. As one current parks planner remarked, it's like we just started and we still haven't caught up with Special Places. I mean in terms of capacity, we haven't caught up with the cuts that were made to the park system in the 1990s in the Ralph Klein era, where we had a billion- dollar infrastructure deficit coming out of that. We have over tripled our park system since the year 2000… and we did a calculation at one point in time that, with the total number of staff we have, like, 0.2 staff people per square kilometre or something like that. It's astronomical. So we have sites where, you know, it's been years since a Park's staff has set foot in there” (Interview 15). Ultimately, Alberta’s protected area system is one that is robust, with immense potential, but continually struggling to secure political support.

Conclusion

As of 2020, Alberta Parks continues evolving, responding to the fluctuating political forces and the shifting cultural discourses that shape the role of protected areas. Increasing concerns around the decline of global environmental health, whether it be through habitat loss, pollution, or human-induced climate change, has resulted in a renewed push to increase the coverage of protected areas. Advocates see the creation of a robust network of conservation areas across the globe as a crucial part of achieving sustainable development. For a brief period, from 2015-2019, it appeared that the Parks Division, and the provincial government more generally, were taking these ideas seriously, working hard to expand the network, involve communities, consult with Indigenous communities, and provide a valuable service to the citizens of the province. Although this progress appears to be in jeopardy, the Alberta protected area system has weathered a

182 183 hundred years of political changes, administrative shuffling, financial turmoil, and public controversy. From its beginning as a set of small public bathing spots in 1930, to covering over 4% of the entire province’s landmass, the Alberta protected area network continues to expand and evolve. The legacy of this system’s development is both the robust and sizable network of protected areas that are cared for by the citizens of the province, and a patchwork of legislation and policies that come together to create an often unclear and ad hoc approach to management. It will come as little surprise in the next chapter that, as the approach to managing the protected area system has been undertaken in an ad hoc manner, with little system-level planning, the approach to conserving cultural heritage resources within this network has been equally unfocused. Moreover, as the Parks Division has sought to deal with immediate challenges, be they political, administrative, or financial, there has been little motivation or capacity to address the demands of cultural heritage conservation.

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Chapter 6: Cultural Heritage Resource Management in Alberta Parks

Introduction

Despite the lack of a well-articulated or well-planned approach to cultural heritage resource management within Alberta Parks throughout its history, the desire to address this issue has persisted. Through the 2000s, this desire has become increasingly central, principally due to a growing call, both within and outside of the government, to reconcile with Indigenous communities. However, over the past two decades there is an absence of accessible policy documents, internal communications, or secondary sources to shed light on how Alberta Parks has approached cultural heritage resource management. Therefore, this chapter draws upon a review of existing management plans, which span the last twenty years of provincial park operations, and an analysis of interview data collected for this project, which clarifies recent developments and ongoing challenges with respect to cultural heritage resource management. In the end, what one can conclude about the approach to cultural heritage resource management in Alberta Parks is that there has been an increasingly sophisticated interest in the issue over the past twenty years and a progressive effort to develop a coherent approach. But the approach that has evolved continues to lack a clear and comprehensive articulation, and as a result, Alberta Parks continues to manage cultural heritage resources in the provincial protected area system in an ad hoc manner.

Early Developments in Cultural heritage resource Management (1930-1974)

When the provincial government passed its first legislation to allow for the establishment of provincial parks in 1930, the Provincial Parks and Protected Areas Act included in its statement of purpose three general goals for these areas, one of which was “the protection and preservation therein of objects of geological, ethnological, historical or other scientific interest” (Mason, 1988, p. 55). The inclusion of historical and ethnological objects of interest is significant because it signals what parks founders were considering. At the time, a movement advocating for the conservation of cultural heritage resources was only in its infancy. Alongside a growing chorus to protect significant, scenic, and pristine natural areas, cultural heritage advocates were making the case for measures to protect historic remains. Into the mid-twentieth century, many

184 185 jurisdictions saw the establishment of parks and historic sites as part of the same preservation and outdoor recreation agenda. In Alberta, parks, in Premier Brownlee’s estimation, were meant to beautify the landscape and, as such, it is easy to understand how the preservation of historic structures and sites could fit into such a program. In this way, the original protected area legislation doubled as a means of conserving critical historic sites and natural areas, as both were meant to serve similar recreational and cultural enrichment functions. Although the legislation initially included the conservation of objects of historic and ethnological significance as a purpose for parks, and it is possible to see how such objects could overlap with natural areas, this clause carried little emphasis, and garnered even less attention until 1953. In that year, the Deputy Minister for Lands and Forests determined that the government needed to create Provincial Historic Sites, and that the Parks Board should undertake this responsibility (PAA, GR0063, Minutes of the Provincial Park Board, March 30, 1953). Despite clear direction, these sites did not, initially, become a high priority for the board. A list of three potential sites was put forward to the Alberta Historical Society in 1955 for review, but it was not until 1959 that these spots — Ribstone, Fort Del Isle, and Fort Vermillion — were finally designated as Provincial Historic Sites (Mason, 1988, p. 112). A slow start, but one that quickly accelerated. To this group, the Parks Board added five more sites in 1960, along with another four in 1961, and a handful more over the next few years, bringing the total to nineteen by 1964. As noted in the previous chapter, in the late 1960s, parks planning started to become more professional, focusing on developing resource inventories to inform decision making, developing overarching policy statements, and writing master plans for individual parks. This desire for modern, professional planning spilled over to historic sites. In 1968, the Parks Division hired a museum display artist to produce a “detailed guide book outlining the facilities and attractions at each of the provincial parks and a comprehensive brochure which gave information covering all aspects of the early and recent history of the Cypress Hills park, its geography, geology, flora and fauna, and the fossils and relics contained within the park” (Mason, 1988, p. 136). A few years later, in 1971, the Division began a survey of archaeological resources in several provincial parks to identify and evaluate existing historical and pre-historical sites within the park system, both for preservation and educational purposes (Government of Alberta, 1974). These developments highlight not only the growing professionalism and desire to fulfill the overall

185 186 parks mandate within the Division, but also signal a parallel growth in appreciation for the cultural heritage of the province, more generally. In 1970, the Alberta government passed the first dedicated cultural heritage legislation with the Alberta Heritage Act, which formally established the Provincial Museum and Archives. Then, in 1974, when the government rewrote the Provincial Parks Act in response to Position Paper No. 13, it decided to withdraw reference to historical sites, along with natural areas and wilderness areas. Instead, the government placed each of these categories under different pieces of legislation, which for cultural heritage was the Alberta Historical Resources Act (1973). This change did not immediately result in the responsibility for historic sites being removed from the Parks Division. Instead, the administrative transition occurred in 1975 as part of the broader government reorganization that formed the Department of Recreation, Parks and Wildlife. In this reorganization, another new government agency, the Department of Culture, was established. It was to this new ministry that responsibility for the Alberta Historical Resource Act was transferred, thus eliminating what had been, since 1956, an integral part of the provincial protected area system. It is interesting to contrast the developments in Alberta during this period with those of other jurisdictions. At the same time, organizations around the world, such as the National Park Services in New South Wales, which had been established initially to conserve sites of both natural and cultural heritage significance, were also struggling to put in place more contemporary legislation and policy. Unlike Alberta, however, other jurisdictions did not carve off responsibility for historic sites from parks organizations, a decision that contributed to more robust programs of cultural heritage resource management within these organizations. In Alberta, by contrast, the government transferred responsibility for historic sites, along with the broader program of historic resource management, which included archaeological and paleontological conservation, to a separate department. This separation was not, however, absolute. With a legacy of supporting the conservation of historic sites and resources, the Alberta Parks Division remained aware of the presence of cultural heritage resources and continued to be responsible for areas that had been established to manage, jointly, the natural and cultural heritage of the province. This continuing legacy propelled an ongoing, albeit often ambiguous, program of cultural heritage resource management within the Parks Division.

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From the Centre to the Periphery (1974-2000)

Although the 1974 Provincial Parks Act did remove legislative responsibility for historic sites, it also maintained a strong mandate to conserve cultural heritage. In its statement of purpose, the Act stated that parks were to be developed and maintained for, among other reasons, “the preservation of specified areas and objects therein that are of geological, cultural, ecological, or other scientific interest” (RSA 1980, c P-22, s. 3b). Policy documents, developed through the 1970s and 80s, reiterated this objective. In the first system plan, Putting the Pieces Together, for example, parks planners developed a classification system that made explicit mention of cultural heritage conservation as an objective of “preservation class” parks, as well as in the zoning framework that the plan established to support park management, where one of the zones was a designated “cultural zone” (Quoted in Swinnerton, 1985, p. 53). The departmental policy statement that was developed in the 1980s, however, offers the most explicit articulation of, and commitment to, cultural heritage resource management anywhere in Alberta Parks’ history. For this reason, and due to the statement’s ongoing importance in shaping the management of the park system for decades, it is worth exploring in detail what this document had to say. After going through a series of drafts in the mid-1980s (Alberta Recreation and Parks, 1986), the Alberta Parks Department published Foundations for Action: Corporate Aims for the Ministry of Recreation and Parks to provide a basis for future programs and services. The document introduced a new foundational language to explain the work the department was undertaking — heritage resource protection — that became the central lexicon for the department for nearly two decades. The term heritage resource protection, the report explains, “refers to the preservation and/or conservation of natural landscapes and features.” However, heritage resources does not only refer to natural heritage, the document continues, stating that, “cultural and historical landscapes and features are important elements of the lands under the ministry’s jurisdiction and are, by definition, included in heritage resource protection” (Alberta Recreation and Parks, 1988, p. 3). This definition is interesting because it signals that the planners who wrote the document were aware of the ambiguity of using the term heritage resource but used it quite intentionally to encompass both natural and cultural heritage. The term heritage resource, in effect, afforded a degree of equality to the two domains, which was

187 188 supported by the assertion that a key role for the protected area system was the protection of cultural heritage resources. What is also noteworthy is that the final definition that appeared in the Foundations document is not where the planners started. Instead, an earlier draft of the policy stated that: The term heritage resource protection refers to the conservation-preservation continuum and indicates the protection of the natural, historical and cultural landscapes and features of the province. As it is used within the context of this revised draft policy statement, heritage resource protection refers primarily to the preservation and/or conservation of natural landscapes and features. (Alberta Recreation and Parks, 1986, p. 7) In this early draft, those who were writing the document wanted to highlight that the priority remained on the protection of natural heritage. However, the final wording reads as a more robust affirmation of the centrality of the cultural and historical realm, and does far less to set a clear priority for natural heritage conservation. Whether this was the intention is difficult to determine, but what is certain is that a conversation around the role of cultural heritage resources in the park system was taking place. Another surprising element in this document is that at a time when the idea of wilderness was still central to nature conservation efforts around the world, the Alberta Parks Department eschewed any reference to the concept or related ideas. Instead, in describing the benefit of protected areas, the document talked about how these areas could “assist in developing and promoting an environmental land ethic by heightening awareness of the natural environment and man’s relationship to it” (Alberta Recreation and Parks, 1988, p. 3). Both the reference to a land ethic and the human-environment relationship, point to the writers of the document being influenced by the work of Aldo Leopold, who introduced the term land ethic to advocate for a mode of stewardship where humans are an integral part of the natural world, and subsequent work that built upon Leopold’s writing. For example, Leopold’s work was influential in critiques of wilderness and nature conservation that emerged in the 1990s (Callicott, 1989; Callicott & Nelson, 1998; Cronon, 1996), and has been cited frequently by those theorizing a move toward non-dualistic understandings of human-environment relations. Beyond supporting a better understanding of the “human-land relationship,” the document also highlighted the ecological value of protected areas. It stated that protected areas “preserve genetic diversity and diversity of species within ecosystems,” “protect undisturbed ecological systems for maintenance processes upon which human life is dependent,” and “provide a

188 189 reference point or benchmark against which natural or human-induced changes can be measured” (Alberta Recreation and Parks, 1988, pp. 3–4). It is worth noting in these points that two of the three focus on the benefit of protected areas to human use, again highlighting the perspective planners held. In addition to the general conceptualization offered by the idea of heritage resource protection and the stated benefits of protected areas, the document also offers a detailed set of beliefs and guiding principles along with several chapters dedicated to operational concerns. The “Beliefs and Guiding Principles” section includes nine statements that are meant to direct departmental operations. In these statements, the natural, along with “historical and cultural heritage,” are continually noted and acknowledged as “an important legacy for future generations” and a “stewardship responsibility” for the department (Alberta Recreation and Parks, 1988, pp. 10–13). The way that these statements are worded makes it clear that the authors’ intention was to fully acknowledge the existence of cultural heritage resources and highlight the responsibility the department had to protect these resources. This commitment is most clearly articulated in eight departmental goals, including one “to preserve and protect, in perpetuity, provincially significant, representative, and special natural and cultural landscapes and features and landscape-related prehistoric and historic resources of the province within an integrated system of parks and other protected areas” (Alberta Recreation and Parks, 1988, p. 14). However, in acknowledging the department’s role in protecting cultural heritage, the document does not try to take on sole responsibility. Instead, Alberta Parks and Recreation saw itself as “one of a number of agencies responsible for protecting examples of significant cultural and historical landscapes throughout the province” (original emphasis, Alberta Recreation and Parks, 1986, p. 30). What this discussion leaves open, however, are several issues. First, is the question of what, exactly, is meant by the terms used in the document, such as cultural and historical resources, and cultural landscapes, none of which are defined, an outcome that created terminological challenges for decades. Perhaps more importantly, even with an acknowledgement of responsibility, the critical question is how these resources were to be protected. The Foundations for Action document touched on the second question in several places. In a section on protected area classifications, the document proposes a new system that includes two separate classes of provincial parks, a “Heritage Provincial Park” and a “Natural Environment Provincial Park.” The former is meant to “protect provincially significant representative and unique natural landscapes

189 190 or features, usually in association with significant historical or cultural landscapes or features, for the education, enjoyment and understanding of the public” (Alberta Recreation and Parks, 1988, p. 28). Among the existing parks in the system, several are noted as being potentially allocated to the Heritage Provincial Park class, including Cypress Hills, Dinosaur, Dry Island Buffalo Jump, Writing-on-Stone, and Peter Lougheed, all of which are large and significant sites in the system. Although there are no specific management guidelines for Heritage Provincial Parks, their existence indicates that an alternate approach would need to be developed. As a more general response to managing cultural heritage resources, the document laid out resource management guidelines, which largely focus on natural resource questions but also address cultural heritage. In one part of this section, the guidelines make an interesting distinction with respect to allowing natural processes to continue unimpeded. In most situations, the policy states, the recommended management approach is to allow natural processes such as fires, diseases, or insects to happen naturally so long as they do not endanger neighbouring lands or infrastructure. However, the guidelines also recognize that there are areas where “changes that have taken place over time are evidence of the history and evolution of a landscape… [and] these changes may have acquired significance in their own right, and, if so, this will be recognized and respected” (Alberta Recreation and Parks, 1988, p. 39). Such an acceptance of landscape change and character as a defining feature of an area, and as a resource that potentially needs to be protected, was novel for the time, demonstrating that planners working on this document were looking for innovative ideas to guide parks management. In addition, the guidelines conclude by saying that, on top of the “natural heritage stewardship responsibilities,” the ministry must ensure the protection and preservation of cultural heritage resources within its system, and will provide opportunities for their understanding, appreciation, and enjoyment through programs of research and interpretation. The ministry will inventory all cultural heritage resources in its system and maintain a database for each area, where appropriate. Cultural heritage resources research, inventory, and management programs will be carried out in co-operation with Alberta Culture and Multiculturalism. (Alberta Recreation and Parks, 1988, p. 40) This statement was the most explicit articulation of the department’s approach to cultural heritage resource management, and has not been repeated since. Much, if not all, of the work called for in this statement was never achieved, but the desire stands as a testament to the direction planners hoped to pursue.

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As a whole, the ideas of heritage resource protection, the stated benefits of protected areas, the guidelines and beliefs, and the management guidelines demonstrate that the Foundations for Action document was an innovative and progressive understanding of the role of protected areas in society, one that was ahead of its time, particularly with respect to how it viewed cultural heritage resource management. It is difficult, at present, as access to archival materials from the period is not yet granted, to know where the motivation to address cultural heritage came from or what the conversations were like behind the scenes. However, after reviewing the history of the Parks Department and looking at this document one can conclude that there were several factors at play. In part, the motivation can be explained by the existence of very apparent cultural heritage resources in several high-profile parks, such as Kananaskis, Writing-on-Stone, Dinosaur, and Cypress Hills, that demanded the attention of the department. In these parks, the landscape was defined, primarily, by the legacy of human passage. At Writing-on-Stone, for example, cultural heritage was literally etched in the landscape. As a result, cultural heritage resource management could not be easily ignored. Apart from the obvious resources that existed in protected areas, there was a legacy of historic site management in the department that remained in the legislative foundation and, likely, the memories of many staff members. Moreover, as the usage of terms like “land ethic” demonstrate, those who were writing the Foundations document were engaged in a sophisticated body of theory and literature trying to understand how humans and the environment interact. It appears that this dialogue was enhanced by conversations between Parks planners and staff in the Historical Resources Division, staff who were working together in response to a wider governmental policy on cross-ministerial collaboration. This latter point is demonstrated by the acknowledgement that cultural heritage resource management would be undertaken in cooperation between the two departments and by the use of some rather novel terms and concepts, such as cultural landscapes and viewing landscape changes as historical resources, neither of which were widely used outside cultural heritage conservation circles. In the end, wherever the motivation came from, the added commitment and dedication to cultural heritage resource management demonstrated in the Foundations document shows that there was something more going on than token acknowledgement; there was a legitimate desire to address cultural heritage. Despite the strong commitment to conserving cultural heritage resources and working collaboratively with the Historic Resources Division to achieve this objective, one of the

191 192 elements that the Foundations document leaves unanswered is how this responsibility was to be shared between these two agencies. In order to better understand the challenges of sharing this responsibility, as well as the relationship between the two agencies more generally, it is worth stepping back to consider the evolving role of the Historical Resources Division.6 At an administrative level, the Historical Resources Division “was part of a continuously morphing Ministry of Culture” (Pannekoek, 2009, p. 71), which began as Culture (1975-1987), then Culture and Multiculturalism (1987-1992), Community Development (1992-2006), Tourism, Parks, Recreation, and Culture (2006-2008), Culture and Community Spirit (2008-2012), again Culture (2012-2014), Tourism and Culture (2014-2019), and finally Culture, Multiculturalism and Status of Women (2019-Present). Although it would seem that these changes would make little difference to the practical work of the division, the various accretions to the ministry over the years tended to shift the focus of the division. Nevertheless, the core of the division’s work has remained much the same since the mid-1970s. Since its inception in 1975, the Historical Resources Division has been responsible for overseeing the implementation of the Historical Resources Act, which includes the management of provincial museums, archives, and, most relevant in a park context, historic sites. The term historic sites is used to identify areas that include, or are comprised of, immovable historic resources. Historic resources, in turn, are defined as “any work of nature or of man that is primarily of value for its paleontological, archaeological, prehistoric, cultural, natural, scientific, or aesthetic interest including, but not limited to, a paleontological, archaeological, prehistoric, historic or natural site, structure or object” (RSA 1980, c H-8). An historic resource of regional or provincial significance can be designated as either a Registered or Provincial Historic Resource, affording it an added layer of protection and care. However, most historic resources covered by the Act fall outside of such formal designations. The Act gives the Minister wide- ranging powers to protect a variety of historic resources, regardless of designation, but, apart from protections for designated resources and requirements to study the potential impact of development on historic resources, there are few legislated conservation requirements. Given the legislated requirements, the division’s role has been to coordinate the governmental and non-

6 The name of the Historical Resources Division has changed along with organizational reshuffling. Today, for example, it is the Heritage Division, within which is the Historic Resources Management Branch. Throughout this text, the label that is associated with the time period being discussed will be used.

192 193 governmental efforts to preserve, study, and interpret the evidence of Alberta’s human and natural history. These efforts included oversight of a network of provincial heritage facilities including the Royal Alberta Museum and the Provincial Archives of Alberta, providing support to local museums, archives, and community organizations, assisting with municipal heritage building designation and conservation, as well as supporting or undertaking research, publication, and education on historic matters. In addition, the division oversees the historic resource impact assessment process, which is an integral element of the broader land-use development process in the province. Alongside general protections for historical resources, the Historical Resources Act put in place a process for assessing whether a proposed development will have an impact on known or potential historical resources. Under the Act, a development proponent (landowner, planner, developer) that wants to undertake a project must comply with the impact assessment requirements. Impact assessments usually begin with the submission of project details to the division where staff review the plan and determine whether there is a likelihood of damage to, alteration of, or destruction of an historic resource. Whether any of these outcomes are likely is determined based on existing inventory data and subject-matter expertise. The inventory is a map of the province where quarter-section land parcels are assigned an Historic Resource Value (HRV) ranging from 1 to 5. The highest level of significance, HRV 1, is given to lands where resources exist that have been designated under the Historical Resources Act as Provincial Historic Resources, and World Heritage Sites, as well as land owned by the government for the purpose of historic resource protection. The other HRVs are defined as: • HRV 2: designated as a Municipal Historic Resource or Registered Historic Resource under the Historical Resources Act. • HRV 3: contains a known and significant historic resource that is of great significance and will require avoidance or assessment. • HRV 4: contains a historic resource that may require avoidance or assessment. • HRV 5: has high potential to contain a historic resource. If a proponent proposes development on a site with an HRV rating, or if Historic Resources staff determine, based on their expertise of the subject, that there is a high likelihood of an impact to historic resources, the division may then require the proponent to: • conduct a Historic Resources Impact Assessment (HRIA)

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• submit a report of the HRIA results • avoid any historic resources endangered by activity • mitigate potential impacts by undertaking comprehensive studies • document historic structures • consult with First Nations (Department of Tourism and Culture, 2020) The last point in this list, consultation with Indigenous communities, is often one of the most prominent, and consequential, features of an impact assessment process. In the consultation process, the intention is to gather information to identify and record archaeological sites, but also what have come to be known as “traditional use sites” (Honda-McNeil & Parsons, 2003). Traditional use sites, in contrast to archaeological sites, are more encompassing of the range of past and present uses of the land by a community. Some of the common types of sites recorded include historic cabins and cabin remains, community campsites, historic settlements and homesteads, unregistered gravesites, burials and cemeteries, ceremonial and spiritual sites, ceremonial plant or mineral gathering sites, historic trail features, sweat, thirst and fasting lodges, and oral history sites. What is clear from this list is that traditional use sites do not need to be relics; they can be sites of ongoing use as well. When consultation is needed, Historic Resources Management Branch staff are available to work with Indigenous communities to help preserve and protect cultural heritage sites by: • evaluating proposed developments and identify when consultation about traditional use sites is needed • engaging with Indigenous communities to help record and protect cultural heritage / traditional use sites • providing community outreach • helping with initiative funding for projects led by Indigenous communities and groups • creating and administering government policies • participating in consultation regarding cultural heritage sites (Alberta Tourism and Culture, 2020) Finally, any archaeological or traditional use data that is generated through the impact assessment process and scientific studies is collected by the division and added to the provincial inventory to aid with future research and development assessments.

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For Alberta Parks, the Historical Resources Act’s requirements toward archaeological surveying and impact assessment are the most consequential components. Although the Act does provide a wide variety of discretionary powers to the Minister, and subsequently the division, it does not mandate significant action for non-designated historic resources. Instead, the Act calls for collaboration with partner organizations, supports research, and provides funding for cultural heritage preservation and presentation. If a historic resource or site is designated as either a Registered or Provincial Heritage Resource, the Act does require certain action, but for any other type of resource or site, the Act only puts in place tools to assist with conservation. What this means is that provincial parks are under no legal compulsion from the Historical Resources Act to conserve or manage historic resources or sites in any specific way, so long as they are not designated. The only exception to this is when a development is proposed within a park, in which case the requirements for an historic resources impact assessment are triggered. Therefore, the most applicable regulation in Historical Resources Act for Alberta Parks is the requirement to comply with rules around land development, as would happen when the organization wants to put in a new road, campground, or visitor facility. As was concluded earlier, Alberta Parks accepted the presence of cultural heritage resources within parks, acknowledged their responsibility to protect those resources, and even called for some proactive measures to begin managing historic resources, including research, inventorying, and interpretation. However, what ultimately transpired was different from the ambitions laid out in the Foundations for Action document. In large part, since the early 1990s, the Parks Division has focused on complying with the requirements of the Historical Resources Act. This is not to say that the Parks Division did not undertake any further management efforts. In some of the large parks with obvious cultural heritage resources, there was an effort to develop some interpretive signage and programs that spoke to historic matters, but these never achieved the ambitions laid out in the Foundations document. The explanation for the lack of achievement was, as described in the previous chapter, a significant change in government policy in the early 1990s that saw dramatic cuts across the public service. Many of the planners who contributed to the 1988 document, those who could have fulfilled its promise, lost their jobs in the cuts (Reeves & Walsh, 2007). Moreover, the focus for the Division shifted with the development and implementation of the Special Places initiative, which called for significant park expansion in order to create a representative network

195 196 of protected areas that could preserve the ecological character of the province. While the idea of expanding the park system to cover representative natural areas was not antithetical to cultural heritage resource conservation, nor the ideas of integrated heritage resource protection, laid out by the parks department in 1988, it was also not entirely sympathetic to those concerns. The shift to conserving representative natural areas coincided with an entrenchment of a scientific and nature-focused approach to conservation in Alberta. A strong example of this transition was demonstrated in the proposed Natural Heritage Act that came out in 1999. The contrast between the purpose of protected areas put forward in 1999 and the one articulated in the 1988 Foundations for Action document is striking. Not only is any notion of cultural or historic resources struck from the proposed act, but protected areas were also to be a “safeguard” from the damage caused by humans rather than spaces to aid in developing a land ethic. Rather than insisting that parks be seen as one part of a larger human-environment system, the goal was to cement ecological integrity, biodiversity, or ecological processes as the primary priority for protected areas (Boyd, 2003). Although the Natural Heritage Act failed to be passed into law, the outcry around it had nothing to do with the way that it reimagined the role of protected areas. Instead, the outrage was focused entirely on the issue of pre-existing development dispositions. The Act itself, and the public debates the surrounded it, reveal a great deal about the ways that the conversation and focus had shifted in the Alberta Parks Division in the decade since 1988. However, in the 2000s, another transition began to take place in the Alberta Parks Division. As noted in Chapter 3, a combination of changing ideas about the role of protected areas, the place of humans in nature, a critique of the idea of wilderness, a desire to engage with Indigenous peoples more respectfully, and a broadening understanding of cultural heritage coalesced to drive parks planners around the world to think more seriously about matters of cultural and historical significance. Conserving biological diversity remained essential, but more and more, space was made to accommodate other goals and values. In Alberta, some of this shift can be attributed to a closer working relationship between the Parks and Historical Resources Divisions, which found themselves housed under the same government department, the Ministry of Community Development (2001-2006) and Alberta Tourism Parks, Recreation, and Culture (2006-2008). However, due to the absence of high-level policy and planning documents since the late 1980s, it is difficult to trace the shifting ideas that were guiding work in parks from the early

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2000s until the present. Fortunately, it is possible to trace recent developments in the approach to cultural heritage resource management by looking at the changes that emerged in operational management plans, and by speaking to those who have worked through this period. It is to these two tasks that this chapter now turns.

Management Planning in the 2000s

In the absence of a clear, overarching operational policy for Alberta Parks, it is difficult to determine how organizational thinking around cultural heritage resource management evolved over the past twenty years. Unlike many jurisdictions, Alberta Parks has not kept up a comprehensive system of management planning. Instead, management plans have only been developed for particularly significant, extensive, or conflicted sites. As a result, of the 470 park units currently in the system, there are only 22 site-specific management plans publicly available. Moreover, each of these plans was written at different times since 1998, with no plan or process for updating or reviewing the documents after their completion. Of course, for effective and coherent management in a park system, this is an unfortunate reality. However, for a researcher, this collection of management plans offers a useful snapshot of the past twenty years of thinking with respect to cultural heritage resource management within the system. By analyzing these plans, it is possible to gain an understanding of how the approach has evolved within Alberta Parks (Figure 16). Overall, what one can see in this collection of management plans is a consistent awareness of cultural heritage in parks, and an evolving effort to conceptualize cultural heritage in the absence of clear policy. In addition, one can also see an ad hoc embrace of cultural heritage resource management that fails to address the issue adequately. What follows in this section is a review and analysis of an illustrative selection of these management plans.

Park Unit Year Section Headings Subsections 197 198

Elbow-Sheep 1998 2.0 Overview 2.2.6 History Wildland 2.2 Natural and Cultural 2.2.7 Scenic and Recreational Values Provincial Park Features Hay Zama 2002 4.0 A Place for People 4.1 Dene Tha’ First Nation Wildland 4.2 Heritage Appreciation Provincial Park 4.3 Access/Boundaries 4.4 Outdoor Recreation 4.5 Heritage Tourism Evan Thomas 2004 3.4 Natural Features 3.4.6 Historical/Cultural heritage Provincial resources Recreation Area 7.0 Management Guidelines 7.5 Preservation 7.5.6 Cultural

Peter Lougheed 2006 3.2 Features 3.2.8 Cultural heritage resources Provincial Park 3.2.9 Land-use History and Spray Valley Provincial Park 6.0 Management Guidelines 6.1.5 Cultural heritage resources

Sundance 2006 3.2 Description of Provincial 3.2.6 Archaeological, Historical, and Provincial Park Park Cultural heritage resources

5.0 Management Guidelines 5.1.13 Cultural heritage resources

5.2 Heritage Appreciation 5.2.2 Historic Sheep River 2008 3.1 Features 3.1.5 Cultural heritage resources Provincial Park 3.1.6 Scenic Resources and Bluerock Wildland 6.0 Management Guidelines 6.1.6 Cultural heritage resources Provincial Park 6.1.7 Scenic Resources

OH Ranch 2010 2.0 Conservation & Protection 2.2.1 Cultural heritage resources – Heritage 2.2 Cultural heritage Management Objectives and Actions Rangeland resources

Cypress Hills 2011 2.0 Conservation & Protection 2.2 Natural and Cultural Landscape Provincial Park Values 2.3 Cultural Heritage Eagle Point 2011 4.0 Conservation and 4.7 Cultural Heritage Provincial Park Protection 4.8 Scenic Quality and Blue Rapids 4.10 Park Management Objectives and Provincial Strategies Recreation Area

Kananaskis 2012 5.0 Conservation and 5.3 Cultural heritage resources Provincial Protection 5.3.1 Historic Resources Recreation Area 5.3.2 Paleontology and Bragg Creek 5.3.3 Archaeology Provincial Park 5.3.4 Historic Structures 5.3.5 Cultural heritage resources – Management Objectives and Actions Castle Provincial 2018 2.0 Conservation and 2.6 Cultural Heritage Park and Castle Protection 2.6.1 Cultural Heritage and Wildland Historic Resources Provincial Park 2.6.2 Traditional Ecological Knowledge and Traditional

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Land Use

3.0 First Nations Áísínai’pi/Writin 2019 2.0 Conservation and 2.2 Cultural Heritage g-on-Stone Protection 2.2.1 Rock Art and Other Provincial Park Archaeological Resources 2.2.2 Cultural Practice Sites 2.2.3 Indigenous Cultural Landforms 3.0 Indigenous Peoples 3.0 Indigenous Peoples 3.1 Collaboration/Participation with Indigenous Peoples 3.2 Indigenous Employment 3.3 Cultural Awareness 3.4 Traditional Land Uses and Traditional Ecological Knowledge

Figure 16: Evolution of cultural heritage resource management terminology in Alberta Parks' management plans.

Elbow-Sheep Wildland Provincial Park (1998)

Located in Kananaskis Country in southwestern Alberta, Elbow-Sheep Wildland Provincial Park (WPP) is a large, relatively remote mountainous area. Written in 1998, the park’s management plan is the oldest in-use plan available (Alberta Environmental Protection, 1998). Despite the mostly natural state of the park, the plan does acknowledge the existence of cultural heritage resources. Under a general heading of “Natural and Cultural Features,” a subsection titled “History” is used to address the cultural component. Under this section, there is a reasonably detailed description of historical uses of the land base, covering mineral and timber extraction, Indigenous usage, and the history of conservation in the area. However, the historical overview does not identify any existing cultural resources, nor is there any reference to the cultural component in the following section on management guidelines. Apart from the confusion between cultural features and the history of the park, the most noteworthy aspect of this plan is the use of the term features itself. The preservation of “natural features,” along with specified areas and landscapes, is one of the central purposes of parks as defined by the Provincial Parks Act. However, in the Act, it is the “objects” of cultural and historical importance within these areas that are to be protected. There is some ambiguity here with respect to the difference between a feature and object but as a result of the Foundations for Action document, which used the term “cultural and historical landscapes and features,” the use of

199 200 features persisted through the 1990s. This began to change in the 2000s, though, as Alberta Parks moved into greater alignment with the wording of the Historical Resources Act.

Hay Zama Wildland Provincial Park (2002)

The Hay-Zama Wildland Provincial Park (PP) Management Plan (Alberta Community Development, 2002) is an interesting example because it is the only available management plan for a northern park. Given the larger population, and subsequently heavier user demands, surrounding southern parks, the majority of Alberta Parks’ management planning efforts have been dedicated to that region. Hay-Zama, in contrast, is a large and infrequently visited park in northwestern Alberta. That is to say, tourists and recreational users infrequently visit the park; the Dene Tha’ First Nation have used the land for millennia, making it an essential part of their traditional territory. Given the strong association with the park by the Dene Tha’, the management plan tries to address the issues around Indigenous traditional use. This plan is the first, and until 2018 the only, management plan examined here that tries to deeply engage with Indigenous land use and structure the park’s management regime to support these uses. The plan tackles Indigenous cultural associations with the land through a dualistic framework that looks at the park as “A Place for Nature” and “A Place for People.” Under the latter section, the plan recognizes that the park is an integral part of the traditional territory of the Dene Tha’ First Nation and sets out three objectives for the area’s management: • Dene Tha’ will continue to use the area for traditional activities • Dene Tha’ will be involved in the management of the wildland park • The park management plan will not supersede any treaty rights and agreements (Alberta Community Development, 2002, p. 9) The first and last of these objectives are achieved in the plan by firm commitments to those principles. The second objective, in contrast, is understood to be an ongoing project that will be achieved through an existing Hay-Zama Committee where the Dene Tha’ constitute a significant player, but also through a more formally negotiated cooperative working relationship with Alberta Parks. This effort is the first example in Alberta of a cooperative management arrangement with an Indigenous community. As noted previously, these arrangements have

200 201 become more common, but Hay-Zama was one of the first formal efforts by Alberta Parks to integrate Indigenous cooperative management. In addition to working to achieve the three goals, the plan also highlights several operational projects for protecting cultural heritage. First, the plan states that “traditional ecological knowledge will be considered when making management decisions.” Alberta Parks “collected much of this knowledge” through a Traditional Land-Use and Occupancy Study commissioned in 1997 (Alberta Community Development, 2002, p. 9). The finality implied in this statement is noteworthy because the idea that most, if not all, of a communities’ ecological knowledge could be collected in a single study and then put on a shelf to be used by decision-makers would be dismissed today (McGregor, 2004). Instead, advocates for integrating Indigenous knowledge and perspectives into management would, today, argue that traditional ecological knowledge is something to be practiced, not collected. Ongoing collaboration and discussion is needed to inform ongoing decisions. Nevertheless, the fact that Alberta Parks made an effort to collect Indigenous knowledge and a commitment to consider this information was a significant step forward. In addition, through the study, a range of cultural heritage resources such as trappers’ cabins, gravesites, and other sites of cultural value were identified. The plan states that such sites would be protected, although in what manner is left unsaid. Finally, the plan also sets out “Heritage Appreciation” as a primary goal. However, unlike other plans that look at this topic from a purely natural heritage lens, the Hay-Zama plan makes a point of calling for opportunities to appreciate the cultural heritage of the park and encourage programs and events for the Dene Tha’ to interpret their cultural heritage to visitors. As a result of the unique circumstances surrounding the park, the Hay-Zama management plan stands as a significant step forward in Alberta Parks’ thinking around addressing Indigenous land use and cultural heritage. Although it continues to lack a coherent framework or terminology for understanding these matters, the effort to include traditional use studies, cooperative management, and a desire to protect existing cultural heritage resources are all necessary first steps.

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Evan Thomas Provincial Recreation Area (2004)

In the early 2000s, Alberta Parks developed management plans for several protected areas in Kananaskis Country. Evan Thomas Provincial Recreation Area (PRA), which encompasses Kananaskis Village, Kananaskis Golf Course, Nakiska Ski Resort, and the sizable Mt. Kidd RV Park, is the central recreation hub for this network of protected areas and, by far, the most heavily developed. In the 2004 management plan, there is a distinct shift in language for cultural heritage resources (Alberta Community Development, 2004). The ambiguous language of “cultural features” or “A Place for People,” which are found in the plans for the Elbow-Sheet WPP and Hay-Zama PP respectively, is replaced with “historical/cultural heritage resources,” which reflect a more focused look at the material resources themselves. Although the language changed, the overview section on historical/cultural heritage resources is, much like in the Elbow-Sheep plan, used primarily as an avenue to describe the history of the area as opposed to any existing resources (p. 16). Most significant, though, is that a second subsection, loosely titled “Cultural,” was added to this plan under the “Management Guidelines” section (p. 26). For the first time, this section put forward some operational guidelines for protecting cultural heritage resources, even though these resources remain undefined. The plan lumps management guidelines for cultural heritage resources into two sections. First, the plan focuses on “heritage appreciation,” where several historical themes are listed including “aboriginal use, the logging and coal mining history, early forest management, 1988 Winter Olympic legacy, [and] wildlife and forest fire history” (p. 21). These themes are to be presented through information centers, signage, brochures, and in-person interpretation. Second, the plan makes a robust, albeit somewhat vague, call for Alberta Parks staff to work with the Cultural Facilities and the Historical Resources Division of Alberta Community Development to compile an inventory and assessment of known archaeological sites within the Evan-Thomas Provincial Recreation Area so that any required protection measures can be taken. Additional research into the archaeological and historical use of the area will be encouraged. Kananaskis Country will work with Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development and the Stoney people to identify any sites of Aboriginal significance and need for ongoing use. Kananaskis Country will work with partners to expand the existing information base about local history as well as expand existing interpretive signage or programming to include historical and cultural content. Kananaskis Country will also work with

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volunteer stewards to monitor and report on the condition of known sites and associated signs. (p. 26) This planning requirement is an important development in the evolution of Alberta Parks’ thinking around cultural heritage resources because it is the first public articulation since the 1988 policy statement to call for direct collaboration with the Historical Resources Division, as well as layout, at least in general terms, some of the work that needs to be done with respect to cultural heritage resource management.

Peter Lougheed Provincial Park and Spray Valley Provincial Park (2006)

The management plan for Peter Lougheed and Spray Valley Provincial Parks (PP) was written only a short time after the one for the Evan Thomas PRA and was put together with close reference to the earlier document. The only significant change between the two documents is that in the newer plan the subsection that was “Historical/Cultural heritage resources” is broken apart into two groups, “Cultural heritage resources” and “Land-use History” (Alberta Community Development, 2006, p. 11). While the separation would seem to address the issue noted above, that this subsection was simply a history of the area rather than an overview of the resources themselves, in practice this is not what happened. Instead, both categories remain as brief histories of the parks, with the only difference being temporal: “Cultural heritage resources” covering Indigenous and early colonial settlement, and “Land-use History” discussing later land- use changes such as forestry and hydroelectric development. As this demonstrates, there was still confusion and uncertainty regarding how to adequately review cultural heritage resources in the park. Concerning management guidelines, this plan is nearly identical to the Evan Thomas PRA plan. There are a few more details on specific programs and cooperative arrangements, such as working with school boards to develop curriculum-linked educational programs, but, overall, the ideas are the same. In fact, the wording for cultural heritage resource protection measures is copied verbatim from the previous plan. Such duplication is not entirely surprising, as all three parks are part of the same Kananaskis Country area. However, this repetition demonstrates the degree of thought and effort that was being put into the issue of cultural heritage resource management. The words themselves were valuable, but without dedicated attention, specific

203 204 study, and real action, those words were mostly token acknowledgements of what should be done.

Sheep River Provincial Park and Bluerock Wildland Provincial Park (2008)

Improving upon the approach taken in the Kananaskis Country management plans, the Sheep River PP and Bluerock WPP management plan acknowledges the existence of cultural heritage resources, and details what resources exist within the parks (Alberta Tourism, Parks, and Recreation, 2008). The plan describes the extent of archaeological research, including known sites and areas of high potential for further research, and highlights that there are sites of ongoing cultural significance. Moreover, the plan notes two historic structures, an old cabin and the Bighorn Ranger Station buildings, neither of which had been assessed yet for historic designation potential. A dedicated section providing management guidelines on cultural heritage resource protection supports the overview. In an encouraging sign, this plan adapted the guidance used in the Evan Thomas PRA and Peter Lougheed PP documents to the specific needs and circumstances of Sheep River PP and Bluerock WPP. Like the previous plans, this one calls for further research to identify new sites, which is to be undertaken with the respective branches of government most suited to the task and also in collaboration with local Indigenous communities. As well, the plan calls for interpretation of the coal mining and logging history at appropriate sites, and aims to assess the old log Bighorn Ranger Station buildings to determine what actions should be taken for designation and preservation. This plan is a marked improvement from the previous ones, in that the authors tried to think through the issue of cultural heritage resource management and how that work could be undertaken in a way that was unique to Sheep River PP and Bluerock WPP. What is most innovative in this plan is the articulation of the idea of “scenic resources.” Scenic resources as a concept were not entirely new, the Elbow-Sheep Wildland Provincial Park management plan had used the same category in 1998, but in a very minimal way. In the Sheep River PP and Bluerock WPP management plan, the features that were included as scenic resources were greatly expanded and reflected ideas generally associated with the concept of cultural landscapes. The plan starts by describing the “outstanding views” of the mountains, canyons, clear rivers, and waterfalls, but then transitions to describe evidence of human activity

204 205 as being an important factor in creating the significant scenery. Moreover, the “visible evidence of human activity” was not limited to the roadways, recreation facilities, and parks infrastructure, but also included less visible evidence such as “vegetation patterns altered by fire suppression, previous haying near the old ranger station, remains of old coal mining or timber harvesting activities, [and] impacts of cattle activity” (p. 16). Thinking of each of these elements as a potential cultural heritage resource, something to be used to reflect upon and interpret the history of an area, was not new at this time. The 1988 Foundations document identified these types of landscape characteristics as potential resources requiring specific management decisions. However, this plan marked one of the first examples of landscape-scale cultural heritage resources being considered for management. This plan did not take the next step to define guidelines for the preservation or presentation of these features, but it did at least state that the resources would be assessed further, leaving the door open for ongoing consideration.

OH Ranch Heritage Rangeland (2010)

Heritage rangelands are a protected area classification that is unique to Alberta. Management objectives for these areas are somewhat different than for other protected areas in the province in that they not only allow, but rely upon, ongoing cattle ranching to maintain the grassland ecosystems and preserve the legacy of cattle ranching and bison grazing in the province. Understood in this way, cultural heritage is central to the conceptualization of this designation, and so it is unsurprising that it is featured in the management plan for OH Ranch Heritage Rangeland (HR) (Alberta Tourism, Parks, and Recreation, 2010). However, the way that cultural heritage is addressed in this plan is a step back from the more progressive understanding displayed in the Sheep River PP and Bluerock WPP plan. In the OH Ranch HR management plan, the interest in cultural heritage is entirely focused on the historic structures in the ranch complex itself, such as old barns and buildings, including an original North West Mounted Police post, and the management guidelines call for a complete inventory of cultural heritage resources. However, no interpretation or presentation of those resources is to be pursued; instead, “the known cultural and historic resources will be managed in accordance with the Historical Resources Act” (p. 19). As OH Ranch Heritage Rangeland is not meant to provide any significant visitor experience, it makes sense that there is no interpretation or presentation called

205 206 for at this site; however, it is unfortunate that cultural heritage is limited to built structures. An understanding of the cultural legacy of human land-use activity is not brought forward in this plan. Perhaps it is taken as a given that through the ongoing use of the land by cattle ranchers, the historical land-use patterns will be maintained, but without acknowledgment and active consideration, there is no way for such an element to be brought forward in management decisions.

Cypress Hills Provincial Park (2011)

In contrast, the management plan for Cypress Hills Provincial Park represents a noteworthy evolution in thinking about cultural heritage resources in Alberta Parks, in part for its adoption of the term “cultural landscape” to conceptualize the area, but also in the detailed guidelines for cultural heritage resource management. Cypress Hills is one of the oldest parks in the provincial system, and one that Alberta Parks always recognized as having historical significance related to Indigenous usage, the Northwest Mounted Police, and local agricultural industry. In the updated management plan (Alberta Tourism, Parks, and Recreation, 2011b), parks planners sought to capture the layered history and significance of the area through two separate sections: “natural and cultural landscape values” and “cultural heritage.” The first section leans on the idea of cultural landscapes but does so in a way that is both undefined and confused. The section is a grab bag to collect three loosely related ideas that roughly correspond to landscape-scale issues. As the plan explains The Cypress Hills landscape is of great natural significance and cultural value. The ‘forest island’ and the elevation of the Hills create an environment where common and rare cordilleran (montane) species flourish. The elevation of the Hills relative to the surrounding prairie offers expansive landscape views and allows for optimum night sky viewing. The quality of the night sky viewing has allowed Cypress Hills Interprovincial Park to be designated as Cypress Hills Dark-Sky Preserve. (p. 17) According to the plan, these three groupings — the hills as a forest island, views, and the dark sky reserve — represent the natural and cultural landscape values. Although clearly an attempt to see the park as a multilayered landscape, this section fails to engage with the concept of cultural landscapes or with the idea of value in any comprehensive manner. Instead, this section simply becomes a place to fit areas of management concern, such as managing viewpoints and the overall visual integrity of the park, that are challenging to fit into any other existing category.

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The section on cultural heritage, by contrast, is robust. The plan begins with an overview of cultural heritage resources and historical themes in the park, stating that: The Cypress Hills are rich in history and artifacts associated with the diversity of human occupation of the area. The history of Aboriginal groups, the arrival of Europeans, the fur trade, Métis settlement, the North West Mounted Police, the ranching era, and the Canadian conservation movement are well- represented. Archaeological excavations at the Stampede Site suggest that intermittent hunting and camp use occurred more than 8000 years ago. There is evidence that many First Nations used the area prior to 1870. Sixty-five historical resource sites have been identified to date within Cypress Hills Provincial Park. (p. 22) The plan then continues with an extensive history of the park, along with a technical description of the various archaeological sites, and then concludes with a detailed set of management issues, objectives, and strategies/actions (Figure 17).

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Figure 17: Cultural heritage resource management issues, objectives, and strategies/actions in Cypress Hill Provincial Park (Alberta Tourism, Parks, and Recreation, 2011, p. 25).

Although noteworthy as the most robust example of cultural heritage resource management of any of the plans discussed so far, two issues emerge. First, the plan’s approach to cultural heritage is focused nearly entirely on the archaeological sites that exist in the park. One gets the sense that much of the cultural heritage section was written by a contracted archaeologist, or at least copied from a survey report. This signals that planners did not develop a comprehensive approach to addressing cultural heritage during the management planning process. Instead, as in the previous section, the impression is that a mixture of ideas and issues deemed important were thrown together into a loosely constructed category. The truth of this is demonstrated by the second issue, which is the confusing use of terminology. Alongside cultural landscapes, the plan

208 209 refers to historical resource sites, historic period sites, historic resources, historical and cultural sites, and cultural properties somewhat interchangeably. The lack of a coherent language to discuss cultural heritage is indicative of a broader confusion around how to talk about, categorize, and manage these resources, as well as a lack of familiarity with new or emerging technical terminologies.

Eagle Point Provincial Park and Blue Rapids Provincial Recreation Area (2011)

The same year that the Cypress Hills PP management plan was published, a second plan was released for two small parks in central Alberta, Eagle Point PP and Blue Rapids PRA. Being small parks with a relatively simple recreation focus, the management plan for these two sites is surprising not only for the fact that it addresses cultural heritage, but for the way it goes about this task (Alberta Tourism, Parks, and Recreation, 2011a). In a short section on cultural heritage, the plan makes a selective reading of key policy documents to develop a new, and quite narrow, definition of cultural heritage. As the document describes: Cultural heritage concerns those aspects of our past that we want to preserve, appreciate, and enjoy today, and pass on to future generations. The Spirit of Alberta: Alberta’s Cultural Policy (Government of Alberta, 2009c) states that “in Alberta, heritage embraces the traditions and practices of Aboriginal people and the great sites of pre-history. Among the Aboriginal peoples of Alberta, culture embraces not only dance, music, games and traditional dress, but values, beliefs and a deep spiritual relationship with the land. It is important to the way Aboriginal peoples live and also to the way in which Aboriginal communities continue to embrace the future” (pg. 4). This definition is notable for two reasons, first for the way that it folds all cultural heritage into Indigenous heritage, and, second, for drawing on the provincial cultural policy to do so. In the absence of any coherent internal policy, the planners behind this document were grasping for any institutional guidance. The remainder of the section goes on to discuss Indigenous uses of the land, including hunting, fishing, and trapping, and notes that members of these communities were consulted during the management planning process, and commits to continuing engagement on these matters. The plan then moves on to specific management guidelines for cultural heritage, which are, in contrast to the definition provided, encompassing and effective (Figure 18).

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Figure 18: Management guidelines for cultural heritage in Eagle Point Provincial Park and Blue Rapids Public Recreation Area (Alberta Tourism, Parks, and Recreation, 2011, p. 35).

What is important to highlight in this plan is twofold. First, the plan demonstrates the emerging centrality of Indigenous issues when Alberta Parks speaks of cultural heritage. Throughout the history of Alberta Parks, Indigenous heritage, when it was addressed at all, tended to be folded into the broader category of cultural heritage, but in this document, the reverse is true. In the years since the publication of this plan, the importance of engaging with Indigenous communities and acknowledging their legacy and connections to land has only become more critical, in turn, further driving the conversation around cultural heritage management in parks. As well, it is worth noting that even in a small park, with relatively few monumental historic resources, the management plan takes up the task of addressing cultural

210 211 heritage resource management. Addressing these issues, along with the effort to rethink how the terms are defined, demonstrates a growing awareness among parks planners and an increasing desire to address cultural heritage resource management.

Kananaskis Public Recreation Area and Bragg Creek Provincial Park (2012)

Building upon the progress made by the Cypress Hills PP management plan and the solid foundation established by the earlier Kananaskis Country plans (Evan Thomas PRA, Peter Lougheed PP, and Spray Valley PP), the 2012 management plan for Kananaskis PRA and Bragg Creek PP offers another strong, yet flawed, attempt to integrate cultural heritage resource management into the park management processes (Alberta Tourism, Parks, and Recreation, 2012). As in the Cypress Hills PP plan, this plan embraces the section heading of “Natural and Cultural Landscape Values,” but again uses it uncritically as a grab bag for landscape-scale issues including viewscapes, evidence of human land-use activity, and a dark sky initiative, that are loosely tied together by a concern for visual aesthetics. Moreover, in a move that illustrates how heavily planners borrowed from previous management plans, and the minimal degree of site-specific consideration that was given to cultural heritage resource issues, this document copies the description of visible evidence of human activity directly from the Sheep River PP and Bluerock WPP plan, despite these parks having different landscape characteristics (p. 24). The section of the plan explicitly dedicated to “cultural heritage resources” provides some innovation by breaking the category into four distinct subsections: historic resources, paleontology, archaeology, and historic structures, which align somewhat closely to the categories offered in the Historical Resources Act. However, the use of these terms remains confusing. The plan uses cultural heritage resources as the general category; however, it then defines historic resources as being inclusive of paleontological remains, archaeological sites, Indigenous cultural sites still in use, and historic structures, in effect, overriding what was before labelled as cultural heritage resources. Moreover, while this is an effort to align the terminology with the Historical Resources Act, the way that the plan defines historic resources is less encompassing or coherent than in the Act itself, which offers a sophisticated understanding where objects, sites, and structures become historic resources by having values assigned to them. Even though this plan does try to formulate a complete framework for cultural heritage

211 212 resources, the attempt simply highlights that planners, at this point, were still not able to find or settle on an agreed-upon way of thinking about and discussing these issues. It is encouraging to see that they continued to grapple with the issue, but it seems that clarity remained elusive.

Castle Provincial Park and Castle Wildland Provincial Park (2018)

Designated in 2017, Castle PP and WPP are two of the most recent additions to Alberta’s park system and, as such, offer an up-to-date representation of Alberta Parks’ approach to cultural heritage resource management. The Castle parks came about during a unique period in the political history of the province. A newly elected New Democrat government was seeking to change the way that the province was governed. This effort included undertaking serious work around environmental issues, for example, by protecting more lands, and having greater input from local communities on decision-making. In addition, the government signed on to the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP) and directed all government agencies to work to comply with the vision laid out in this declaration. Given this situation, Alberta Parks’ planners were placed in a novel position when the branch established Castle PP and WPP. Not only was there a blank slate upon which to develop a new park, but the process for going about that creation was meant to be collaborative, modern, innovative, and with meaningful involvement from Indigenous communities. The resulting draft management plan was released in 2018 for public feedback (Alberta Environment and Parks, 2018a). In the plan, cultural heritage resource management is dealt with in the most robust and comprehensive manner of any of the management plans examined here. However, although it is a marked improvement and a clear indication that planners were striving to make sense of the issues, as with the other plans, the conceptualization and framework provided remain flawed. The parts of the management plan for the Castle parks dealing with cultural heritage is broken into two general sections, the conservation and protection of “cultural heritage” and a separate one dedicated to First Nations. The first section, on cultural heritage, is worth quoting at length as it is the most sophisticated attempt to make sense of cultural heritage in any Alberta Parks documents. In this section, cultural heritage is described as being a fragile, non-renewable resource that must be protected to maintain its authenticity. Cultural heritage is composed of both tangible and intangible elements that define human groups and their interactions within a landscape.

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For the Castle area, it can be defined through a combination of traditional uses of the natural landscape and built environment, oral histories and the artifacts that represent human activities practiced in earlier times. Preservation of cultural heritage is essential for providing the context to understanding human diversity, fostering acceptance of other people and practices and ensuring that future generations may benefit from the knowledge of the past and present. Within Alberta, there are two approaches to the protection of cultural heritage. Since 1973, the Historical Resources Act has provided legislation that results in the preservation, study, interpretation and promotion of the appreciation of historic resources. Under the Act “historic resources” are the tangible expressions of heritage. They include sites, structures and objects that are valued for their “...palaeontological, archaeological, prehistoric, historic, cultural, natural, scientific or aesthetic interest” (Historical Resources Act RSA 2000). The intangible expressions of cultural heritage are based on the stories, traditions and beliefs that are shaped by the land and embedded in the identities of generations of local Indigenous communities. Sometimes referred to as “living heritage,” it is represented in the practices and customs of living groups of people, the language they speak and the skills they have acquired from living on the land. Although expression of some elements of this intangible heritage are represented in traditional land use sites, there are many other aspects that are transitory, making them difficult to preserve. This intangible quality, and its close connection with community identity in the Castle area, makes it important to employ a diverse range of tools to protect and preserve cultural values. (p. 53) Certainly, this statement is a far cry from the modest efforts to define cultural heritage examined in previous management plans. Whoever was tasked with writing this section was reasonably well-versed in the literature around cultural heritage. Concepts such as intangible heritage, living heritage, site contexts, and oral histories are ones that had never been brought forward in official parks documents, tending instead to be confined to more disciplinary-specific cultural heritage literature. Although admirable in the attempt, the usage of the terms in this plan remains messy and conceptually inaccurate. The writer is trying to distinguish between the tangible cultural heritage resources and something less material to which they attribute the term intangible elements or expressions. However, tangible and intangible resources are discussed as both the things to be conserved and the approaches to protecting cultural heritage. As well, the writer seems to argue that intangible cultural heritage is the sole purview of Indigenous peoples. Semantics aside, when the plan gets to the details of how parks staff intend to manage cultural heritage, it is reasonably effective and detailed, largely because the poorly articulated concern with intangible elements expressed in the preamble are pushed aside in favour of a more

213 214 traditional tangible resource-focused approach. This is achieved through a subsection titled, somewhat ambiguously, “Cultural Heritage and Historic Resources,” which leads off by stating that: …the effective protection of historic resources requires preservation at two levels: the preservation of the physical remains (e.g. artifacts, structures, residues) and the preservation of site contexts. The physical remains provide the direct evidence of human activities within a landscape, the time periods during which they take place and the cultural affiliations of the people practicing them. It is the contextual information, however, that gives meaning to these physical remains by showing the interconnected relationships they have on a site, regional or national level. (p. 54) The inclusion of the idea of site contexts is a novel addition here. Although the term is used differently than cultural heritage specialists would use it, the general idea the writer is seeking to capture, that managers need to look beyond the site itself to consider wider elements of the landscape as part of an historic resource, is important. After this introduction, the document goes on to address some of the main objectives for the management of tangible cultural heritage resources. Primarily, the goal is to comply with the Historical Resources Act. But the goal is also to identify cultural heritage resources and, in the future, develop more detailed plans for how to protect identified historic resources, including writing management intent statements for significant sites. Unfortunately, a second subsection to the cultural heritage segment, titled “Traditional Ecological Knowledge and Traditional Land Use,” muddies the approach to cultural heritage resource management. The goal of this subsection is to highlight the need for identifying sites of cultural significance for Indigenous communities, gathering stories about the land, collecting traditional place names, and supporting the ongoing use of sites. All of these are important endeavours, but what this subsection lays bare is that the planners behind this document still lack a coherent understanding of cultural heritage and cultural heritage resources that can encompass Indigenous and settler cultural legacies. Despite being a part of the broader chapter on cultural heritage, there is no reference in this subsection to the concepts of cultural heritage or cultural heritage resources, nor to any of the protective measures discussed elsewhere. Moreover, much of what is discussed in this subsection is then repeated or expanded upon in the following chapter, which focuses, in broader terms, on the relationship with Indigenous communities.

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Approaching the subject of Indigenous communities in a dedicated section offers the plan an opportunity to address the unique challenges of Indigenous cultural heritage, as well as concerns such as cooperative management arrangements, treaty rights, and access restrictions. One of the great strengths in this document is the robust way that it engages with Indigenous communities, acknowledging their unique needs and relationships with the land and striving to work effectively with these communities. However, the somewhat convoluted conceptualization of cultural heritage and the messy approach to cultural heritage resource management does little to enhance these efforts.

Áísínai’pi/Writing-on-Stone Provincial Park

In the Alberta parks system, there are few sites more emblematic than Áísínai’pi/Writing-on- Stone Provincial Park.7 The uniquely etched prairie landscape, formed by the coming together of the meandering Milk River, deeply incised coulees that drop out of flowing grasslands, memorable sandstone formations, a long history of ceremonial and spiritual use by the Blackfoot peoples that resulted in countless rock carving and art sites, and a more recent history of settlement is unlike anything else in the province. These exceptional features were what initially led the provincial government to set aside land parcels in 1935 to protect this landscape and have since provoked such interest on the part of settler communities, as well as ongoing advocacy on the part of Indigenous peoples, that the park has become the pinnacle of innovative management in the province. In 1997, after over a half century of ad hoc planning and management, and ever- increasing user pressure, the first management plan for the area was adopted. The plan recognized “the primary importance of the interpretation, management, and conservation of rock art at Áísínai’pi/Writing-on-Stone Provincial Park, while minimizing the impacts due to access and development. The plan also identified a need for greater Blackfoot involvement in all aspects of park management” (Alberta Parks, 2019, p. 19). Since the adoption of the original management plan, the provincial government has dedicated significant resources to the site, including supporting the involvement of members and elders of the Kainai Nation in management through regular meetings of the Mookaakin Cultural and Heritage Society, the

7 In recent years, Alberta Parks has begun to use the joint name of Áísínai’pi/Writing-on-Stone to include the traditional Blackfoot name for the area.

215 216 designation of the site as a Canadian National Historic Site, and, most recently, successful inclusion of the park on the World Heritage List as an associative cultural landscape. In keeping with the requirements of the World Heritage designation, which occurred in 2019, Alberta Parks staff have been working to update the management plan for the park. Currently, a draft Interim Management Directive has been developed but it has yet to be moved through the formal public consultation process, which, pending adjustments made based on public feedback, would allow it to be formally adopted. Despite the further regulatory requirements for the Management Directive, a working draft was provided by one of the interview participants. This document offers as an excellent example of how, driven by the high standards required by the World Heritage system, Alberta Parks is moving to articulate the place of cultural heritage in a park setting and the methods for successfully managing cultural heritage resources. The Management Directive begins with a comprehensive introduction, detailing the management priorities, park history, various designations, stated significances of the site, regional context, and more. Throughout the introduction, the importance of cultural heritage is repeatedly made clear. In the section describing the area as a cultural landscape, for example, the document explains the contemporary importance of the area to the Blackfoot by stating that the spiritual meanings associated with the valley, the rock art and the landforms are rich. The dome-shaped hilltops of the badlands are known to the Blackfoot as “Spirit Lodges,” and are said to house spirits during the day. These spirits leave these dwellings at night to inhabit the areas in the valley bottom. The strangely shaped hoodoos are thought of as animate beings, demonstrating the Blackfoot perspective that living spirits inhabit all the elements of the natural landscape (Alberta Parks, 2019, p. 6) The document carries on describing the value of the archeological record for understanding the history of Indigenous peoples in the area and the changes brought on by European settlement. Taken together, the document explains, the existing cultural heritage resources in the park document nearly 3000 years of human history and remain the source of significant cultural value today. The following chapter, on Conservation and Protection, lays out the operational management of cultural resources in the park under an overarching section on cultural heritage. This section begins with a description of what is meant by cultural heritage, which pulls its explanatory text directly from the Castle Provincial Park plan, reiterating the existence of two approaches to protection, one focused on the tangible resources through the Alberta Historical Resources Act,

216 217 and a second that considers intangible expressions (Alberta Parks, 2019, p. 23). Next, the document sets out objectives and strategies for three interlinked resources: rock art and other archaeological resources, cultural practice sites, and Indigenous cultural landforms. For each, a description of the resource is provided, along with a set of overarching objectives and operational strategies to ensure the resources are protected, conserved, and/or interpreted in an appropriate manner. These strategies are wide-ranging and specific to the challenges of each resource but include actions such as “analyze all new infrastructure development plans for potential impact on daytime and night-time viewscapes,” “conduct Traditional Land Use Assessments to create an inventory of cultural sites in the park,” and “continue the Rock Art Monitoring Program to update information about the status, integrity and condition of rock art sites in the park” (Alberta Parks, 2019, p. 25-27). These sections are then supported in the next Chapter, which focuses specifically on the engagement of Indigenous peoples in the management and decision-making processes including operational strategies to enhance consultation and engagement, Indigenous employment, cultural awareness, and the understanding/implementation of traditional knowledge. Placing the two chapters together, the Interim Management Directive offers a truly high- quality example of management planning that not only accounts for, but actively embraces, cultural heritage resources as an integral component of the natural landscape protected by a park. The objectives and strategies are strong, and, while there remains a degree of confusion with respect to the distinction between cultural heritage resources and values, there is a much greater degree of conceptual clarity on display in this plan than is seen previously. What conceptual confusion does exist, however, does not reduce the range of effective mechanisms suggested by this document. Ideas and programs such as robust zoning, cultural resource monitoring, the development of an Indigenous protocols document to guide operational decisions, and enhanced communications and interpretive outputs are crucial for achieving effective cultural heritage management. In the end, the Management Directive for Áísínai’pi/Writing-on-Stone Provincial Park offers a clear example of what is possible when resources and interest are dedicated to this issue, however, the challenge remains translating these lessons to other sites where cultural heritage resources are not so easily prominent.

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Current Challenges and Opportunities

Overall, what does this review of the past twenty years of management planning reveal about the approach to cultural heritage resource management within Alberta Parks? First, the way of discussing and conceptualizing cultural heritage has been evolving. Over the past two decades, there has clearly been a growing desire to tackle this issue, and, as a result, one can see an increasingly sophisticated conceptualization and operational approach being put forward. However, this has happened in a rather ad hoc manner that is inconsistent both institutionally and geographically. Across the province, it seems, regional planners are working to develop solutions to the unique challenges presented by individual parks without proper organization-wide guidance. This has meant that regional planners have been required to draw upon their own inexpert understanding and ideas about how to define and address cultural heritage, creating a patchwork of innovations and failures. Central to this inconsistency is a lack of agreed-upon terminology, a problem that is compounded by the emergence of new and changing concepts, which makes it nearly impossible for planners across the province to create a uniform framework. In 2018, recognizing the need for more comprehensive and coherent management planning, Alberta Parks released a new policy to shape the planning process going forward (Alberta Environment and Parks, 2018b). Given that only a handful of the 470 parks in the system have a current management plan, the task of preparing a new plan for each park is overwhelming. As many of the parks in the system are small recreation sites or natural areas, detailed management plans like those developed for larger provincial parks are likely unnecessary. Therefore, instead of calling for site-specific management plans for each park, the Alberta Parks policy states that the priority will be to develop “regional park plans” that will be in alignment with the seven planning regions used in the Land-use Framework.8 Regional park plans are meant to provide

8 The Alberta Land-Use Framework (ALUF) is a blueprint established by the provincial government in 2008 as a means “to manage public and private lands and natural resources to achieve Alberta’s long-term economic, environmental and social goals.” At the core of the new land-use strategy was the establishment of an integrated regional planning system organized around seven regional areas, covering the entirety of the province. For each region, a regional plan was meant to be developed. However, the ALUF has been plagued by political challenges over the past decade as various groups see regional plans as being either too restrictive or lenient. To date, only two of the seven plans have been finalized and, currently, little work is being undertaken to complete the process. Nevertheless, it remains a central guidance for wider land-use discussions in the province.

218 219 high-level direction for all parks within a region. Through the process of regional park planning, the policy states, priority sites that require specific management plans are to be identified. Determining which sites require more intensive planning is to be based on the “significance of a site’s natural and cultural heritage values,” the “level and type of use,” and the “extent of existing and potential land-use conflicts” (Alberta Environment and Parks, 2018b). In the hopes of creating a more uniform planning structure, this policy also provides guidelines for site-specific management plans so that they can “set out objectives and strategies for conservation, development, interpretation, and operations.” Plan development is to be done in consultation with communities and is meant to rely on current information about “natural values, cultural values, recreational opportunities, and resource activities occurring on surrounding lands.” Furthermore, the policy states that each plan needs to, among several other tasks, “define how a site will be managed to maintain ecological integrity and preserve key natural and cultural heritage values” (Alberta Environment and Parks, 2018b). Since the release of this policy, Alberta Parks has not published any new regional plans or site-specific management plans; however, having this policy in place is beneficial and could lead to a more coherent, current, and comprehensive system of management planning in the provincial protected area system. For this research, what is interesting to note in this policy is that there is a distinct shift away from a discussion of cultural heritage resources to one of cultural values. From the policy itself and the evolution of earlier management plans, it is difficult to determine how this shift came about, or what it means for the management of cultural heritage. Moreover, it is not possible to determine what work is being undertaken on the ground to identify cultural values or manage cultural heritage resources. Given the dearth of effective management planning, which is planning that is both comprehensive and regularly updated, in the Alberta protected area system, one is left blind as to what is happening at an operational level. It could very well be the case that cultural heritage resource management is being taken up quite effectively by staff without reliable guidance from the planning team. To better understand what the current conversation in Alberta Parks is with respect to cultural heritage resource management and how the operational approach continues to evolve, it is necessary to speak with those directly involved. In the next section, this analysis turns to findings from interviews with current government staff engaged in parks and cultural heritage resource management in planning, policy, and field operations roles.

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Interview Analysis

In order to gain an understanding of how Alberta Parks currently is thinking about and approaching cultural heritage resource management, a series of in-depth, semi-structured interviews were conducted with individuals involved with the organization. These interviews focused on current beliefs and practices, as well as some of the ongoing challenges and potential avenues for improvement. Below, these insights are grouped as responses to several critical questions related to cultural heritage resource management.

Is there a need for cultural heritage resource conservation in protected areas?

Each interview began with a simple question of whether the individual felt cultural heritage resources needed to be conserved by parks and protected area organizations and, if so, why. Across the board, all the participants agreed that there is a need to address cultural heritage resource conservation in protected areas. No one denied the primary importance of conserving natural systems and biodiversity, but at the same time, each recognized that there was value in considering the human dimension as well. One participant put it succinctly, stating that they “start with the point of view that parks and protected areas are about nature conservation, but nature conservation doesn't have to exclude the important cultural dimensions of what nature is, or what has gone on in the place where the nature conservation occurs” (Interview 12). In this quote, the sentiment is clear: nature conservation is the priority, but there is also space to consider other aspects. Although participants unanimously agreed to the importance of cultural heritage resource conservation, the responses varied in justifying why this was the case. For several participants, cultural heritage resource conservation needs to be addressed in protected areas in part because it is required by the legislation, both the Historical Resources Act and in the mandate of Alberta Parks. “It’s woven into the Parks Act,” one participant explained, “where it speaks to the conservation of natural and associated cultural elements, so it is one of the fundamental aspects of what we're doing” (Interview 9). In addition to the legislated requirement, another participant, focusing on the value of cultural heritage resources in and of themselves, highlighted the unique opportunity that protected areas have for conserving cultural heritage in a way that other organizations and government agencies cannot.

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The ability for parks to protect contiguous landscapes and, I think, take a more holistic approach to the protection of cultural heritage resources… we see it done best in a park setting if only because we don't have the opportunity to do it very well and very often outside of a park setting…. I think Parks has a responsibility and… are well-positioned to look at cultural heritage a little bit more holistically and… recognize that cultural heritage is not just in the site- specific unit, it stretches much larger. (Interview 13) For other participants, cultural heritage resource management was understood as a requirement, but also having additive value for Alberta parks, multiplying the significance of a site. Protecting cultural heritage resources within the park is not like creating an outdoor museum. This stuff is part of the cultural landscape…. Let's say we're talking about hoodoos in Writing-on-Stone Provincial Park, the hoodoo is itself a geologic formation, a geologic feature, a landform feature which has it’s scientific meanings in terms of how it was formed, you know, deposition and erosion. But layered on top of that is cultural significance. So, I see these things as having a multiplying effect in terms of their significance. A hoodoo is significant as a geologic oddity and as a part of the landscape that has this aesthetic value. But then when you put on a layer on top of that, it's cultural meaning and spiritual significance to Indigenous people. Then we've really upped the significance. (Interview 5) Most participants, however, saw the need to manage cultural heritage resources as interwoven with a broader consideration of managing the cultural or human dimensions of protected areas as part of the whole visitor experience. Participants noted that the Parks Act and policy directives such as the Plan for Parks, make it clear that parks are not established solely for the protection of nature. Instead, parks also need to provide a service to people and, as such, the work of park managers is primarily focused on the needs, desires, experiences, and challenges of humans. Nature, left alone, needs little attention from people, but once people start using an area, management issues become far more complicated. As one Alberta Parks staff person explained, at the end of the day “the things that are changing, and that we need to manage for, almost always have very little to do with the biodiversity, but they have a lot to do with actually managing the users or managing the groups that are interacting with biodiversity” (Interview 15). More than just a managerial challenge, though, several participants saw people as the reason that parks exist. Putting in place the infrastructure and conserving resources to enhance peoples’ experiences ultimately leads to the long-term viability of protected areas. One participant captured the various aspects of this thinking quite effectively, stating that One thought that provokes into my mind is that parks are for humans. You know, if we simply wanted, if our main purpose was to only… preserve, keep

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it exactly the way it is. I mean if that was our only objective, then a person could make an argument that the best thing to do is build a giant fence around the entire thing and let no human ever in there. Clearly, that's not the approach that Parks takes. Not only because it's not our mandate. Our mandate is to make sure… the ability to enjoy these landscapes and natural places and cultural heritage resources is available to Albertans and other visitors. But also, that, in fact, is not the best way to protect them because without the political will, without the social license earned from… the citizens of Alberta, then protection actually becomes a bigger challenge. People need to connect to something in order to care about it and they need to care about it before they're going to protect it. Making that connection is really important. So our job is to allow people to interface with it in a way that doesn't threaten the value, but in fact can enhance the value, because then people connect to it, they understand it, they care about it, they value it. (Interview 5) This idea of building connections to the landscape as a means of garnering support for protected areas and enhancing visitor experience was central for many participants. Cultural heritage resources needed to be conserved because they were understood to be an important part of a more extensive program of enhancing visitor experience and, in turn, supporting people’s connections to a place. In this way, cultural heritage resources quickly lost their defining characteristics as historic material remains because they were incorporated into a larger and amorphous sphere of cultural dimensions. This is important because it highlights how, without a clear articulation of what cultural heritage resources are, or how they fit into a broader management program, they can quickly become mixed up with several other human concerns. But at the same time, it is clear that, however loosely defined or understood, cultural heritage is seen as a vital component of the work of protected areas in Alberta.

Is Alberta Parks working to conserve cultural heritage resources?

While participants believed that cultural heritage is an essential aspect of the work of protected area management, generally, in a follow-up question, they also felt strongly that cultural heritage was being acknowledged by Alberta Parks. This is a sentiment that was shared by staff in both Alberta Parks and the Historical Resources Division. As a member of the latter explained, “I think one of the things that's changed over the last ten years or so is that there used to be a much clearer separation between natural and cultural heritage resources organizationally, if not philosophically. And it seems to me as though there's a much greater willingness to

222 223 integrate the two” (Interview 16). Moreover, despite the institutional separation between the two organizations, this same individual noted that it “does seem like there's a much greater willingness on their [Alberta Parks’] side to entertain this concept of considering cultural heritage resources as integral to what Parks does in terms of its interpretive mandate. And its conservation mandate as well” (Interview 16). Although participants tended to agree that Alberta Parks had taken cultural heritage resource management more seriously in recent years, they had varying perspectives on why this shift occurred. The most common explanation provided by those working for Alberta Parks was that this shift stemmed from a growing concern with effectively and respectfully engaging with Indigenous peoples. As one parks planner said, “I don't know that this is truly at the base of everything, but, 2015, I guess, is when the Government of Alberta made a very clear commitment to supporting the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People, which I think really provided a very clear direction for us” (Interview 9). This was reiterated by another planner who, after acknowledging the deficiency in the work of Alberta Parks on cultural heritage resource issues, noted that I would say that I do think that there's an upswing in recognizing the importance of culture and social relevance in protected areas. I think part of that, certainly in the last three to five years, has been a focus, both globally and nationally, on Indigenous protected areas and understanding biodiversity from an Indigenous perspective. This has, I think, made people, forced people to understand and look at biodiversity not by itself. (Interview 4) Surprisingly, some of the most insightful comments on why the shift was occurring came from those outside of Alberta Parks. In addition to acknowledging the desire to work collaboratively with Indigenous communities, one member of the Heritage Division observed an enlarged interest in providing quality visitor experiences and an awareness of how cultural heritage resources could be a vital tool in this pursuit. I think from my perspective, one of the things that's happened is that parks has always had a dual mandate. So, the first is the conservation mandate. And then the second is this kind of recreation and interpretation, a very public, mandate. And, I think, that one of the things that I have seen happen with Parks over the last number of years is that they have just become increasingly aware of the value of incorporating cultural heritage into their interpretive and public programming because it does add such an incredible richness and depth to the experience of visitors to these sites. And, you know, regardless of whether or not the layering of history there is Indigenous or nonindigenous, they recognize that people are fascinated by what previous inhabitants and

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occupants of these lands have done. So, I think that's been a big part of it is them recognizing that there's a public interest in the cultural history of those places as well. (Interview 16) From this individual’s perspective, one of the reasons why Alberta Parks has come to recognize how valuable cultural heritage can be for public programming is the ongoing advocacy and collaboration on the part of Historic Resources staff, as well as an awareness that a sizable amount of money is being spent by the parks department to comply with historic resource assessment regulations. There should be some more significant benefit to this investment. They [Alberta Parks] have gone from looking at us as a regulatory burden to a department that can assist them in their mandate. And one of the reasons that that has happened, I think in part, is that they are obligated to get Historical Resources Act approvals for developments within the park. And they have paid a ton of money to do that, millions of dollars. And it only makes good sense for them, if they're going to be investing all that money, to actually try to do something meaningful with all of that work that's coming out of it. And I think that one of the beneficial things of the work that [a Heritage Division staff person] has done is that they have done a fantastic job of facilitating this relationship with parks, helping them to comply with the regulation, but then also helping them to understand why it's so important that they do this. (Interview 16) What these comments highlight is the importance of consistent and effective collaboration and knowledge sharing, but also the value of individual relationships and how great of an impact a single advocate can have in shaping organizational behaviour. But these collaborative relationships are not only the work of individuals, as this Heritage Division staff member also explained, another factor to consider in understanding this shift are the broader structural changes around how government operates. At a practical level, the Government of Alberta, over the last decade or so, has implemented several initiatives that brought together different ministries. “Things like the Land Use Framework,” this individual explained, “is a great example, but there's also things happening with Indigenous Relations where you've got multiple ministries coming together, and I think that one of the things that has done is it has sensitized other ministries to the value of the work that we do in our department” (Interview 16). Finally, alongside these practical and institutional shifts, participants identified a broad generational shift in the civil service. With new staff of a younger generation coming into planning roles in Alberta Parks, there has been a change in perspective on issues of Indigenous reconciliation and collaboration across departments. Older managers “who were the ones that

224 225 were more resistant to things” have been replaced by new staff who are “coming out of universities… steeped in this whole notion of interdisciplinarity in a way that previous generations were not. So, they don't necessarily perceive these sharp lines between… natural and cultural heritage, Indigenous, non-Indigenous” (Interview 17). Younger staff are seen to be more ready to pick up the phone, ask questions of colleagues outside their department, and learn about issues that are unfamiliar to them. This kind of openness breaks down barriers, creating more fruitful opportunities for cooperation.

How is Alberta Parks managing cultural heritage resources?

Despite the greater interest in the cultural dimensions of protected areas that all the participants observed in Alberta Parks, the actual operational work on this front is still perceived to be lacking, and this is particularly true for cultural heritage resource conservation. As one senior Alberta Parks planner explained, for the most part, cultural heritage resources are “probably not something that has been explicitly recognized… there's not a very robust method to capture and understand what our cultural heritage resources are within our protected areas” (Interview 15). Some new initiatives are being adopted to identify cultural values more successfully, which will be returned to below, but, overall, this individual confirmed, there is currently no dedicated approach to cultural heritage resource management. Instead, the general approach at the moment is twofold. First, to comply with the requirements of the Historical Resources Act by undertaking historic resource impact assessments when new developments are being considered. Second, to use “an umbrella approach to management whereby if you’re protecting biodiversity… those same kind of measures are protecting cultural heritage resources” (Interview 15). However, this clear assessment of the current situation was not present in most of the interviews, the majority of which were not with senior planners in the department. Most participants believed that cultural heritage resource conservation was happening in various ways throughout the park system, but not necessarily in the most effective way. Many were able to point to notable examples, such as Áísínai’pi/Writing-on-Stone or Cypress Hills Provincial Parks, where cultural heritage resources figure prominently, and have been incorporated into management planning in some significant ways. According to staff who have worked on management planning in Áísínai’pi/Writing-on-Stone Provincial Park, for example, a great deal of innovative work is being done at this site to enhance cultural heritage resource

225 226 conservation. Much of the impetus for this effort has come about through a recent effort to have the site designated as a World Heritage Site, a process that demands internationally accepted management processes. Two examples from this site, which will be explored more fully below in connection to questions around Indigenous engagement, are a decades-long collaboration with an Indigenous advisory board and recent work around developing an Indigenous protocol manual to support operational staff. In addition, Áísínai’pi/Writing-on-Stone, over the past several years, has developed a formal monitoring program to keep track of the condition of both natural and cultural heritage resources in the park. As one manager explained I guess there's always been… fairly informal or ad hoc monitoring when archeologists have come down to the site to do their surveys… However, along with developing the World Heritage nomination, one of the really important components of that is… having a monitoring program with strong integrity to it. So, we developed those… we've got a continuing set of monitoring records for our rock art sites at the park… looking at the condition, looking at impact, looking at any kind of degradation, whether it's due to natural causes or human-induced causes. (Interview 9) Apart from several local examples of cultural heritage resource management, participants were only able to point to one organization-wide initiative to standardize the approach to cultural heritage. One of the most innovative changes taking place within Alberta Parks that became clear in the interviews is a shift to values-based management. To improve the quality of management in Alberta Parks, planners are in the process of adopting the Protected Areas Management Effectiveness (PAME) framework. This framework, as described in Chapter 3, was developed by researchers working with the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) as a means to assess how successfully protected areas are being managed. The concern that motivated this effort was one of “paper parks,” areas that were formally protected, but due to a lack of effective management were still being degraded. Through a series of toolkits and workshops, the PAME process aims to identify what values are present in a protected area and then to determine whether current management practices are protecting, degrading, or enhancing those values and associated resources. When the PAME framework was developed in the mid-2000s, the IUCN called for all protected areas to complete management effectiveness evaluations. This goal was highlighted again in 2010 when the Aichi Targets included the same goal as part of its vision for 2020. However, despite the international effort, PAME gained little traction in Alberta until the last few years. In 2015, when Canada’s federal, provincial, and territorial governments released

226 227 the 2020 Biodiversity Goals and Targets for Canada in response to the global Aichi Biodiversity Targets, PAME was an important component (Government of Canada, 2016). As an Alberta Parks planner explained, The reason why [the PAME process] resonated so much in Alberta is that we saw real gaps in our understanding of what our values are in our sites… even having a comprehensive inventory of what are the values that we have in our sites, was a critical gap… And we saw this as a real means to start to get at that and provide our management teams and our practitioners with some [guidance]… So the combination of the inventory, the threat assessment, and then doing a comprehensive evaluation of all of those things that affect management has enabled them to kind of pinpoint where they can put their limited resource dollars. (Interview 15) In Alberta, the PAME program begins with an inventory where planners, site managers, and operational staff work together to understand what the values are for a protected area. The group then moves through a series of workshops to assess how well each value is being protected, scoring them based on a predetermined criteria. This process was described by interview participants, but also has been articulated in a series of unpublished draft manuals that were provided by one of the interviewees. Central to the PAME process used in Alberta is the organization of the values into three categories. The first is conservation values, which include a range of natural heritage values such as ecosystem representation, special or unique habitats, special features, and species of concern. These values exist at several scales “from landscape to genetic while including a number of components important for the ecological integrity and biodiversity of a site” (Alberta Parks, 2020a, p. 1). The second category is recreation values, which includes site settings and activities, site experience, and attractions (Alberta Parks, 2020b). Finally, there is a third category, which planners call “the other bucket,” that holds “all sorts of things that would relate to cultural heritage resources, including, like, what is the value aesthetically at this place? What is the value to scientific research? What is the value of education? What is the value of this site to Indigenous sustainable livelihoods?” (Interview 15). Two of the values that are placed in this other bucket, which are important for this discussion, are cultural/historical values and Indigenous values. These are briefly addressed in the Conservation Values and Risk Assessment Tool (Alberta Parks, 2020a). The cultural/historical values section asks whether there are “sites of cultural or historical value that have been identified by Alberta Culture present in the protected area, and if so, what is their significance?” If there are such sites, the worksheet then asks for them to be

227 228 categorized as archaeological, cultural, geological, historic, natural, or palaeontological, and then assigned a value based on the Historic Resource Value (HRV) rating system used in the provincial inventory of historic resources. In contrast to other methods of identifying and assessing the value of cultural heritage resources in the landscape, such as the Parks Canada Standards and Guidelines for the Conservation of Historic Places, the Burra Charter, or Stephenson’s Cultural Values Model (Australia ICOMOS, 2013; Parks Canada, 2010; Stephenson, 2008), this approach is clearly inadequate. Not only does it employ evaluation criteria that were developed for an entirely different purpose — assisting in the approval process for developments — and do not speak to heritage value at all, it does little to understand what resources are present in the protected area or how value is connected to these resources/sites. Similarly, in the section on Indigenous values, there is a distinct lack of development on what is to be included. The section asks, simply, whether “the site is used by Indigenous peoples for spiritual/cultural purposes and/or collection of plants or animals for medicines, tools or other purposes?” This is followed by a list of potential uses, including hunting/fishing, gathering, cultural identity, spiritual/rituals, living traditions, ceremonial, and economic. It needs to be noted that this section is paired with a comment saying that these categories and descriptions are largely placeholders, and they need to be developed further. However, it is useful to see the draft as a demonstration of how thinking around this issue is evolving. Likewise, following the section on Indigenous values, there is a list of other “non-Indigenous values” that are not at all developed but offer a glimpse into the range of issues Alberta Parks planners are considering. These include: • hunting/fishing • pastures/grazing • gathering • cultural identity • spiritual/rituals • pilgrimage • transmission of knowledge • living traditions • ceremonial • economic (related jobs, amenity values)

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• sustainable use/ income/ tourism • therapeutic / health (mental and physical) • artistic inspiration and expression / technology and science • stewardship and volunteerism (sense of connection by giving back) • multi-generational history / shared experiences • scenic areas / value / aesthetic • intrinsic value • naturalness (quiet and solitude) • sense of place • social (gathering place) • special places • dark sky • community values expressed in social institutions (harmony with nature, sustainable use of resources) • soundscapes • education (Alberta Parks, 2020a, pp. 23–24)

The draft manuals demonstrate that significant effort has gone into developing the tools to identify and assess conservation and recreation values; however, the other bucket remains undeveloped. The range of other values being considered highlights, again, the interest and commitment to trying to engage with the cultural dimension of protected areas. But the inadequacy and lack of coherence in the tools meant to address these values also demonstrates that there is a great deal of confusion and uncertainty about how to conceptualize and address the cultural dimension, in particular, cultural heritage. This confusion was recognized and admitted to by the interview participants. As one parks planner explained, “we've really struggled with figuring out how to assess cultural values, but particularly Indigenous values because we don't necessarily feel that the way we approach conservation and recreation values is an appropriate format to approach Indigenous values. And we also haven't really worked with external stakeholders or partners when we've been doing evaluations and assessments” (Interview 20). Apart from engaging with Indigenous communities to better articulate what they value about protected areas, at the moment, there is no plan of action to develop this toolkit. As the previous

229 230 quote highlights, in the absence of clear policy, uncertainty around how to approach cultural heritage resources and values remains.

How is Alberta Parks managing Indigenous cultural heritage?

For many of the participants, non-Indigenous heritage was more straightforward and reasonably addressed by the requirements of the Historical Resources Act. Indigenous heritage, in contrast, was felt to be more complicated. For one participant, this complication emerged from a sense of uncertainty about how to go about the consultation process. They explained that “one of the problems we found is who do we interact with to get that information… there's a need to know all the political sensitivity, but… I'm not quite sure how we should move forward on this, and who do we interact with without causing any conflict” (Interview 2). This uncertainty is exacerbated by a lack of clear policy direction from the planning and policy staff, which, in turn, leaves these decisions in the hands of site managers who are often ill-equipped and under- resourced. As one regional manager explained, Indigenous engagement is “a big corporate priority… but there isn't the prescription or some detail about how you go about it, the kind of expectations around that” (Interview 16). Despite a lack of direction on how to approach Indigenous cultural heritage, some participants also highlighted that some of the prominent parks in southern Alberta, like Áísínai’pi/Writing- on-Stone, Kananaskis, and Fish Creek, having been working to engage with Indigenous communities for some time. As one retired parks manager explained there were a lot of attempts to get the local tribes involved in things that were happening in Fish Creek, you know, they would always bless the archaeological digs at the start of every season. We would have them do a lot of talks and things in interpretive programming. We would ask them to review information we were giving to the public. Those kinds of things. Could more be done? More could be done in every area. But was it a concern that we considered when we were doing management functions, yeah, it was. (Interview 1) However, the interviews also reveal that, in the past several years, Alberta Parks has been developing a more robust approach to engaging with Indigenous communities. This was demonstrated in the previous analysis of management plans, but was reiterated and clarified by the participants.

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In general, Alberta Parks’ engagement with Indigenous communities is achieved through two primary avenues, compliance with historic resources impact assessment and cooperative management arrangements. Explaining how these two elements were incorporated into the recent management plan for Castle PP and WPP, one Alberta Parks planner explained that the process began with a commitment to working with Indigenous communities, and, in particular, the Piikani Nation. There was a commitment, right off the bat, to setting up a co- management arrangement and working through the creation of that… so that it develops into something that works well for the Piikani and for Parks… And the other part of the process was a journey of learning. So, working with the Piikani and other Indigenous groups with a connection to that place to do traditional ecological knowledge and land use studies…. so that information could be applied to how that park was planned… [including] the creation of a Blackfoot offering site and placing a traditional territory type marker in the landscape. (Interview 9) What is especially noteworthy with the work with Castle PP and WPP is that the park managers decided to undertake traditional land use and ecological knowledge studies proactively, rather than in response to proposed developments. This practice, one participant noted “is not a legal requirement by any means,” but is, instead, “just very good governance and best practice” (Interview 17). Importantly, doing this work proactively helps develop an extensive database of information about the area, which can then support ongoing management decisions, interpretation, and guide future consultation requirements. As noted previously, due to the protections offered to archaeological and traditional use sites by the Historical Resources Act, the impact assessment process often includes consultation with Indigenous communities to identify traditional use sites and prepare appropriate mitigation measures. While the Heritage Division does offer reliable guidance to Alberta Parks staff as they work to follow the regulations, several challenges arise. In part, the challenge is to understand how to go about engaging with these communities and to make consistent decisions on management issues. One tool that staff working at Áísínai’pi/Writing-on-Stone have been developing to support decision making around ongoing traditional uses of the land is a protocols document. In partnership with the Blackfoot, parks staff are working to develop a how-to guide for our staff to use and to follow when we are asked for special access for traditional use. So for example, if somebody comes and says, you know, I want to come and collect traditional medicines, or I want it to come and harvest an animal, it's sort of a description of the traditional practices and

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why they're important to know. It also describes how we are able to handle those things in order to permit or enable that traditional access to continue. (Interview 5) A document like this offers a transparent decision-making platform to ensure consistent communication from all staff. Another challenge that several participants brought up was the conflicting need for information to support management decisions and confidentiality for Indigenous communities. Central to this concern is the need for Indigenous communities to maintain control and ownership of their cultural knowledge. As one member of the Heritage Division explained A lot of the sites that we are recording and witnessing out on the landscape are sensitive or sacred or ceremonial in nature. And there's lots of considerations with that for how the community may want that information portrayed, even within our own databases, which are not shared outside of our section or our branch. (Interview 13) To address these concerns, the Heritage Division, over the years, has developed a sophisticated system built on trust, consistent communication, and tight data controls to ensure that Indigenous knowledge is used appropriately. As one staff member explained, the way the system currently works is that when we go into the communities at the beginning to introduce what we're doing, we tell them this is how Culture manages sensitive data. So, normally we wouldn't provide the listing of historic resources, we would put them up [on the inventory] with a 360-acre buffer, it wouldn't say what the site is, what site type it is, where it is, what community is associated, we would just say there's a traditional use site in this area…[In addition] we have an agreement [with the community] that we don't share information outside of our branch. So, no other department can access that without permission from the community. So, we do maintain that strong level of confidentiality because it builds trust. It builds that confidence in the community that if they tell us something, they're not giving it to the whole government. It stays in one little body, for one specific purpose. (Interview 18) From the perspective of a parks manager, however, the concern is that they would not be able to access detailed information on what traditional and ceremonial use sites exist within a park, which may be necessary for making a decision. As one parks planner explained, “it seems like there is a bit of a breakdown there in the fact that the Heritage Division gets all the information and then it's sort of difficult for that information to jump across” (Interview 13). This concern, a Heritage Division staff member maintains, is not a significant obstacle because “we have data sharing agreements” that communities can agree to, that allow Parks staff to access some

232 233 information, but these types of agreements require a great deal of mutual trust and communication.” To complicate the issue further, these types of agreements do not allow unlimited use of the information because “there's a difference between sharing that information for a park planning and protection piece versus that more interpretation kind of piece within the park” (Interview 18). The uncertainty on the side of Alberta Parks staff on how to access and responsibly use data from Indigenous communities is noteworthy and highlights an important issue. Even with adequate information, however, making management decisions and putting in place policies to protect Indigenous traditional use sites is not easy. In some cases, Alberta Parks simply lacks the mechanisms to control access to sites. The desire to limit access to significant sites within parks, one participant noted, occasionally comes up when speaking with Indigenous communities. We'll have communities say, you know, this area is significant to us, we would like it to be set aside not just for no development to occur, not just for it to be protected from industry, but to have exclusive access to this area to exercise their treaty rights and traditional uses and to conduct ceremony and to have a space that is just for us. The trouble that we have is that there's really no mechanism within the Government of Alberta that ensures exclusive use. (Interview 13) In the absence of mechanisms to effectively control access to an area, Alberta Parks must instead rely on informing the public, requesting that people respect requests around a site, or simply not advertise that a site exists. However, this is not always successful, as one Historic Resources staff person explained We hear things, like in the Kootenay Plains region that is a heavily significant area for many communities, there are always Sundances happening out there in the summers. But from what we've always heard with communities is that it's too close to the recreational areas where non-Indigenous people go, too close to roads and they get a lot of gawkers, they get a lot of disturbance. They get people showing up and… going up to the Arbor site and taking photos when they're not allowed to. They shouldn't be doing things like that…. Concern is that… if you're going to be creating parks or facilitating increased access, there's going to be an impact on the community's ability to continue their traditional ways, and that needs to be mitigated and managed somehow (Interview 18) To complicate matters further, the need for confidentiality or access restrictions is often overestimated by those who are not directly involved with Indigenous communities. Although it

233 234 is essential to ensure robust controls over how data is shared and used, for many members of Indigenous communities, keeping a site secret is not the point. As one member of the Heritage Division explained One of the things that has been really striking to me working with Indigenous communities, especially the Blackfoot, is that they, in almost every meeting where issues around archeology or traditional use sites in their territory come up, they almost invariably raise the issue of tourism, which has been quite shocking to me, I have to say. I think that one of the reasons it's been surprising to me is that there is this perception that if you go out onto the landscape, for instance, with Indigenous people, and they identify sites, that necessarily they are going to want access to those sites restricted… But the impression that I've gotten is that there certainly are sites where they would not want unrestricted, public access. There's no question about that. But there are many, many sites where they, I think, see a real opportunity to tell other people about their cultural history. And I think that part of this process over the last however many years of engaging with these communities more directly, is just making clear that communities have an interest in economic development, in sharing their cultural story, that can be hugely beneficial. And that has really shifted this perception that any time you involve Indigenous communities, anytime you do archeology, that it's this necessary no. (Interview 16) Taken together, what the interviews demonstrate is that Indigenous cultural heritage remains a crucial challenge for park managers to conceptualize and work with. Uncertainties around data sharing, confidentiality, best practices in consultation, and how to manage contemporary use and access combine to create a complicated set of issues. However, as the work in Áísínai’pi/Writing-on-Stone and Castle PP and WPP demonstrates, through close collaboration with staff in the Heritage Division, proactive inventorying and transparent policies written down in management plans and protocols documents, there is a path forward that Alberta Parks is partly pursuing to protect places of significance to Indigenous communities. The second component of Alberta Parks’ approach to working with Indigenous communities and effectively managing their cultural heritage is entering into cooperative management arrangements to ensure ongoing input on management decisions. Although Alberta Parks has recently formalized its approach, a form of collaborative decision-making has existed in Alberta Parks for over twenty years at Áísínai’pi/Writing-on-Stone PP and for nearly as long at Hay- Zama WPP. At Áísínai’pi/Writing-on-Stone, this arrangement has been one between Alberta Parks and a group of elders from the Blackfoot Confederacy who came together as the Mookaakin Cultural and Heritage Society. There is no formal cooperation agreement between

234 235 the two parties, but after years of working together, a great deal of trust has been built. Currently, Alberta Parks meets with the Society twice a year to update them on the work of the park and hear concerns. As well, the Society is always available to Park staff when new issues arise. As one park manager explained, “when we're faced with a question or a management challenge that we don't know the answer to, or we don't know what the right thing to do would be when considering cultural protocols, we've got individuals we can just go to directly to clarify those concerns” (Interview 9). Although informal and relatively simple, the arrangement has proven effective at Áísínai’pi/Writing-on-Stone PP. Recently, Alberta Parks has developed a more formal and standardized approach to shared decision-making. The first example of this was in 2018 when the Alberta Government signed a cooperative management agreement with the Piikani Nation to oversee operations in the Castle PP and WPP. The agreement established a joint management board, co-chaired by representatives from each party, to provide input on issues such as hunting, harvesting, interpretation, Parks staff training, economic development opportunities, and the access and use of the land for cultural practices (Alberta Parks, 2018). That same year, five new wildland parks were established in northeast Alberta, all with the intention to be managed cooperatively with Indigenous communities. An important note on terminology is that the Alberta government uses the term cooperative management, rather than co-management, which was chosen deliberately to emphasize that “it's not shared governance…[because] decision making still rests with the Minister” (Interview 20). Instead of sharing decision-making power, the boards serve an advisory role and are “responsible for developing a management plan and then implementing that management plan.” As well, the board “provides advice about issues as they come up and really defines the values and objectives of how the park will be managed. So, even though decision making power rests with the Minister, there's a lot of decision making that rests with the board” (Interview 20). Ultimately, cooperative management arrangements not only allow for more voices to be heard, and a formal process to be established for sharing decisions, but they also help address the uncertainty around knowing who to go to for information and insight into Indigenous heritage in various parks. Together with an improved approach to gathering information about what resources and sites exist in the landscape, cooperative arrangements offer a robust way forward.

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The interviews established, quite clearly, that there is a great deal of work going on in Alberta Parks with respect to cultural heritage management, especially as it relates to Indigenous communities. Where non-Indigenous cultural heritage is being addressed, principally, through compliance with Historical Resource Act requirements, efforts toward identifying cultural heritage values, and some modest interpretive programming, Indigenous cultural heritage management is being more actively pursued as part of broader government priority. Nevertheless, despite the efforts that are underway, the approach to cultural heritage resource management remains ad hoc and ill-defined, and significant challenges exist to limit progress on this front.

What are the ongoing challenges for managing cultural resources in Alberta Parks?

Although interview participants felt that Alberta Parks’ approach to cultural heritage resource management had improved in recent years, especially with respect to engagement with Indigenous communities, they were quick to highlight the ongoing challenges that staff faced. Most noticeable is the lack of human and financial capacity. As noted previously, Alberta Parks has never fully recovered from the deep cuts made to the public service in the 1990s. Staffing has never reached the same levels as in the 1980s, and this, alongside a greatly expanded park system, has limited what can be achieved with respect to cultural heritage resource management. Apart from a few sites with especially significant cultural heritage resources, there is little funding available for projects or people to work on cultural heritage conservation. “I think capacity is one of the big ones,” one interviewee from Áísínai’pi/Writing-on-Stone explained, “not every park, of course, has its own team of people to focus on these things” (Interview 9). Moreover, this is not a problem that is limited to Alberta Parks; across the government, staff are stretched to do more with less. The Heritage Division also suffers from its own internal issues, which limit how effectively it can engage with other departments. As one Alberta Parks manager explained, there is “very little staffing involved in Historic Resources… From a department perspective, there weren’t a lot of people you could turn to for advice working on projects” (Interview 1). This is problematic because, as Alberta Parks takes its responsibility to conserve cultural heritage resources more seriously, much of this work gets downloaded to the Heritage Division, where there simply is not the capacity to address the matter effectively. As an

236 237 example, the work around Indigenous engagement that has recently emerged in Alberta Parks is commendable but, as one Historic Resources staff member said I've always been shocked by the fact that parks doesn't have more staff dedicated to consultation, given the nature of their work. So [a Historic Resources staff member] has been a phenomenal resource for Parks in that they take on a lot of the fieldwork that really, they probably should have internal capacity to be doing. But I mean, [Historic Resources staff member] is, he's probably the most knowledgeable government employee on this whole issue. And so, it makes sense for him to be assisting. But Parks really should have developed some internal capacity around this given, again, the nature of their work. (Interview 16) This issue of offloading work onto other groups is exacerbated when one looks at the Indigenous communities themselves. One Historical Resource Division staff member explained this concern, stating that one of the things we really need to emphasize here is that it's beyond just our own internal issues, it’s the capacity of the communities to respond. We want to work with the communities. We want to work with the knowledgeable elders who have the knowledge that they can add to this. Sometimes, I think, as government we forget that these… communities with these very, very small agencies of people are being put upon by multiple ministries. Every developer out there, every archeologist, every anthropologist. So, you sometimes have an office of four or five people that are fielding hundreds and hundreds of requests for time in a single month and they just can't accommodate it all. (Interview 17) While the offloading of work onto other departments is a serious concern, it also highlights a more fundamental challenge that several participants noted. Alberta Parks and the Heritage Division have, over the years, found themselves as part of the same department. In the early 2000s, for example, the two groups were housed under the Department of Community Development. This arrangement spurred a greater degree of communication and collaboration, the outgrowth of which can be seen in the improved conceptualization of cultural heritage resource management in park management plans during this period. However, today the two groups again find themselves institutionally separated, which, despite broader government efforts to improve cross-department cooperation, has negative implications. “As much as we talk about being an integrated organization,” one Alberta Parks staff member explained, “it does get down into our silos, and some of that is just, hey, this is what I’ve got to deal with right now. That's not that I don't really care about that, but I got to put my focus right here” (Interview 6). This is an unfortunate reality when staff are limited in the amount of time they can dedicate to any one

237 238 concern, and it has a detrimental impact on the work being done. As one participant explained, the staff with the Heritage Division are able to do excellent work and “obviously Parks is hugely appreciative to see these features on the landscape or to hear directly from community and knowledge keepers about the history of this place.” But Historical Resources Management Branch staff are less familiar with the park setting and management issues than those who are focused on protecting that area. Parks staff, in contrast, “can be in a far better position to inform… what's going on in this park” (Interview 13). In the end, the government is simply a large organization, and building connections between departments and divisions is a challenge, especially when those entities are already stretched thin. Moreover, the government is stretched across a large geographic area. Alberta Parks staff are tasked with managing landscapes in the far north of the province, the far south, and everywhere in between. It is no surprise that, alongside the challenges of institutional divisions, regional disparities and divisions also emerge. As an Historical Resources Management staff member explained, what you do find is there are certain pockets of the province where it is just difficult to get your message through, either because they're unreceptive or because you just don't have an ability to contact them. So, you can find, and it's been my experience, that there can be a significant discontinuity in terms of the receptiveness of regional parks or staff within parks responsible for various things to this whole issue of cultural and historic resource management. So, I would say that's a significant impediment, and that's just, I would say, a structural issue that will always exist anytime you have a large organization. But again, I think there… has been positive progress made on those fronts, but I think that's always going to be a challenge. (Interview 16) Exacerbating the institutional challenges facing the integration of cultural heritage resource management into Alberta Parks’ efforts are several issues of perception. The first, as noted by one participant, is the opinion that cultural heritage resource management is a treacherous regulatory burden determined to stop any proposed development. There is often a perception that, according to one cultural resource specialist, “I'm the bad guy, and… we've been trying to break… this perception that CRM means no” (Interview 6). Coupled with this perception of cultural heritage resource management is a broader bias amongst parks staff toward natural heritage conservation. “I think even within Parks,” an Alberta Parks manager explained, “I can think of colleagues who… would say okay, that's nice, but you know, parks are to protect natural values” (Interview 5). Although these opinions are changing as a result of staff turnover, internal

238 239 training, and governmental initiatives, a degree of bias remains. Reflecting on this issue, another participant noted that One of the challenges, I suppose, is not only capacity, but I guess it's… the background or the, I don't think it's necessarily a bias, but it's where a lot of parks officials maybe are coming from. They come into the organization with maybe more of a natural sciences background. But it's less common to have staff coming to Alberta Parks who have a strong education in cultural heritage, or you know, archeology or the different sciences that kind of lean into that sphere (Interview 9). Without a strong understanding and appreciation among Parks staff for cultural heritage resource management in protected areas, there is little chance that such work will be able to proceed. Another challenge that was frequently discussed in the interviews was the lack of information on what cultural heritage resources exist in parks. Despite improvements in gathering cultural heritage resource information through traditional use studies and commitments in management plans to undertake inventories of cultural heritage resources in parks, several participants highlighted that information was still hard to find. “I think with everything,” one participant argued, “the biggest problem is a lack of data. It's a lack of actual objective information” (Interview 15). Moreover, information on cultural heritage resources is quite variable, with some parks having a greater understanding than others. As one manager explained, “it's just, I think, the level of knowledge or information of what we know about those places. It's obviously very variable from place to place. Some parks they don't currently have a baseline, a set of information to really draw from like the resource libraries or papers or whatever” (Interview 9). Having more information about cultural heritage resources is the obvious solution to this issue, however, gathering this information can also be challenging. The lack of information is exacerbated further on three fronts. First, is the cultural complexity of places with overlapping traditional territories. Some parks, such as Áísínai’pi/Writing-on- Stone, are relatively well-positioned in that they are the center of the Blackfoot traditional territory. As one park manager explained, it wasn't as complex to find that relationship with the Mookaakin Society and to continue working with them. Whereas in other settings, there's… much more overlapping traditional territory as well as maybe several neighbouring Indigenous communities that may not be on the same page with things. I think that can be kind of daunting, as well, to find out how are we going to navigate through that? How are we going to develop this in a way that is inclusive and meaningful and supported by all of our communities? (Interview 9)

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Such complexity makes it challenging to gather the appropriate layers and depth of information for a park. Second, while the overall body of information about cultural heritage in parks is inadequate, this is especially true for resources that are not archaeological sites. This is because the principle focus for Alberta Parks’ approach to cultural heritage resource management has been on protecting archaeological sites. In part, the focus on archaeological remains is a result of the historic impact assessment requirements, which also focus, primarily, on archaeological heritage and, to an increasing degree, traditional use sites. As noted previously, when asked to think about protecting cultural heritage resources, park managers often frame it in terms of complying with Historical Resources Act requirements. Unfortunately, this does little to account for the broad diversity of cultural heritage resources in a landscape, which might include field patterns, traditional trails, evidence of land-use change, or non-registered historic structures. As a staff member with the Heritage Division argued, one of the more interesting distinctions in terms of cultural heritage management is between built heritage and archeology slash traditional use site heritage. One of the things I have noticed is that it's much more difficult to make the case for Parks to conserve built heritage. There's multiple reasons for this, but one of them is that the Indigenous heritage components, so that includes archeology and traditional uses, it's just understood now that that's how government operates, right? It's become part of our DNA now that you have to engage with Indigenous communities, you have to involve them… With built heritage, you know, it costs a lot of money and they're very often not seen as priorities because oftentimes they're structures that don't have a use. And so that's where we're running into a lot of trouble. And I mean, it's not Park's fault, they just don't have the budget for it. They don't really, to their mind, have a mandate to do it. So that's where it becomes quite challenging. (Interview 16) Third, connected to the primary focus on archaeological and traditional use sites, is that the information that is gathered continues to be approached and conceptualized through the frame of sites, which neglects notions of connectivity and landscape characteristics. One participant highlighted this issue with an illustrative example, explaining that there needs to be the recognition that a place within this park or this place is not in a silo on its own. It's a node within a larger network of land use. And the same way, I think the Blackfoot would describe an individual buffalo jump site [as being] not just a site in and of itself, it's connected to this whole network of other sites. I had one elder describe it as the Walmarts and the convenience stores of buffalo jump sites. So, you're going to have the ones that are for your big shops, like your Head-Smashed-In… and then you need a quick thing from the store. (Interview 13)

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Gathering the appropriate level of information to recognize landscape-scale connections is challenging, but is starting to be recognized by Alberta Parks staff as a necessary step to manage cultural heritage properly. “What we're learning from places like Head-Smashed-In and Writing- on-Stone,” one participant noted, “is that you can't just manage a place in isolation of all the other places… managing the landscape takes into account so many different cultural issues — the environmental issues, the engineering issues, the archeological issues, the paleontological issues — and we're still getting our heads around that. So, trying to figure it out because we're still thinking in terms of points [on a map] because that's easier to do” (Interview 17). Beyond the institutional, perceptual, and informational challenges, participants noted several other ongoing issues. One of the crucial ones is the lack of operational guidelines on cultural heritage resource conservation. This issue seemed especially relevant for one manager who, already stretched thin by limited human and financial capacity, was trying to sort out what to do with cultural heritage resources in the parks under their responsibility. “I think a lot of the cultural things, the cultural understanding, Indigenous cultures in our world, and all those sorts of things are really, really significant, but how? There's no manual… for that kind of stuff. There’s nowhere you can go to pick that up… We just struggle with trying to find time for these sorts of things and I haven't figured it out” (Interview 16). Another critical issue is the need for greater public awareness and education on what cultural heritage resources are and how Alberta Parks is trying to protect them. In Áísínai’pi/Writing-on- Stone, for example, one planner explained that there are a lot of misunderstandings from non-Indigenous visitors… [who]… may not understand the difference between carving their name into a piece of sandstone and somebody who did that a thousand years ago… or simply even seeing this stuff. I mean, a lot of times, people don't see it, and they step on something that they can’t identify, or they scrawled their name over top of something that actually has a really important piece of rock art underneath it” (Interview 5). Similarly, as in the example described earlier with respect to non-Indigenous Sundance observers in the Kootenay Plains Ecological Reserve, often the public is unaware of how to interact appropriately with these resources, and it is the job of Alberta Parks to raise that awareness. It was also noted that the acknowledgement of ongoing cultural uses in a park by Indigenous peoples has been met with pushback from other communities who feel that they are engaged in uses of the land that are historically grounded, such as horse riding, fishing, and hunting. Such complaints from the public force managers to think about ways of justifying some uses, such as

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Indigenous harvesting, while limiting others. One way to work toward a solution to this issue, one manager explained, is to focus on the time-depth of activities. Evidence seems to suggest… that a Blackfoot connection to a specific spot might go back, you know, thousands of years. Right? So the length of that connection, the sort of depth of that cultural tradition is an element that we have to say, you know, if I've been using my e-bike on a certain trail now for two years it doesn't reach the same level of cultural importance of traditional use as somebody who's been collecting sage to burn in a smudge for 5,000 years. So, there's a whole spectrum of cultural values as they overlay on to parts of parks. Doesn't mean they're not important, but let's say a cultural use that's relatively new, let's say it's three years old or even 30 years old, that very much has to be calculated in balance to protecting cultural heritage resources that are older. (Interview 5) Each of these issues requires clarity on what is allowed in parks, and what the justifications for those decisions are, which can then be translated into public education and awareness-raising campaigns. Finally, one participant brought up the issue of climate change, noting that it is not only real, but a “major issue that relates to [cultural heritage resource management].” Certain landscape features that have cultural value, such as the forests in Cypress Hills or ranching grasslands, may become threatened as the climate becomes drier and hotter. “So how do we address and manage for people's expectations and increase the environmental literacy around climate change so that people can adapt to a changing environment” (Interview 15). Taken together, there is no shortage of challenges facing Alberta Parks as it tries to address cultural heritage resource management. Fortunately, participants were optimistic in picturing ways to improve the system.

How can cultural heritage resource management in Alberta Parks be improved?

Although participants were optimistic, when asked how Alberta Parks could improve its approach to cultural heritage resource management, they were less clear on specific practical measures than they were on the challenges facing the system. Suggestions for improvement tended to parallel challenges, with the prescription being simply to address the issue. For example, when discussing the challenge of inadequate information, one of the typical comments for improvement was the need to establish systems to gather better information about what resources and values exist in a given park unit and develop tools to have that information

242 243 disseminated to staff. As one participant argued, “fundamentally, you have got to have a bonafide inventory of what the cultural heritage resource base is and what are the components. So, there's a lot of groundwork to do before one could incorporate that within your management programs” (Interview 3). Achieving this type of inventory is, as noted in the previous section, fraught with challenges including the requirements for confidentiality, and capacity issues, both of which are compounded by the differences between resources and values. While cataloging resources may be a more straightforward pursuit, establishing what cultural values are associated with these resources is much more difficult, especially when there is no framework or guidance on what those values are, or how to evaluate them. Given the challenges, there were not any concrete suggestions from participants for ways to improve the system. Nevertheless, their suggestions to inventory and determine existing resources and values do point toward a range of work that could be beneficial. Alongside better information to support decision making, several participants also pointed to the need for cultural heritage resource management to be considered early in the planning process. Too often, this is not the case. As one of the Historical Resources Management staff members explained, for us, from the regulatory point of view, the big problem has been that we've always entered the picture too late. So, people put together all their developments, they've paid their engineers, they've paid their surveyors, and then we become the afterthought, and they say, “Oh yeah, let's go talk to Historic Resources.” And at that point, we would say, “well, there's conflict.” And so, for them, it would look like that's a big obstacle. Now, what do we do? (Interview 16) Starting early helps ensure that cultural heritage resources are considered carefully and integrated into plans, rather than being identified later to the detriment of a project. Fortunately, this same staff member felt that things were beginning to change, Parks and others… are now getting to the point where they realize that… if you can work with us in the early part of the planning process, we will help you navigate through the things that might've been an obstacle in the past, but figure out how we can work with you. Not necessarily to always avoid the conflict but to at least minimize the impacts that a certain kind of development or a certain placement of a campsite or a kiosk or something will have and perhaps place it in a way that not only can we minimize the impact but also maybe use it to interpretive advantage as well. (Interview 16)

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Putting in place more formal processes for early engagement with Historical Resources Management Branch staff, this participant argued, would help reduce impediments and improve management planning. Other participants highlighted the need for greater cooperation between departments. Noting that the relationship between Alberta Parks and Alberta Culture has “been pretty good,” but even still “government departments sometimes do work in silos and that's tough to break out of, and it becomes tougher to break out of it the more that funding to government programs is reduced, because, you know, it takes time to collaborate” (Interview 5). One suggestion for capitalizing on the potential for intergovernmental collaboration was to look at finding connections with the renewed Alberta education curriculum, which has a greater focus on community connections to land and learning about Indigenous cultures (Interview 9). Since these interviews were conducted, the new government threw out the rewritten curriculum and restarted the process, so it remains to be seen whether similar ideas will reemerge. Another suggestion was to provide examples and resources from park units where some work around cultural heritage resource conservation has taken place, to park managers throughout the province. “Having resources,” one Alberta Parks manager said, “whether it's program models or examples of a way of uncovering or protecting a certain cultural element to a park, or a format for employing Indigenous employees, can boost the emphasis and the protection on cultural heritage” (Interview 9). In a series of related comments, several participants highlighted the need for better staff training, arguing that it is crucial “to help people develop a higher level of comfort” with cultural heritage. In some parts of the parks system there is a robust training component, which has been quite useful. For example, at Áísínai’pi/Writing-on-Stone PP cultural heritage training is part of the requirements for conservation officers and seasonal park rangers and this model is spreading in southern Alberta where staff are “developing stronger cultural awareness training for the Castle Parks right now” (Interview 9). However, this is not the situation across the province. More could be done, some participants argued, to expand the training programs one of the things I would love to see… is more education of park staff about cultural heritage generally. I mean, they're very good around the issues of natural heritage, conservation and interpretation. But a lot of them, they just don't have the understanding of the cultural heritage of the parks in which they work, or don't understand things like the technical side of conserving a heritage building within a Park, and they don't necessarily need to understand it any

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great depth, but what I think would be valuable is if parks staff, generally, were sensitive to cultural heritage philosophically and then also to the practical requirements of conservation and interpretation. I think that would go a long, long way. (Interview 16) Finally, one important suggestion to address all these challenges, from better training to policy to inventory expansion, was to have staff within Alberta Parks dedicated to addressing cultural heritage resource management. As one park manager explained, if they could have one thing to address this issue, it probably would be someone with that as their job. Or a significant part of their job description. Because I think if it's a training program or if it's a manual or a course here and there, we might be able to carve out time and go for it. Right? But if there is someone that carries that torch. Someone who is tagged with it, who has such a significant part of their time for it, things will happen. (Interview 15) Although by no means a comprehensive set of suggestions, or a road map to advancing Alberta Parks’ approach to cultural heritage resource management, the suggestions made by participants, along with their insights on the existing state of the system, signal a range of opportunities to make substantive changes.

Conclusion

Over the past twenty years, Alberta Parks has been making a slow recovery from the significant cuts the organization faced in the 1990s, playing catch-up with limited capacity, a significantly increased land base, and ever-growing user demands. Within this climate, the organization has continued to maintain a concern for cultural heritage resource management, albeit in a manner that often is tangential to the central concerns of ecosystem protection and recreational service delivery. By analyzing the past twenty years of parks management plans, one can witness an increasingly sophisticated approach to management, particularly with respect to cultural heritage resources. However, confusion around what cultural heritage is, and how to go about protecting these elements, has persisted. Instead, cultural heritage has been addressed in an ad hoc manner, with little to suggest a coherent overarching strategy. Even in the most recently published management plan for Castle PP and WPP in 2018, there is a great deal of conceptual confusion and a lack of clear and practical actions to identify and protect cultural heritage

245 246 resources. Over this period, there have been improvements, especially with respect to engaging with Indigenous communities and bringing them into the decision-making process, but a fully- formed approach to cultural heritage resource management remains elusive. This conclusion is sustained by the interviews conducted with Alberta Parks staff and other government employees working alongside the park system. In these interviews, it was clear that there was a commitment and desire to address cultural heritage resource management, especially as it relates to Indigenous heritage, but also an acknowledgment that this was not being achieved effectively. Central to this failure are several persistent challenges including a lack of capacity, government work occurring within various silos, an inherent bias to natural heritage conservation, a lack of adequate baseline information on what cultural heritage resources exist in a park unit, a lack of overarching policy, and a need for greater public awareness. Although numerous, these challenges offer a guide to begin thinking about how to build a more active approach to cultural heritage resource management within Alberta Parks. It is to this challenge that the next chapter turns.

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Chapter 7: Recommendations

Introduction

The understanding that there is a desire and an ongoing effort within Alberta Parks to effectively address cultural heritage resource management should, at this point, be apparent. However, what should also be apparent is the need for a more comprehensive, consistent, and contemporary program for achieving this end. Drawing upon international and national examples, the history of progress within Alberta Parks, and insights garnered through the interview process, this chapter attempts to map out what this program should look like. In what follows, a series of high-level recommendations, supported by detailed action items are presented. The proposal is that these recommendations are necessary steps for Alberta Parks to take to protect the cultural heritage resources under their care. The recommendations are organized to cover the spectrum of protection moving from high-level, overarching, or guiding management policies to specific conservation measures. Although the recommendations are organized in this manner and present a logical set of steps that could be followed, they are not meant to be read as a definitive step-by-step guide to action. In practice, progress toward effective cultural resource management in Alberta Parks will be through incremental steps, pursued strategically, but more so with a strong tendency toward opportunism. Openings, both big and small, will arise to take action on any one of these recommendations. Therefore, these recommendations should be seen as spots on a map, clearly connected but with the pathway linking them to be determined through the possibilities the emerge in practice. While these recommendations are the result of in-depth research, their value needs to be assessed in collaboration with those who are working in Alberta Parks. To this end, the second part of this chapter presents the results of an online survey that was distributed to staff with Alberta Parks and the Heritage Division. The survey presented participants with the list of recommendations and action items and asked them to reflect on the desirability, usability, and achievability of each, as well as provide any further commentary to improve the proposals. Ultimately, the results show that participants were generally supportive of the recommendations. Individuals saw the proposals as a valuable road map for future work with respect to cultural

247 248 resources in Alberta Parks, but they also raised several concerns about the prospects of most, if not all, of the recommendations being achieved.

Recommendations

1. Adopt a coordinated strategic management approach to cultural heritage resource management in Alberta Parks.

Strategic management is the process of using resources to achieve organizational goals and objectives. In Alberta Parks, there is a general lack of a coordinated strategic approach to cultural heritage resource management (CHRM), which has resulted in an ad hoc approach to decision making, resource allocation, and conservation practice. Moreover, there is a sense that CHRM is a regulatory burden that emerges late in the planning process and creates complications. There is a need to overcome this impression and to demonstrate the potential value this work may have for other operational activities. Given the requirement in the Alberta Parks Act to protect cultural heritage resources contained within the park system and the stated policy goals to this effect, Alberta Parks needs to implement standard cultural heritage resource management strategies across the system and link those to organizational strategic plans. While this type of strategic planning can be achieved under the current legislative mandate, any future efforts to amend and consolidate the Parks Act need to affirm and clarify the importance of cultural heritage.

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2. Develop an overarching cultural heritage resource management policy (CHRM).

Foundational to a program of strategic management are clear and consistent links between organizational goals and operational activities. A CHRM policy serves this purpose by providing a concise summary of values, principles, and requirements. A CHRM policy needs to be developed through a consultative process involving staff, local communities, and the public.

Action Items

A cultural heritage resource management policy needs to: • Establish a clear purpose • Explain the legislative and policy context for CHRM • Establish a common terminology for key terms, such as cultural heritage, cultural heritage resources, and cultural heritage values. • Define primary principles, which may include ones such as: o Acknowledgement that Indigenous communities have the inalienable right to manage their own heritage. o Commitment to treat Indigenous cultural heritage a distinct part of the broader category and to manage it through respectful and comprehensive engagement. o Commitment to information-based management decision making. o Commitment to view the entire protected area network as a cultural landscape. See Recommendation 3. • Establish management requirements for identifying and managing cultural heritage resources that includes guidance on how to: o identify and evaluate cultural heritage resources o set priorities for management o conserve resources o assess impacts

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o monitor the condition of resources o record and document CHRM efforts • Establish accountabilities, determining who is responsible for ensuring the policy is carried out.

3. Utilize a cultural landscape approach to conceptualize and guide protected area management.

The idea of a cultural landscape also offers a conceptual tool that can be applied in protected area management to work toward the integration of natural, cultural, tangible and intangible heritage, and biological and cultural diversity. Seeing the entirety of a protected area as a cultural landscape shifts the focus away from the loss of discrete heritage resources to a concern for the broader landscape context, bringing into view geographic and temporal patterns of change.

While a cultural landscape approach can be valuable for protected area management, it can also create terminological confusion as the concept can be used to identify tangible heritage resources as well. This can be corrected by reserving the term cultural landscape for defining the bounded landscape resources that exists in an area and the term cultural landscape approach when discussing the overarching understanding of an area as having inherent cultural values.

4. Strengthen and deepen existing relationship with the Heritage Division.

Collaboration is essential for effective, long-term CHRM within the Alberta parks system. Often, the Heritage Division is seen to be the sole agency responsible for the management of cultural heritage in Alberta, but this is not the case, especially with respect to Alberta Parks. While the Heritage Division is responsible for ensuring compliance with the regulations of the Historical Resources Act and has significant expertise on CHRM matters, Alberta Parks cannot rely on the work of the Division to fulfill its obligations to effectively manage cultural

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heritage. In order to develop a robust program of CHRM within the park system, Alberta Parks must take on responsibility for this work, but continue to draw upon and work with staff in the Heritage Division.

Action Items • Fully complying with Historical Resources Act requirements. • Collaborate and consult with experts from the Heritage Division to develop and formulate Alberta Parks’ approach to CHRM. • Build internal capacity at Alberta Parks to coordinate, drive, and undertake ongoing CHRM work instead of relying on Heritage Division staff. • Provide resources to revitalize the Historic Sites Co-ordinating Committee, which the Historical Resources Act established to “liaison between and co-ordinate the activities of departments in relation to actions and programs that may have effect on the preservation and development of historic sites” (RSA 1980 cH-8 s12).

5. Address Indigenous cultural heritage as a related, but unique aspect of the park system’s cultural heritage.

Indigenous cultural heritage is a unique part of Alberta’s cultural heritage. All the parks within the system today were once a part of various communities’ traditional territory and many places within these parks have been important social, cultural, and spiritual sites since time immemorial. Indigenous peoples’ understandings of the land and the objects therein, how they relate to individuals and communities, the knowledge that surrounds these elements, and the means for using, controlling, and protecting these resources are not to be taken as given. Through engagement, and the inclusion of traditional knowledge, these issues can be addressed.

Indigenous cultural heritage includes both tangible and intangible cultural heritage resources, but it cannot be dealt with in the exact same way as other forms of cultural heritage. Instead, the central guiding principles for managing Indigenous cultural heritage

251 252 need to be ones of respect and engagement that recognize that the communities themselves are best positioned to make decisions regarding their cultural heritage.

Action Items • Develop a dedicated policy for Indigenous engagement as it relates to all aspects of parks management and planning and ensure this policy is linked to other overarching government policies. Policy toward Indigenous cultural heritage must recognize and acknowledge that: o “Uncertainty about Indigenous heritage values at a place should not be used to justify activities that might damage or desecrate this heritage; o Indigenous people are the primary determinants of the cultural significance of their heritage. Indigenous people are the primary source of information about the value of their heritage and how it is best protected and conserved. o Indigenous people must have an active role in any Indigenous cultural heritage planning process. o Indigenous people must have early input into the assessment of the cultural significance of their heritage and its management so they can continue to fulfill their obligations towards their heritage.” • Continue establishing cooperative management arrangements in newly established parks and explore opportunities to establish similar partnerships, agreements, and other mechanisms in existing parks. • Develop outreach resources and tools for park managers to open conversations with relevant Indigenous communities and provide guidance on how to respect and include diverse perspectives. • Develop communications resources to be distributed to Indigenous communities to explain how the parks are managed, how decisions are made, and who to contact for information on specific issues. • Engage in robust and thorough consultation and surveys to identify Indigenous cultural heritage resources within the park system. o Draw upon and collaborate with expert Aboriginal Consultation Advisors from the Aboriginal Heritage Section of the Heritage Division to a) undertake

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Traditional Use Studies b) develop internal capacity for consultation and c) avoid duplication and consultation burn out among Indigenous communities. • Support parks staff being on the land with Aboriginal Consultation Advisors, researchers, and community members. • Ensure management plans establish clear policies on contemporary uses of the land for traditional harvesting, hunting, ceremony, and other cultural activities. • Where possible use park zoning to limit access to ceremonial and sacred sites when requested by Indigenous communities. • Support efforts by Indigenous communities to co-create, tell, and present their own stories and cultural heritage in ways that are of value to them, and whether that is external or internal programming.

6. Establish at least one Cultural Heritage Resource Management Advisor position in each of Alberta Parks’ operational regions.

Having expertise dedicated to addressing cultural heritage resources is, perhaps unsurprisingly, a necessary precursor for any effective management of these resources. While each of the previous recommendations, potentially, could be accomplished by existing staff or contractors, a comprehensive, strategic approach is unlikely in this scenario.

Internal capacity to address cultural heritage management is important because these individuals can advocate for the importance of conserving cultural heritage resources within a park system. Bringing a concern for cultural heritage resources to the planning and management table is essential when the reality that managers face is one of limited resources and ever mounting priorities. Dedicated cultural heritage resource staff positions can help to clarify an organizational approach to cultural heritage resources, formulate strategic policy, undertake surveys, manage contractors, and train other staff in the steps needed to identify and conserve cultural heritage resources.

7. Ensure that cultural heritage resource management is adequately funded.

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A lack of financial resources is perhaps the biggest challenge facing CHRM in Alberta Parks. In most cases, CHRM is not funded as a discrete output of the organization at all. Without an adequate funding allocation, little can be done to better achieve CHRM. However, all the functional areas of Alberta Parks’ operations suffer from chronic underfunding. Making the case to increase funding for CHRM must be done in a way that does not detract from other activities but instead enhances and connects with other work.

Action Items

• Develop a business case for cultural heritage resource management in parks to advocate for and support increased resource allocation • Allocate funding to support Cultural Heritage Management Advisor positions. • Allocate ongoing core funding for cyclical maintenance of cultural heritage resources within the organization. • Prioritize resource allocation to parks and sites based on relative significance, visitor experience potential, and level of threat. • Seek to capitalize on existing investment in Historic Resource Impact Assessment requirements by linking study outcomes to conservation planning, presentation development efforts, and inventory development.

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8. Incorporate core cultural heritage management competencies into organization-wide training programs.

With background primarily in the natural sciences, protected area staff tend to have limited training, skills, or qualifications in cultural heritage management or the social sciences, more generally. Yet, these individuals are making significant management decisions that impact cultural heritage resources. Ensuring that staff are aware of the requirements for cultural heritage resource management is essential for achieving effective management and integrating new policy into operational activity.

Action Items • Develop a dedicated training workshop on cultural heritage management to introduce staff to the key ideas of cultural heritage, the responsibility of Alberta Parks to protect these cultural heritage resources, and the process of managing cultural heritage. This workshop would need to be offered on an ongoing basis to new staff and revisited. • Include management of conflict around cultural and spiritual values in training programs. As with any conflict resolution, this requires respect, a capacity to listen and an ability to create a situation in which different parties can find a solution themselves.

9. Develop a promotional and advocacy strategy that aims to present cultural heritage resources and highlight CHRM efforts being undertaken in the park system.

Alberta Parks has a broad range of initiatives designed to raise awareness of natural heritage issues and to encourage visitors to enjoy the natural areas of the parks. While some promotional materials highlight significant cultural heritage, more could be done to highlight the wealth of resources in this area.

Advocacy or promotion of cultural heritage within the park system and the role of CHRM

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in helping to protect the landscape has an important role to play in helping conserve cultural heritage. Advocacy serves to increase public awareness of, and support for, cultural heritage resources in the parks system. Moreover, promotional work helps garner internal, organization-wide support for CHRM initiatives and bring new policy and programs to the attention of staff across the province.

10. Develop guidelines and programs to promote and support active community involvement.

There are several excellent volunteer and community programs operating in the Alberta parks system, for example the ‘Friends of’ societies. Most of these partnerships were set up to enhance natural heritage values, although some have a lesser focus on cultural heritage. However, there are many community organizations dedicated to studying, presenting, and protecting community heritage that are not currently working with Alberta Parks. Enhancing these connections can be invaluable for long-term conservation, monitoring, and understanding of cultural heritage.

There is a concern that well-meaning, but poorly trained enthusiasts might damage places of cultural heritage significance. Therefore, these relationships need to be managed to ensure that community members are properly trained and their work is in line with organizational policy and goals.

Action Items

• Encourage park managers to reach out to local organizations involved in cultural heritage management to develop new programs and partnerships. • Work with community partners to ensure they are aware of basic cultural heritage management issues.

11. Develop a cultural heritage resource management handbook for planners and

256 257 operational staff to use to make decisions regarding cultural heritage resources.

Two of the key issues with respect to CHRM in Alberta Parks are inconsistency in planning and implementation, and ad-hoc decision making by well-intentioned but untrained staff. While the CHRM policy will serve as a high-level commitment and plan of action, standard operating procedures (SOP) are also valuable. SOPs are step-by-step instructions for undertaking tasks. Due to the diverse nature of cultural heritage resources found throughout the Alberta park system, a rigid, well-defined SOP is not possible, or necessarily desirable. However, a detailed guidebook for managers and field staff can help translate the concepts of CHRM into understandable actions. Having an organizational guide to action can ensure the core values, principles, and goals developed in the CHRM policy flow through to operational activity.

Action Items A CHRM handbook will: • Expand upon the concepts introduced in the CHRM policy, providing background, examples, and guidance. • Develop a typology of cultural heritage resources with illustrative examples from the Alberta park system. Although categories of resources are somewhat artificial, with considerable overlap, they remain valuable. A typology could, for example, categorize cultural heritage resources into tangible and intangible heritage, with specific subcategories. • Define an approach to identifying and assessing cultural heritage values. o Determining cultural heritage values is both conceptually and practically challenging. Values are socially constructed, hinging on a range of social and cultural factors. Different groups value resources in different ways and these change over time. Therefore, the key questions to be considered are who is best placed to assign value and to conduct significance assessments of cultural heritage? Many different sets of criteria exist for evaluating and articulating cultural heritage values.

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• Describe the conservation management cycle and provide guidance on Indigenous cultural heritage. • Provide advice on how to integrate cultural heritage into interpretive programming. • Provide links and resources for further information.

12. Institute a modern cultural heritage resource management cycle to identify, evaluate, plan, protect, present, and monitor cultural heritage resources in the park system

Cultural heritage resource management is a rational process for identifying cultural heritage resources, deciding whether and why a resource is worth protecting, and what form that protection will take. A large body of literature, including handbooks, manuals, theoretical studies, and other resources exist to support CHRM efforts around the world. While the specifics may vary, the general consensus rests on the need for careful and rigorous planning followed by a series of well-defined steps, understood as the management cycle. The management cycle begins with planning, and following from the decisions made in this process steps are taken to identify, protect, conserve, present, and monitor cultural heritage resources. The cycle is iterative and must be returned to repeatedly to reassess and redefine the outcomes. Effectively managing cultural heritage in Alberta Parks means engaging in this cycle.

While new methods need to be implemented to effectively manage cultural heritage in Alberta Parks, all management efforts must continue to comply with the regulations of the Historical Resources Act. This involves ensuring protecting designated historic sites, undertaking historic resource impact assessments and addressing any issues that arise through this process and other requirements.

The following recommendations build upon this concept.

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12.1. Implement a thorough and consistent approach to identifying and evaluating cultural heritage resources in the park system.

All cultural heritage conservation efforts need to begin with knowing what resources exist in the landscape. Without adequate information, decisions can only ever be optimistic guesses. Ensuring resources are identified and that information related to these resources is available for staff is essential.

Action Items

• Prepare and maintain an inventory of cultural heritage resources. o In much the same way that the Alberta Conservation Information Management System (ACIMS) gathers natural heritage resource information to facilitate decision making, an understanding of the resources that exist within the park system needs to guide all CHRM activities. • Ensure the inventory is accessible and user-friendly for staff and linked to databases for Historic Sites and Resources maintained by the Heritage Division (while accounting for the necessary confidentiality and buffering requirements). • The inventory should be developed using a standardized inventory form that includes: o GPS location of the resource o a description of the resource o a preliminary assessment of the significance of the resource and its associated values o an initial intervention recommendation, i.e. repair, maintenance, stabilization • Compile existing cultural heritage resource data, accumulated through external studies, historic resource impact assessment studies, internal research, and other sources, and integrate this information into inventory. • Prioritize identification efforts on geographic areas or resource types where there is little recorded inventory and/or a potential threat exists to unrecorded sites.

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• Identify cultural heritage values (the reasons why a resource is significant) during the identification process. Values can be straightforward and easily identifiable, or multiple, complex, and varied. Understanding what values exist may require staff assessment, expert advice, and/or community engagement. Many different sets of criteria exist for identifying and articulating cultural heritage values. In order to facilitate and simplify this process a categorization of values is recommended. o The framework used in the Standards and Guidelines for the Conservation of Historic Sites in Canada offers a simple and commonly accepted typology that includes: aesthetic, historic, scientific, cultural, social, and spiritual values

12.2. Develop a consistent methodology for evaluating the significance of cultural heritage resources in the park system.

Evaluating significance can be a difficult, subjective process. While all cultural heritage is of significance, developing a hierarchy of importance is necessary to justify and focus management decisions. Due to the inherent social construction and dynamism of cultural values, questions of significance often need to be answered with the help of experts and in connection to a consultative process.

At the most basic level, the assessment process must abide by the requirements of the Historical Resources Act. Registered and Designated Provincial Historic Sites have the highest level of significance and must be protected in the most stringent way. Apart from this level of designation, however, Alberta does not have a system of criteria by which to judge the significance of cultural heritage resources. Therefore, priorities for management of and investment in cultural heritage resources must be defined through the planning process for protected areas. In this case, significance must consider:

• Organizational priorities and existing priorities • The heritage value of the cultural heritage resource

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• Its physical condition and threats to its condition • Its ability to convey the heritage value of the protected area related to its human history (potential for visitor experience and external relations) • Its importance to Indigenous peoples, local communities, and stakeholders.

12.3. Explicitly and consistently address cultural heritage management in all park management plans and, where possible and practical, develop a dedicated cultural heritage resource management plan for regions and/or individual parks or sites of significance

Long recognized as an essential tool for effectively caring for protected areas and cultural heritage resources, site-specific management plans are the foundation for what happens in a protected area. Organizations that are the most effective at integrating cultural heritage resource conservation into overall park management are those that have robust management planning processes in place and have ensured cultural heritage considerations are included in these formal processes.

Action Items • CHRM planning should be linked to the regional planning program being employed by Alberta Parks. During the initial regional planning process sites and/or parks of particular cultural heritage significance need to be noted and prioritized for further CHRM planning. • CHRM planning can be either broad or focused depending on the requirements found in the regional planning process. o Broad CHRM plans should be prepared for larger land areas with relatively uniform historic values and minimal cultural heritage resources, and/or for places with complex, multiple, and geographically linked cultural heritage resources. In either case, shorter, focused, CHRM plans can then be prepared for identified heritage resources in the

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area. Broad plans offer an opportunity for macro-level management planning and help prioritize further work. o Focused CHRM plans for individual sites and/or parks should be prepared where there is a significant threat to cultural heritage resources, the resources are recognized as being of great significance or value to community, or there is a multiplicity of values. • Make CHRM plans and other major plans for parks available for stakeholder and public input. Develop a template and guidelines for writing CHRM plans.

12.4. Institute formal processes to leverage the Alberta parks system to protect cultural heritage resources.

Here the protection of cultural heritage resources refers to the passive measures to ensure cultural heritage resources are not destroyed. This includes such means as acquisition, listing, designation, advocacy, and promotion. In Alberta, the tools to protect legally cultural heritage resources are primarily in the hands of the Heritage Division in their work to execute the Historical Resources Act. However, through its ability to acquire and manage land, Alberta Parks is also able to protect cultural heritage resources. In this way, Alberta Parks’ ability to protect resources through an ‘umbrella approach’ is largely intact; however, consideration needs to be made for acquisition of future resources.

Although Alberta Parks should continue to follow its existing systems planning objectives, the existence of significant cultural heritage resources in an area should be seen as having additive value and this should be clearly acknowledged and articulated. Moreover, unprotected landscapes with cultural heritage significance should be considered for future acquisition.

Action Items

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• Ensure that cultural heritage significance is formally assessed and considered when planning for new park establishment or acquisition. • Develop policy and allocate funds to purchase properties with high cultural heritage significance.

12.5. Conserve cultural heritage resources according to established plans and according to current professional standards.

Conservation refers to all actions or processes that are aimed at safeguarding cultural heritage resources in order to retain their value. This can include a wide continuum of possible approaches, and combinations of approaches, for each cultural heritage resource. These approaches range from minimal intervention, such as recording/documenting, monitoring, or benign neglect, to high intervention, such as reconstruction, replication, and renovation. Similarly, interventions can have a high impact on the resource, as with renovation or with managed decline, or minimal impact on the resource, as with documentation or stabilization measures.

Decisions regarding which conservation route to take depend on the significance, nature and scope of threat, and importance to community or organization

The conservation of cultural heritage resources has been extensively studied for many years and a wealth of information exists to aid in decision-making and to guide interventions.

Action Items • All conservation interventions applied to identified cultural heritage resources in protected areas must be done in accordance with the Standards and Guidelines for the Conservation of Historic Places in Canada. • All conservation interventions need to be done according to a plan.

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• Conservation options need to be clearly understood and articulated through the CHRM handbook so that all staff are aware of the various options.

12.6. Present cultural heritage to Alberta Parks’ visitors in a robust and organized manner.

Presentation refers to all the processes undertaken to present cultural heritage to the public. Presentation includes interpretation and educational activities, programs and services, visitor center displays and shops, publications, and signage. The most important issue for presentation is deciding what places to present and ensuring that interpretation is based on the identified significance of the place.

Action Items

• Put in place a decision-making process to determine which places are presented to the public and in what form. This can be linked to the assessment process noted earlier. Potential criteria to help determine whether a resource should be presented include: o level of significance (both thematically and individually) o proximity to population centers o desire of local community o ease of access o potential threats presentation poses, vulnerability of site o visitor appeal o high associated natural and Indigenous values o associated tourism strategy o degree of difference from other places • The form of any presentation can be assessed to ensure that it does not detract from the value of the place o it will improve visitor understanding of the place

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o it will explain any conservation work undertaken, or to be undertaken, where appropriate to do so o it will encourage respect for cultural heritage values o it provides for the presentation of various values (natural and Indigenous) • Work with Indigenous communities to create opportunities for initiatives (such as youth camps, demonstration sites, and interpretive material) that can provide a service to the communities and raise awareness of their cultural traditions. • Expand presentation services to cover more sites in the park system. • Create presentation approaches to highlight the objects and sites in the park system but also the landscape scale resources and narratives. • Explore innovative collaborations with voluntary organizations, artists, and other groups to present cultural heritage to different audiences in varied ways. • Explore innovative delivery alternatives to “increase virtual visitor experiences through the use of technology” (Alberta Tourism, Parks, and Recreation, Plan for Parks, 2009, p. 12) for presenting cultural heritage, especially large, complex resources such as landscapes.

12.7. Monitor the condition of identified cultural heritage resources in the park system.

Monitoring primarily entails the systematic and regular inspection or measurement of the condition of the materials and elements of a cultural heritage resource to determine their behavior, performance, and rate of deterioration over time. It also includes efforts to assess the outcomes of conservation actions and programs, as well as to communicate the state of cultural heritage resources to decision-makers and the public.

Monitoring can be formal or informal including site observations, performance measurement, visitor satisfaction surveys, and other feedback mechanisms.

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Action Items

• Develop an informal cultural heritage resource monitoring system for identified assets. This system will require field staff to make regular observations and report on any significant changes. • Include an update on results from monitoring, including any significant changes, in annual reporting. • Develop an evaluation toolkit for ‘Cultural Heritage Values,’ based on the above-mentioned typology, to contribute to the Protected Areas Management Effectiveness (PAME) process to ensure that protected areas are effectively managing the cultural heritage resources within their boundaries. • Integrate cultural heritage resources into organizational asset management systems. • Develop a formal process for consistently reviewing management plans. • Maintain records and documentation of condition assessments in inventory. • Ensure questions concerning cultural heritage are included in visitor satisfaction surveys. • Where possible, desired, and practical explore the option of creating Indigenous Guardians programs to monitor changes to the land.

Survey Results

Survey participants were, overall, positive about the recommendations, seeing them as a valuable roadmap for pursuing CHRM within Alberta Parks. However, the participants were far less optimistic in their assessment of the potential implementation of the recommendations. Citing the current political and economic climate as significant obstacles, participants were doubtful that any new initiatives, however worthwhile, could be pursued in the near future. As the charts below highlight, the number of affirmative answers for each question diminished as they moved toward the matter of achievability.

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Is this Recommendation Desirable? 90 80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 0 Definitely Yes Propbably Yes Probably Not Definitely Not

Is this Recommendation Usable? 90 80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 0 Definitely Yes Propbably Yes Probably Not Definitely Not

Is this Recommendation Achievable? 90 80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 0 Definitely Yes Propbably Yes Probably Not Definitely Not

Figure 19: Combined responses from all recommendations for each survey question.

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Despite the pessimism that these recommendations could be achieved, participants reaffirmed the value and utility of the proposals, especially when thinking about the development of the Alberta park system beyond short-term election cycles. As one respondent summarized: Great suggestions, and I was happy to read through them as they got me thinking about the work that needs to be done internally to enable greater protection of Alberta's cultural heritage resources. Within Parks there is the desire to change how we think about and manage sites to incorporate other ways of knowing and it will require champions at both the grassroots and leadership levels. While current political and economic realities are severely limiting and present numerous challenges to implementing these proposals, they are extremely relevant long-term for the Parks program. In addition to the general assessment of the desirability, usability, and achievability of each recommendation, participants were asked to provide specific comments. Participants were articulate and thoughtful in their replies, expressing support and validation for many of the points, but they also raised several important concerns. The most significant issues brought up, time and again, were staff and financial capacity limitations, which were exacerbated by the uncertainty created by the current political and economic climate. For each recommendation, one, if not more, participant highlighted the value of the proposal but made the caveat that achieving it required additional resources that are simply unavailable. Several participants explained that the current provincial government is reviewing options for restructuring the Department of Environment and Parks. The understanding is that the existing Parks Division will be reduced to a Parks Operations Division, thus dispersing much of the planning and scientific expertise elsewhere in the department and, in turn, reducing the role and capacity of Alberta Parks. Under the new arrangement, Alberta Parks' focus would be, primarily, on providing visitor experiences, recreation, and maintaining the existing infrastructure, rather than larger issues of system planning, expansion, and land management. While such a shift does not necessarily, reduce the potential importance of CHRM, it does limit the divisional staff and financial capacity. Although these plans are not yet finalized, participants expressed uncertainty about the future role and function of Alberta Parks, which, coupled with a broader governmental focus on reducing spending, means that capacity for undertaking work around cultural heritage resources is largely limited for now and, likely, for some time in the future. While these changes do not substantially alter the validity and potential of the proposed recommendations, they did inform how participants prioritized and reacted to the proposals. In

268 269 several instances, participants highlighted the value of practical tools, such as the CHRM handbook, on-the-ground conservation resources, and staff training, which they saw as being especially important if the Division were to shift to a more operations-focused position. Given the budgetary constraints created by the current economic and political climate, participants responded more favourably to those recommendations that required the least additional funding and staff resources. Recommendations 8 (CHRM training), 9 (promotional campaign for cultural resources), and 12.6 (presentation of cultural heritage) were particularly well-received.

Is this Recommendation Achievable? 4

0 Definitely Yes Probably Yes Probably Not Definitely Not

Figure 20: Survey response for recommendation 8.

Speaking to the value of recommendation 8, one participant noted that "there have been limited periods of time when the Heritage Division and the Parks Division were able to collaborate in creating small-scale training programs for Parks staff," but this work has stopped in recent years due to capacity restraints. Training programs are, the participant continued, an activity that should be re-initiated because it is relatively low cost, provides an opportunity for successful collaboration between Alberta Environment and Parks and Alberta Culture, Multiculturalism and Status of Women and usually attracts a large number of willing and interested participants among Alberta Parks staff. In contrast, respondents were least supportive of those recommendations that required obvious additional funding to be achieved, such as recommendation 6 (hiring CHRM advisors),

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7 (adequately funding CHRM), and 12.4 (leveraging additions to the park system to protect cultural resources).

Is this Recommendation Achievable? 6

0 Definitely Yes Probably Yes Probably Not Definitely Not

Is this Recommendation Achievable? 5

0 Definitely Yes Probably Yes Probably Not Definitely Not

Figure 21: Survey responses for recommendations 6 and 7.

One of the exceptions to the tendency toward supporting low-cost recommendations was the enthusiasm expressed toward the recommendation for strengthening efforts toward protecting Indigenous cultural heritage and engaging with those communities. All of the participants felt that this proposal is immensely important, although they also highlighted the complexity of this matter and the subsequent capacity issues of both the Indigenous and provincial governments

270 271 that would need to be resolved. Overall, issues of capacity and uncertainty were top of mind for participants, but apart from these overwhelming concerns, several other challenges were raised. Apart from doubts about the capacity to achieve the proposals and the unknowns associated with government restructuring, the most prominent concern participants raised with the recommendations was that they require a great deal of cross-departmental collaboration, which is problematic for both logistical and legislative reasons. Undertaking work across departments, in this case, primarily between Alberta Parks (Department of Environment and Parks) and Heritage Division (Department of Culture, Multiculturalism, and Status of Women), is often immensely challenging. As one participant put it with respect to recommendation 1, "the time and effort to create a coordinated strategic plan that blends the interests of at least two Ministries would be a herculean task that would be difficult and time-consuming to coordinate… As a result, it would be a difficult project to complete, especially if the time-frame over which it was conducted crossed changes of government with different priorities and budget allocations." The standard challenge of this type of collaboration is further compounded by the potential departmental restructuring, which would see the responsibilities of Parks staff further reduced and distanced from that of the Heritage Division. Second, as one participant highlighted, there is a significant challenge that arises from the fact that Alberta Culture, Multiculturalism, and Status of Women, through its Heritage Division, is the provincial manager for historic resource protection under the Historical Resources Act. Having Alberta Parks develop policies and programs for the management of cultural heritage resources within parks boundaries and absent oversight and control by the Heritage Division could be problematic. The "introduction of a parallel set of specialists [and policies] managing historic resource issues in Alberta Parks (in a Ministry that is not responsible for the execution of the Historical Resources Act)," the participant explained, "has the potential of leading to conflicting approaches, inconsistencies in the management of processes related to the Historical Resources Act within and outside the Parks and confusion in proponents, consultants and researchers who might end up working both inside and outside Parks." While this is a legitimate concern, a follow-up conversation with one Heritage Division staff member helped clarify the nuances of the issue. The concern this survey participant raises is one to do with the regulatory power of the Heritage Division. The Heritage Division has the responsibility to oversee designations, the proper protection of designated sites, and to enforce the requirements for

271 272 historical resource impact assessments when developments are proposed. However, these functions should not be construed as the sole purpose of the Heritage Division. The regulatory powers and functions of the Division must be respected and dutifully abided by, but there remains a wide range of conservation, management, and interpretive work that can be undertaken by Alberta Parks that falls outside of those regulatory functions. It is in these realms of activity that the most fruitful collaboration and improvements can be made. There is significant expertise and knowledge within the Heritage Division to advise and support cultural heritage resource management within parks, and this can be drawn upon without a regulatory function being triggered. At the same time that participants raised flags about the practical challenge of cross- departmental collaboration, several of the respondents also expressed a concern that the recommendations did not give due credit for the degree of existing coordination that has already been achieved. One participant noted that "a program of Alberta Parks Historical Resources Act compliance, preservation and planning has been in place between the Parks and Heritage Divisions for the last thirteen years." However, this program did not seem to be reflected in the recommendations, which the participant thought "shows that Alberta Parks staff are largely not aware of the fact [this program exists and]… may reflect a lack of communication within Alberta Parks about the support resources available to their staff in the achievement of historic resources protection." This program, it was clarified through a subsequent follow-up conversation with one Heritage Division staff member, is a formal agreement between Alberta Parks and the Heritage Division whereby the former pays for a portion of a Heritage Division staff member's salary in exchange for their working on behalf of Parks to fulfil the requirements of the Historical Resources Act, almost entirely with respect to archaeological surveys. Over the past thirteen years, this agreement has proven immensely fruitful, streamlining the historical resources approval process and helping to generate a significant body of historical resource data for parks throughout the province. One of the recent results of this work has been an effort to look at ways to incorporate this data into new interpretive programs and materials for Alberta Parks. Finally, on a positive note, alongside existing collaborative programs, the survey highlighted and reiterated several areas where tentative steps and effort toward more comprehensive CHRM currently are being undertaken. Participants noted that elements of the proposal to develop a CHRM Handbook are being incorporated into a redevelopment of the management plan

272 273 development process and a PAME guidebook. Another participant noted that a dedicated cultural resource staff member is something that individuals within Parks have been advocating for recently, which, despite the unlikeliness of success, is a promising commitment. An example of an existing community collaboration between Alberta Parks and the Calgary Chapter of the Archaeological Society of Alberta to conduct research into the history of Glenbow Ranch Provincial Park was highlighted by one participant, demonstrating again the range of innovative initiatives currently being pursued throughout the park system. Nowhere is this more true than at Áísínai’pi/Writing-on-Stone Provincial Park, where participants reiterated the ongoing work around presenting cultural heritage stories to the public, monitoring cultural resources, and developing a more comprehensive inventory. These examples and the ongoing engagement of participants in CHRM efforts is a promising sign and a reason for optimism in the face of significant challenges and uncertainty.

Conclusion

Developing a robust program of cultural heritage resource management within the Alberta parks system is no small task. As the previous chapters have highlighted, this challenge is neither unique to Alberta nor easily addressed elsewhere. Although the lands protected by parks often contain highly significant cultural heritage resources, institutional, political, conceptual, and practical challenges stand in the way of the kind of protection to which many aspire. For many years in Alberta, there has been an interest in an effort to protect cultural heritage resources within the park system, but the challenge of the task, limited resources, and competing priorities have left much to be desired on this front. This chapter presented a series of recommendations that are drawn from an understanding of how other jurisdictions have succeeded in addressing cultural heritage, contemporary best practice in cultural heritage resource management, and an in-depth analysis of the current state of practice in Alberta Parks. This chapter has also presented the results of a survey conducted with staff from Alberta Parks and the Heritage Division, where individuals were asked to reflect on the desirability, usability, and achievability or each of these proposals. Although the participants were supportive of the recommendations as they are presented, the commentators expressed several concerns about the likelihood of future progress on these matters. The current political and economic climate presents significant obstacles to any comprehensive realization of the program laid out in these recommendations, but, despite short

273 274 term uncertainty, the participants were optimistic that, when seen as a longer-term program of work, the recommendations offer a valuable roadmap for improving the integration of cultural heritage resource management with overall protected areas management in Alberta.

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Chapter 8: Conclusion

The management of cultural heritage resources is not a new concern, nor is the recognition that these resources exist in areas commonly understood as wild or natural. Cultural heritage resources, the tangible and intangible legacies of past human existence, are a key part of how people engage with the history of an area to learn from, as well as build and hold connections to places. While many argue that cultural heritage resources have inherent value for aesthetic or representational reasons, it is the value that these resources have to people in their contemporary lives, to shape and give meaning to human pursuits, that is often cited as a reason for engaging in the management of these resources. As David Glassberg argues, The ways that humans understand and value their surroundings are inseparable from the histories they experience in that environment, either first-hand or through others’ stories. They attach memories to places, and over time form emotional bonds with the particular, familiar environments they call home. These bonds orient them in space, telling them where they are in the world; they orient them in time, telling them their place in a succession of past and future generations; and they orient them in society, telling them with whom they belong. (2014, p. 29) In efforts to conserve cultural heritage resources in the Western world over the past century, there has often been a belief that these human legacies exist separate from natural spaces, which are unmarred by human activity. For decades, though, academics and professionals have noted that seemingly pristine landscapes are very much marked by human passage. While monumental architecture from the past may be the most obvious example of human activity, there are very few places in the world that have not been shaped by humans who call those areas home. However, the desire to actively engage in the management of cultural heritage resources within areas that are primarily focused on the protection of natural systems and features is a relatively recent development. Increasingly, researchers, advocates, professionals, and decision- makers involved in the protection of nature are coming to believe that cultural heritage resources are a critical part of the landscape, which are deserving of protection in their own right and can potentially contribute to the overall aims of nature conservation. Many have come to argue that protected areas, one of the central pillars of the nature conservation movement, should set aside

275 276 traditional notions of pristine nature or wilderness in order to embrace a vision of the world where the domains of humans and nature overlap and mix together. Although such an embrace challenges some of the most cherished aspects of Western conservation practice, it also, as Bruce Braun argues, opens space to “think critically about our relations to, and responsibilities for, the environments we relate to in our everyday lives,” in turn allowing us to “imagine how we might responsibly inhabit our complex socioecological worlds” (2002, p. 10). In the field of nature conservation, engaging in this kind of critical thinking and imagining of the interweaving of the human and natural worlds has, in turn, resulted in several significant changes of practice. These changes include the devolution of decision making power to more diverse groups of people who tend to have closer historical and contemporary associations with the land, the acceptance of greater human activity — such as traditional harvesting — within protected areas, the establishment of livelihood and social development objectives, and a desire to have nature conservation occur in varying levels of intensity across larger geographic areas. While cultural heritage was not always the central impetus for these changes, a concern with conserving the legacy of past human lives in an area and the ongoing connections that emerge from this history was always present or interwoven with larger debates. Despite its importance, the role of cultural heritage and the value of conserving these resources has not been well-articulated by academics or professionals. Therefore, building upon this understanding of the potential and value of cultural heritage resources, as well as the shifting desire within protected areas management practice to include more of the human dimensions of nature, this dissertation’s first task was to develop an argument for the benefits of embracing cultural heritage within protected areas. First, reflecting the argument of Glassberg and others, it was argued that cultural heritage resources help develop attachments to places that, in turn, contribute to enduring support for the protection of nature. When people care about a specific place, they are more inclined to fight for its ongoing protection. Second, efforts to conserve cultural heritage offer the opportunity to broaden the visitor base for protected areas by creating new and more diverse visitor experiences. Third, one of the most critical benefits is that cultural heritage conservation offers an avenue by which to respect and engage with Indigenous peoples for whom protected areas often comprise or contain sacred and culturally significant sites and are an important resource base for traditional practices. There is a risk of segmenting Indigenous histories and connections into a narrowly defined sphere of cultural heritage, which would be a

276 277 further injustice to the holistic ways that these communities understand their relationship to the land, but there is also an opportunity to bring to light less recognized elements of that relationship through cultural heritage. At an operational level, engaging with cultural heritage resources also offers a new and potentially valuable source of information to protected area managers about past ecological systems. Finally, engaging with cultural heritage in a protected area setting offers an opportunity to reconsider and reflect on the human relationship to nature and model more sustainable patterns of behaviour. There are clear benefits to engaging with cultural heritage resource conservation in protected areas, and there is a strong argument being made that these areas should not be managed for the sole purpose of protecting nature. Unfortunately, though, belief does not easily translate into action. The persistent challenge that the conservation fields face is how to go about the practical process of integrating cultural heritage resource management into the established systems of management that currently operate in protected areas. Despite several notable efforts in recent years, especially within the World Heritage system, uncertainty remains as to how to successfully ensure that cultural heritage resources are conserved within protected areas and, moreover, can begin to fulfill their potential. It is to this ongoing challenge that this research project is directed. The project described in this dissertation is, fundamentally, applied research in that it seeks to address practical questions or challenges and, while not necessarily solving a problem, moving toward a resolution. The central practical issue that this research seeks to address is how to combine cultural heritage resource and protected area management processes to realize the benefits described above and push forward the overarching agenda of truly integrating the natural and cultural domains. The integration of management processes that occur on both sides of this divide is a challenge facing jurisdictions around the world. However, the solutions are contingent; varying legislative, political, geographic, social, and historical contexts create different conditions and obstacles. To narrow the scope of this research and allow for more specific solutions, the focus here is on how the protected area system in the Province of Alberta can better address cultural heritage conservation. To work toward an answer to this issue, two interrelated questions were pursued:

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• How is cultural heritage conservation being addressed within the management of Alberta’s provincial protected areas? What are the strengths and challenges that exist in the current approach? • How can Alberta’s provincial protected areas more effectively integrate natural and cultural heritage conservation in overall management operations? In pursuit of answers to these questions, an iterative qualitative research methodology was designed and implemented. As noted previously, this research employs a single descriptive case study of the Province of Alberta’s protected area system. This case study was examined through several interlinked methods beginning with a review of international and national approaches to cultural heritage conservation within protected areas in order to identify common approaches and challenges. The goal here was not to define universal requirements for integrating cultural heritage resource management, but rather to identify common issues and innovative solutions. Following this international analysis, an historical review of the development of Alberta’s park system was conducted. This review examined the evolution and changes to the legislative, institutional, and policy structures guiding the Alberta park systems’ operations, particularly as they relate to cultural resource management. In order to understand how internal discussions and policy direction around cultural resources have evolved during the past three decades, a document analysis exercise and a series of in-depth semi-structured interviews were conducted. The document analysis exercise looked at key published and primary materials, including policy documents, research studies, and management plans. Parallel to this process, interviews with protected area managers and cultural heritage conservation professionals engaged in Alberta were conducted. The interviews were used to identify the current state of cultural heritage conservation in Alberta’s protected areas, as well as the strengths and weaknesses that exist. Using the information gathered through these steps, a set of recommendations, ranging from high-level policy goals to site-specific tools and resources, were developed to support more effective integration of cultural heritage conservation. Finally, to test the validity of and refine these recommendations, an online survey was distributed to protected area managers and decision-makers in Alberta. The results from each of these steps helped inform and guide the research by identifying opportunities, challenges, and questions that remain to be answered. The review of alternate

278 279 approaches around the world reiterated that the challenge of integrating cultural heritage resource management into protected areas is not unique to Alberta. Although there are no jurisdictions that have solved the problem, there is a great deal of innovation. Elements such as well-defined legislation, strategic policy and operational guidelines that define the terms of practice, dedicated expert staff, wide-ranging training, comprehensive and consistent planning, and a real, respectful effort to engage Indigenous communities have allowed other jurisdictions to build toward integrative processes and successful cultural heritage resource protection. In Alberta, each of these elements would be of significant value, but understanding how such measures can be incorporated requires a comprehensive picture of the existing state of practice in the province. Although cultural heritage resources have long been acknowledged to exist in the Alberta park system, and for much of the twentieth century the conservation of historic sites was the responsibility of the evolving Alberta Parks branch, the past forty years have seen little progress toward a comprehensive and consistent approach to cultural heritage management. Having expanded and struggled through periods of significant investment and budget reductions, Alberta Parks, over the past twenty years, has maintained a concern for cultural heritage resource management, albeit in a manner that often is tangential to the central concerns of ecosystem protection and recreational service delivery. In analyzing the past twenty years of park management plans, this research demonstrates that there has been an increasingly sophisticated approach to management, particularly with respect to cultural heritage resources. However, this success is tempered by confusion around what cultural heritage is, and how to go about protecting the cultural heritage resources that exist in provincial protected areas. Most often, cultural heritage has been addressed in an ad hoc manner without clear and practical actions for identification and protection. Although the management plans and other available documents demonstrate improvements, especially with respect to engaging with Indigenous communities and bringing them into the decision-making process, a holistic approach to cultural heritage resource management within Alberta Parks remains elusive. In the interviews conducted for this research, it became clear that this analysis was largely accurate. Within Alberta Parks, there is a commitment and desire to address cultural heritage resource management, especially as it relates to Indigenous heritage, but, at the same time, there is an acknowledgment that this work was not entirely successful. Several persistent challenges, including a lack of capacity, government work occurring within various silos, an inherent bias to

279 280 natural heritage conservation, a lack of adequate baseline information on what cultural heritage resources exist in a park unit, a lack of overarching policy, and a need for greater public awareness were identified as ongoing barriers. Despite their breadth and the difficulty of overcoming them, these challenges also present a guide for what needs to change to ensure a more active approach to cultural heritage resource management within Alberta Parks. Bringing together insights from the literature and lessons learned from the analysis of other jurisdictions, management plans, and interviews, a comprehensive set of recommendations were developed to present a plan of action for how Alberta Parks could approach the challenge of integrating cultural heritage resource management into its operations. In several ways, this list of recommendations reflects the widely accepted approach to cultural heritage resource management, which has been developed and articulated over the past century. For Alberta Parks, to address successfully cultural heritage resource management, it is fitting that much of the work is just to adopt the sophisticated and professional processes developed by those who have worked with these issues for decades. However, any one of the recommendations is a potentially enormous task for a government agency like Alberta Parks. The time and resources that are required to translate a good and relatively straight forward idea into practice across an organization that manages land throughout the province are significant. Therefore, for several of the recommendations, a series of individual action items were developed, which offer an initial road map of the work that needs to be done to achieve the goal of the recommendation. This is not to say that the action items are a comprehensive work plan, but rather a series of starting points that increase the utility of the recommendations. Although the recommendations are the result of a robust research process, one of the key goals in this project is to produce results that can be applied in practice, since often the products of academic study can fail to bridge the gap between a good idea and something that can be put to use. In order to address this issue, an online survey was developed, which included recommendations and action items. The survey was distributed to the interview participants who work with the Alberta Government. Participants were asked to reflect on the desirability, usability, and achievability of each of the recommendations, as well as provide any feedback on areas for improvement. Overall, the respondents were supportive of the recommendations, finding inspiration and value in the ideas. However, across the board, respondents were also uncertain about the ultimate achievability of the recommendations. While some were optimistic

280 281 that long-term success was possible, others, who focused on the near-term practicality, were not inclined to imagine any successful outcomes. In both cases, the pessimism about the ability of Alberta Parks to achieve any significant change on this front had little to do with the value of the recommendations themselves and more to do with changes in the economic and political contexts of the province. Barring any significant changes in these areas, Alberta Parks does not have the capacity to move ahead with any resource-intensive initiatives. That said, even the pessimistic respondents saw potential success in several of the recommendations that required less resource investment, such as internal training programs, or those that built upon the outcomes of work that was currently underway, such as studies required for regulatory purposes or additions to the redevelopment of the management planning framework. In this way, the respondents provided a framework for prioritizing the recommendations and lent credence to the idea that, seen in the long-term, the roadmap offered by the recommendations may be achievable. What is most encouraging in the results of the survey is the clear desire by those in Alberta Parks to engage with the issues around cultural heritage resource management. Although the resources to pursue a robust program of cultural heritage resource management may not be in place currently, the desire persists, and that desire produces results, albeit small and limited. However, over time small results add up, gather momentum, and, ultimately transform institutions. For now, the small steps are being taken, and the hope with this research is that a roadmap of inspiration and potential action now exists to help guide those future steps. Finally, in recognition of the many ways in which this research is not perfect, a few words on research limitations are in order. First, as a consequence of developing recommendations to support cultural heritage management specifically in Alberta Parks, the results of this project are limited in their generalizability. Other jurisdictions will face different legislative, historical, and geographic contexts that shape their approach, or lack thereof, to cultural heritage management. In northern Canada and British Columbia, for example, the negotiation of modern land claims settlements with Indigenous governments has dramatically reshaped the ways in which provincial and territorial governments are thinking about protected area establishment and management. Further, the emergence and formal recognition of Indigenous self-government institutions has given greater prominence to an entirely different mechanism for landscape conservation, known as Indigenous Protected and Conserved Areas (IPCAs). Alberta Parks, in

281 282 contrast to some of the more innovative models for conservation being developed today, is a relatively conservative institution, albeit one that is working to enact more substantive change in how it operates. That said, there is much in this research that will likely resonate with jurisdictions that are similar to Alberta, although each area will face its own unique challenges and opportunities. Ensuring that the approach to cultural heritage management in any given jurisdiction is responsive to the unique contexts of that area is essential for ensuring that the path forward is practical and achievable. The second consideration is the somewhat restrained treatment of the approach to protecting Indigenous cultural heritage in the recommendations. As noted previously, for many in Alberta Parks, adequately and respectfully addressing Indigenous cultural heritage is a key priority when thinking about this topic, however, the recommendations on this issue are relatively general. The reasons for this are twofold, first, as they are across jurisdictions in Canada, the protected areas and Indigenous peoples of Alberta are diverse. Different regions, protected areas, and communities demand different responses. This diversity is not, on its own, justification for not developing specific pathways to move forward, however, the second reason for the chosen approach is a belief that the varied responses should ultimately be determined by the Indigenous communities themselves, as they are the rightful decision-makers with respect to their own cultural heritage. The recommendations put forward here are therefore not meant to define specific steps, but rather support an ongoing process whereby decisions about how to address Indigenous cultural heritage can be made respectfully, in full participation with the community, and in the spirit of reconciliation. Third, there were several methodological challenges and/or errors that bear recognition. The first of these was that the management plan analysis exercise was undertaken in parallel with the qualitative interviews. As noted in the chapter on methods, research is rarely, if ever, a straightforward linear pursuit, but instead tends to circle back on itself and, in doing so, gradually move toward a more comprehensive understanding. Due to the length of time required to organize and conduct interviews, the intervening periods were filled with work analyzing management plans and other background document research on Alberta Parks. As both the interview and document analysis exercises progressed, a clearer understanding of how Alberta Parks approaches cultural heritage management emerged. The consequence of this approach was that information gathered from the management plan analysis could not always be used to

282 283 support interview questions. Site-specific questions, such as whether or not a particular proposed strategy that was identified in a plan was ever taken up by Alberta Parks, at times, were overlooked. Follow up interviews or email exchanges, when possible, were undertaken but several valuable opportunities for additional conversations were missed. A more effective research strategy would have been to ensure that these processes occurred in sequence, with one lending support to the other. The obvious drawback to this kind of sequential approach is the extension of the timelines, however, the result may be more comprehensive. The second methodological challenge adds further explanation to the necessity of a non-sequential approach. As noted in the text above, in the spring of 2019 a provincial election was called. This occurred in the middle of the interview process, which meant that in the nearly two months leading up to the writ being dropped and for several months afterward, Alberta Government employees were largely unresponsive to interview requests. Employees were either not allowed to speak publicly due to election regulations or were too focused on the work involved with government transition to sit for an interview. This reality, coupled with the standard pace of government interactions, created some significant delays in conducting the interviews. Finally, as described in the text, one of the biggest limitations that has emerged for this research relates to the changes in government brought about by the 2019 election. As new governments are wont to do, the priorities and focus of the Alberta Government have shifted since much of this research was conducted. This limitation was addressed previously with respect to the survey results, but it bears repeating. I do not believe that significant changes to the recommendations would result if this research were conducted in the current political climate. The proposed path forward is meant to be somewhat irrespective of political calculations; however, resourcing and leadership direction are factors to be weighed when striving for achievable policy proposals. Finally, at the risk of being present-focused, as this dissertation is being finalized the world is in the midst of the Covid-19 pandemic. While the word unprecedented has been used altogether too liberally over the past several years, this moment in history seems as fitting as any other. What the world will look like going forward is impossible to predict, apart from saying that it will look different. Given the scale of the crisis and the reverberations that will surely result, it seems fitting to note that there will be implications for cultural resource management, but those are impossible to know. Perhaps, as past moments of crisis have shown, people around the world will be reminded of their place in a long narrative of humanity, a story that has played out over

283 284 the landscape in all corners of the globe. And, in recognizing that connection to a deeper story, people may continue to advocate for the protection of the traces that remain and further invest in the continual retelling of the story. It is hard to do wrong in remaining aware of the history that surrounds us and the lives that stretch out into the past and future.

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Natural Resources Wales, Historic England, Historic Environment Scotland, National Parks England, National Parks Waless, National Parks Scotland, Cadw, Natural England, Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Wales, & Scotish Natural Heritage. (2015). Joint statement on the historic environment in the National Parks of England, Scotland and Wales. Naveh, Z., & Lieberman, A. S. (2013). Landscape ecology: Theory and application. Springer. Nethery, B. (1995). Managing for public benefit: Conservation, maintenance and preservation of historic cultural landscapes [Unpublished report]. Historic Heritage Division, Environmental Policy Division, NPWS, Department of Environment and Climate Change. Newing, H. (2010). Bridging the gap: Interdisciplinary, biocultural diversity and conservation. In S. Pilgrim & J. N. Pretty (Eds.), Nature and Culture: Rebuilding Lost Connections. Earthscan. Nicholas, G. P. (2006). Decolonizing the archaeological landscape: The practice and politics of archaeology in British Columbia. American Indian Quarterly, 30(3/4), 350–380. NLC. (2018). Pathways forward: Progress and priorities in landscape conservation. Network fo Landscape Conservation (NLC). NPWS. (1997). Aboriginal cultural heritage: Standards & guidelines kit. NSW National Parks and Wildlife Service. http://www.nationalparks.nsw.gov.au/npws.nsf/Content/Publications NPWS. (2006). Mungo National Park plan of management. Department of Environment and Conservation. NSW Heritage Office. (2005). State agency heritage guide: Management of heritage assets by NSW government agencies’. NSW Heritage Office. OEH. (1997). OEH operational policy: Protecting aboriginal cultural heritage. Office of Environment and Heritage. http://www.nationalparks.nsw.gov.au/npws.nsf/Content/Publications OEH. (2011). Mimosa rocks national park plan of management. National Parks and Wildlife Service, Office of Environment and Heritage. Olson, R., Hackett, J., & DeRoy, S. (2016). Mapping the digital terrain: Towards Indigenous geographic information and spatial data quality indicators for Indigenous knowledge and

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Appendix A: Interview Questions

1. Briefly describe your experience working in/with protected areas? 2. Have you ever worked in/with cultural heritage conservation? 3. From your perspective, either personally or in your professional capacity, what does cultural heritage entail? a. Do you believe this to be an adequate understanding of cultural heritage? Is anything missing? 4. Do you see a role for cultural heritage in protected areas? What aspects of cultural heritage do you see as being of value to the work of protected areas? Why? What aspects are not valuable/useful in this work? 5. In academic and professional conversations around the world, there is a great deal of discussion concerning the division between the conservation of cultural heritage and nature and there have been a number of initiatives aimed at bringing these two more closely together. Is this something that resonates with you, or in your work? 6. In your experience, or in the experience of your organization, is this a conversation that is happening in Alberta? a. Who is talking about it? Why or why not? 7. Have you ever been involved with or observed efforts to incorporate cultural heritage conservation into protected area management? If, How, and When was cultural heritage considered? a. What did this look like? What data sets/information do you use? b. What challenges emerged? c. What value, if any, do you see emerging from these efforts? 8. Are there other examples of such integration can you think of in Alberta? 9. What challenges do you see in Alberta with regards to incorporating cultural heritage conservation into protected area management? a. What strengths? 10. Looking at the contemporary situation, do you see any opportunities to improve or strengthen the integration of cultural heritage into protected area management? Do you see this as something that is desirable? a. What would need to change to make this happen? What tools and/or information would make help address these challenges?

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Appendix B: Consent Form

Name of Researcher, Faculty, Department, Telephone & Email: Jon Weller, Ph.D. Candidate, Faculty of Environmental Design, 403.899.2918, [email protected]

Supervisor: Dr. David Monteyne, Graduate Program Director, Faculty of Environmental Design, 403.220.7859, [email protected]

Title of Project: Conserving Common Ground: Integrating Natural and Cultural Heritage in Alberta’s Protected Area Management

This consent form, a copy of which has been given to you, is only part of the process of informed consent. If you want more details about something mentioned here, or information not included here, you should feel free to ask. Please take the time to read this carefully and to understand any accompanying information.

The University of Calgary Conjoint Faculties Research Ethics Board has approved this research study.

Participation is completely voluntary and confidential. You are free to discontinue participation at any time during the study.

Purpose of the Study This research project aims to contribute to an understanding of how to better integrate cultural heritage into protected area management. Protected areas here being in reference to, as the International Union for the Conservation of Nature explains, "a clearly defined geographical space, recognised, dedicated and managed, through legal or other effective means, to achieve the long term conservation of nature with associated ecosystem services and cultural values." This study seeks an understanding of how cultural heritage conservation is currently being integrated into protected area management, what strengths and weakness exist, and how this can be more effectively achieved.

What Will I Be Asked To Do? You will be asked to participate in an interview with the researcher. During this interview, you will be asked questions related to the management of protected areas and the role of cultural heritage in these processes. Questions will focus on your:

• knowledge of cultural heritage conservation and its integration into protected area management;

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o Including your role in and/or the work of the organization you have been involved with, as well as the work of other relevant organizations; • perception of the current challenges and strengths that exist with regards to cultural heritage conservation in protected areas • knowledge and perception of the other potential avenues for improving current outcomes.

If you agree to be interviewed, the researcher will meet you at a place of your choosing, this may be your place of employment, a café, in a meeting room, or another location. Alternatively, if meeting in person is not possible the interview can be conducted by telephone.

Your participation in this study is completely voluntary. You may refuse to participate altogether, may refuse to participate in parts of the study, may decline to answer any and all questions, and may withdraw from the study at any time.

What Type of Personal Information Will Be Collected? Should you agree to participate you will have the option of being identified by name or by a position/organizational title with which you agree to be identify in subsequent publications. The disclosure of this information is valuable to understand and convey your role in the field of cultural or natural heritage conservation and to help situate your perspectives.

With your consent, the interview will be audiotaped and transcribed in an electronic format. The transcribed record will be returned to you for review and approval in order to ensure your thoughts and opinions are accurately conveyed. If you choose to not be recorded, you may still participate and the researcher will take notes during the interview.

Please review each of these options and choose Yes or No:

I grant permission to be audio-taped: Yes: ___ No: ___ I wish to be identified by name and title: Yes: ___ No: ___ I wish to remain anonymous, but you may refer to me by a title: Yes: ___ No: ___ The title I choose for myself is: ______I wish to remain anonymous: Yes: ___ No: ___

Are there Risks or Benefits if I Participate? There are no significant risks associated with participation in this study. It is a possibility that you may be asked questions that would require you to reveal information that is sensitive or confidential in the context of your professional or community obligations. If you do choose to reveal this information it will be kept confidential and you may stipulate how or if it can be used by the researcher in subsequent publications. Alternatively, you may refuse to answer any questions with which you fell uncomfortable.

What Happens to the Information I Provide?

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The information that is collected during this study will be kept confidential. Following the interview, the recording will be transcribed and returned to you to ensure its accuracy and allow you an opportunity to make any changes you feel necessary. The digital audio recording of the interview will be deleted and the transcript will be stored as a password protected and encrypted digital document. Any identifying information that you do not consent to will be removed from this transcript. Only the researcher and the supervisor will have access to these files. Upon leaving academia or after five years, the researcher will delete these transcripts.

Excerpts of the interview may be used in future publications and presentations. Attribution, in these instances, will follow the requests set out by the participant previously. The full record and the transcript of the interview will never be made public.

Should you choose to withdraw at any point in the study, the researcher will immediately stop taking notes, turn off the recording device, and end the interview. If the participant desires it, the information already given will not be used and the associated files will be deleted. If you choose to withdraw after having completed the interview you may do so within two months of the interview date. As well, every reasonable effort will be made to accommodate requests made after this date.

Signatures Your signature on this form indicates that 1) you understand to your satisfaction the information provided to you about your participation in this research project, and 2) you agree to participate in the research project.

In no way does this waive your legal rights nor release the investigators, sponsors, or involved institutions from their legal and professional responsibilities. You are free to withdraw from this research project at any time. You should feel free to ask for clarification or new information throughout your participation.

Participant’s Name: (please print) ______

Participant’s Signature: ______Date: ______

Researcher’s Name: (please print) ______

Researcher’s Signature: ______Date: ______

Questions/Concerns If you have any further questions or want clarification regarding this research and/or your participation, please contact:

Jon Weller Faculty of Environmental Design

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403.589.1098, [email protected] and Dr. David Monteyne, Graduate Program Director Faculty of Environmental Design 403.220.7859, [email protected]

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If you have any concerns about the way you’ve been treated as a participant, please contact the Research Ethics Analyst, Research Services Office, University of Calgary at (403) 220-6289/220-4283; email [email protected]. A copy of this consent form has been given to you to keep for your records and reference. The investigator has kept a copy of the consent form.