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5 Cultural Heritage Management in China Current Practices and Problems Chen Shen and Hong Chen Cultural heritage management in China has undergone several decades of intensive development, with many key events taking place in 2006. In April of that year, the Wuxi Proposal detailing the preservation of industrial heritage was adopted at the first forum for the preservation of industrial heritage in Wuxi, Jiangsu Province. In May, the State Council of the Government of China announced the Sixth List of National Major Cultural Heritage Protection Units, which named 1,080 new cultural heritage sites. On June 10, China celebrated its first Cultural Heritage Day. In July, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) designated Yin Xu, the 3,000-year old archaeological ruin of the Bronze Age Shang Dynasty as a World Heritage site. In October, the international scientific symposium hosted by the International Council on Monuments and Sites (ICOMOS) in Xi’an, Shaanxi Province, commemorated the first anniversary of the Xi’an Declaration. In November, the Ministry of Culture executed the Acts of World Heritage Site Protection and Management, which provides the first ever guidelines and regulations for managing the 38 World Heritage sites in China (as of 2009), along with those being considered for future application for World Heritage designation. At the end of 2006, the State Administration of Cultural Heritage (SACH), the top agency of central government authority, announced plans to carry out the Third National Cultural Heritage Survey and Registration as part of its next strategic five-year plan. China has a rich and diverse cultural heritage representing the foundation of Chinese civilizations and cultural traditions. In addition, through thousands of years of historic interactions and cultural exchanges with other areas, China is now recognized as having played an important part in the cultural heritage of other parts of the world. In the past two decades, China has demonstrated stunning economic development, providing unprecedented opportunities for implementing managerial measures for cultural heritage conservation. At the Cultural Heritage Management in China 71 same time, it has produced unforeseen preservation challenges that management authorities and professionals share. While it is impossible to fully address the magnitude of cultural heritage management (CHM) in China within these limited pages, we will discuss the practices of CHM in relation to current economic development in the nation, and the problems arising from the challenges commonly seen during the development stage. We focus on the existing system of CHM in China, evaluating common policies and practices, and then on problems of CHM for the ongoing South-to-North Water Transfer Project that exemplifies the current problems of CHM practices in China. The Establishment of the Yin Xu Museum We begin by sharing an example that illustrates the excitement, as well as the problems, of CHM in China. In the summer of 2005, Chen Shen, the senior author of this essay, received an urgent call from Dr. Tang Jigen, the director of the Anyang Archaeological Station of the Institute of Archaeology, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, who had been asked by the local government to design and install a permanent gallery of Shang civilization in the new Yin Xu Museum in the city of Anyang (population 700,000) in northern Henan Province . The government gave just two months to finish the task, from concept designs to complete installation of about 500 artifacts in 2,400 square meters of exhibition space. The mission was straightforward and nonnegotiable because, at the time of the museum’s construction, Yin Xu was being considered as one of the candidates in the competition of 2006 for World Heritage designation. The museum had to be completed, with the gallery in place, by the time the representative from the UNESCO World Heritage Committee visited Anyang to inspect the site. Shen spent the first week of July at Anyang with Tang’s team working on the concept design. He left with strong misgivings as to how they could finish the task for the targeted opening date in September, particularly as construction of the building was still in progress. The opening of the Yin Xu museum to the public in October 2005 was as amazing as any other recent economic development event in China. The speed with which the museum was established, and the beauty and quality of the spectacular Shang gallery, probably set a new record for any country in today’s world of museum development. During the museum’s first ten days of operation , the attendance reached approximately 2...

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