Archaeo-spatial Europe

Should Europe be a nature park, or a heritage park? It should be neither, but that is the choice that is being imposed. False ethical arguments are used by the (archaeological) heritage lobby. Yet there is no ethical objection to destroying heritage.

It is not at present impossible or remote to think in terms of single park status for Europe. The scale of the original national parks in the USA was large, but they were in remote thinly populated areas. The scale of national parks and protected landscapes in Europe is smaller, but these zones now cover an increasing amount of territory per nation state. The number and type of protected zones increases, while area is stable, and therefore the inevitable trend is to full coverage.

Some park-like planning structures were already large, even a generation or more ago. The London and Moscow green belts were both in the 100 kilometre range. The new buffer zones, recreational areas and de-agriculturalised zones of European planning are approaching the 500 kilometre range, in the Benelux, Germany, and Europa 2000+, the European Union proto-plan.

The scale of historical/ archaeological sites and parks was until recently much smaller, but the concentration of activity and investment was greater. On-line information on archaeological parks is available from for instance:

1. www.htw-kempten.de/earch.html
2. www.spaintour.com/plata.htm#archaeologicalpark
3. www.sistemia.it/Italiano/Siracusa/Turismo/Neapolis.htm
4. www.mairie-lyon.fr/focus/histoz_parcarcheo-a.html, et bien en Anglais.

The now abandoned Disney civil war theme complex in Virginia is indicative of the planned level of investment. So is the less directly historically oriented Huis ten Bosch in Japan. Of course, the scale of investment in non-historical theme parks was always great. (There is a theme park research site with a list, links and images).

Theme park types of spatial structure now re-organise former industrial zones (Warner in the Ruhr) or inner urban areas (Disney on 42nd Street). Given the growing scale of these parks, the spatial scale of archaeological and historical parks is likely to increase as well. Probably they will be into the 100 kilometre range in the next 20 years.

The combined impact of these trends, if they continue, is that all Europe will be in a park-like spatial structure within 50 years. This trend to mega-park structures is a basic trend of modernity, see An Urban Ethic of Europa of large sites, such as that at Xanten. (The painted facade used to promote the reconstruction of the Berlin Stadtschloss, was also virtual reality. Virtuality is not only electronic, and is not always intended as a substitute).

Nature versus history

This hyper-restorative trend, at increasing scale, brings the possibility of conflicts between themes. For instance, the "nature versus history" conflict that damaged the Disney Virginia project. Another possibility is convergence on a single park type. Already, urban policy in Europe is centred on a sustainability-heritage-culture combination.

There is already some "convergence" literature on restoration of past landscapes, up to planetary scale. "Restoration ecology" is the issue, restoration of heritage and landscape. The claimed dualisms of nature-culture, or nature-humanity may therefore be temporary. In urban policy "sustainability" and "culture" now go together. In the European Union, tourism projects such as the model European Culture Park already combine nature and culture heritage, archaeology and cycle paths. (The scale of nature restoration projects will probably be adopted for archaeological projects. One signposted tourist route, the "Via Romana" is already 5 500 km long).

In the Netherlands there are plans for the full conversion of large metropolitan areas at 50 kilometre scale to nature parks. Especially the World Fund for Nature/ Wereld Natuurfonds (WNF) wants re-structuring of the Netherlands into a nature park. An inhabited nature park, yet with a restored pre-agricultural landscape.

The Netherlands a nature park? Apparently, archaeologists cannot let this pass. Archaeologists Jan Kolen and David van Reybrouck attacked the WNF plans in De Volkskrant. They suggest that "nature" in nature parks is being faked - at the expense of cultural heritage, on land settled for centuries:

It is ironic that new nature areas are being laid out on former agricultural areas. The farmer has to make way for leisure users. This creates false oppositions between nature and culture, production and recreation, history and stagnation.

Kolen/van Reybrouck

But the authors have invented the oppositions themselves. Nothing is being deconstructed: a policy of nature-archaeological parks is being constructed. This is a simple trick, a manipulation of ethics. By claiming that an entity consists of a "false opposition", the value of the entity can be derived from "overcoming the opposition". This trick works like this:

1. oppositions must be deconstructed
2. there is an opposition in Europe between Christianity and Democracy
3. Christian Democracy overcomes the opposition
4. vote for Helmut Kohl

So this "debate" is in reality a design process: design of the next generation of mega-parks, celebrating both nature and cultural heritage.

The convergent trend

In summary, there is a spatial trend to an archaeo-spatial Europe, driven by:

1. convergence of nature parks, theme parks and heritage parks
2. expansion of the scale of such nature/heritage parks
3. integration of urban area into such park-like structures
4. increased scale of investment in such park-like structures

This trend rests on an implicit territorial claim: that all territory should be at least partly dedicated to the continuance of the past. In turn, this claim can be included within the values of the European conservative tradition.

Archaeology, concerned with material remains of the human past, is the legitimising academic discipline for this spatial trend.

Even if the metaphor of heritage is not used, archaeology and related disciplines claim value for artefacts, and for a broad range of material and non material entities derived from the past. The European Commission defines European Cultural Heritage as:

Geschichte und Architektur (städtische Denkmäler und Bauten, archäologische, militärische, religiöse und maritime Stätten, usw.), Industrie und Technologie (Textilindustrie, Eisen- und Stahlindustrie usw.), Handwerk (Kunsthandwerk, herkömmliche Handwerksberufe, Know-How usw.) oder Musik.

The ethical claims

The legitimising of the past (especially this form of heritage) by archaeology is circular. The argument takes the form:

1. x has value
2. therefore x should be known and studied
3. therefore there should be an academic discipline of x-ology
4. x-ologists are those who study x
5. therefore x-ologists are the appropriate persons to determine if x has value
6. x-ologists agree that x has value
7. therefore x has value

In archaeology specifically, the claims are approximately this:

1. The past has value, and it should be studied through its material remains. For this purpose academic archaeology is established, often funded by the state, and supported by public opinion.
2. It is legitimate for university departments of archaeology to insist that their students value the past, the object of study. It is legitimate for archaeological journals to refuse articles which do not accept this basic value. It is right that those who oppose the value of the past are kept out of archaeology.
3. All archaeologists, who are the experts in the subject, agree that the past has great value. Therefore those who oppose the past should not be taken seriously.

These claims can be rejected. That is, a contrary position can be stated, of equal logical validity. In the case of artefacts:

Projection of past into future has no inherent validity. Non-projection has equal value. Destruction rights of ancient artefacts are as legitimate as any existence rights. Knowledge of the past is transgenerational and subject to ethical rejection on that basis. No human-artefact relation legitimises an artefact, for example:

1. knowing, studying or valuing the artefact
2. ownership of the artefact, legal or metaphorical - "heritage"
3. biological descent from the maker, or institutional continuity

Academic fashions make no difference. It makes no difference if archaeologists write books on post-modern archaeology, or deconstruct nationalist archaeology. There is a more general "contrary position" about the past...

No value of the past can be derived from the past...

1. being real, or a simulacrum or pastiche
2. having a meaning or contested meanings
3. being multiple, or fragmented
4. being the Other of the present, or the Same, or Self

The claims to restructure all Europe for heritage /past / patrimony, are monopoly claims. Heritage excludes non-heritage, if all Europe is for heritage. These claims have no other basis than the claim itself: they are unethical. An archaeo-spatial Europe is a Europe designed to continue the past, to the exclusion of innovation, especially if innovation needs some form of territorial separation. A heritage zone is no place for innovation. Think of the way people behave in a museum, and you have some idea of the kind of society in a large museal zone.

Inequality

The defining characteristic of archaeology is its arrogant denial of the freedom to reject the past. This makes archaeology wrong. Archaeological education and journals form a self-maintaining filter. It tends to exclude rejection of the past. (The original version of this text was submitted to an on-line archaeological journal, who insisted that it should be entirely changed before publication). So the apparent consensus, for a Europe of nature/archaeology parks, results from unjust social structures. They deliberately exclude and devalue opposition.

To summarise the ethical position: the past has no value, and its claimed value is unethically imposed by distortion, injustice and discrimination. There is therefore no moral or ethical basis, for an archaeo-spatial Europe.

Termination of heritage

To terminate the monopoly claim of an archaeo-spatial Europe, heritage and/or archaeological material should be terminated.

Priority lists for the clearance of heritage exist already. In the tradition of nation states, most European states have official list of national heritage, often integrated into the UNESCO list of world heritage. They may be supplemented by local, or regional lists. There are on-line examples from: