The aim of this resource list is to provide heritage staff who have to work in dangerous situations, with electronic information that might assist them in safeguarding their vulnerable heritage. The resources are presented in English but often other languages can be chosen on the website. Please inform us if any hyperlinks are broken, you would her us and others a lot.
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Risk Management
- Arts Management in Turbulent Time (pdf, in English and Russian) by Milena Dragićević Šesić and Sanjin Dragojević, and translated by PhD. Nihad Salem. First edition 2007. The book tackles arts management under tempestuous social, economic and political conditions and in times of crises.
- Australian War Memorial has many references on their Conservation page for use of the general public on the following subjects: salvage of water-damaged items, flooding-response and recovery, disaster recovery, cleaning soot damaged objects, barbara reeve’s paper on bushfire conservation…
- Building an Emergency Plan: A Guide for Museums and Other Cultural Institutions (pdf) compiled by Valerie Dorge and Sharon Jones. The Getty Conservation Institute, Los Angeles, 1999
- Collections Theft Response Procedures (pdf) by Wilbur Faulk and Laurie Sowd. The Getty Conservation Institute, Los Angeles 2001.
- Cultural Heritage Disaster Preparedness and Response. International Symposium Proceedings published by ICOM/MEP. Salar Jung Museum, Hyderabad, India. 23-27 November 2003.
- Cultural Heritage in Postwar Recovery. Papers from the ICCROM FORUM held October 4-6, 2005, (pdf) by Stanley-Price, Stanley (ed.). ICCROM, Rome, 2007.
- Digital Emergency Plan. This plan developed by the Illinois Institute of Technology and the Paul V. Galvin Library is about disaster preparedness, mitigation and digital recovery. Last updated 2012.
- Disaster Planning, Response and Recovery. A webpage by Museums & Galleries NSW.
- Disaster Preparedness and Response Bootcamp for Mixed Media Collections. This is a set of 11 videos from the NYU’s Moving Image Archiving and and Preservation program (March 7, 2013). This is a great introduction once keeping in mind that every institution has different needs, also in disaster preparedness.
- Disasterready – The largest online learning library for humanitarian and development professionals (registration needed).
- Endangered heritage: emergency evacuation of heritage collections, UNESCO and ICCROM.It provides step-by-step guidance for evacuating cultural collections under extreme conditions. It is meant to assist those communities and institutions, which are trying to prevent the destruction and looting of cultural objects during a crisis situation. It can be used to train others and to improve emergency pre-paredness at cultural sites.
- Global Facility for Disaster Reduction and Recovery (GFDRR). The GFDRR is a partnership of 41 countries and 8 international organizations committed to helping developing countries reduce their vulnerability to natural hazards and adapt to climate change. It published amongst others:
- Federal Emergency Management Agency. The official US disaster agency who’s mission is to support ‘our citizens and first responders.’ They publish interesting pages on:
- Heritage Preservation. This website from the National Institute of Conservation is a very rich source on Emergency Planning, Preparedness and Response.
- IFLA disaster preparedness and planning. A brief manual. A special issue of International Preservation Issues (IPI) 6 by John Mcllwain (2006). This basic manual focuses on the main points to take into consideration when writing a disaster plan: assessing risks, managing the disaster risk, getting ready to cope when disaster strikes, responding and getting back to normal are the main stages of this publication.
- ICCROM – The ABC Method – A risk management approach to the preservation of cultural heritage
This manual offers a comprehensive understanding of risk management applied to the preservation of heritage assets, whether collections, buildings or sites. It provides a step-by-step procedure and a variety of tools to guide the heritage professional in applying the ABC method to their own context. The method can be applied to a range of situations, from analysis of a single risk to a comprehensive risk assessment of the entire heritage asset. - ICCROM – A Guide to Risk Management of Cultural Heritage
This guide is an abridged version of The ABC Method. It explains the ABC Method using many images, basic examples and simple exercises. It has been designed to introduce the risk-based approach to decision makers and to promote its use by heritage professionals and a younger generation of conservators. - Lecture on Disaster Response and Recovery in Haiti. Learn how the Smithsonian- in partnership with the President’s Committee on the Arts and Humanities, U.S. Committee of the Blue Shield, National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH), National Endowment for the Arts (NEA), American Institute for Conservation (AIC), and Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) – is helping the Haitian government assess, recover, and restore Haiti’s cultural heritage.
- Library as Safe Haven: Disaster Planning, Response and recovery (pdf) by Deborah D. Halsted Shari Clifton Daniel T. Wilson. Neal-Schuman, an imprint of the American Library Association. Chicago, 2014.
- Managing Disaster Risks for World Heritage (pdf).UNESCO, Paris 2010.
- National Archives of Australia. On their webpage, looking after “Storing and preserving information” they list two documents that are of interest here:
- Preserving cultural heritage in times of conflict by René Teijgeler. In: (G. E. Gorman and Sydney J. Shep, [eds.]) Preservation Management for Libraries, Archives & Museums. London, Facet. 2006, pp.133-165. Published online at Culture and Development/Kultur und Entwicklung. Heritage Protection on September 13, 2006.
- Primer on Disaster Preparedness, Management & Response (pdf). This primer discusses how to plan for, salvage, and care for paper objects in emergencies, such as fire, flood, and earthquake. The Primer was issued by the Smithsonian Institution, National Archives and Records Administration, Library of Congress, and National Park Service.
- Protecting cultural heritage in times of conflict. Contributions from the participants of the International course on First Aid to Cultural Heritage in Times of Conflict (pdf). ICCROM, 2012.
- Protection of Cultural Property/Kulturgüterschutz. This website of the Swiss Civil Protection agency gives splendid information on Risk Management in general and the Protection of Cultural Property in particular. Also see
- KGS Publications. Originally in German but many translated into English
- Reducing Disasters Risks at World Heritage Properties. A useful webpage on the UNESCO – World heritage website.
- Risk Evaluation and Planning Program. Tools & Tips. Useful webpage by Heritage Preservation
- Risk Management. A webpage by Museums & Galleries NSW
- Risk Management and Disaster Planning. Very practical webpages on the website of the American Museum of Natural History · PaleoPortal Collections Management
- Risk Management at Heritage Sites: A Case Study of the Petra World Heritage Site by UNESCO Amman Office and Katholieke Universiteit Leuven. Amman, 2012.
- Risk Preparedness: a management manual for world cultural heritage (pdf) by Herb Stovel. ICCROM, 1998.
- Simulation d’un incendie dans la chapelle de Lorgues (Var) by Laboratoire de conservation, restauration et recherches de Draguignan, 2007. A video on a simulation of a fire in a church and the safeguarding of its antiquities. Both an English version and a French version (17 min)…
- Scan, save, and archive: how to protect our digital cultural heritage. On digitally preserving and sharing the world’s cultural heritage. The organization CyArk is the world’s leading, and non-profit, digital cultural heritage archive. It has been archiving some of the planet’s most important heritage places since 2003. Using the 3D scans of both the original building and post-fire rubble and remains, the timber pagoda atop the gate in Sungnyemun has been meticulously reconstructed. In Conversation (12 April 2014) by Kelly Greenop and Justin R. Barton.
- Terminology on disaster risk reduction. The UNISDR Terminology (2009) aims to promote a common understanding and usage of disaster risk reduction concepts and to assist the disaster risk reduction efforts of authorities, practitioners and the public. In (EN) or (AR).
- World Heritage: Fostering resilience. Issue n°74, January 2015 of the World Heritage magazine. It covers different issues on disaster reduction (e-version).
Looting & Illicit Traffic
- Anti-Looting campaign posters from Belize. In early 2013 Belize’s Institute of Archaeology, a division of the National Institute of Culture and History (NICH) launched an anti-looting campaign and were kind enough to share two of their posters with us. This is just to give an example of posters for a campaign.
- Cultural Property Advice. This UK based website is a guide to collecting, buying and selling art, antiques and antiquities. In their pages on Public Collections they present much useful information on
- Legal and Practical Measures Against Illicit Trafficking in Cultural Property (Arabic). This UNESCO Handbook briefly draws attention to some basic legal and practical measures and tools to help combat illicit trafficking in cultural property.
- Norwegian Arts Council and partners’ awareness-raising playing cards.’ The intention is to use the cards as a means of raising awareness of the potential threats to cultural heritage, and also offer practical advice, such as how to help limit damage to sites in times of conflict, what international conventions are in place, and even objects to avoid purchasing due to the likelihood that they were originally looted. To go directly to the pdf file click here…
- Trafficking Culture. Researching the global traffic in looted cultural artefacts. This research project aims to produce an evidence-based picture of the contemporary global trade in looted cultural objects. The programme is based at the University of Glasgow and is funded by the European Research Council.
- Understanding the U.S. Border: Archaeologists, Law Enforcement, and the Preservation of Cultural Heritage. The purpose of the section ‘The Relationship Between Heritage Protection and Law Enforcement’ is to provide the archaeological community and others with an overview of how law enforcement works to protect cultural heritage; to outline the safeguards offered by cultural heritage law; and to suggest ways that archaeologists may contribute their expertise to this process. For the pdf-file of the webpage click here…
Also see our webpage Conflict, Heritage and Law
