INTRODUCTION
With the rapid expansion of global markets, increased demand for discovery and extraction of natural resources in the sea, and development of marine remote-sensing technologies, there is also now worldwide recognition of the need for conservation directives and protection of maritime cultural heritage from marine development and unscrupulous treasure salvors (e.g., UNESCO's Convention on the Protection of Underwater Cultural Heritage). Yet, adoption is lagging for international treaties, legislation, governance schemes, and management tools in the United States to protect coastal and marine archaeological sites from private treasure salvors, infrastructure and development projects, as well as climate change impacts.Footnote 1
In the United States, there are many endangered cultural resources, both tangible and intangible that merit preservation and management. However, no cultural resource has received such considerable public interest and simultaneously such limited conservation effort and resource management as submerged and coastal archaeological sites including Native American settlements, shipwrecks, and historic waterfronts. While the hulls of shipwrecks and their fragments and contents are representative of U.S. maritime heritage, the waterfronts and shipyards that propelled the construction of ships and facilitated trade and fishing are also a significant part of the maritime cultural landscape, as examples of the land-sea interface. As the rate of growth in marine technology, exploration, and coastal development steadily increases, these resources are being progressively threatened.
Maritime heritage and cultural resources, specifically underwater heritage sites such as shipwrecks, are generally not assessed in terms of overall value, and heritage managers charged with their conservation, redevelopment, and long-term care rarely consider valuation as an assessment tool. Many of the valuation concepts and methods discussed in this article are not new, but their application to maritime and underwater heritage is generally not considered. This article seeks to establish a foundation for such assessments, and reviews the concepts and metrics that can be applied effectively to support decision making by heritage or cultural-resource managers. The application of these concepts is an important step in developing a comprehensive policy for the protection of maritime heritage, and in determining the long-term social and economic benefits of sustainable conservation, as opposed to the short-term financial gains of treasure hunting and destructive underwater salvage work.
Without valuation tools to assess the collective value and significance of maritime cultural heritage, government and heritage managers may be forced to make difficult and ill-informed conservation decisions. Determining the social and economic benefits of this heritage and its conservation to present and future generations is essential. This requires knowing the value of cultural resources in terms of their direct and indirect uses as well as the value of nonmarket services (e.g., existence value) to quantify the costs and benefits of cultural heritage conservation to stakeholders.Footnote 2 Cost-benefit analyses and other market or nonmarket valuation techniques can be used in such cultural heritage assessments to prioritize management strategies, identify long-term economic and social welfare benefits of conservation, and ensure that maritime cultural resources are available to present as well as future generations.Footnote 3
In the eyes of many historic preservationists, assessing the economic value of a cultural resource is a somewhat disturbing task. Most would likely contend that the intrinsic qualities of heritage resources preclude an assessment of their value. They might also argue that cultural heritage is denigrated by a process of economic valuation. A firsthand assessment of economic value suggests that profitability might take precedence over historical and cultural worth and imply that only those cultural resources that yield a profit should be preserved. However, economic valuation should not be interpreted to mean financial valuation (e.g., the value of gold coins recovered from a shipwreck), nor should economic assessments be viewed as a detraction in any way from the social, cultural, or research qualities (or values) of a cultural resource. Rather, economic valuation techniques have developed over recent years to account for both tangible and intangible benefits people derive from natural and cultural resource functions and processes.
In fact, economists argue that heritage resources possess a distinct form of nonmarket value, which some have termed “cultural capital.”Footnote 4 Specifically, cultural capital is “an asset that embodies a store of cultural value, separable from whatever economic value it might possess; in other inputs the asset gives rise to a flow of goods and services over time which may also have cultural value.”Footnote 5 Accepting this interpretation, economic valuation may contribute to cultural heritage management by not only identifying market costs and benefits, but also in measuring the intrinsic values or nonmarket, sociocultural benefits of cultural heritage and conservation projects.
The inclusion of economic valuation as an approach to cultural resource management, consequently, may allow for the interpretation of cultural capital within broader social and economic contexts, and potentially provide greater flexibility in decision making and policy formulation.Footnote 6 This article examines how ecological economic techniques may be applied to capture the value of cultural heritage resources in terms of their cultural and social value as well as their economic benefits and costs. It seeks further to answer these questions: What is the value of maritime cultural heritage? What are the good and services it provides to society? And what exactly are the benefits of maritime cultural heritage conservation to coastal communities?
THE VALUE OF MARITIME CULTURAL HERITAGE
Economic valuation methods are often employed by ecologists in order to quantify the components, processes, and overall value of ecosystem functions as well as to measure the possible costs and benefits of environmental change and management decisions to human well-being.Footnote 7 While many of the functions and services of ecosystems are quantifiable in monetary terms, other cultural or aesthetic benefits of ecosystems are especially difficult to capture in commercial markets and monetary units. In the same way, culture heritage maintains a host of intrinsic qualities (e.g., spiritual, symbolic, historical, cultural values), which are not easily measured. Nevertheless, ecologists, economists, and state-mandated preservation programs (e.g., the U.S. Advisory Council on Historic Preservation [ACHP]) have started to address both the market (principally in regards to heritage tourism) and nonmarket values of cultural heritage, as well as to develop methods for assessing their overall value in economic terms.Footnote 8
Ecological economics and ecosystem valuations employ techniques that may be used to capture the tangible as well as intangible qualities of maritime cultural heritage in both sociocultural and economic terms. Economic analyses typically involve the expression of value in some monetary terms so that the costs and benefits of disparate services can be compared using a common metric.Footnote 9 However, monetary units are simply a matter of convenience, and other qualitative-type metrics can also be used to assess the value of cultural resources.Footnote 10
Although many cultural resources (antiquities, historic buildings, etc.) are privately owned, economically speaking, cultural resources may be considered “public goods.”Footnote 11 This definition implies that they are nonrival, meaning that the enjoyment of a resource by one person does not come at the expense of another, and nonexcludible, meaning that a person generally should not be excluded or prevented from receiving benefits provided by a cultural resource. Furthermore, economists and ecologists typically classify value according to how goods and services are used, as well as by the socioeconomic and cultural values that humans place on heritage resources. Economic valuation can therefore assess the value of cultural heritage in both utilitarian and nonutilitarian terms—it intends to measure the usefulness that humans derive from goods or services (utilitarian value) and measures the intrinsic sociocultural qualities of cultural heritage (nonutilitarian value).Footnote 12 When framed around principles of sustainable development (i.e., inter- and intragenerational equity, generational benefit), utilitarian and nonutilitarian value assessments can be used to capture the entire “value” of cultural heritage.
As a first step in such a valuation process, however, the “functions” and “services” of cultural heritage must be defined in order to broadly comprehend its importance to society. Although there is no standard among archaeologists and historic preservationists, and a dearth of quantitative data and literature in defining cultural functions and services, a few notable ecosystem and heritage preservation studies have recognized the significance of human values and cultural heritage components (e.g., material culture, built heritage, traditions). Typologies of cultural heritage have broadly classified culture or cultural heritage according to their functions, services, or values (Table 1).Footnote 13
Table 1 Typologies that Classify Culture and Cultural Heritage in Terms of Functions, Services, and ValuesFootnote 14Footnote 15Footnote 16Footnote 17
The meanings and uses of “function,” “service,” and “value” are problematic, and differ considerably within ecological, economic, and preservation scholarship. The classification of functions and services is a value-laden process; therefore, functions, services, and values can be ideologically difficult to extricate.Footnote 18 The classification schemes in Table 1 illustrate the problem—functions are often used to imply values, others equate values with services, and yet others reconceptualize functions to mean services. The terms “goods and services,” “benefits,” and “uses” carry similar meaning and are used here interchangeably. For simplification purposes, “goods and services” are collectively referred to as “services.” De Groot et al. note that current scholarship generally refers to ecosystem functions as either the processes or internal functions of ecosystems (e.g., trophic interactions), or as the goods and services (i.e., benefits or uses) provided to humans by ecosystem processes (e.g., food production, medicine).Footnote 19 In an attempt to clarify the matter, De Groot defines ecosystem functions as “the capacity of natural processes and components to provide goods and services that satisfy human needs, directly and indirectly.”Footnote 20 Unfortunately, cultural processes and components are not captured within this definition. Therefore, “functions” are defined here simply as the primary set of values that society imbues or associates with cultural heritage. “Services” are defined as the direct and indirect benefits that society derives from cultural heritage.
Whether in the form of archaeological resources, the built heritage, or traditional lifeways, all cultural resources possess some degree of value or function that supports human welfare. The degree of significance of certain values or functions, however, is likely to vary in relation to the perspectives of different groups of people. Therefore, cultural heritage functions are broadly aggregated and exhaustively classed here so that most values are held accounted. Although descriptions of ecosystems functions tend to be value-neutral, cultural heritage functions are unavoidably value-laden. The main social and economic functions of cultural heritage are identified in Table 2.
Table 2 Values Associated with Cultural Heritage
These functions broadly reflect what society currently believes is valuable or important about cultural heritage. Because values are likely to change over time (what we value today might not be valued tomorrow), decision making and management of cultural heritage should be viewed within the framework of sustainable development. By exercising caution in the face of uncertainty, considering the needs of future generations, and respecting cultural pluralism, sustainability can help to account for future functions and values that may become associated with cultural heritage.
APPLICATIONS
The services provided by cultural resources are a subset of their functions and are the quantifiable market and nonmarket benefits provided by cultural resources. Although the valuation of services is dependent upon the type of cultural resource components being addressed and to whom the services are being provided, the potential value of specific cultural resources (i.e., archaeological sites, built heritage, traditional lifeways) and their services can be estimated. The total economic value (TEV) framework, commonly used by ecological economists to identify and value ecosystem goods and services, is one method that can be used to assess the overall value of cultural resources.Footnote 21 The TEV can be used to derive the total economic value, against which the benefits and costs of specific impacts, threats, and management regimes can be measured.Footnote 22 It classifies ecosystem goods and services according to “use” and “nonuse” values (also commonly referred to as “market” or “nonmarket” values). Use values are the direct and indirect, tangible and intangible, consumptive and nonconsumptive (or extractive and nonextractive), goods and services provided by a resource. Nonuse value refers typically to the benefits of nonmarket goods and services, such as a resource's existence value (valuing the existence of a heritage item, even if it is not experienced directly) and bequest value (the desire to bequeath a resource to future generations).
The flow of benefits and services derived from cultural resources is analogous to natural resources, which have market and extractive, as well as nonextractive and nonmarket properties.Footnote 23 Extractive uses refer to the harvesting of goods and services such as fish from the ocean or oil and natural gas from the seafloor. An example of an extractive use of a cultural resource is the reuse of New England's historic riverfront mill buildings for living or working space. Tourists visiting maritime museums or historical societies are another example of direct uses and possibly extractive services provided by cultural resources. Nonextractive uses are services provided by a resource that do not require the harvesting of goods. Examples might include the aesthetic benefits provided by the unique natural and cultural landscapes of the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary or Acadia National Park, Maine. Nonmarket value refers to the intrinsic or existence value of resources. Although it is unlikely that any of us will ever visit the deepwater shipwreck of Titanic, we might feel a sense of loss if any such heritage site is destroyed. Cultural resources, in particular, retain a host of intrinsic historic, artistic, social, spiritual, and symbolic qualities valued by society, which are not readily observed in markets.
Maritime cultural resources have few direct or extractive uses, but these limited uses still have considerable economic value. The adaptive reuse of historic waterfront building and structures (e.g., mill buildings, lighthouses, military fortifications and structures, waterfront landings, and waterfront residential homes) has significant market value in the rehabilitation construction industry. The real-estate industry through the buying, selling, and renting of desirable historic waterfront properties for commercial and residential use, is also a market activity with considerable economic impact.Footnote 24 Extractive uses of maritime cultural resources also include heritage recreation and tourism activities. In the United States, approximately 118 million American adult travelers (or 81% of all tourists) visit heritage or cultural sites and places annually.Footnote 25 These travelers spend significantly more money: $623 per trip compared to $457 per trip for other types of tourists.Footnote 26 Heritage tourism is a leading industry for coastal states in the United States, and recreational scuba diving, particularly wreck-diving, has grown substantially over the last decades.
Other heritage tourism extractive and nonextractive activities include: visiting coastal state and national parks that contain historic sites (e.g., historic buildings, lighthouses, archaeological sites); vacationing to historic maritime villages (e.g., Lunenburg, Nova Scotia); experiencing firsthand maritime industries, working waterfronts, and reconstructed historic lifeways (e.g., lobstering, fishing, tall-ship sailing, boatbuilding, traditional or native arts and crafts, colonial-period museum villages); visiting museums to appreciate maritime art; or boating and kayaking along coasts and islands to appreciate the natural beauty of a region's marine, riverine, and estuarine environments and maritime cultural landscapes. Significant infrastructure and management costs are needed to sustain heritage tourism, as well as to maintain the integrity of the region's maritime cultural resources (which attract tourists in the first place); however, these maritime-related activities generate significant direct and indirect economic benefit for coastal communities.
Although difficult to estimate in any detail, nonmarket and nonutilitarian values are equally important to assess. Maritime archaeological sites, in particular, contain information relevant to the understanding of our natural and human environments, which can be gained from scientific research and study. Shipwrecks, historic waterfronts, cultural landscapes, coastal and submerged prehistoric archaeological sites all provide knowledge toward understanding socioeconomic structures and processes, and help to understand the relationship between humans and the marine environment. Knowledge can be gained about past environmental conditions (e.g., paleo-environmental data, land-use patterns, biological data), natural-resource exploitation and extraction behaviors (e.g., fishing patterns), technology development (e.g., coastal engineering, shipbuilding), communication, trade and relations between cultures and people.
Many maritime cultural resources are important to individuals or communities simply because of their existence value. Others may want to bequeath future generations with the potential scientific and educational knowledge that could be gained, for example, from the study of the multitude of shipwrecks that lay quietly beneath the sea, even though they may never acquire that knowledge themselves or witness the discovery of the archaeological sites within their own lifetimes. Maritime cultural resources also inspire art and music, and often represent symbols that instill cultural pride and nationalism. Archaeological sites and landscapes have intrinsic religious and spiritual value, particularly for indigenous groups. They also retain value as places where people assemble, socialize, and work (e.g., landings, piers, fishing holes and boardwalks).
Nonmarket values can be determined in large part by consultation with stakeholders that have a vested interest in a particular resource, reached through a process of group consensus, or decided by resource specialists. One valuation approach is the current U.S. national historic preservation scheme, where historic contexts are developed by heritage specialists to serve as a measuring stick from which the significance of a cultural resource may be determined.Footnote 27 Alternatively, a valuation approach may analyze nonutilitarian values, for example, by using hypothetical scenarios, where resource users and nonusers are asked their willingness to pay for continued access to or existence of a resource. However, in order to achieve any measure of specificity for nonmarket values of maritime cultural resources, resource assessments must typically be conducted on a case-by-case or site-by-site basis. Contextual studies, for example, can serve as a guide or framework for conducting more precise, site-specific, nonmarket value assessments, and when combined with valuation tools and techniques, may be used to assess the stock of a region's cultural assets and prioritize conservation and management efforts.
VALUATION TOOLS AND TECHNIQUES
Ecosystem valuation techniques are rooted in welfare economics. They measure an individual's willingness to pay (WTP) or accept loss (WTA) for changes in the use of or access to certain goods and services.Footnote 28 As a rule, WTP measures the increase in services for beneficiaries who do not own resources, and WTA calculates decreases in the value of goods or services owned by beneficiaries. Because WTA estimates are generally higher, WTP is preferred in valuation studies for its conservative results. Numerous valuation techniques have been used to estimate WTP for cultural heritage services in Europe (particularly built heritage, but also museums, performance art, and urban archaeological sites). There is a dearth of published economic valuation studies of cultural heritage in the United States.Footnote 29 However, recent studies by Schuster et al. (1997), Throsby (2001), Navrud and Ready (2002), and the Getty Conservation Institute (see e.g., Demas, 2002) have broadly assessed the advantages, limitations, and applications of various economic valuation techniques to cultural heritage.
There are two primary ecosystem valuation methods: revealed preference and stated preference (Table 3). Revealed preference methods are used to assess observable market behaviors, either directly or indirectly, of producers or consumers. This method uses standard direct market price and indirect valuation techniques. Indirect techniques are used to analyze surrogate markets or nonrival services such as the aesthetic benefits of a cultural landscape.Footnote 30 Indirect services are difficult to put a price on, but numerous economic techniques have been developed to analyze such nonmarket values. Alternatively, when no market goods or services are traded or observed, stated preference techniques are used to analyze hypothetical behaviors. These techniques are preferred (but not used exclusively) for nonmarket service valuations, and they typically involve group deliberation, ranking of particular services, or use survey questionnaires in order to measure WTP based on individual responses to direct questioning.
Table 3 Revealed and Stated Preference Methods Applicable to Cultural Resource Service ValuationsFootnote 31
Revealed Preference Methods
The “market price” method uses standard economic techniques to estimate the value of goods such as fish and timber, which are bought and sold in commercial markets. The method is applicable to cultural heritage goods and services such as recreation and heritage tourism, where market data is available. For example, museum admissions and membership fees, as well as gift shop and cafeteria sales, or hotel and restaurant revenue data generated directly through the presence of cultural heritage, can show people's willingness to pay for heritage services at market prices. Market price is measured by calculating economic surplus, or the sum of consumer and producer surplus. Generally, time series data is needed to generate a demand curve for consumer surplus, and the costs of production and revenues from heritage services are needed to calculate producer surplus. Subsequently, cost-benefit analysis can be calculated. Another application is thought to lie in the market pricing of real estate.Footnote 32 For example, value can be derived by comparing the market price for a historic property to be used for commercial purposes (e.g., bed-and-breakfast) and its related consumer surplus (i.e., WTP to stay at an historic bed-and-breakfast) and producer surplus (i.e., maintenance costs for an old building), to the market price and economic surplus of similar but nonhistoric or newly constructed service properties.
The demand for a good or service is often reflected in the price that people are willing to pay for their associated characteristics, such as the proximity of a house to the coast or a home with unique historical characteristics. The “hedonic pricing” method typically analyzes observable residential housing market prices, and can be used to estimate the value of cultural heritage attributes (i.e., aesthetic and historical characteristics) and how they affect the price of marketed goods. By holding some characteristics constant, estimates of residual attributes (e.g., listing on the National Register of Historic Places) are possible. An example might be an estimation of value based on the comparison of similar houses in a neighborhood, where some homes have access to a historic waterfront and others do not. A breakdown of the various attributes of the homes may show that homes with access to the historic waterfront have a higher price and thus a greater value. The application has shown merit in valuing commercial and residential properties that are listed on national historic property registers or designated part of a historic district.Footnote 33
The “travel cost method” can be used to measure the time spent and travel costs related to visit a heritage site from variable locations. The cost associated with travel to a heritage site, such as a monument, museum, or archaeological site, can be assumed to reflect the maximum willingness of visitors to pay to receive heritage benefits. Traditionally, this method is used to estimate the economic value of recreational sites. It can also be used to measure the costs and benefits of changes in access to cultural heritage, as well as the value incurred from the loss or addition of a heritage site, monument, or museum. Travel cost collects observed behavioral data from visitors. This data can range from basic regional data (e.g., postal codes of visitors) to more specific survey information such as the socioeconomic characteristics of visitors, the amount of time spent at heritage sites, whether trips are made to visit one particular heritage site or if the trip had several purposes, visitor perceptions of authenticity and environmental quality, travel expenses incurred, and so forth. There are several travel cost techniques used by economists including zonal travel cost, individual travel cost, and a random utility approach.Footnote 34
Travel cost method is rarely used to estimate the benefits of cultural heritage sites in the United States. However, Poor and Smith (2004) have used the zonal travel cost methodology to assess the consumer surplus benefits of Historic St. Mary's City in Maryland. The study revealed that increases in admission prices to the site will likely result in a reduction of revenue, and it determined that visitors from high-income zones would be more likely to spend money on cultural activities other than travel to Historic St. Mary's City.Footnote 35 Although the results are perhaps not what were hoped for, they do effectively assist site managers in decision making, for example, in providing information about to whom and where marketing efforts should focus.
Travel cost is an indirect market valuation technique that can be used to estimate willingness to pay for the use of a site by visitors. Results from travel cost surveys might also indirectly reveal nonuse values important to heritage visitors. However, economists warn that travel cost methods are problematic,Footnote 36 and that there are other revealed preference methods, such as avoided cost (or damage cost avoided), replacement cost, and factor impact, which could be useful in application to cultural heritage.Footnote 37
Stated Preference Methods
“Contingent valuation” (CV) is the most commonly employed valuation method to estimate non- or passive-use values related to ecosystem and environmental services as well as cultural heritage. Although infrequently used in the United States, numerous European studies have successfully applied CV in order to assess the nonuse (as well as use) values of cultural heritage and preservation projects.Footnote 38 In principle, CV is a simplistic approach that asks the willingness of people to pay (WTP) for the benefits afforded by cultural heritage. CV may also be used to determine the amount of compensation people are willing to accept for the loss or destruction (WTA) of tangible as well as intangible cultural heritage goods and services. The CV method involves the presentation of one or more hypothetical scenarios in which an individual identifies, usually in the form of currency, how much they are WTP or WTA for preservation or loss of a particular heritage resource. Because the method is based on what people say they would do, as opposed to actual observed behavior, economists and psychologists have disputed the validity of CV studies.Footnote 39 However, a blue-ribbon panel study by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) has determined “that CV studies can produce estimates reliable enough to be the starting point of a judicial process of damage assessment, including lost passive-use values.”Footnote 40
Contingent or discrete choice methods, although rarely applied in cultural resource assessments, are similar to CV in that they build hypothetical scenarios, but also provide a series of options where an individual is asked to assess the trade-offs between sums of money relative to changes in the condition of environmental or cultural goods or services. Group valuation, also a stated preference approach, establishes resource value by coming to consensus in open public debate in lieu of measuring an individual's WTP or WTA.Footnote 41 This democratic method is occasionally used in cultural resource management decisions, but such deliberations are generally unstructured, ad hoc, and do not formally assess “value” to inform decision making or the development of cultural heritage policy.Footnote 42
DISCUSSION
For centuries, the “salvage” and purchase of archaeological sites' artifacts and monuments has been practiced and condoned by nations as well as reputable and renowned museums.Footnote 43 Internationally, such activities are now considered, if not illegal, certainly unethical. Nevertheless, public interest and market demand for shipwreck artifacts and cargoes remains high, and salvage laws and in rem claims by private corporations are often applied and upheld in U.S. admiralty courts.Footnote 44 However, public interest in and policies to protect these underwater cultural resources have approached broad consensus with the ratification of UNESCO's Convention on the Protection of Underwater Cultural Heritage in 2009. There is now worldwide recognition of the need for conservation directives and protective measures of maritime cultural heritage from marine development, seabed and natural-resource extraction activities, and treasure salvors.Footnote 45
Sovereignty laws, bilateral agreements, and war graves acts also provide international measures to protect shipwrecks and serve to deter treasure hunting and salvage of historic and archaeological sites.Footnote 46 However, in the recent case of the salvage of the HMS Sussex by Odyssey, Inc., the United Kingdom effectively relinquished its sovereign immunity rights to Odyssey in exchange for a small percentage (20%) of cultural objects and remuneration, thereby limiting protection of the public's interest in and rights to access its cultural heritage.Footnote 47 Although the United Kingdom could have exercised its full sovereign immunity and rights over this vessel, knowingly or not, it essentially considered its willingness to accept (WTA) the loss of its sovereign immunity, future public access to the shipwreck site and its materials, and the destruction of a war grave and archaeological site in exchange for archaeological documentation and 20% of recovered cultural materials and precious metals. The United Kingdom made this determination on behalf of the nation's public, both current and future generations, without performing any formal WTP or WTA analysis. What would be the costs and benefits of in-situ preservation, or a state-sponsored salvage operation of the shipwreck? What is the public's WTP for such options? What is the public's WTA for destruction (even if by archaeological means) of its national heritage?
It is precisely the assessment of value (both tangible and intangible, market and nonmarket) that is needed to show the benefits and costs (to current as well as future generations) of conservation as opposed to salvage and sale of underwater resources. The development of value metrics will be a necessary step in order to establish maritime cultural heritage on equal ethical footing, policy base, and in procedural practice, with its terrestrial counterparts. Currently, market demand is the only approach to evaluate shipwrecks with precious metals and financially rich cargoes. Modification of existing or new valuation techniques and procedures are needed, which account for and compare the costs and benefits of public and private salvage, highlight market and nonmarket benefits, and consider the future costs and sustainability of conservation and salvage scenarios. While many existing valuation methods can be applied directly to maritime heritage resources, the development of WTP and WTA valuation techniques for unique archaeological site types such as shipwrecks will help to engage the public and assist with building policies that provide cultural resources in the sea the same protective conservation measures afforded to those on land.
Currently, in the United States, the determination of whether a cultural resource will be conserved or nominated to the National Register is based primarily on historical significance assessments by preservation specialists such as archaeologists, architectural historians, and cultural-resource managers. These experts may involve public participation in order to reach consensus among interested parties and determine economic costs and benefits of a preservation project, but most do not, as there are no formal rules or guidelines for it in the regulations that govern the National Historic Preservation Act (NHPA), section 106 review process. Subsequently, when preservationists determine the impact of a federal action upon a cultural heritage resource, it is usually without public consultation and results in recommendations of avoidance, minimization, or mitigation.Footnote 48
The lack of a bottom-up or participatory process limits state and federal historic preservation officers from determining to whom resources are significant. In practice, National Register property listings are generally limited to “nationally” significant resources, often excluding resources that may be significant or of value to local groups and areas. Although exceedingly rare, evaluations of cultural heritage resources important to minority groups and local communities in terms of social and civic, spiritual or religious, and natural values are increasingly considered, particularly in significance determinations of Native American cultural landscapes and properties.Footnote 49 However, consultation is generally avoided by preservation agencies and officials—these agents ultimately rely on their own judgment and expertise, as to what is significant and to whom it is significant.
Some contemporary cultural heritage management and preservation scholars have suggested abandonment of the term “significance” for “value,” claiming that “cultural significance” does not account for the full range of attributes that embody heritage resources.Footnote 50 There are no explicit rules within the section 106 process of NHPA to conduct economic analyses or valuation studies, yet preservationists have long recognized that in “the basic sequence of steps of the preservation process, one must also recognize that preservation always has been, presently is, and always will be primarily a matter of market economics.”Footnote 51 Combining the traditional approach of significance determination with economic valuation, in a formalized way, may provide government and the public with a substantially more transparent and inclusive process that considers both top-down, expert opinion, and bottom-up, community interests and values.
Valuations can occur in the review and compliance processes of the U.S. National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) and NHPA, namely in the development of NEPA environmental assessments (EAs) or environmental impact statements (EISs), and within NHPA section 106 procedures. NEPA and NHPA regulations and procedures do not explicitly require assessment of values or maintenance of service values into the future, but doing so would not be inconsistent within the scope of their statutes. Although NEPA regulations do not prevent federal activities from going forward, they do present the potential impacts of proposed actions, which typically lead to selection of the action with the least worst net effect. This type of assessment is not much different from a market or nonmarket valuation approach (e.g., contingent or discrete choice valuation) that examines trade-offs in choices or scenarios. While socioeconomic impacts should be considered in resolving the adverse effects of federal activities upon cultural resources, the decision-making process within section 106 of NHPA is often limited to the National Register criteria of eligibility, which do not explicitly consider socioeconomic factors or to whom cultural resource are valued.
Valuations should be an integral part of the baseline information-gathering process for maritime cultural heritage assessments under section 106 of NHPA or EA or EIS compliance within the regulations of NEPA. Technically, federal agencies must receive a review and response to a proposed activity from a State Historic Preservation Officer (SHPO), Tribal Historic Preservation Officer (THPO), or any other group identified for consultation, before proceeding with any mitigation measures. In the case of NEPA, if a SHPO or THPO objects to an EA or EIS, the objection is brought to the ACHP. The ACHP then proposes a resolution to the objection. Because section 211 of NHPA gives the ACHP “rulemaking authority for Section 106, and can issue regulations for compliance, which a federal agency must follow,” the ACHP may amend existing regulations (36 C.F.R. pt. 800) to include (market and nonmarket) economic valuations as an option to treat properties. The adoption of economic valuation and the development of explicit guidelines for such assessments will help to assess not only impacts to National Register eligible maritime cultural heritage properties, but also assist with determinations of their market and nonmarket values.
SUMMARY
The fundamental principle on which to base maritime cultural heritage and resource management should be sustainable development. This guiding principle posits that cultural resources should be managed in a way that ensures conservation for current generations without sacrificing access to and appreciation of these resources for future generations. In the event that human and environmental actions impact cultural heritage, management decisions should be made that consider not only national historical significance but also sociocultural as well as economic values relevant to regional, state, and local populations and communities. Consciousness of and sensitivity to the principles of equity, precaution, and cultural diversity will provide the basis for long-term sustainability of cultural heritage resources.
Ecological economics can be used to assess the market and nonmarket, or use and nonuse values associated with maritime cultural heritage. Valuation tools and techniques can help to addresses exactly what heritage is worthy of protection, to whom it is significant, and how resources managers can best develop and interpret that heritage for the public. Valuations determine historical significance and intrinsic values of maritime historical and archaeological resources, and assess opportunities for use, enjoyment, education, and community engagement. By acknowledging the existence of “cultural capital” and the interconnectedness of natural and human systems, government, resource managers, and the public can conceptualize cultural heritage as a product of human interaction with the natural environment; analyze the goods and services provided by cultural assets; encourage science and educational activities contributing to the well-being of coastal communities; and support economic activities such as recreation, tourism, and growth in market economies such as real estate. Overall, the objectives of valuation are to improve quality of life by maintaining the historical and cultural integrity of coastal communities, protect culturally or historically diverse and sensitive areas, and sustain traditional ways of life and the natural areas within which humans live.
