Who decides what deserves to be preserved? Power and heritage in Latin America

This article is part of "Thresholds", a special edition printed newspaper by Cobe Notes x ArchDaily.

When we enter a museum, walk through a historic center, or check a country's heritage list, we rarely think about the process behind these choices. Who decided, on behalf of us all, that these objects, places, and architectures deserved to be preserved and promoted, while others are cast aside?

Generally, it is specialist professionals who hold the decision-making power—be they historians, museologists, architects, or geographers. But on what basis are these decisions made? Can the complexity of history fit into a checklist? Or, even more fundamentally, on which version of history are these decisions being based?

+ 13

In a global context marked by socioeconomic inequality, structural historical injustices, and imminent ecological collapse, an era of reconstruction is born—of cities, architectures, and communities, but also of heritage—where raising these questions seems essential.

Heritage Beyond the Object: Memory, Identity, and Practice

To open the debate on heritage, we must consider that there are various definitions of the term, and that many of them are linked to the idea that those responsible for managing and conserving tangible and natural heritage should only be specialists and professionals. However, contemporary studies and practices have shown that heritage is not limited to the material or physical; rather, it constitutes a relationship between identity, place, and memory, and is therefore directly related to the community that experiences or has experienced it.

Researcher Laurajane Smith argues that heritage is a process, a performance, that embodies specific ways of knowing and understanding the world. Through it, we identify values that give meaning to the present and guide what we deem important for the future. In this context, she defends the idea that heritage is far more than a collection of physical objects—be they artifacts or buildings—and that what truly matters is how they are appropriated, without separating the tangible from the intangible.

This conception of heritage connects directly with what Ailton Krenak, one of today's leading Indigenous voices, has advocated. In a lecture, he expressed skepticism toward the widely circulated concept of heritage and preservation. As he recounts, in his youth, he was constantly encouraged to preserve the forest and the rivers—elements tied to his daily life and the shaping of his identity and culture.

By contrast, the most widespread idea of heritage and preservation—despite recent progress—still largely fails to connect places or objects to daily practice. Furthermore, it often serves as an instrument of privilege, distinguishing those who can access and enjoy places that marginalized groups cannot. For Indigenous peoples, heritage was for a long time defined by what the colonial order established—a history that, indeed, did not belong to them.

The Authorized Heritage Discourse and Its Origins

From this perspective, it becomes clear that heritage practice is not random, but structured and guided by social norms—what Smith calls the Authorized Heritage Discourse (AHD). Eurocentric and Western in origin, it is heavily linked to the rise of European nationalism, which sought to secure national identities. Within this discourse, heritage becomes a monument—aesthetically pleasing, preserved to secure a shared identity for the future, and placed under the care of experts.

In practical terms, in Brazil, for example, the institutionalization of this practice occurred precisely alongside the rise of the dictatorship, through the creation of preservation bodies grounded in modernist intellectual currents and their project of building a national identity linked to elites.

This largely unquestioned application of preservation and listing methods in Brazil produced a highly homogeneous list of protected assets, dominated by buildings and architectural complexes—chiefly religious structures—concentrated in a few states. This persistent pattern has meant that official heritage overwhelmingly reflects elite values, while references to popular culture and historically marginalized groups, such as quilombos and terreiros, appear almost residually.

This outcome reveals that decisions about what is preserved as heritage are never neutral; rather, they construct a selective representation of the country's history and identity.

The Histories That Heritage Listing Fails to Protect

In the effort to prioritize consensual readings of national memory, narratives are diminished or even erased. This practice is not exclusive to Brazil or Latin America, though it often feels more acute in these contexts.

Smith cites the example of England, where recognized heritage is dominated by castles, aristocratic estates, Roman archaeology, and industrial sites that narrate the history of the so-called great men who owned them. And what is left out? The histories of the working classes, immigration, colonial expansion, and slavery, among others.

This same exercise can be applied anywhere, including Brazil and Latin America more broadly. Here, preference is generally given to colonial and imperial architectural ensembles, historic centers associated with elites, religious complexes—mostly of Catholic tradition—monuments linked to the founding of cities and the arrival of Europeans, as well as large-scale pre-Columbian archaeological sites with strong monumental and tourist appeal.

On the other hand, memories and places associated with colonial violence, such as sites of massacres and expulsions, frequently remain marginalized, alongside living Indigenous heritage—territories, practices, and knowledge systems—that extends far beyond sensationalized archaeological remains. Similarly, spaces linked to Black and Afro-descendant populations, particularly regarding the history of slavery and the post-abolition period, are less recognized, as are sites of memory for the working classes, urban peripheries, and the histories of non-hegemonic immigrant groups. Likewise, the narratives of women, children, and LGBTQIA+ communities tend to be underrepresented.

This "absence" goes far beyond a lack of physical preservation mechanisms; it impacts the self-esteem and sense of belonging of a people. National heritage is a powerful source of meaning, and those who do not see themselves reflected in this mirror are made to feel as though they do not truly belong, as Krenak expressed above.

Efforts toward Reparation and the Reclamation of Memory

The Memórias da Terra project, led by Paulo Tavares—which laid the groundwork for the award-winning Brazilian Pavilion at the 2023 Venice Architecture Biennale—exemplifies a shift in focus. It maps old Xavante village sites forcibly abandoned in the 20th century and proposes their recognition as territorial and landscape heritage, viewing the landscape as "living archaeology" and heritage as an instrument of memory, restitution, and historical reparation.

In this same arena of advocacy, the case of the Munduruku people stands out. They occupied the construction site of the Teles Pires Dam in the Brazilian interior to demand the return of funerary urns and other sacred artifacts removed from their territory during the hydroelectric project's construction and subsequently placed under state custody. Their actions exposed the expropriation of Indigenous cultural assets in the name of development and asserted the community's right to control their spiritual and archaeological heritage.

In Colombia, public acts of protest and the toppling of colonial and conquistador statues, though more transient, also serve as examples of social mobilization around memory and identity, demanding heritage references that genuinely represent the population.

Paths toward Decolonizing Heritage

To overcome the logic of a single authority and build a more critical and inclusive perspective on heritage, we must value the diversity of voices, encourage dialogue, and broaden social participation. Within heritage policy, decolonizing means revising preservation criteria inherited from European frameworks and their exclusionary narratives—what Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie identifies as the danger of a "single story."

The so-called architectures of reparation, as Tavares points out, challenge the canon and bring to light historically erased or silenced narratives. In the architectural field, the idea of reparation implies a historical and conceptual effort to revisit, reorder, and reconstitute archival records and narratives, clearing the way for alternative readings of the past and its relationship to territory. This process also involves questioning the symbolic criteria and epistemic foundations that organize archives, museums, and collections, in alignment with current debates and initiatives surrounding heritage restitution.

As Smith argues, it is possible that what we produce will eventually become a new dominant discourse; ideally, however, it will be more inclusive, more democratic, and constantly subject to critique.

This article is part of the ArchDaily Topics: Rethinking Heritage: How today's architecture shapes tomorrow's memory. Every month, we explore a topic in-depth through articles, interviews, news, and architecture projects. We invite you to learn more about our monthly topics. And, as always, ArchDaily is open to contributions from our readers; if you want to submit an article or project, please contact us.