Heritage Making in Lijiang: Governance, Reconstruction and Local Naxi Life

Since the UNESCO World Heritage Convention was ratified by China in 1985, the country has had forty-seven of its national sites inscribed as World Heritage. The ratification of the World Heritage Convention expresses the country’s efforts to build up its national identity and pursue economic development through the revitalization of cultural traditions and the promotion of heritage tourism. The heritage discourse in China has created space for dynamic negotiations between the local and the global, and culture and economy, in the practice of heritage governance and management.