Architecture is not everything: a multi-faceted conceptual framework for evaluating heritage protection policies and disputes

This paper is grounded in a rancorous debate in built-heritage studies concerning heritage policies and the disputes associated with them. Despite the seeming dominance of architectural considerations in decision-making about heritage protection, factual evidence from previous studies shows that not one, but five factors are involved, in differing doses, in the decisions made by planning bodies: architecture and design, city-planning, social considerations, economics, and property-related considerations. This paper categorizes each of these elements and frames them in a new conceptual framework. The framework analyses the five factors from the perspectives of two prisms: support or opposition to heritage protection policies. Through a prominent case-example of Tel Aviv’s conservation plan, we then demonstrate that the new conceptual framework can be utilized to better understand the multifaceted debates–overt or covert–surrounding heritage protection. The case study and the conceptual framework suggest that although urban form and design issues are quite dominant, other non-physical considerations shape the dynamics of conflicts, practices, and policies surrounding heritage protection.