http://www.interpret-europe.net/fileadmin/Documents/publications/interpret_europe_trend_analysis_2016.pdf

As part of Interpret Europe’s (IE) strategic development process, this study is based on a short-term volunteer research project undertaken by 15 IE members at the request of IE Management. It defines more than 60 trends that may affect the development of heritage interpretation (HI) in Europe within the five next years. Paving the way for a later SWOT analysis (analysing strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats related to IE), the study also highlights the opportunities and threats resulting from IE’s macro-environment. As a STEP analysis, the research focuses on socio-cultural, technological, economic and political trends. The two latter are split into two parts each: one for general economic trends and one focused on economic trends related to tourism, and one for natural heritage and one for cultural heritage as European policy in these two fields is clearly separate. In this context, it should nevertheless be emphasised that UNESCO claims “respect for cultural and biological diversity as a whole” and advocates for “an inclusive approach, considering environmental, cultural and socio-economic needs“ when highlighting the role of heritage for the transformational change towards sustainability (The Kyoto Vision 2012). There are five trends where the impact on HI has been assessed as extremely high:  Slow economic growth leading to declining heritage funding  Increased emphasis on people and ‘heritage communities’  Search for authenticity, quality and value  Increase of purpose-driven activities  Increasing importance of social media. Within the political trends regarding cultural heritage in Europe, the key opportunity for IE arises from a greater profile of cultural heritage and an acknowledgement that cultural heritage can deliver outcomes across wider policy areas. This should mean that IE can more easily lobby for recognition of HI. To do this, IE can draw, in particular, on the existing body of empirical research about the contribution that HI makes to promoting heritage and making it more accessible to people. There are, however, also threats associated with this greater recognition of cultural heritage. Other disciplines and their representative bodies might be considered more relevant to the delivery of outcomes from cultural heritage in particular policy areas unrelated to managed heritage. This may be an issue regarding community interpretation, where professional HI may be displaced. As HI’s professional representation at an EU-level, IE may struggle to position itself and HI against competition from other fields.