DOI: 10.3986/Traditio2021500106 TRADITIONES, 50/1, 2021, 79–105
This article presents three examples of Slovenian–Italian 
cross-border heritage initiatives. The ZBORZBIRK project 
linked thirty-four collections from the border area. The Walk 
of Peace trail from the Alps to the Adriatic connects the most 
important remnants and monuments of the Isonzo Front in 
Slovenia and Italy. The municipalities in Brda/Collio are 
working to nominate the cultural landscape of this area for 
the UNESCO World Heritage List. The comparison presents 
the scope of the cross-border initiatives, the actors, their 
motivations, the actions taken, and their longevity—that 
is, the imprints in the cultural heritage discourse between 
the tourism industry and identity politics.
Keywords: heritage-making, heritage initiatives, cross-border 
cooperation, cultural landscape, ZBORZBIRK, Walk of 
Peace, Goriška brda / Collio (Gorizia Hills)
Avtorici predstavita tri primere slovensko-italijanskih 
čezmejnih dediščinskih pobud. Projekt ZBORZBIRK je 
povezal 34 zbirk z obmejnega območja, Poti miru od Alp do 
Jadrana povezujejo najpomembnejše ostanke in spomenike 
soške fronte v Sloveniji in Italiji, občine na območju 
Goriških brd pa si prizadevajo za nominacijo kulturne 
krajine tega območja na Unescov seznam svetovne dediščine. 
Primerjava kaže na obseg čezmejnih pobud, njihove akterje, 
motivacije, izvedene ukrepe in njihovo dolgoživost, torej na 
odtise v dediščinskem diskurzu med turistično industrijo in 
identitetnimi politikami.
Ključne besede: dediščinjenje, dediščinske pobude, čezmejno 
sodelovanje, kulturna pokrajina, ZBORZBIRK, Pot miru, 
Goriška brda
COLLECTIONS, WALKS, AND CULTURAL LANDSCAPES
 SLOVENIAN–ITALIAN CROSS-BORDER HERITAGE INITIATIVES
ŠPELA LEDINEK LOZEJ AND MARJETA PISK
INTRODUCTION
There is a mutually constitutive interplay between boundaries, borders, and heritage that 
is understood as a metacultural process (Kirshenblatt-Gimblett 1998, 2004). Boundaries, 
borders, limits, divisions, and their multiplicative effects can be focal points of transition, 
encounter, and conflict, as stated at the announcement of the meeting of the SIEF Working 
Group Cultural Heritage and Property in January 2020.1 This article considers three dif-
ferent cross-border heritage-making initiatives: a network of collections, a trail connecting 
remnants and memorials of the First World War, and a terraced cultural landscape. We 
compare the heritage initiatives, the actors involved, their purview and agendas, the initia-
tives’ longevity, the robustness, impact, and scale2 at which initiatives take place, and how 
scale and (cross-)border heritage interact in a fluid and contingent manner. By employing a 
comparative perspective, we examine various modalities of cross-border heritage(-making), 
1 Available at: https://www.siefhome.org/downloads/wg/chp/SIEF%20CH%202020%20Borders-
Boundaries.pdf (accessed September 13, 2021).
2 By scale we mean a continual process of (re)construction of power relations: “while scale is often 
at the heart of how domination is facilitated and inequalities legitimated, it might also be possible 
to make astute interventions in how power geometries operate through an intelligent and sensitive 
understanding of scalar politics” (Harvey, Mozaffari, 2019).
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its appropriation, and possible internalization. Our aim is also to check the possible impact 
or at least potentials of these cross-border heritage initiatives to transcend the still domi-
nant nation-building perspective of heritage initiatives and heritage discourse in general.
Cross-border heritage initiatives and heritage-making are a challenge to (sometimes 
still predominant) monocultural and nation-building heritage endeavors, and they are an 
opportunity to contest heritage narratives about the nation and national identity that can 
be claimed simultaneously below the national level (i.e., locally) and above the national 
level (i.e., transnationally), as well as within it. By presenting and comparing three diffe-
rent heritage initiatives, we seek to answer whether and how they work within or beyond 
nation-building narratives. Following the objectives of the heritage initiatives studied (e.g., 
preserving remnants, safeguarding collections, developing tourism, raising the profile of 
the region, etc.), we analyze how successful they are in achieving their aims and what role 
the different types of coordinators (experts, local foundations, local communities, etc.) 
play in each of the heritage initiatives studied. The analyses follow the approach of Maria 
Lois and examine border areas 
as discursive sites, where authorities, locales, the tourism industry, visitors, con-
sumers, and so on negotiate what is to be narrated and what is to be silenced, 
and, specifically, which scalar dimensions are to be found in border heritage sites, 
events and promotional materials. (Lois, 2019: 82)
The article draws on various sources—political and planning documents, institutional 
and media reports, and the ethnography of border sites—by employing (participant) obser-
vation, informal conversation, and more or less structured interviews with various actors, 
as well as self-reflection based on active participation in some initiatives.
ROOTS AND ROUTES:
HERITAGE, BORDERLANDS, AND CROSS-BORDER COOPERATION
Like borders, heritage “can be understood both in terms of roots and routes. They are 
matters of administration, but they are also matters of consideration, matters of competi-
tion, and matters of contention” (Källén, 2019: 9). The roots of today’s Slovenian-Italian 
border date to the mid-twentieth century. After the Second World War, the ethnically 
mixed former Venezia Giulia was divided into two zones. With the exception of Trieste 
and its surroundings,3 the border between Yugoslavia and Italy was established at the peace 
conference in Paris in 1946. The Treaty of Paris was signed on February 10, 1947, and its 
3 The issue of Trieste and its surroundings was temporarily settled with the establishment of the Free 
Territory of Trieste, which remained divided into Zone A under British–American military govern-
ment and Zone B under Yugoslav military government. This provisional arrangement was resolved by 
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provisions came into effect on September 15, 1947. The status of Trieste (Sln. Trst)4 and 
the adjacent border were finally settled by the Treaty of Osimo in 1975 (Troha, 2016). 
Following the breakup of Yugoslavia in 1991 and Slovenia’s accession to the EU in 2004, 
and entry into the Schengen area in 2007, both countries were part of a broader region 
that—until the recent COVID-driven changes to the border regime—allowed the free 
movement of people and goods without border controls.
The changes to various European borders after the late 1980s have given rise to exten-
sive methodologically and disciplinarily diverse research. In the 1990s, a new disciplinary 
specialization, the anthropology of borders, emerged (Donnan, Wilson, 1999) that sought 
to document how local communities were important participants in much wider relations 
of power, exploitation, domination, and subversion (Bellier, Wilson 2000; Haller, Donnan, 
2000; Ballinger, 2002; Kockel, Nic Craith, Frykman, 2012; Wilson, 2012; Markov, 2015). 
Borderwork was no longer the exclusive preserve of the nation-state (Rumford, 2006: 164), 
but involved several actors and strategies, including the EU and its territorial cohesion and 
regional development policies.
In the EU’s agenda, cultural heritage is recognized as “an irreplaceable repository of 
knowledge and a valuable resource for economic growth, employment and social cohesion”;5 
therefore, cross-border cooperation initiatives can receive EU funding for preserving vari-
ous elements of cultural heritage (Balogh, 2019: 30). Borders influence the understand-
ing of heritage and are undeniably crucial for the production of past, present, and future 
cultural heritage (ibid.), but heritage itself is in turn sometimes understood as being about 
constructing borders (Källén, 2019: 7–8). Certain cross-border heritage initiatives and 
transboundary heritage sites presumably participate “in the symbolic and networked 
debordering of the EU” (Niklasson, 2019: 118). Nonetheless, the state constantly struggles 
to control heritage on the border and invests its energy in positioning itself transparently 
in relation to the processes of its regional development through cross-border EU projects 
(Kravanja, 2018a: 114). Hence the actors presented in this article and their objectives are 
not explicit about addressing national perspectives. Despite European rhetoric, they are 
embedded in the still dominant national(istic) heritage discourse, which is defined through 
common investments in and common responsibility for “our heritage” (Thompson, 2006; 
the Memorandum of Understanding on October 5, 1954 (also called the Memorandum of London), 
when the respective zones were assigned to Italy and Yugoslavia (Troha, 2016).
4 We use bilingual toponyms only at first mention, after which Italian toponyms are used for the Italian 
part of the borderlands and Slovenian toponyms for the Slovenian part. In the case of areas and rivers 
that cross the borders, we have decided arbitrarily; for example, in the case of the Isonzo Front, which 
is named after the river called Isonzo in Italian and Soča in Slovenian, we use Isonzo Front because it 
is more common in English texts.
5 Communication from the Commission to the European Parliament, the Council, the European Economic 
and Social Committee and the Committee of the Regions: Towards an Integrated Approach to Cultural 
Heritage for Europe, July 22nd, 2014, COM (2014) 477: 2, available at: https://ec.europa.eu/assets/eac/
culture/library/publications/2014-heritage-communication_en.pdf (accessed April 2, 2021).
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Hafstein, 2018). This embeddedness of actors in a national perspective can actually chal-
lenge their real cross-border heritage work; however, at the same time it is an opportunity to 
open the national(istic) heritage narratives to different perspectives, which can be claimed 
simultaneously above and below the national perspective, as well as within it.
THE NETWORK OF COLLECTIONS
The first cross-border heritage initiative examined is a network connecting thirty-four 
heritage collections covered by the cross-border project ZBORZBIRK—Cultural Heritage 
in the Collections between the Alps and the Karst (2012–2015).6 The project was built on 
grassroots collecting practices and municipal heritage collections that were not necessarily 
inventoried by authorized museum institutions. Based on long-term ethnography of the 
territory since the 1990s, the initiative was conceived by the ethnologist Mojca Ravnik 
and co-designed with collectors, local stakeholders, and other researchers between 2008 
and 2011. It was implemented by eleven partner institutions (two academic institutions, 
one cultural-educational institution, two museums, and six local communities) between 
2012 and 2015, thus interrelating local collectors, municipalities, and experts from various 
fields (linguistics, history, museology, and digital humanities) on both sides of the northern 
Italian–Slovenian cross-border area between the Julian Alps and the Goriška brda / Collio 
area.7 The motivations of the actors and stakeholders were different. The municipalities and 
some collectors were predominantly interested in infrastructure investments for presenting 
the collections and developing cultural tourism based on promotional and awareness-raising 
activities. A pull factor for academics and museums was documenting and registering col-
lections and their items, as well as gathering folklore. The various responsibilities led to a 
fruitful dialogue and some divergences in the implementation phase because the partners 
were not equally bound to all of the aims. However, the majority of the project activities 
were fulfilled; they revolved around the creation of a network of thirty-four collections 
and comprised a joint inventory, intensive ethnography of collecting practices, five invest-
ments in infrastructure housing collections, presentation of twelve collections to the public, 
establishing eleven information points, publishing a guidebook (Poljak Istenič, 2015), 
holding two major dissemination events—a workshop for collectors and an international 
conference on collections, oral traditions, and cultural tourism (Dapit, Ivančič Kutin, 
6 The project was co-funded by European Regional Development Fund (Interreg IVa, Italy, Slovenia) 
and by national funds from Italy and Slovenia. This article predominately builds on participant obser-
vations and reflections on the project activities and findings by one of the authors.
7 The borderlands are located in the Province of Udine (Sln. Videm) in Italy and in the Gorizia and 
Upper Carniola statistical regions (Sln. Goriška statistična regija and Gorenjska statistična regija) in 
Slovenia. For more information on project design and implementation, see Ravnik, 2012; Ledinek 
Lozej, Ravnik 2016; Ledinek Lozej, 2017, 2020.
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Ledinek Lozej, 2015)—and various other dissemination activities.8 After the project, the 
network remained vital only for the range of ordinary activities of the project partners and 
stakeholders (e.g., drawing on the folklore material collected and insights, the academic 
partners published several articles; some collections became part of tourism activities and 
were more systematically included in several itineraries). Some partners, stakeholders, and 
researchers involved (cf. Ivančič Kutin, 2016, 2017; Kravanja, 2018b) reconfigured the 
project results in new heritage activities and configurations. This cross-border cooperation 
also made possible some further partnerships, collaborations, and joint activities on herit-
age. Nevertheless, the most significant deficiency of the initiative is the lack of longevity 
and long-term sustainability; because of this, it was brief and its long-term heritagization 
impacts on borderlands have not been identified.
THE WALK OF PEACE
The Walk of Peace trail is a cross-border route connecting various remnants of the First 
World War along the former Isonzo Front: military cemeteries, caves, trenches, ossuaries, 
chapels, monuments, an outdoor museum, crosses, tombstones, memorial plaques, and 
other memorials from Log pod Mangartom in the middle of the Julian Alps in Slovenia 
to Trieste on the Adriatic Sea in Italy.9 The trail was set up by the Walks of Peace in the 
Soča Region Foundation (Sln. Fundacija Poti miru v Posočju), through several projects, 
local, national, and European funds, and self-motivated collaboration of several institu-
tions, local communities, and individuals. It became Slovenia’s flagship contribution to 
the pan-European formal remembrance of the centenary of the First World War (Fikfak, 
Jezernik, 2018: 120; Jezernik, Fikfak, 2018: 26).10 The concept of the Walk of Peace 
8 For example, the project website at http://zborzbirk.zrc-sazu.si/ (where some more information and all 
project publications are also available), signposts, roll-up stands, posters, and twenty-seven different 
leaflets for a total circulation of 36,300 copies, the exhibition catalogue (Miklavčič-Brezigar, 2015), 
three CDs (Dapit, Kropej, 2014; Ivančič Kutin, 2014; Pignat, 2015), and over twenty smaller events.
9 For a detailed description of the Walk of Peace, see a general guide (Koren, 2015) and various guide-
books and maps, also available at the foundation website (http://www.potmiru.si/eng/publications-
and-articles). This article is based on long-term observation of activities, two interviews with Maša 
Klavora (on March 26 and July 14, 2021), and, due to pandemic circumstances, questionnaires com-
pleted by Željko Cimprič (April 5, 2020), Zdravko Likar (March 31, 2020), and Petra Svoljšak (March 
26, 2020), to whom we are grateful for sharing their information and perspectives with us. Parts of 
the text are complemented by information from articles (Likar, Klavora, 2015; Klavora, 2016; Testen, 
Koren, 2015; Repič 2018, 2021; Kozorog, 2019; Kravanja, 2021).
10 In fact, the first memorials in the region date back to the period of fascism after the First World War, 
when the Italian authorities transferred the remains of soldiers to the ossuaries in Kobarid, Redipuglia, 
and Oslavia (Sln. Oslavje), as well as to larger cemeteries, and erected numerous monuments to the 
fallen in the countryside (Kravanja, 2021; Saunders, 2013: 52). After the Second World War, research 
on and the museum presentation of the First World War was promoted by the Nova Gorica Museum. 
For a detailed overview of the memorials, see Drole, 2019; Hazler, 2021.
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Figure 1. Booklets Walk of Peace in different languages (photo by Špela Ledinek Lozej).
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ŠPELA LEDINEK LOZEJ AND MARJETA PISK
Figure 2. In the battlefield area. On the top of Mrzli vrh (photo by Jurij Fikfak).
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COLLECTIONS, WALKS, AND CULTURAL LANDSCAPES: SLOVENIAN–ITALIAN CROSS-BORDER HERITAGE ...
trail was proposed as Friedenswege (in German) and Le vie della pace (in Italian) as early 
as the 1970s by the Austrian historian Walther Schaumann, who was working on the 
Italian–Austrian front line in the Carnic Alps in Austria and Italy.11 After that, the idea 
blossomed in the Italian Dolomites and Slovenia’s Soča region in the 1990s. In the Soča 
region, it was envisioned (alongside the Kobarid Museum, dedicated to material from 
the First World War and the Isonzo Front) by Zdravko Likar, a versatile social, cultural, 
and political actor in the Soča region, who (together with some other associations and 
individuals) had promoted the heritage of the Isonzo Front since the 1980s. The idea of 
preservation, conservation, research, and tourism built on the heritage of the Isonzo Front 
was supported by his colleagues: Željko Cimprič, the cofounder of the Kobarid Museum; 
Anton Jeglič, secretary-general at the Slovenian Ministry of Science, and Technology in 
2000; and Robert Blinc, an academy member and research committee head at the Jožef 
Stefan Institute—all of them influential at the local and national levels. Hence, in 2000, 
Slovenia adopted a program for the preservation, renovation, research, and tourism use of 
the heritage of the Isonzo Front. At the end of that year, the Walks of Peace in the Soča 
Region Foundation was established, which gained government financial support for car-
rying out the program. In 2007, the outdoor museums, major monuments, and memorials 
of the Isonzo Front, natural points of interest, two museums (in addition to the private 
Kobarid Museum also the regional Tolmin Museum), some private museum collections, 
and tourist information centers were connected to form a trail called the Walk of Peace in 
the Upper Soča Region. At the same time, endeavors were also made to preserve remnants 
and to erect memorials to the First World War in southern parts of the Isonzo Front, either 
in Slovenia or in Italy.12 Following the example of the Walk of Peace trail in the Upper Soča 
Region, in 2010 the initiative was scaled up to the entire cross-border area from the Alps 
to the Adriatic, and it has been progressively implemented since then. The majority of the 
cross-border activities were carried out as part of two EU cross-border Interreg projects and 
some other (trans)national programs.13 In 2011, the foundation registered the trademark 
Pot miru (Eng. Walk of Peace).14
11 In 1973, he founded the cultural association Friends of the Dolomites (Germ. Dolomitenfreunde, Ital. 
Amici delle Dolomiti), which has been promoting restoration, preservation, and awareness-raising for 
the remnants and events of the First World War in the Dolomites. Available at: https://www.dolo-
mitenfreunde.at/home-it (accessed September 14, 2021).
12 For a more detailed overview of the actors involved, see Likar, Klavora 2015: 101 and http://www.
potmiru.si/eng/publications-and-articles (accessed May 5, 2020).
13 For more information on projects, see http://www.potmiru.si/slo/uspesni-razpisi (accessed January 
6, 2021). In 2020, the project Walk of Peace was the winner of the Interact project slam, available at: 
http://www.potmiru.si/eng/o-fundaciji/152-the-walk-of-peace-in-the-soa-region-foundation-awarded-
with-the-golden-apple-prize and https://euregionsweek2020-video.eu/video/interreg-30-years-project-
slam (accessed September 14, 2021).
14 See the Slovenian Intellectual Property Office’s database at http://www2.uil-sipo.si/ (accessed January 
7, 2021). In 2021 they plan to register it at the European Union Intellectual Property Office.
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In addition, several actors have been working to nominate the Walk of Peace for the 
UNESCO World Heritage List.15 The nomination, titled The Walk of Peace from the Alps 
to the Adriatic—Heritage of the First World War, was submitted to the UNESCO Tentative 
List in 2016.16 After that, the foundation sought to join the transnational nomination with 
France and Belgium, but all the efforts came to a halt because UNESCO formed an expert 
body to reconsider the nominations of difficult heritage based on wars and conflicts.17
Since 2000, the Walks of Peace in the Soča Region Foundation has managed to obtain 
support and involve actors at various levels and from different spheres. In addition to the 
Slovenian government, one of its main (financial) supporters,18 they have expert support from 
the Slovenian Cultural Heritage Protection Institute, the Slovenian Academy of Sciences 
and Arts Research Center (ZRC SAZU), and the Contemporary History Museum. At the 
local and regional level, it cooperates intensively with associations that bring together (re)
interpreters of the events and collectors of the remnants of the Isonzo Front,19 the municipali-
ties of Bovec (Ital. Plezzo), Kobarid (Ital. Caporetto), and Tolmin (Ital. Tolmino), regional 
development centers, the Kobarid Museum, the Tolmin Museum, the Nova Gorica Museum, 
local tourism societies, tourist information centers, and private collectors. After 2011, the 
Walk of Peace initiative also gained support from the local and regional government, expert 
institutions, associations, and private collectors in the southern part of the Isonzo Front in 
Slovenia20 and Italy.21 Since 2019, a representative from Italy, a former vice-president of the 
15 The idea was launched by Italy in 2014 with the aim of preparing a transnational serial nomination 
together with Slovenia and Austria, but it was not realized.
16 See the UNESCO World Heritage Tentative List at https://whc.unesco.org/en/tentativelists/6077/ 
(accessed January 7, 2021). The submission format was prepared and submitted by the Walks of Peace 
in the Soča Region Foundation; its preparation was coordinated by a historian and the vice president 
of the foundation’s management board, Petra Svoljšak, at the (ZRC SAZU) in close cooperation 
with the Ministry of Culture, the Slovenian Cultural Heritage Protection Institute, the Ministry of 
Defense, and external experts. The nomination was supported by twelve local municipalities.
17 See the ICOMOS discussion paper Evaluations of World Heritage Nominations related to Sites Associated 
with Memories of Recent Conflicts (2018), available at: https://www.icomos.org/images/DOCUMENTS/
World_Heritage/ICOMOS_Discussion_paper_Sites_associated_with_Memories_of_Recent_Conflicts.
pdf (accessed March 15, 2021).
18 Initially, the foundation was financially supported by seven ministries, and in the last decade by three 
ministries.
19 For example, the societies 1313, Peski, and Mengore.
20 The municipalities of Nova Gorica, Brda (Ital. Collio), Kanal ob Soči (Ital. Canale d’Isonzo), Šempeter–
Vrtojba (Ital. San Pietro-Vertoiba), Miren–Kostanjevica (Ital. Merna–Castagnevizza), and Renče–
Vogrsko (Ital. Ranziano-Voghersca); the Isonzo Front Society, the Temnica Caving Club Temnica, 
the 1. SVIT Tourism Society, and the Globočak Tourism and Recreation Society.
21 The Province of Gorizia was even a coordinator of the cross-border projects Pot miru / Via di Pace 
– Historic Trails of the First World War from the Alps to the Adriatic. The other Italian partners 
involved were the provinces of Trieste and Udine, the municipalities of Gorizia and Monfalcone (Sln. 
Tržič), the Mountain Community of Torre, Natisone, and Collio (Sln. Ter, Nadiža, Brda) and the 
Mountain Community of Gemona, Fella, and the Canale Valley (Sln. Humin, Bela, Kanalska dolina), 
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Province of Gorizia (Sln. Gorica), and a representative of the Slovenian minority in Italy 
have been members of the foundation’s managing board. According to the director, Maša 
Klavora, this is a step toward real joint cross-border governance. Despite this and the facts 
that the Province of Gorizia was the formal lead partner of the first cross-border project 
(Sln. Pot miru, Ital. Via di Pace), that Italy initiated the idea for the UNESCO nomination, 
and that many actors at different levels are involved in carrying out the initiative, we argue 
that the crucial ideator and operator has been the locally rooted foundation with many 
(cross-border) horizontal and vertical networks. These networks made possible simultaneous 
cooperation at the local, regional, and national scales, and also at the supranational level 
through the commemorations of the centenary of the First World War and with activities 
aiming to add the Walk of Peace to the UNESCO list.
The motivations and aims of the initial program and reasons for establishing the 
foundations can be condensed into 1) renovation and preservation of First World War 
heritage, 2) establishing a study center, and 3) developing tourism to create new jobs.22 In 
two decades, the initiative has outgrown its original motives and goals. Today, as stated in 
several sources and by various actors, it promotes the coexistence and reconciliation of the 
formerly hostile nations and the identity of the area, develops tourism in the (cross-border) 
area along the Soča River, and represents Slovenia at supranational commemorations of 
the centenary of the First World War. It has become a recognized brand, not only in the 
Soča region and in Slovenia, but also at a European level and, through its inclusion in 
the UNESCO Tentative List of World Heritage, at a global level. As a “palimpsest of a 
landscape of conflict” (Saunders et al., 2013), it has managed to bring together different 
modalities of remembering (antagonistic, agonistic, and cosmopolitan; Kravanja, 2021). 
Despite its heterotopic nature, as detailed by Boštjan Kravanja (2021), the “landscape on 
the move brings hope across the border and stands for renewal through new modes of land 
management” (Kozorog, 2019: 73).
and the Jezik–Lingua Target Temporary Association, see http://2007-2013.ita-slo.eu/projects/pro-
jects_2007_2013/2015060310130521 (accessed January 8, 2021). The strategic project Walk of Peace 
was joined by the Veneto region and its regional development association (Ital. GAL Venezia Oreintale), 
by the Friuli Venezia Giulia regional tourism organization (Ital. PromoTurismo FVG) and its institute 
for cultural heritage (Ital. ERPAC), and the Municipality of Ragogna, see http://new.ita-slo.eu/en/
walkofpeace (accessed January 8, 2021). The foundation also cooperated with the Provincial Museums 
of Gorizia: the Great War Museum.
22 Today it receives one-third of its funds from the government, one-third through commercial activi-
ties, and the remaining third through various European projects.
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THE BRDA/COLLIO/CUEI TRANSBOUNDARY TERRACED CULTURAL 
LANDSCAPE
The idea of the joint cross-border candidature23 for adding the cultural landscape of Goriška 
brda / Collio24 to the UNESCO Tentative List was born “during a discussion” between 
the mayor of the Municipality of Brda, Franc Mužič, and the former mayor of Dolegna 
del Collio (Sln. Dolenje), Diego Bernardi, in 2014. The same year, the first activities and 
networking started between the representatives of the local communities of Brda/Collio 
along the Slovenian–Italian border. The proposal to include the agricultural landscape 
with innovative land-management systems between the Soča and Idrija/Judrio rivers on 
the UNESCO World Heritage List was formally proposed by the Municipality of Dolegna 
del Collio. A category of cultural landscapes, as a heritage defined by UNESCO in 1992, 
acknowledges the need to recognize and protect the “combined works of man and nature.”25 
According to the initiators of the proposal, the Brda/Collio region succeeded in preserving 
its uniqueness in rural architecture, traditions, and agricultural activities (fruit and wine 
production in particular), together with the mixing of languages.26
The memorandum of understanding for the “project for the candidature for inclusion in 
the list of UNESCO World Cultural and Natural Heritage of the Italian/Slovenian Collio/
Brda” of April 18, 2015 was signed by the Italian Province of Gorizia, the Italian munici-
palities of Dolegna del Collio, Cormòns (Sln. Krmin), Capriva del Friuli (Sln. Koprivno), 
Mossa (Sln. Moš), Farra d’Isonzo (Sln. Fara), San Lorenzo Isontino (Sln. Šlovrenc), San 
Floriano del Collio (Sln. Števerjan), and Gorizia (Sln. Gorica), the Friuli Venezia Giulia 
Region (Sln. Furlanija Julijska krajina), the Cassa di Risparmio di Gorizia Foundation, 
the Chamber of Commerce of the Industrial and Agricultural Industry of Gorizia, and the 
Slovenian Municipality of Brda. A meeting was then held with UNESCO representatives 
23 Because the candidature’s preparatory committee kept the details of the application confidential until 
submission, this article predominantly relies on observation and reflection on the project activities 
and outcomes. Communication with the head of the Slovenian part of the preparatory committee, 
Tina Novak Samec (the director of the Brda Institute for Tourism, Culture, Youth and Sports, April 
28 and October 22, 2020, February 12, 2021) and with Francesco Marangon (the head of the Italian 
part of the committee, University of Udine, February 22 and 23, 2021) allowed some insight into 
the preparatory processes and acquaintance with limited content of the candidature.
24 The official title of the proposal, Brda/Collio/Cuei Transboundary Terraced Cultural Landscape, uses 
three names for the Gorizia Hills: Brda (as a common emic short form of the Slovenian geographical 
name Goriška brda, which we use in the rest of this article) on the Slovenian side of the border, and 
the Italian name Collio and the Friulian name Cuei for the Italian part of the territory.
25 The Operational Guidelines for the Implementation of the World Heritage Convention, available at: 
https://whc.unesco.org/en/guidelines/ (accessed March 16, 2021).
26 Giovanni Vale. 2018. Collio and Brda, together towards UNESCO. Osservatorio balcani e caucaso 
transeuropa, October 18, available at: https://www.balcanicaucaso.org/eng/Areas/Slovenia/Collio-
and-Brda-together-towards-UNESCO-190508 (accessed January 21, 2021)
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COLLECTIONS, WALKS, AND CULTURAL LANDSCAPES: SLOVENIAN–ITALIAN CROSS-BORDER HERITAGE ...
(Srebrnič, 2020: 21) of the Vineyard Landscape of Piedmont heritage site,27 a similar cul-
tural landscape that was added to the World Heritage List in 2014. After a few meetings 
to promote the project to the public and stakeholders, the memorandum was ratified in 
2016. Although there was only one partner from Slovenia, it was agreed that the proposal 
would be officially presented to UNESCO by Slovenia. This decision was based on the rule 
that each country can submit only one element per year and that, having fewer UNESCO 
proposals, it would be easier for the initiative to gain national support in Slovenia. The 
activities were very intense at the local level. In addition to the Italian municipalities of 
Dolegna del Collio and Cormòns ratifying the memorandum and establishing a promotion 
committee, steps were also made toward a joint Italian–Slovenian technical and scientific 
committee, composed of various experts in charge of the submission preparation. The 
Italian side worked to engage local and regional administration (e.g., the Friuli Venezia 
Giulia region) and associations (e.g., the UNESCO Club of Gorizia) to gain national expert 
support of ICOMOS.28 However, representatives of the Slovenian expert institution (i.e., 
the Nova Gorica regional unit of the the Slovenian Cultural Heritage Protection Institute29 
were not actively involved in the first steps of the preparation of the proposal.30 Despite this 
lack of Slovenian expert recognition at the national level, already in 2016 the initiative was 
included in the section “Slovenian cultural monuments and sites awaiting inscription on 
the Tentative List” of the publication Heritage in Slovenia and UNESCO prepared by the 
Slovenian Cultural Heritage Protection Institute, ICOMOS Slovenia, and the Office of 
the Slovenian National Commission for UNESCO (see Stokin, 2016: 70–73).
We assume that the heritage campaign of the local stakeholders also had the political 
support of the Friuli Venezia Gulia region and the two countries. In 2017, the Slovenian 
foreign minister provided assurances that the Slovenian government would take all necessary 
27 For more about the UNESCO heritage site Vineyard Landscape of Piedmont: Langhe-Roero and 
Monferrato, see https://whc.unesco.org/en/list/1390/documents/ (accessed April 9, 2021).
28 Unesco: Nasce il comitato per la candidatura del Collio/Brda. Il Friuli.it, December 18, 2016, avail-
able at: https://www.ilfriuli.it/articolo/cronaca/unesco-nasce-il-comitato-per-la-candidatura-del-
colliobrda-/2/161559 (accessed January 16, 2021); Unesco: Serracchiani, ok candidatura Collio ma 
valenza culturale. Regione Autonoma Friuli Venezia Giuliai, August 3rd, 2017, available at: https://
www.regione.fvg.it/rafvg/comunicati/comunicato.act;jsessionid=6DCFB0292888AAB70892D6F8
057703FA?dir=&nm=20170803153729001 (accessed April 15, 2021).
29 The Slovenian Cultural Heritage Protection Institute and the Slovenian Nature Conservation Institute 
follow the Strategy for the Protection of Cultural Heritage and Valuable Natural Features in the 
Republic of Slovenia (Strategija za varstvo kulturne dediščine in naravnih vrednot v Republiki Sloveniji 
v skladu z mednarodnimi pravnimi instrumenti in aktivnostmi no. 62000-3/2007/3, December 27, 
2007, available at: http://www.arhiv-spletisc.gov.si/, accessed April 5, 2021) and are responsible “for 
the preparation and establishment of the national tentative list, for entries on the tentative list, for 
cooperation with other countries at the expert level, for cooperation among groups, and for supervi-
sion of heritage” (Stokin, 2016: 12).
30 Mitja Marussig. 2015. Čezmejna Brda bi šla v Unesco. Primorske novice, November 30th, available at: 
http://www.primorske.si/novice/goriska/cezmejna-brda-bi-sla-v-unesco (accessed January 16, 2021).
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measures to add the cultural landscape of Brda/Collio to the UNESCO Tentative List.31 As 
seen above, the issue was that the Ministry of Culture had not been formally included in the 
activities at the local and locally demarcated cross-border level. It was only in January 2019 
that the Ministry of Culture and experts from the Slovenian Cultural Heritage Protection 
Institute reviewed material for the first time, with considerable time constraints. They 
considered it to be of a working nature and that it did not contain a sufficient measure of 
exceptional universal value required for the addition to the World Heritage List. The mate-
rial prepared did not fully comply with the UNESCO norms for assessment of outstanding 
universal value. There was another objection to the listing because the formally allowed quota 
for submission of proposals from Slovenia for 2019 and 2020 had already been reached.32
In 2019, the preliminary submission was delivered to the Italian National Commission 
for UNESCO (CNIU) and the Italian Ministry for Cultural Heritage and Activities and 
Tourism (MIBAC), which recommended changing the name; instead of Rural Landscape 
Collio (Ita) and Brda (Slo) between Isonzo and Judrio they proposed Brda/Collio/Cuei 
Transboundary Terraced Cultural Landscape (Srebrnič, 2020: 22). The stakeholders agreed to 
develop the project as required and strengthen the substantive reflection on the concept of 
the proposal and justify its potential. The Slovenian Ministry of Culture offered administra-
tive and professional assistance in the nomination process after a positive expert opinion.
The Italian Temporary Association of Purpose (ATS),33 established in January 2020 
to manage the various participating entities and the funds in a more coordinated way, and 
the Slovenian Municipality of Brda have been intensively working together since November 
2020. The technical and scientific committee—which is composed of various experts led 
by Tina Novak Samec at the Brda Institute for Tourism, Culture, Youth, and Sports on the 
Slovenian side and by Francesco Marangon from the University of Udine on the Italian 
side—has been preparing the submission focused on terraces34 as the main feature of the 
landscape in the region as advised by the CNIU and MIBAC (Srebrnič, 2020: 22). Only 
31 As stated in the parliamentary question by Branko Grims on February 27, 2019. Available at: https://
www.sds.si/novica/mag-branko-grims-zaradi-neodziva-vlade-brda-ne-bodo-uvrscena-na-seznam-
kulturne-dediscine (accessed January 23, 2021).
32 See the response by the Slovenian government to the parliamentary question on adding the Brda/
Collio cultural landscape to the UNESCO Tentative List, available at: https://www.sds.si/sites/default/
files/documents/odgovori-na-posl-vpr/Grims_Slovenija%20v%20UNESCU_280319.pdf (accessed 
January 23, 2021).
33 The ATS is led by the Friuli Venezia Giulia Chamber of Commerce and members of the Municipalities 
of Gorizia, Cormons, San Floriano del Collio, Mossa, Capriva del Friuli, Dolegna del Collio, Farra 
d’Isonzo, San Lorenzo Isontino, and Banca di Cividale and the Collio Wines Consortium, with sup-
port from the Friuli Venezia Giulia region.
34 Tanja Gomiršek, a historian and a member of the committee, emphasizes that archaeological excava-
tions have proven the existence of cultural terraces in Brda as early as in the third to fourth century 
AD (Gomiršek 2020: 1393–1394). The terraces were built manually following a specific process; see: 
Ambrož Sardoč. 2019. Z edinstveno krajino bi radi med elito. Goriška, April 12, available at: https://
www.primorske.si/2019/04/11/z-edinstveno-krajino-bi-radi-med-elito (accessed January 18, 2020).
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COLLECTIONS, WALKS, AND CULTURAL LANDSCAPES: SLOVENIAN–ITALIAN CROSS-BORDER HERITAGE ...
individual parts of the region would be included on the list, and so this would impose only 
minor restrictions on land use.
As stated by the head of the Italian part of the committee, Francesco Marangon, the 
primary purpose is to present “in one document the characteristics and to emphasize the 
particular features and uniqueness of the Brda and Collio terraces, even compared to other 
terraced agricultural arrangements in the world. All the insights will be used to protect 
the landscape, agricultural and technical heritage, to raise awareness and educate, to plan 
development accurately, to preserve settlements (urbanization), and to improve the quality 
of life of the inhabitants of the Collio and Brda territory.”35 Therefore, a cross-border per-
spective36 is central, although the habitual use of the designations “Brda and Collio” and 
not “Brda/Collio/Cuei” indicates that the unity of the landscape is not so internalized and 
familiarized as envisaged by its promotors, and that other interests might also be at stake.
THE COLLECTIONS, TRAIL, AND CULTURAL LANDSCAPE FROM A 
COMPARATIVE PERSPECTIVE
The three initiatives described, which are closely involved in heritage-making processes 
along the Slovenian–Italian border, differ significantly from each other at multiple levels. 
In the following comparative analysis, we discuss the actors and stakeholders involved, 
the objectives, longevity, and impact of each, and the cross-border perspective and scale.
ACTORS
The ZBORZBIRK initiative combined the Slovenian and Italian experts’ incentives with 
local collectors’ and stakeholders’ wishes. The Interreg project was designed according to 
the program’s rules and was implemented by two academic institutions, one cultural and 
educational institution, two museums, and six local communities.
The initial idea of the Walk of Peace was put forward by a non-local, but it was embraced 
by local enthusiasts, who were aware of the heritage potential of the First World War and 
Isonzo Front long before. In addition to local enthusiasts, the support of politicians and 
researchers at the national level was crucial for establishing the Walks of Peace in the Soča 
Region Foundation and the program for developing the heritage of the Isonzo Front. The 
foundation gained government financial support for carrying out the planned program’s 
activities, and it also became active in cross-border and transnational cooperation programs.
35 Personal correspondence with Francesco Marangon, February 23, 2021.
36 As reported in the media (Unesco, appello per la candidatura Brda/Collio, available at: https://www.
ilfriuli.it/articolo/politica/-unesco-appello-per-la-candidatura-brdacollio-/3/234171, accessed January 
21, 2021), these cross-border initiatives were recently stimulated by the success of the joint candida-
ture of Nova Gorica with Gorizia for the European Capital of Culture.
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ŠPELA LEDINEK LOZEJ AND MARJETA PISK
The initiators of the Brda/Collio initiative were the mayors of neighboring local com-
munities. Local administrations gained the support of local experts and the UNESCO clubs 
of the Friuli Venezia Giulia region. The Slovenian heritage expert institutions responsible 
for addition to the UNESCO list became involved in the nomination process only later.
AIMS
Although all three initiatives are embedded in the heritage discourse, their official and 
publicly communicated objectives somehow differ. In the ZBORZBIRK project, the ini-
tial aims of those involved ranged from folklore documentation and supporting grassroots 
collecting practices to developing cultural tourism and investments in infrastructure. The 
project results partially fulfilled all the initial expectations by providing a collection network 
with possible further potential.
The Walk of Peace initiative has sought to preserve and conserve various remnants 
of the Isonzo Front and to link their tourism development with synergies generated by the 
centenary of the First World War. The acquisition of heritage labels, in particular inclusion 
on the UNESCO World Heritage List and on the Council of Europe Cultural Routes, was 
viewed as a suitable means to achieve this.
In the case of the Walk of Peace, the long-term objectives are somehow in line with the 
purpose of the Convention Concerning the Protection of the World Cultural and Natural 
Heritage (1972); namely, the active and professional protection of cultural and natural 
heritage. In contrast, in the case of the Brda/Collio endeavors, the aim would primarily be 
promotional37 because the UNESCO World Heritage emblem is of great importance in 
tourism. The aspired inclusion on the prestigious UNESCO list would raise the profile 
of the region and have a decisive impact on the cross-border region’s joint branding and 
development of cultural tourism.
LONGEVITY AND IMPACT
After the formal conclusion of the three-year Interreg project, the ZBORZBIRK network 
of collections remained vital in the range of the project partners’ and stakeholders’ ordinary 
activities. Some collections were recognized as having significant tourism potential and were 
included in local tourism. Cross-border cooperation resulted in some further partnerships, 
collaboration, and joint activities in heritage. As with many projects co-financed by the 
European Regional Development Fund, it was difficult to ensure long-term sustainability. 
Therefore, not many substantial long-term impacts on borderlands were identified.
37 Ambrož Sardoč. 2019. Z edinstveno krajino bi radi med elito. Goriška, April 12. https://www.pri-
morske.si/2019/04/11/z-edinstveno-krajino-bi-radi-med-elito (accessed February 10, 2021).
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COLLECTIONS, WALKS, AND CULTURAL LANDSCAPES: SLOVENIAN–ITALIAN CROSS-BORDER HERITAGE ...
The Walk of Peace initiative gradually raised its profile at the local, national, and 
supranational levels, expanded its territorial coverage, and expanded its scope by taking 
on new heritage activities. This included registering the heritage of the Isonzo Front on 
other European heritage lists, such as Cultural Routes of the Council of Europe and the 
European Heritage Label for Holy Spirit Memorial Church in Javorca at the European 
Commission (Klavora, 2016: 136).38 The Walk of Peace is slowly becoming a brand that is 
recognized among locals and visitors, and, like other such sites and places of remembrance 
(cf. Balogh, 2019: 30), it is also a setting for various cultural exchange events and high-level 
political meetings.
On the other hand, the idea of adding the cross-border Brda/Collio cultural landscape 
to the UNESCO World Heritage List did not have a solid organizational backup outside 
this area, which led to a stalemate and a reformulation of the nomination process. Therefore, 
the negligible impact to date and the initiative’s longevity will depend on the success of the 
nomination process and inclusion in wider institutional networks.
THE CROSS-BORDER PERSPECTIVE
The cross-border perspective, which already opened during the accession negotiations and 
intensified after Slovenia’s accession to the EU, has been implemented differently and at 
different stages of the initiatives presented above.
ZBORZBIRK was based on both sides of the border, and a cross-border perspec-
tive was integrated into the Interreg project proposal, leading to a subsequent three-year 
heritage project. On the other hand, it was only later, as part of two Interreg projects, that 
the Walk of Peace developed its cross-border (and recently also transnational) dimension 
following the example of similar cross-border heritage routes and trails that are “renowned 
for their ability to bring about dialogue and interaction” (Balogh, 2019: 32). The cross-
border cooperation introduced a supranational perspective, recognized by UNESCO and 
awarded by the Council of Europe.
The ZBORZBIRK and Walk of Peace heritage initiatives received EU funds from the 
Slovenian–Italian cross-border cooperation program, which had an important influence 
on employment and implementing a cross-border perspective. In contrast, the Brda/Collio 
cultural landscape initiative did not receive any direct support from the EU.39
38 The listing of the church was achieved by the Tolmin Museum, Municipality of Tolmin, Soča Valley 
Tourist Board, Ministry of Culture, and Slovenian Cultural Heritage Protection Institute.
39 Here we do not take into consideration several other cross-border Interreg projects between the 
Municipality of Brda and some other actors from both sides of the border that, among other things, 
also have an impact on the cultural and terraced landscape. Examples include TRANSLAND 2007: 
Sustainable and Integrated Territorial Development of the Italian–Slovenian Cross-Border Area 
(2005–2007), VALORVINO: Enhancement of Wine as a Quality Product of the Cross-Border Area 
(2005–2007), UE-LI-JE: Olive Trees in the History, Landscape, and Economy of the Brda Area and 
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ŠPELA LEDINEK LOZEJ AND MARJETA PISK
The Brda/Collio initiative emphasizes a region’s unity after separation caused by a border 
regime after the Second World War. The cross-border perspective is therefore central but 
is questioned by some stakeholders,40 who emphasize that the UNESCO World Heritage 
List candidacy should not be the starting point, but instead the arrival of a real means of 
cross-border cooperation and innovative management of the territory. An important obstacle 
to the transboundary UNESCO candidacy is its dependence on one state party’s central 
governmental institutions when submitting a bilateral proposal.
SCALE
The concept of geographical scale indicates social and spatial organization within a bounded 
geographical area, usually labeled as size or level. In addition to this technical definition, 
there are more nuanced elaborations, such as scale as a hierarchy, instrument of power, 
process, or network (Lähdesmäki, Thomas, Zhu, 2019: 4–8).
The ZBORZBIRK network of collections was a cross-border project co-funded by 
European and national funds of Italy and Slovenia. Individual grassroots collecting prac-
tices and municipal heritage collections from both sides of the border were included in the 
cross-border network. The initiative’s span remained mostly locally bounded, even though 
two academic institutions outside this microregion were heavily involved.
On the other hand, the Walk of Peace has traversed a path from a local initiative—
first in the Upper Soča region and then in the entire (cross-border) Soča region from the 
Alps to the Karst Plateau and the Adriatic—of some (farsighted) enthusiasts to a nation-
ally recognized program supported by the Slovenian government and inclusion on the 
UNESCO Tentative List in 2016. Although it refers in the nomination to the heritage 
of humanity by instrumentalizing the multinational nature of the Isonzo Front, actively 
participating in the wider European and transnational commemoration of the First World 
War centenary, and even including an Italian representative on the management board, 
it remains nationally and locally anchored. Thus, the actors have managed to achieve 
multilevel instrumentalization of the Isonzo Front and have tried to consider and reconcile 
different perspectives.
Cooperation in the Brda/Collio heritage initiative is based on the joint endeavors of 
municipalities on both sides of the Italian–Slovenian border. In Italy, various regional 
administrations, heritage institutions, and clubs (e.g., UNESCO clubs and ICOMOS 
Northern Italy) of the Friuli Venezia Giulia region were involved, whereas in Slovenia the 
regional branch of the Slovenian Cultural Heritage Protection Institute was not actively 
on the Hills of Eastern Friuli: Conservation and Development (2006–2007), UE-LI-JE II Olive Oil: 
A Symbol of Quality in the Cross-Border Area (2011–2015), and so on.
40 For example, Facebook’s Progetto per Cormons, available at: https://www.facebook.com/
progettopercormons/?hc_ref=ARQGyjCfKWO_SIokYKK0i4OJZKV-tvPqOQ45RmuFSdGISSO
O6zcnkoXuJuuxgr6cC0A&fref=nf&__tn__=kC-R (accessed December 24, 2019).
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COLLECTIONS, WALKS, AND CULTURAL LANDSCAPES: SLOVENIAN–ITALIAN CROSS-BORDER HERITAGE ...
involved until recently. The initiative sought political support but did not have sufficient 
backing from authorized heritage administration and expert institutions at the national 
level until 2019.
CONCLUSIONS
Former UNESCO Director-General Irina Bokova stated that transboundary projects truly 
enhance the founding principles of the World Heritage Convention, which was designed 
to build peace through cultural cooperation and foster collective responsibility for shared 
heritage.41
Nevertheless, all three of the cross-border initiatives described, which identify and 
refer to this “common heritage,”42 are not equally consolidated—by which we mean, above 
all, robustness, longevity, and (general) recognition.
This recognition is not guaranteed by the aim and ambition of the project, as is 
shown by the Brda/Collio cultural/terraced landscape example: the ambition to list it on 
the UNESCO World Heritage List did not ensure the recognition of its heritage poten-
tials by the heritage institutions responsible for additions to the UNESCO list, nor did it 
guarantee a better profile and approval among the general public at the national level (not 
to mention the supranational level). Compared to the cultural landscape, collections and 
remnants of the First World War were much more easily perceived as heritage. The reason 
lies in the institutionalization and expert authorization of collecting as an authorized 
heritage(-making) practice, as well as in the materiality and tangibility of collected objects 
and remnants. Partially, it is also due to the events at the centenary of the First World War, 
which popularized and enhanced the profile of the remnants of the Isonzo Front.
Nor is the cross-border heritage initiative’s longevity ensured by EU funding for cross-
border cooperation, as is proven by the case study of the short-lived network of collections. 
In a “Europe of regions,” regions are envisaged and promoted not only as institutional 
structures, but also as strategic formations in planning and development agendas, and 
cross-border regionalization has become a laboratory to test the integration process. 
By forging two (or more) border areas of different states, cross-border cooperation 
programmes with regional and local actors (institutional and non-institutional; 
public and private) engage in development strategies where the national states 
are not the main political space or agency. (Lois, 2019: 83)
41 Transboundary Cooperation for Conservation of World Heritage: A Global View. Expert Meeting 3–4 
June 2019 Maun, Botswana, available at: https://whc.unesco.org/ (accessed March 19, 2021).
42 On “shared” and “common” heritage in UNESCO discourse, see Debarbieux et al., 2021.
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On the other hand, as shown by the case studies presented by Tatiana Bajuk Senčar 
(2019), the primary motivation for securing EU funding is often to compensate for the 
lack of financial resources from national budgets, which in this case is defined according 
to non-inclusion in authorized heritage programs financed at the national level.43
The main challenge to the similarity and complementarity of collecting practices, 
identified by the ZBORZBIRK project on both sides of the border, was not language 
(and other cultural) differences, but establishing a real (local) cross-border joint structure 
that will incorporate two different national or regional administrations, legislations, and 
funding systems. The EU’s formal solution to such problems is the European Grouping of 
Territorial Cooperation (EGTC), which was established for Italian–Slovenian border areas 
in 2010 by the municipalities of Gorizia (Italy), and Nova Gorica and Šempeter-Vrtojba 
(Slovenia)44 and is substantially supported through various (cross-border) instruments.45 
However, as the Brda/Collio initiative to nominate a (terraced) cultural landscape for the 
UNESCO list shows, even in the case of successful administrative cross-border coopera-
tion, transboundary heritage-making is reduced to (only possibly expert) representatives 
of local communities employed or engaged by the local administration. They (re)present 
views and understandings of cultural heritage authorized by local administrations. Every 
local community has its locally authorized heritage discourse and its representatives with 
symbolic and social capital, gained by heritage brokerage. As determined by Mateja Habinc 
in the Pivka (Ital. San Pietro del Carso) region, they are subordinated to the expert or politi-
cal understanding of heritage and rarely create new, alternative forms of heritage(-making) 
(Habinc, 2020: 79).46 Because this expert and political understanding is conceptualized 
at the (inter)national level, it is actually through locally authorized heritage brokers that 
(inter)national heritage policy is downscaled.
Our scrutiny also shows the overlap between heritage and tourism brands. Much has 
been said about the UNESCO heritage lists and tourism promotion (cf. Winter, 2010); these 
are universally acknowledged as major motives for inclusion because countries nominate 
cultural and natural heritage sites and traditional practices for the UNESCO lists to attract 
43 EU cross-border cooperation funding programs are meant to encourage initiatives that transcend 
national boundaries, but some specialists in the anthropology of EU borders “argue that existing 
bordering (and debordering) practices have resulted in the proliferation of borders as opposed to their 
reduction” (Donnan, Wilson 2003; Green, 2013, cited in Bajuk Senčar, 2019: 215).
44 The Convention on the Establishment of the EGTC was signed by the mayors of the three founding 
municipalities on February 19, 2010, and it was approved by the Slovenian government the same year 
and by the Italian government a year later. The EGTC was registered as a legal entity on September 
15, 2011. See https://euro-go.eu/en/chi-siamo/storia-del-territorio-e-del-gect/ (accessed April 6, 2021).
45 It leads predominantly large infrastructural projects, but lately it has also been in charge of the coor-
dination of the Bid Book for the European Capital of Culture in 2025 by Nova Gorica with Gorizia. 
See https://www.go2025.eu/ (accessed April 6, 2021).
46 As David Harvey warns, “we should understand the spatialized geometries of power rather than be 
blinded by any warming glow of localness” (Harvey, 2015: 589).
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COLLECTIONS, WALKS, AND CULTURAL LANDSCAPES: SLOVENIAN–ITALIAN CROSS-BORDER HERITAGE ...
tourists (cf. Tschofen, 2007; Di Giovine, 2009; Halfstein, 2018). Heritage and tourism are 
collaborative, as Barbara Kirshenblatt-Gimblett (1998: 15) has suggested: “heritage convert-
ing locations into destinations and tourism making them economically viable as exhibits 
of themselves.” These ambitions are evident from the Brda/Collio and Walk of Peace case 
study. Nevertheless, UNESCO World Heritage is primarily a heritage brand (Di Giovine, 
2015: 93)—in fact, a heritage brand “through which it is possible to influence national and 
international heritage policy,” as highlighted by Kravanja (2018a: 118) for the heritage of 
the Isonzo Front. On the other hand, one can also see that current place branding tactics 
employ several resources at hand. This anticipation of contradictory futures is, for example, 
evident from the projects of the Municipality of Brda, which is simultaneously striving to 
build a new spa resort47 that will substantially alter the landscape’s dominant features and 
to achieve recognition and preservation of its heritage value.
However, heritage is not only employed as an economic resource, but also as a redoubt-
able resource for emancipation, empowerment, social cohesion, devolution, and scalar 
politics (see, e.g., Hafstein, 2004; Adell et al., 2015; Harvey, 2015).
Based on the case study of the Walk of Peace, we assume that the number and sectoral 
diversity of mobilized stakeholders at the local level, as well as complementary recogni-
tion and support at the national level, are a guarantee for the longevity and robustness of 
the heritage initiative. In the long-term heritage-making perspective, EU projects funded 
through European transnational cooperation are short-lived if they are not embedded in 
long-term national strategies. At the same time, supranational mechanisms, such as the 
European Heritage Label48 and the UNESCO lists, are heritage promoters, which cannot 
be realized without the support of the (national) state parties. Despite several cross-border 
projects and supranational ambitions, key long-term heritage actions are still carried out 
within the national framework.
The comparison showed that locally born heritage initiatives, supported by cross-
border cooperation and driven by supranational ambitions, are successful (in the sense of 
long-term robustness) only in the case of national support. It is national support that makes 
possible regular (co)funding, access to EU funds, and, as in the case of the UNESCO 
state parties, addition to its lists. The lack of recognition as nationally significant cultural 
heritage reduces the possibility of overcoming bureaucratic obstacles. It was precisely the 
dilemma in identifying the Brda/Collio landscape as a cultural heritage site at the national 
level—be it Italian or Slovenian—that was, as the nomination process so far suggests, the 
decisive factor that stifled the initial momentum of the Brda/Collio mayors. The rhetoric of 
a “Europe of the Regions” and the instruments of European Territorial Cooperation that 
47 See the presentation of the project on the municipality’s website, available at: https://www.obcina-
brda.si/obcina_brda/novice/2020011017000888/ (accessed April 6, 2021).
48 As determined by Lähdesmäki and Mäkinen (2020: 46), the reading and interpretation of some of 
the most symbolic sites awarded the European Heritage label is still to a very large extent a national 
reading, even though they aim at building European communality and feeling of belonging.
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frame cross-border projects turned out to be more or less transient inasmuch as they are 
not embedded in national strategies, as occurred with the network of collections.
Currently the Walk of Peace initiative seems to be the most vital, not only in terms of 
the number of stakeholders and sectors involved, but also in terms of multi-level balancing, 
or rather in terms of scaling up the local initiative to the national level and scaling down 
and embedding the rhetoric of peace and multinational character of the Isonzo Front at the 
local level. These intelligent and sensitive understandings of scalar politics, through which 
power geometries operate (Harvey, 2015; Harvey, Mozaffari, 2019), or multi-scalarity, mean 
that different layers of heritage meanings are activated in certain discourses, policies, and 
practices at different scales. They can thus be used to foster different scalar identities or 
feelings of belonging to communities organized at different scales (Lähdesmäki, Thomas, 
Zhu, 2019: 3).
The Walk of Peace trail has already outgrown the initial phase and has become, as 
evidenced by the eponymous foundation, an institution for “contemporary pragmatic 
heritage management, coordinated with national and wider policies, with experts, with 
tourism and economic use of heritage, as well as with what can be expected from ‘difficult’ 
heritage and general heritage futures” (Kravanja, 2018a: 107). Compared to the centrality 
of the cross-border perspective of the EU project on the network of collections and local 
municipalities’ nomination, the Walk of Peace initiative is more far-sighted and, in its 
balancing of scales and amalgamation of enthusiasm and pragmatism, the cross-border 
dimension seems quite ephemeral.
Therefore, we can confirm the introductory statement that cross-border heritage initia-
tives do not make such a significant contribution to symbolic debordering as envisaged by 
the EU’s (macro)regional strategies and territorial cooperation programs and that—despite 
global cultural flows, cultural hybridity and movements of people, numerous cross-border 
initiatives, and constant questioning of consensual heritage narratives—heritage might 
be initiated and operationalized at local and cross-border levels. However, in order to be 
effective in the long term, it also has to be conceived at the national level. The national 
framework functions as the most common scalar level in promoting communal meanings 
of heritage (Graham, Ashworth, Tunbridge, 2000: 259). Thus, the national framework has 
played (and still commonly plays) a central role in dominant heritage discourses and the 
management of heritage (Lähdesmäki, Thomas, Zhu, 2019: 10). Heritage discourses and 
the management of heritage, which are predominantly arranged along a hierarchy of spatial 
scales, reveal that scale is not just a relational construct but also an instrument of power, 
making possible or even (re)producing uneven power relations. Top-down administrative 
systems “have been established to reinforce heritage governance at ‘lower’ scales” (ibid.: 6). 
International heritage policies are still enacted and put into practice by countries and their 
national heritage actors at the national level (Bendix, Eggert, Peselmann, 2012). As a result, 
the processes of heritage-making are influenced and manipulated by discourses produced at 
the “higher” scales of power. The local heritage actors are those that in practice implement 
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these processes. However, in the initiatives described above, we have also evidenced a sig-
nificant up-scaling or, rather, a constant movement from local to regional, cross-border, 
national, and transnational, and back to local; for example, the Walk of Peace initiative 
becoming the main national and transnational setting at the centenary of the first World 
War. In this regard, as clearly stated in all of the heritage initiatives described above, cross-
border cooperation presents opportunities for supranational alliances and, as is most appar-
ent from the Brda/Collio example, empowers local actors for up-scaling its influence at the 
national level. Heritage(-making) productively traverses the scales; whereas the network of 
collections was a balanced implementation of cross-border heritage work in the EU project 
framework, the other two initiatives are more ambitious. So far, the Walk of Peace has 
shown artful maneuvering between private and public, inclusive amalgamation of diverse 
sectors (tourism, research, the economy, culture, and heritage preservation), pragmatic 
balancing between (transnational, cross-border, and regional) enlargement and integration 
into the local environment, and successful instrumentalization of diverse scales. In the case 
of the Brda/Collio initiative for the terraced cultural landscape, time will reveal its eventual 
potential for more open-ended, inclusive, and progressive (cross-border) heritage-making.
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ZBIRKE, POTI IN KULTURNE KRAJINE:
SLOVENSKO-ITALIJANSKE ČEZMEJNE DEDIŠČINSKE POBUDE
V prispevku so na podlagi raznovrstnega gradiva, etnografije obmejnih območij in aktivnega 
sodelovanja predstavljene tri študije primerov slovensko-italijanskih čezmejnih dediščinskih 
pobud: mreža zbirk, pot, ki povezuje ostaline in spomenike prve svetovne vojne, in terasirana 
kulturna (po)krajina. 
Čezmejni projekt ZBORZBIRK je povezal 34 zbirk z italijansko-slovenskega obmejnega 
območja v mrežo, ki je združila zbiralce, lokalne skupnosti in strokovnjake različnih ved. Pot 
miru povezuje zapuščino in spomenike soške fronte v Sloveniji in Italiji; Fundacija Poti miru 
v Posočju jo je v sodelovanju s partnerji na različnih ravneh oblikovala v okviru več (nad)
nacionalnih, čezmejnih in lokalnih projektov ter pripravila predlog nominacije za Unescov 
seznam svetovne dediščine. Občine ob slovensko-italijanski meji na območju Goriških brd 
si prav tako prizadevajo za predložitev nominacije kulturne (po)krajine na Unescov seznam 
svetovne dediščine. 
V članku so predstavljena presečišča in razlike med obravnavanimi dediščinskimi pobudami, 
in sicer glede na akterje, cilje, dolgoživost in vpliv opravljenih aktivnosti, njihov čezmejni značaj 
in raven oz. doseg. 
Interregov projekt ZBORZBIRK so izvajali različni partnerji na obeh straneh meje, in 
sicer dve akademski ustanovi, kulturno-izobraževalna ustanova, dva muzeja in šest lokalnih 
skupnosti. Projekt Pot miru, za katerega so izhodiščno idejo dobili pri primerljivih pobudah 
v soseščini, je v Posočju zasnovalo več lokalnih pobudnikov, z vsestransko podporo politike in 
strokovnjakov na nacionalni ravni pa ga je z različnimi projekti in programi ter v sodelovanju 
s številnimi partnerji na različnih ravneh na obeh straneh meje uresničila Ustanova Fundacija 
Poti miru v Posočju. Pobudniki pobude vpisa briške (po)krajine na Unescov seznam svetovne 
dediščine so bili briški župani, ki so pridobili podporo lokalnih strokovnjakov, deželne vlade 
Furlanije Julijske krajine in tamkajšnjih Unescovih klubov. Slovenske dediščinske ustanove na 
nacionalni ravni, odgovorne za pripravo in predložitev, so se v postopek vključile šele pozneje.
Čeprav so vse tri pobude del širših dediščinskih procesov, se njihovi primarni cilji razlikujejo. 
Pri projektu ZBORZBIRK so sledili interesom različnih partnerjev, od dokumentacije folklore, 
popisa zbirk in predmetov, do podpore zbirateljem ter razvoja kulturnega turizma. V projektu 
Pot miru so želeli ohraniti ostaline soške fronte in spomenike prve svetovne vojne kot značilen 
dediščinski in turistični produkt, namenjen nadnacionalnemu povezovanju in promociji ideje 
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miru. Prizadevanje briških občin za vpis na Unescov seznam svetovne dediščine pa motivira 
turistična promocija čezmejnega območja. 
Vse tri dediščinske pobude so čezmejne, vendar v različni meri. ZBORZBIRK so zasnovali 
partnerji z obeh strani meje, čezmejna perspektiva je bila sestavni del projektnega predloga 
in izvedbe. Pot miru je šele v okviru projektov Interreg dosegla čezmejno (in v zadnjem času 
tudi nadnacionalno) razsežnost. Medtem ko sta omenjeni pobudi prejeli finančna sredstva iz 
evropskega programa čezmejnega sodelovanja med Italijo in Slovenijo, jih briška prizadevanja 
za vpis kulturne krajine na Unescov seznam (zaenkrat) še niso bila deležna. In to kljub temu, 
da dosledno poudarjajo pokrajinsko enotnost območja, ne glede na razmejitev po 2. svetovni 
vojni. Prav tako do nedavnega niso bila priznana na nacionalni ravni, kar je nekoliko ustavilo 
začetni zagon pri promociji predloga čezmejne nominacije.
Pobude se razlikujejo tudi po obsegu in ravni vpetih akterjev. Mreža zbirk je kljub 
čezmejnosti ter večravninskosti partnerjev ostala lokalno omejena pobuda. Na drugi strani 
pa je Pot miru prerasla lokalne okvire, postala (čezmejna) regionalno in nacionalno poznana 
znamka, z vključitvijo na Unescov poskusni seznam svetovne dediščine in pridobitvijo znaka 
evropske kulturne dediščine pa tudi nadnacionalno. Medtem ko so pobudo po graditvi in 
promociji skupne briške terasaste pokrajine na italijanski strani podprli na več ravneh in v 
različnih ustanovah, so do nje na slovenski strani strokovne ustanove in upravni organi na 
nacionalni ravni (zaenkrat) zadržani. 
V sklepu avtorici ugotavljata, da opisane pobude načelno sledijo evropskemu vodilu k 
premoščanju in zabrisovanju nacionalnih mej, za dolgoživost in prebojnost pa sta še vedno 
najpomembnejša priznanje in podpora na državni ravni. 
Assist. Prof. Dr. Špela Ledinek Lozej, ZRC SAZU, Institute of Slovenian Ethnology, Ljubljana,  
spela.ledinek@zrc-sazu.si
Dr. Marjeta Pisk, ZRC SAZU, Institute of Ethnomusicology, Ljubljana, marjeta.pisk@zrc-sazu.si
The authors acknowledge financial support from the Slovenian Research Agency, research core 
funding Heritage on the Margins (no. P5-0408).