Conservation & Exploitation: Governance and Sustainability Issues in Lijiang Cases

Abstract

This paper is based on a field research on the management of Unesco “World Heritage” sites in China (Wang & Zan, 2010). The aim was investigating the impacts of getting listed for individual Chinese sites: what the changes on professional aspects (conservation and presentation first of all); in term of visitors (numbers, profile, behaviours); in economic terms (investment costs for fulfilling the procedure and coping with standards; additional revenue and costs after being listed); and more in general in terms of ‘pros/cons.’