Unesco

Updated for 2010, this guide fully describes every official UNESCO World Heritage site.

In 1959, UNESCO launched an international campaign to safeguard the world's most important sites, which led to the first World Heritage List. In clear text that highlights all the fascinating facts, this revised edition of World Heritage Sites details all 890 properties, including the 13 new sites added in 2009.

Covering 148 countries, the World Heritage List has proved to be a valuable tool in the battle to preserve much of the world's cultural and natural heritage. Its strict criteria result in only the world's most spectacular and extraordinary sites making it onto the list, including:

• The Statue of Liberty in New York
• The Rideau Canal in eastern Ontario
• Waterton Glacier International Peace Park, the world's first international peace park, which straddles the US-Canada border
• The ancient Nabataean city of Petra in Jordan
• The remarkable Dazu Rock Carvings in China
• Cahokia Mounds State Historic Site in Missouri, the largest pre- Columbian settlement north of Mexico
• The unique ecosystem of the Serengeti in Tanzania

The new sites added to this edition are:

• Stoclet House in Belgium
• The Ruins of Loropeni in Burkina Faso
• Cidade Velha, the historic center of Ribeira Grande, in Cape Verde
• Mount Wutai in China
• Shushtar, a historic hydraulic system in Iran
• The Dolomites in Italy
• The royal tombs of the Joseon Dynasty in South Korea
• Sulamain-Too Sacred Mountain in Kyrgyzstan
• The Wadden Sea in Germany and the Netherlands
• The Sacred City of Caral-Supe in Peru
• The Tower of Hercules in Spain
• La Chaux-de-Fonds and le Locle, historic centers of watch-making and town-planning in Switzerland Pontcysyllte Aqueduct and Canal in the United Kingdom

Featuring gorgeous photographs and updated maps, World Heritage Sites is uniquely comprehensive.

The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) was founded in 1945 with the ambitious goal to build peace in the minds of men and women through education, social and natural science, culture and communication.

"No school, public, or academic library could go wrong including the very affordable World Heritage Sites in both reference and circulating collections." -- Booklist

In 1959, UNESCO launched an international campaign to safeguard the world's most important sites, which led to the first World Heritage List. This new edition includes the 21 brand-new sites, such as:

• The first capital of the Saudi dynasty
• Colonial-period convict sites in Australia
• Bikini Atoll
• Important commercial centers on the Silver Route and the Silk Road in Iran
• Subtropical rain forests and cloud forests in Réunion National Park
• A major reindeer migration route across the Arctic
• An 18th-century astronomical observation site in India

The 911 sites are found in 151 countries across the globe, and strict criteria assures that only the most spectacular and extraordinary sites make it onto the list. Many are familiar, such as the Great Barrier Reef, the Great Wall of China and Mount Kilimanjaro, and many are less known but equally important, including Sweden's Engelsberg ironworks and the Sewell Mining Town in Chile. The United States and Canada together boast 36 sites, including the Statue of Liberty, the Mammoth Caves, Dinosaur Provincial Park, Historic Quebec and Everglades National Park, recently added to the World Heritage List of Sites in Danger.

Featuring gorgeous photographs and updated maps, World Heritage Sites is a uniquely comprehensive and valuable resource to the world's most important historical and natural treasures.

By: Michael Bright.

By: Julian Huxley.

By: J.P. Singh.

This book traces the history of UNESCO from its foundational idealism to its current stature as the preeminent international organization for science, education, and culture, building a well rounded understanding of this important organization.

The book:

• provides an overview of the organization and its institutional architecture in the context of its humanistic idealism
• details the subsequent challenges UNESCO faced through cold war and power politics, global dependence and interdependence, and the rise of identity and culture in global politics
• analyses the functioning of UNESCO administration, finance, and its various constituencies including the secretariat, member-states, and civil society
• explores the major controversies and issues underlying the initiatives in education, sciences, culture and communication
• examines the current agenda and future challenges through three major issues in UNESCO: Education or All, digital divide issues, and norms on cultural diversity
• assesses the role of UNESCO in making norms in complex world of multiple actors and intersecting issue-areas.

Reflecting on UNESCO’s vision, its everyday practices, and future challenges; this work is an essential resource for students and scholars of international relations and international organizations.

By: Di Michael A. Giovine.

By: Ellen McClay.

By: Richard Hoggart.

An Idea and Its Servants is a book from the alternative, parallel universe of UNESCO. That universe can be found in the original architects’ renderings of the UN complex as it was being designed and built. The images give impressions of mission, concentration, and important things being decided. Richard Hoggart was assistant director-general from 1971 to 1975 and reflects that epoch in this work; he also describes how UNESCO’s mission became side-tracked by politics.

Hoggart offers both idealism and accuracy when he reports what actually happens inside the UNESCO Secretariat. Readers may shrink from discussion of its bureaucracy, for the obvious reason that bureaucratic life is frequently mind-numbing. Hoggart reports that UNESCO’s secretariat is hopeless, observing that, "…bad practices within the Secretariat are very bad indeed…." and that it has "…an atmosphere too much shot through with petty or large dishonesties."

Hoggart’s experiences remain relevant to our contemporary understanding of the world of multilateral organiations. While he reflects an earlier era in United Nations’ history, the book is also a reminder that agencies, like individuals, are not eternal. They are subject to ideology, nationalism, and sheer logrolling. Hoggart examines all of this with a clear-eyed insider perspective. John Bolton’s new introduction shows that the more one understands the insides of these entities, the less faith one can have that there is a long-term future in entrusting the affairs of human governance to them. Hoggart permits the reader to enjoy the talent of a great essayist and public servant, while Bolton tells us why we should remain properly skeptical of UNESCO in the twenty-first century.

By: B. A. Ogot.