ECONOMICS UNIQUENESS

ECONOMIC VALUATION OF CULTURAL HERITAGE ■ 83
in economics. Th e methodology to take account of various—priced and unpriced,
direct, and indirect—eff ects is clearly not straightforward. One may broadly
distinguish three major assessment classes for cultural assets: (1) performance
indicators analysis, (2) monetary analysis, and (3) decision support analysis.
Performance indicators analysis is a method that stems from the management
literature and takes for granted that cultural heritage may be viewed, in the same
way that a corporate organization is as an entity that may have to be judged on the
basis of a set of predefi ned performance indicators. Th ese indicators may refer to
heritage quality indices, conservation or rehabilitation risks, natural landscape
conditions (using aerial photography, for instance), architectural identity, accessibility,
integration into the urban fabric, uniqueness of historic districts, and so
on. Methods used in this context, to obtain a systemic comparative framework
are benchmark techniques and balance-scorecard techniques.
Monetary analysis method has its origin in the applied welfare theory; it is
based on the assumption that public policy serves to improve national welfare.
To achieve this measure, public expenditures are to be made, but these expenditures
are not aimed for general purposes but for specifi c goods and services in
the framework of designated plans or projects. Th us, all cost components have to
be measured as accurately as possible. Furthermore, the aim of national welfare is
very broad and needs to be more focused, as usually not all individuals, groups,
or regions in society will benefi t to the same extent from a plan or project. Hence,
plans or projects have to be evaluated with a view to their foreseeable impact on
diff erent groups or regions in a society; consequently, measurements of costs, of
benefi ts, and of distributive eff ects are necessary.
Th e conventional economic evaluation of cultural heritage usually fi nds its
origin in the notion of consumer surplus, by way of incorporating the so-called
travel cost method. Th is consumer surplus represents the consumer’s fi nancial
sacrifi ces—represented in terms of distance a visitor is willing to travel and time
he is willing to devote, the so-called willingness to pay minus the actual costs of
a visit. Usual research methods used to assess this willingness to pay are, among
others, based on survey techniques and interviews. A major problem in this case is
the specifi cation of a demand function, because of heterogeneity among individual
users, the importance of remaining (omitted) explanatory variables, synergetic
eff ects caused by other recreation users (congestion, for example), the evaluation
of time (or time preference), and the intangible nature of cultural heritage.
Finally, the decision support analysis method is based on an operations
research type of approach. Th is strand of literature rests on the proposition
that cultural heritage has multiple use dimensions and that its societal signifi -
cance is hard to translate in a single and unambiguous common denominator
such as a monetary dimension. Examples in practical valuation exercises can be
found in community impact analysis (Lichfi eld 1989) and multicriteria analysis