Remaking the ‘World’ in the World Heritage List: International Organisations, Settler Colonialism, and Architectural Preservation in Brasilia

Abstract

This article explores the entanglements of settler colonialism with the integration of the 20th century-built environment onto the UNESCO World Heritage List by focusing on architectural preservation in Brasilia. The addition of Brasilia to the World Heritage List in 1987 was the realisation of a longstanding effort to enhance institutional legitimacy by expanding the representation of 20th century sites in geographies from the Global South. However, I argue that the addition of the pilot plan as Brasilia implicated both the World Heritage Committee and purveyors of Brasilia’s significance to architectural history in circumscribing the pilot plan from surrounding urban fabric. This argument is advanced by drawing on settler colonial studies, architectural history, architectural preservation, histories of Brasilia, and meeting notes from the World Heritage Committee. The article concludes that the preservation of the pilot plan as Brasilia 1) legitimates of spatial fragmentation in Brasilia through architectural history, 2) shows how settler colonialism is constitutive of the legitimacy of the World Heritage List, and 3) illustrates how international organisations have the potential to serve as vehicles for the reproduction of the logic elimination and the consolidation of settler spatial control.