Unfolding the Incidental Process: Nominations Contested in the UNESCO Memory of the World Programme

Abstract This paper aims to analyze the impact of the Incidental Process activated during the UNESCO Memory of the World (MOW) 2022/23 nomination cycle and the Memory of the World Regional Committee for Asia and the Pacific (MOWCAP) 2021/22 nomination cycle. The Incidental Process is a mechanism that allows a Member State to contest nominations submitted by other Member States in the inscription process of the MOW Register. Japan became the first Member State to initiate the Incidental Process in 2022, contesting five nominations submitted by Korea and China. Japan’s initiative, seemingly part of its decade-long campaign, concentrated on identifying the elements in the nominated documents that would evoke the image of perpetrators and removing them from inscription. However, the MOW and MOWCAP responded in different ways to the contestation, which highlighted several contentious issues that were not effectively addressed by the General Guidelines. Furthermore, the disputes surrounding Japan’s contestation revealed the institutional weakness of the International Advisory Committee (IAC), the main operational body of the program. This paper, after examining the extraordinary situations that arose during the MOW and MOWCAP inscription process, attempts to identify the origin of the contentious issues and suggests the need to implement the provisions of the Incidental Process for the future operation of the MOW.