The word governance in social sciences draws attention to the many possibilities of overcoming the conventional “anarchy” in the international system, by introducing mechanisms for the creation of a certain amount of political order in the world system.
This raises issues that range from the material allocation of material resources, to environment protection, wealth production and distribution, labour laws and their evenness/unevenness across the world, security and peace issues, human rights and, in general, governance for development.
At the level of politics, it raises the crucial issue of power and authority, their origin and agents having to be considered. Cosmopolitanism versus communitarianim can be addressed also from this point of view (or from a more philosophically inspired viewpoint: universalism versus relativism).
Thus, ideas on politics and on how to govern the world, in a context of globalisation, encompassing notably ideologies, political regimes are soft law arrangements, are crucial for the understanding of politics as common heritage of humanity.
Furthemore, policies on heritage, as part of much larger politic context, might also be addressed under this topic, enhancing the significance of political decisions and policies for heritage preservation and meaning under the framework of Sustainable Development.

Sustainable Development became a keyword in late Modernity and Postmodernity.
One of the pillars for sustainability is the people, not only as individuals but as groups and communities, capable of producing cultural expressions of their inner dynamics, both of an immaterial and of a material nature.
Thus, peoples’ capacity for aggregating, translated into groups, communities, societies, institutions and organisations, civil society and social movements and the ways in which these patterns percolate across the world are very much at the core of the creation of  both the common heritage of humanity and specifities and localisms.
Social meanings and uses of heritage are to be addressed under this topic, enhancing the social importance of heritage as references and keyfactors for social cohesion and development.
Demographic issues (from birth policies to euthanasia and migration) are also part of this panel, in the sense that the bodies and underlying cultures are also part of a common heritage, which the concept of human development so well expresses.

As a pillar of Sustainable Development, Environmental issues play a key role on the preservation of our global ecological system. Environmental approaches are facing both nature conservation and environmental degradation such as resources, energy and waste management.
These environmental concerns are addressed in this topic by analysing relationships between both natural and built heritage and environmental key aspects.
At the natural heritage level, the following issues are suggested for consideration: natural heritage and environmental degradation, such as climate change, natural disasters, pollution, and depletion of species; management of natural heritage areas regarding accessibility, and impacts from visitors.
At the built heritage level, the following issues are suggested for consideration: energy efficiency strategies in building and historic districts renewal; waste management from historic buildings renewal; policies for historic districts and protection areas of monuments, such as pollution reduction and low impact mobility.

Culture is often mentioned as one of the pillars for Sustainable Development, in fact as the forth pillar, alongside with Environment, Economics and Society.
Heritage 2012, following the path established by the previous Conferences, will welcome papers that address Cultural Heritage as a primary issue for Sustainable Development.
Under this topic Authors are invited to submit papers on recent research work - both theoretical and/or applied - where Heritage and Cultural issues, and their interrelationship, are the the focus of discussion.
In this sense, Cultural embraces a number of fundamental questions in present days communities, such us heritage preservation, heritage exhibition, heritage publication and heritage uses.
For this topic papers on material heritage and on intangible heritage will be accepted, since they focus on the central theme of this Conference: Heritage and Sustainable Development.

Despite not being considered per se as one of the main pillars for Sustainable Development, Education is in the centre of a major discussion on what concerns present days sustainable development.
In fact, education can be perceived as a fundamental instrument preparing future generations for sustainable solutions and decisions; education can also be addressed as the only possible way to invert some of the wrong paths humankind has been choosing for the last decades and that are definitively risking the sustainability of the whole planet.
As such, papers addressing education as one of the ways to use and preserve heritage, contributing for Sustainable Development, will be welcome in this Conference. Under this topic papers may address education as a theoretical issue or present case-studies, both on what concerns formal and non-formal education.

HERITAGE 2012 introduces a Special Chapter embrancing issues related with preservation of historic buildings.
Papers submitted under this topic shluld address questions regarding historic buildings preservation, rehabilitation, adaptive reuse, maintenance, and as well questions related with sustainable use of historic constructions.
Approaches to historic buildings preservation may considerer the whole building or structure, as well significant aspects such as materials conservation and repair, monitorisation of structures and materials decay, among others.
Approaches considering sustainable key aspects, such as energy efficiency in historical buildings, are also welcomed.
Case studies on this topic are also accepted.