First published in 1987, The Heritage Industry sets out to protect the present and the future of life in Britain from their most dangerous enemy: a creeping takeover by the past.The author sets today’s obsession with yesterday in the context of a climate of social and political decline.The economic uncertainties and cultural convulsions of post-war life have made the past seem a pleasanter and safer place.But how true is that image of the past, and whose past is it, anyway?Hewison questions the way institutions like the National Trust are helping to create a past that never was.While the real economy crumbles, a new force is taking over: the Heritage Industry, a movement dedicated to turning the British Isles into one vast open-air museum.This book will be of interest to students of history, art and cultural studies.