This article analyses property relations in cultural expression in the ambivalent process of heritage
production, and considers the implementation of intangible heritage by communities and individuals
in the framework of cultural policy making. Ownership reflects an entanglement of interests,
grounded in the established social and political domains. There appear moments that sustain or
contest agency in property ownership, while modern cultural politics may dictate conflicts between
individual or communal property rights in the context of claiming significance to heritage.
My discussion of the predicaments of collective or individual ownership, contested restitution or
celebration observable in the policies of intangible cultural heritage is based on the experience of
the Seto community in Estonia.
Keywords: property relations, communal and individual ownership, intangible heritage, policy
making