The purpose of this Convention is to develop mutual understanding among the peoples of Europe and reciprocal appreciation of their cultural diversity, to safeguard European culture, to promote national contributions to Europe's common cultural heritage respecting the same fundamental value.

The purpose as outlined in the new Convention on Offences relating to Cultural Property is to prevent and combat the intentional destruction of, damage to, and trafficking in cultural property by strengthening criminal justice responses to all offences relating to cultural property while facilitating co-operation on an international level.

This Convention is based on the idea that knowledge and use of heritage form part of the citizen’s right to participate in cultural life as defined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The text presents heritage both as a resource for human development, the enhancement of cultural diversity and the promotion of intercultural dialogue, and as part of an economic development model based on the principles of sustainable resource use.

This revised Convention updates the provisions of a previous Convention (ETS No. 066) adopted by the Council of Europe in 1969. The new text makes the conservation and enhancement of the archaeological heritage one of the goals of urban and regional planning policies. It is concerned in particular with arrangements to be made for co-operation among archeologists and town and regional planners in order to ensure optimum conservation of archaeological heritage.

The main purpose of the Convention is to reinforce and promote policies for the conservation and enhancement of Europe's heritage. It also affirms the need for European solidarity with regard to heritage conservation and is designed to foster practical co-operation among the Parties. It establishes the principles of "European co-ordination of conservation policies" including consultations regarding the thrust of the policies to be implemented.

The aims of this Convention are to promote the development of European multilateral cinematographic co-production, to safeguard creation and freedom of expression and defend the cultural diversity of the various European countries.

This Convention and its Protocol are centered around the principle of compulsory legal deposit of all moving-image material produced or coproduced and made available to the public in each signatory State. Legal deposit involves a requirement not just to deposit a reference copy with an officially designated archive but also to look after the material and do the necessary conservation work. In addition the material has to be available for consultation for academic or research purposes, subject to the international or national rules on copyright.