The Monument Men led to UNESCO's Culture Program

The movie described in the trailer and a book (The Monuments Men: Allied Heroes, Nazi Thieves and the Greatest Treasure Hunt in History by Robert M. Edsel) describe the efforts made by an American led Allies team to protect art treasures during World War II. The men involve risked their lives (and two died in the effort) to keep world heritage safe during combat. The effort continued to recovering the artistic treasures that had been appropriated by the Axis forces as spoils of war, or that had been confiscated as what they considered "degenerate art".

In a radical departure from the practice of other victors in other wars, the western Allies after World War II chose to return the works of art that they had managed to rescue to their countries of origin.

Of course, after the War the western Allies led in the creation of UNESCO, which had among its early functions helping the museum community in Europe to rebuild and reorganize. UNESCO quickly established international conventions to protect cultural heritage threatened by war, to prevent the international trafficking in stolen cultural heritage, and to protect World Heritage.

Action to combating trafficking in cultural property

Cultural Property: its Illicit Trafficking and Restitution

This is one of UNESCO's flagship programs! UNESCO has been actively involved in the return and restitution of cultural property for many years. It has led in the elaboration of a set of multilateral treaties:

• Hague Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict (1954) and its two protocols (1954 and 1999)
• UNESCO Convention on the Means of Prohibiting and Preventing the Illicit Import, Export and Transfer of Ownership of Cultural Property (1970)
• UNIDROIT Convention on Stolen or Illegally Exported Cultural Objects (1995)
• Convention on the Protection of the Underwater Cultural Heritage (2001)
• Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage (2003)
• Convention on the Protection and Promotion of the Diversity of Cultural Expressions (2005)

An information note has been prepared to facilitate the understanding of the complimentarity between and the functioning of the 1970 UNESCO Convention and the 1995 UNIDROIT Convention.

Read more on the UNESCO program!

U.S. Ratifies UNESCO Convention to Protect Cultural Property in Time of War

The Hague Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict was negotiated in 1954. On March 13, 2009 the instrument of ratification was presented to UNESCO Director-General Koïchiro Matsuura. The U.S. signed the Convention soon after its creation, and on September 25, 2008, the Senate voted to give its advice and consent to ratification. It is only after the Senate gave it consent that the United States became a full party to the Convention. The United States thus joins 122 other nations as a party to this treaty.

United States diplomats Stephen Engelken (center) and T. Michael Peay (left), present the instrument of ratification to UNESCO Director-General Koïchiro Matsuura.
© UNESCO/Michel Ravassard

Links of Interest

UNESCO Flash Info: The United States of America deposits its instrument of ratification of the 1954 Hague Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict


Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property In the Event of Armed Conflict (The Hague Convention), 14 May 1954


U.S Department of State International Cultural Property Protection


Ambassador's Fund for Cultural Preservation

United States and Honduras Extend Agreement to Protect Archaeological Heritage of Honduras

A “Memorandum of Understanding between the Government of the United States of America and the Government of the Republic of Honduras Concerning the Imposition of Import Restrictions on Archaeological Materials from the Pre-Columbian Cultures of Honduras" has just been signed according to the Department of State.

Effective March 12, 2009, this extension represents a continuation of cooperation that began in 2004 when the United States implemented import restrictions to stem the problem of pillage of Honduras’ rich pre-Columbian heritage and the illicit trafficking in such material. Recognizing that this heritage is in jeopardy from pillage, the agreement enables the imposition of import restrictions on certain categories of archaeological material ranging in date from approximately 1200 B.C. to approximately 1500 A.D., including objects made of ceramic, metal, stone, shell, and animal bone. The agreement also calls upon both governments to encourage academic institutions, nongovernmental organizations, and other private entities to cooperate in the exchange of knowledge and information about the cultural patrimony of Honduras, and to collaborate in its preservation and protection.

This U.S. action is in response to a request made by the Government of Honduras under Article 9 of the 1970 UNESCO Convention on the Means of Prohibiting and Preventing the Illicit Import, Export and Transfer of Ownership of Cultural Property

Comments on the UNESCO Culture Program

The Hudhud Chants of the Ifugao

©Renato S. Rastrollo / NCCA -ICH /UNESCO

Following the class last week on the World Heritage Center, students this week presented a class on the remainder of the Culture program of UNESCO. That program has helped to prevent illegal traffic in cultural artifacts such as art and archaeological objects, to protect artifacts during conflict and to repatriate artifacts that have been illegally removed from their rightful place. Perhaps the most important aspect of the convention is that it has made museums and dealers more careful about handling such objects; having helped dry up the demand for such goods, the convention has reduced the incentives for those who would remove cultural objects from their legitimate homes.

More recently an emphasis has been added on intangible cultural heritage. This enabled the students to show a clip from the Masterpieces of Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity website. Much of the UNESCO coverage of these intangible aspects of culture is focused on things which seem picturesque to our graduate students, and indeed would seem so to most people who might read this blog.

The students discussed the fact that American culture also distinguishes us from other nations, including the culture of our institutions of higher education. Americans are known internationally not only for its popular culture (movies, television, music) but also for an ideology based on belief in free markets and democracy, the remains of its frontier culture, church attendance, and emphasis on civil society.

It was pointed out that not all aspects of cultural heritage are worthy of being maintained. America has a heritage of slavery, racism and prejudice which many people feel must be overcome. Indeed, UNESCO's efforts to foster a culture of peace recognize that some cultural changes are to be desired. Thus the efforts to protect intangible culture must be seen as empowering peoples more fully to choose the cultural changes that they will foster.

There was also a discussion of the efforts of UNESCO to protect threatened languages, including demonstration of the UNESCO Interactive Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger. Again, there was a recognition that living languages change and develop, but that there are thousands of languages used by only small populations that may eventually die out, with a loss of the oral heritage that they convey.

The discussion recognized that UNESCO does recognize the role of culture in development, and especially seeks to help nations to recognize the appropriate role for policies protecting cultural diversity within their development policy portfolio. In this respect, UNESCO has a program fostering cultural industries (such as music, art and crafts), and of course UNESCO has an important role in international copyright law and protection.

Both the presenters and the audience found the materials so interesting that time grew short, and there was little time to discuss all of the cultural activities, Thus the discussion of the Convention on Underwater Cultural Heritage had to be cut too short to adequately introduce that important topic. (Did you know that sea level has risen 100 feet since the height of the last ice age, and that as a result it has been very difficult to investigate the hypothesis that an important route for human migration to the Americas was down the coasts in the final stages of the ice age.)

All in all a stimulating topic and discussion!

Aksum Obelisk successfully repatriated and reinstalled

The third and last block of the Aksum Obelisk was successfully mounted by the UNESCO teams at the end of July in its original location in Ethiopia. The monument’s reinstallation was greeted with joy by the local people, who spontaneously organized musical concerts yesterday at the site.

Weighing 150 tons and 24 meters high, the obelisk is the second largest stela on the Aksum World Heritage site in northern Ethiopia, close to the border with Eritrea. Transported to Rome by the troops of Mussolini in 1937, it was returned in April 2005 by the Italian government. Its dismantling in Rome, transport and reinstallation were funded by the Italian government.

Read more!

Thinking About Cultural Property

Edward Rothstein has a review in today's New York Times of the book Who Owns Antiquity?: Museums and the Battle over Our Ancient Heritage by James Cuno. The review begins:

To what culture does the concept of “cultural property” belong? Who owns this idea?

It has, like much material property in the last 50 years, often changed hands. And in doing so, it has also changed meanings and grown in importance. It now affects the development of museums, alters the nature of international commerce and even seems to subsume traditional notions of property.

It was brought to modern prominence in 1954 by UNESCO as a way of characterizing the special status of monuments, houses of worship and works of art — objects that suffered “grave damage” in “recent armed conflicts.” In its statement Unesco asserted that such “cultural property” was part of the “cultural heritage of all mankind” and deserved special protection.

But the framers of that doctrine with its universalist stance would hardly recognize cultural property in its current guise. The concept is now being narrowly applied to assert possession, not to affirm value. It is used to stake claims on objects in museums, to prevent them from being displayed and to control the international trade of antiquities.

The so called tragedy of the commons recognizes that if no one owns a resource, then there is little incentive to manage it well. We often institutionalize property rights to protect such resources. (An alternative is to retain the resource in a commons, but to institutionalize systems to manage that common.)

The tangible cultural property to which the Rothstein-Cuno analysis applies is movable -- paintings, sculptures, etc., the antiquities we often associate with museums. Of course it was not UNESCO that first treated these objects as property. Kings and the wealthy did so for millenia. UNESCO helped recognize the concept of "cultural property", reflecting the fact that such objects often have transcendental value within a specific culture. Thus a religious artifact may have huge value among the adherents of the religion involved and little value to others.

UNESCO has also helped recognize the concept of World Heritage. Thus everyone has a legitimate interest in some objects of transcendental beauty and cultural importance, such as the Mona Lisa or the contents of Tutankhamun's tomb. The crux of the issue addressed by Rothstein and Cuno is the property that is both claimed by specific cultural groups and as broader world heritage.

It would seem that the custodian of any cultural property or item of world heritage should have a responsibility to protect that property and pass it on to future generations. The owners of a cultural property or item of world heritage would also seem to share that responsibility, and indeed the responsibility to allow others to act as custodians of such objects only if they can realistically guarantee to safeguard the property.

So who are the owners of cultural property. The oldest statues in the world were found in what is now Jordan, and date back some 8,000 years. Jordan is a historic crossroads and modern Jordanians have little in common with the folk who lived i that geographic area 8,000 years ago. So, one may ask, why should they have ownership of those ancient statues? In this case the answer is clear. They have them, the artifacts were found in their land under their law, and the Jordanians ascribe cultural value to them as well as recognizing their status as world heritage.

The situation is not so clear when a piece of cultural property found in one country is located in another, both claiming legitimate ownership. Greek antiquities in the United Kingdom or Egyptian antiquities in the United States come to mind. UNESCO has developed conventions that help to allow the parties to such disputes to negotiate their solution, or at least adjudicate them. They don't always work, but those conventions represent a major advance over the anarchy of the past. Still, Rothstein and Cuno suggest that often countries have gone too far in seeking to recognize the rights of cultural property ownership based on things being found in areas now occupied by the claiming party.

In last week's meeting, the U.S. National Commission for UNESCO recommended that UNESCO institutionalize mechanisms that would allow long term loans of cultural property from one nation to another without the transfer of ownership. There have been loans of museum exhibits for many years, but the new mechanisms would be for a decade or more. The new mechanism would allow sharing of experience of world heritage, while recognizing ownership rights to cultural heritage. Sounds good to me!

John Daly
(The ideas expressed in this posting are mine alone, and don't necessarily reflect those of any organization.)

An appeal to stop illicit trafficking of Iraqi cultural property

The International Coordination Committee for the Safeguarding of Iraqi Cultural Heritage, which met at UNESCO Headquarters in Paris on 13 and 14 November, ended with an appeal to the international community to help stop illicit excavations, pillaging and trafficking of Iraqi cultural property.

The Committee brings together some 20 international experts on Iraqi cultural heritage and is chaired by Iraq’s Senior Deputy Minister of Culture, Jaber Mohammad Abbas Al-Jaberi. It recommended, among other measures: to facilitate an international prohibition on trade in or transfer of ancient Iraqi cultural property in line with United Nations Security Council Resolution 1483 of 22 May 2003; and to encourage all countries to keep the recovered items in established safe havens, under the auspices of UNESCO and/or Iraqi diplomatic missions, in view of their restitution to Iraq when the adequate conditions are met.

Read more about the Committee meeting.

April 10-12, 2007 was the fourth anniversary of the looting of the Iraq Museum in Baghdad. SAFE/Saving Antiquities for Everyone organized a candlelight vigil to end the looting and destruction of cultural heritage in Iraq, and around the world. The following (five minute long) video was produced as part of that effort, with a talk by the Director of the Iraq Museum in Baghdad, and images of the vigil at the State University of New York's Stony Brook campus:

U.S. and Mali Extend Agreement to Protect the Archaeological Heritage of Mali

In response to Mali's activation of the related UNESCO article on 'Means of Prohibiting and Preventing the Illicit Import, Export and Transfer of Ownership of Cultural Property', US and Malian governments extended the agreement to impose restrictions on importation of archaeological materials from Mali from the Paleolithic Era (Stone Age) to approximately the Mid-Eighteenth Century.

The 1970 UNESCO Convention offers a framework for multilateral agreements in order to preserve archaeological sites and prevent activity that would destroy information about past cultures and jeopardize a nation's cultural heritage.

Niger River Valley includes a continuum of civilizations from the Neolithic period to Colonial era, and therefore archaeological articles like the materials from Tellum burial caves of the Cliff of Bandiagara (Land of the Dogons) are preserved via the UNESCO Convention.