The Fusion of Law and Ethics in Cultural Heritage Management

This chapter considers how law and ethics affect professional practice and demonstrates how engagement with law and awareness of ethics are pivotal to archaeologists in the field. A changing global order shaped by human rights, Indigenous heritage, legal pluralism, neocolonialism, development, diplomacy, and emerging nonstate actors directs the 21st-century policies that shape laws and ethics. Alongside ethics, law has become customary and integral in archaeological field practice and scholarship as well as in cultural heritage management. The emergence and rapid spread of political and/or ideological extremism poses an unprecedented and urgent challenge for archaeologists and heritage practitioners. During armed conflict and insurgency, it is difficult to assess directly the full impact of hostilities on the historical and cultural heritage of an occupied area, often owing to prolonged violence. While the pillaging of cultural heritage during war is an age-old practice, the rise of militant groups stresses the urgency to rethink approaches to the protection of cultural heritage in conflict zones.