Cultural Property In Crossborder Litigationturning Rights Into Claims Mara Wantuchthole by Mara Wantuch-thole 9783110355437, 3110355434 instant download after payment.

The legal discipline of cultural property law is a fairly young one compared to

the main areas of law practiced throughout the legal community. Owing to the

growing awareness of the value and meaning of art and cultural heritage for hu-

mankind, however, it is becoming a fast evolving subject with a constant flow of

new legislation being enacted both nationally and internationally. The monetary

value of art and archaeological artefacts has experienced an exponential growth

in the past three decades and so has the illegal market in such objects. The re-

cent conflicts in the Middle East have curbed the illicit trafficking in archaeolog-

ical objects from the region, where plunderers are said to control archaeological

sites and the export of cultural heritage.

Once however, art or cultural property has found its way onto the black mar-

ket, claims for its return to the original owner have proven to fail, notwithstanding

the vast body of domestic and international laws. Litigation is often complex, both

in terms of procedure and substance. I t involves a mix of domestic civil and crim-

inal law, European Human Rights and EU law, Private International Law as well a s

Public International Law. Successful litigation, however,would increase the aware-

ness of illegal dealings with such goods. Returns of movable antiquities to its

source countries could help diminish the destruction of archaeological context

caused by looting, if they succeed in serving as a deterrent to prospective purchas-

ers and thereby providing a disincentive to looters and illicit traffickers. In support

of this contention, this book upholds the view that the return of illegally excavated

and exported cultural objects i s an imperative based on legal argument.

The research consists of two parts.The first part comparatively delineates differ-

ent means of acquiring or retaining rights in cultural objects. They may be property

rights, interests that equal property or interests that do not count as property, but

serve as a mechanism to protect movable cultural heritage. The second part of the

thesis will be devoted to investigating and delineating ways to enforce interests i n

cultural objects and to turn such interests into claims.

The thesis that served as a breeding ground for this book has been admitted

as a PhD research project at King’s College London in 2007.The upgrade defense

took place in 2009.The project was further accepted as a doctoral thesis at Hum-

boldt University Berlin in 2010 and jointly supervised by Prof. Norman Palmer

and Prof. Stefan Grundmann. The defense took place at Humboldt University

in 2013. The main manuscript has been completed with the defense of the doc-

toral thesis, however, several amendments had to be undertaken until its actual

publication. This includes amongst others EU Regulation 1332/2013 concerning

restrictive measures in view of the situation in Syria, which was enacted as a re-

sult of the exponentially increasing illegal trafficking with Syrian cultural herit-

age following the intensification of political upheaval in the Middle East as well

as recent case law on the enforcement and justiciability of claims involving cul-

tural objects.