Yesterday, a French celebrity collector, Pierre Berge, alleged that he offered to donate two Chinese bronze animal heads to Taiwan's National Palace Museum but was turned down. AFP reports that the museum's refusal was rooted in ethical reasons as well as a reluctance to incite conflict with China. The article quotes the director of the museum, Chou Kung-shin saying: "In accordance with professional museum ethics, we can't collect disputed artefacts."
"Disputed" is the keyword here. These artifacts were not recently looted, but stolen from Beijing by the British and French during the Opium Wars in 1860, and Beijing has repeatedly asked for their repatriation. There were no laws in place 150 years ago to protect these items - the museum's refusal to accept the bronzes was on moral, not legal, grounds. This incident is reflective of what I hope is a growing consciousness of the role that cultural heritage plays in a country's relations with other nations.
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Is it being suggested here that there were no laws 150 years ago that prohibited the violent deprivation of the property of others? We have often heard Westerners say there were no international rules forbidding such dispossessions but clearly the laws of all civilized countries had provisions regarding the protection of property against violent and unauthorized confiscation. The strong States, mainly the Western States, have often not wanted to respect even the most elementary rules of Natural Law. Advancing an argument based on absence of laws can only strengthen those States which even in our days are not willing to abide by the rules accepted by the majority of States, the United Nations and UNESCO. Just look at how some States deal with current issues of restitution. The impression that cultural artefacts looted in the past can only be recovered on the basis of morality sets up a false dichotomy between law and morality. Most laws are moral or have a moral basis accepted by the majority of citizens otherwise it would be impossible to secure the observance of law.
Arguments based on the absence of laws in previous decades are a smokescreen for avoiding examining the actual conduct of Western States in their unbridled desire to subjugate others so as to secure their material wealth. Wars and other aggressive acts against States that are thousands of kilometres away from the aggressors’ country speak a lot about the invaders.
We must move away from such arguments and examine the actual conduct of those States that have been for centuries disorganizing the world: they may have might on their side but they have neither Law nor Morality as supporters.
It may be interesting to look at the detailed arguments I have presented at
IS IT NOT TIME TO FULFIL VICTOR HUGO'S WISH? COMMENTS ON CHINESE CLAIM TO LOOTED CHINESE ARTEFACTS ON SALE AT CHRISTIE'S
http://www.modernghana.com
Kwame Opoku.
More about this from Taiwan here
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