The Stick and Carrot

In a recent New York Times article by Benjamin Genocchio, an interesting quote appeared on the bottom line. Referring to the recent import restrictions on Chinese cultural property, Dr. Stephen K. Urice, a former archaeologist and now Associate Professor at the University of Miami School of Law, reportedly said: “We got the stick, and now it’s time to see the carrot”. The Stick and Carrot metaphor is insightful in that it reveals a mindset that academic archaeologists often share but couch in other terms in a futile effort to appear subtle. The objective of nationalist archaeologists is to preclude (by any and all means) the distribution of material objects from the past—which to them means diffusion of culture. All of this "cultural property" (and the list is very, very long) belongs, in their view, in the place where it was created. Nevermind that it might have originally been produced for export, and migrated freely aroud the world for centuries. True national treasures aside, the very concept of national retention of cultural property runs against the grain of globalism. Yet, countries that seek the nationalism of what they call cultural property are often the same countries espousing more global assistance in their internal development. The U.S. State Department publicly advocates cultural sharing, yet advocates a restriction on shared "cultural property" of the most mundane and innocuous nature. The dichotomies are extreme and nonsensical.

Dr. Urice obviously considers the levying of import restrictions on Chinese cultural property as a "stick" in the master plan of cultural property nationalists. The "carrot" must, in his view, come from the Chinese. That is, the Chinese government should be enticing its citizens with incentives to hinder the search for objects of antiquity and, when found, to retain them within China. Is there something wrong with this picture? The United States government, perhaps the most active promoter of globalism in history, is using a stick against its own citizens to advance nationalist interests abroad. At the same time, it is asking (respectfully and gently) that the Chinese government TRY to dangle a carrot before its own people. The dichotomies are astounding and the pride with which nationalist archaeologists point to the China MOU as being good for society is literally beyond comprehension.

When the United States prohibits the importation of the very coins that the Chinese government advertises and sells directly to tourists through its Bank of China, there ought to be some sort of awakening to the reality that there is a disconnect. That the State Department imposed import restrictions knowing full well about those coin sales is an abomination. But, no, the U.S. imposed restrictions are applauded by nationalist archaeologists as a good thing. How, might I ask, can the Chinese government provide the carrot when they are officially and happily doing exactly what these archaeolgists would have them discourage among their citizens? When Richard Nixon opened the door to China, he could never have anticipated such a bizarre and incomprehensible situation—least of all with the blessing of the U.S. State Department and the archaeological community, once the largest importer of antiquities in the world.