Med aktsemd og armlengds avstand: Provenienspolicy ved norske kulturhistoriske museum

Abstract

Cultural heritage-crime continues to this day to be a problem for the museum as an institution, and for the humanistic sciences at large. The material remains of our human past is constantly plundered for economic gain, of which the consequences are irreparable damage to our knowledge of the past. In this thesis, I seek to map out the various legal and ethical frameworks used to combat this problem. Furthermore, this thesis will discuss how professionals at various Norwegian museums of cultural history relate to this problem in their day-to-day praxis, both where the official regulations overlap and where they differ. I conclude that, faced with bureaucratic bulwark, a great deal depends on “the human factor”. The human factor here is understood as how the individual professional interprets and employ standards and conventions, and thus, shape local policies. This thesis have collected its data from qualitative interviews with museum employees from a selection of Norwegian museums for cultural history.

[Cultural heritage-crime continues to this day to be a problem for the museum as an institution, and for the humanistic sciences at large. The material remains of our human past is constantly plundered for economic gain, of which the consequences are irreparable damage to our knowledge of the past. In this thesis, I seek to map out the various legal and ethical frameworks used to combat this problem. Furthermore, this thesis will discuss how professionals at various Norwegian museums of cultural history relate to this problem in their day-to-day praxis, both where the official regulations overlap and where they differ. I conclude that, faced with bureaucratic bulwark, a great deal depends on “the human factor”. The human factor here is understood as how the individual professional interprets and employ standards and conventions, and thus, shape local policies. This thesis have collected its data from qualitative interviews with museum employees from a selection of Norwegian museums for cultural history.]