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On June 2–4, 2016, UNESCO is holding a meeting of international experts in the German Foreign Ministry to discuss the preservation of cultural heritage in Syria. Mr. Hilgert, what do you think are the most important questions here?

The first key issue is that of damage assessment: What was destroyed? Where is it located? What methods can be used to assess the damage? Then we have to consider how best to involve civil society and local communities in the reconstruction process. Notwithstanding the importance of cultural heritage measures, the first priority must be to create a democratic, pluralistic, civil society in Syria. This raises a new question: to what extent can the country’s cultural heritage play a part in this effort? A complex project such as the conservation work on Palmyra requires so much organization, so much knowledge, so much infrastructure, that it can act as a seedbed for much of what we consider to be typical of civil societies. This is a circular relationship: on the one hand, we need civil society in order to protect and maintain cultural heritage. On the other hand, we should also ask ourselves how cultural heritage and the reconstruction process could be used to help create the structures of civil society. This would necessarily involve capacity building: putting the country and its people in a position to rebuild – and effectively operate – all the institutions such as museums, libraries, universities, and so on, that are relevant to their cultural heritage. Then we come up against the question of priorities again. What is the first thing that needs to be done, once political instability and humanitarian emergencies have been dealt with? 

What do you say to the accusation that cultural heritage protection is only about looking after “old stones” and neglects ordinary people in the Syrian civil war?

There seems to be a direct relationship between the indiscriminate destruction of cultural heritage as a repository of identity on the one hand, and the violation of human rights on the other. Wherever cultural identity and cultural diversity – and with them people’s freedom of cultural development – are put in jeopardy, fundamental human rights or beliefs are also being violated. If you look at the reality of the world heritage sites, you can see the relevance of cultural heritage to ordinary people. The alleged dichotomy between stones and people is easier to assert from the Western perspective, where we are currently living in peace. It does not hold true though, because the stones would not be there without the people, while the people would lose their way without the stones. Cultural theory tells us that we human beings ultimately get our orientation from cultural practices, and that these cultural practices always take a material form. The inevitable conclusion is that this separation of culture and human, stone and body, is not appropriate.

ILLICID, ZEDIKUM, ICHASM: these fine-sounding names represent a number of projects run by the Vorderasiatisches Museum (Museum of the Ancient Near East), which explore various aspects of cultural heritage protection. Could you tell us briefly what they are about? 

The illegal trade in cultural goods is a threat to cultural heritage, but it has not been studied. We have no robust figures on the extent of the trade, the supply of objects, the players, the networks, and the channels of communication. Nor do we know what methods we should use to obtain this information. ILLICID covers research into the hidden or “dark” areas of the illicit traffic in cultural goods. The aim is to determine which research methods are at all feasible and effective in this specific area of trade. ILLICID is the only project in the world so far with an interdisciplinary approach to creating a scientific basis for tackling illegal trade in cultural property. It involves sociologists, IT specialists, and experts on antiquities working in close co-operation with state investigators and international organizations. By the end of the project, we should have a better idea, for one thing, of how the trade in archaeological cultural goods from the Eastern Mediterranean region functions in Germany. For another thing, we will have a much better understanding of what legislators, authorities, and institutions need to do if the illegal trade in cultural goods is to be suppressed effectively. 

In addition to ILLICID, we have several capacity-building projects, of which ICHASM, the expert dialog with Iraq, is probably the most important. It centers on the question of how best to build capacities sustainably in a country like Iraq. What kinds of local infrastructure, technology, and political conditions need to exist if capacity building is not just to focus on individuals (who might not share their knowledge) but is to be genuinely sustainable. 

The 3D-digitizing project ZEDIKUM also deals with cultural heritage protection. One objective is to find out whether 3D digitizing, in its capacity as a documentation technology, could serve as a pre-emptive measure to safeguard cultural heritage, or as a means of obtaining a record in situations of crisis and armed conflict. The practical issues here are how to obtain portable, low-cost systems and how to set up long-term data storage. It is crucial to ensure that the capacities and infrastructures are designed in such a way that data can be stored locally and instruments can be used effectively. Naturally, ZEDIKUM is also concerned with cultural heritage protection here in Germany, in particular measuring the archaeological objects in our own collections as accurately as possible and documenting them. 

So is cultural heritage protection also an issue in our own museums?

The first important task is to clarify how the objects found their way into our collection. We know that roughly 95 percent of them came to Germany under arrangements made with Iraq and Syria on the division of finds. Now we need to achieve transparency in the histories of the objects and collections. This is also relevant to the protection of cultural heritage, because the countries of origin, such as Iraq and Syria, expect us to be fully capable of accountability when it comes to the history of the collection – and to share the results of provenance research with the countries of origin. Arrangements for the division of finds were made at times of asymmetrical political power. We now need to shoulder this historical burden and to reappraise it. The primary question is not about what we should give back. Instead, the first step should be to clarify the circumstances under which the objects entered the collection and then, together with the countries of origin, consider how to deal with the difficult cases. Nowadays, museum practice is no longer concerned with collecting, but with protecting. This protection can only be provided in close cooperation with the countries of origin. In the future, exhibition practice will no longer consist of displaying objects blindly, without casting light on looking at their history and provenance. In this context, we want to reach an understanding with the countries of origin. This will serve as a basis for facilitating the exchange of temporary and permanent loans – in both directions. That way, both sides can benefit from sharing cultural heritage. 

The interview was conducted by Gesine Bahr-Reisinger.