Can you monetise antiquities?

A fascinating piece by Reuters' Felix Salmon who has blogged from the Milken Conference on how to leverage developing countries’ antiquities. The panel discussion was triggered by a report last year which sugested that governments could turn their antiquities into an income stream by selling archaeological development bonds:

[The bonds would] address long-term community development as a means to bridge current funding gaps on national and local levels. The archaeological development bonds should target projects that bring financial benefit directly to local populations that would, as a result, increase their participation in and appreciation of their cultural heritage. A community in Peru, for example, could build a small museum around a Chimu site, while the federal Ministry of Culture prepares a new wing of the National Museum dedicated to Incan stonework from a sponsored dig in Cusco. Avoiding the bureaucratic traps that arise when national and regional funding bypasses local communities, the bonds would encourage economic growth on the ground, while providing overall returns.

This is not a new idea. It has been touted for a couple of years. One of the more articulate views on the subject comes from Michael Kremer, Gates Professor of Developing Societies at Harvard, in a 2007 paper "Antiquities: Long-Term Leases as an Alternative to Export Bans".

Salmon, of course, recognises the flaws in the proposal. He writes:

The problem with this is ... while it’s very easy to get excited about the arrows going to the right ("tapping into the U.S. and international investor market could open the door to unprecedented capital resources”), you can be sure that very few governments would be very happy about turning their antiquities into an income stream and then sending that money abroad, especially when a major component of the size of that return “would be determined by the market price of the objects” found at archaeological development sites.

The trouble is that I just don't buy any of it. I have no problem even putting a monetary value on antiquities, though many archaeologists and historians will scream as they read that sentence. The difficulty is, to paraphrase Marginal Revolution's comments on the idea a couple of years ago, that the antiquities market is driven by ownership.

Despite the claims of English Heritage, the rise of Nighthawking is unstoppable (see last Friday's story on the recovery of a statue of a late Roman female figure from Bulgaria as just the most recent example). While some finds do make their way to eBay and the open market, the majority are hoarded in private collections.

Museums are private collectors writ large. The difficulties in organising international loans for large exhibitions read like a plot from an Evelyn Waugh novel. Aside from the separate issue that it is never a good idea to politicise history, as a rule heritage and government do not work well together. While no one would disagree either that archaeology needs the cash or that archaeotourism can be profitable, this proposal is simply unworkable.