Why Do Ethical Systems Try to Limit the Role of Money?
Author(s)
Frank, Robert H.
Abstract
For the purposes of articulating a modern position on the use of looted and otherwise illicit artifacts, the SAA (Society for American Anthropology) has outlined a new set of guidelines and ethical considerations to which one must adhere during research. Wylie, taking his cue from the then recently passed ethical guideline of Latin American Antiquity, sees many inappropriately using the “salvage principle” to justify their work with materials that have obviously been obtained in a disagreeable manner by stating that it would be a shame to allow whatever information they may hold to simply go unrecorded. Wylie rejects this position, however, stating that it is nothing more than a rationalization that leads to the ever-increasing value of looted objects and the chance that they’ll be damaged or inexcusably removed from their place of origin. Citing the influence that researchers have on the global market of looted good, Wylie calls for a complete cessations to the practice of working with and paying for all goods of a suspicious nature (this is doubly important as the integrity and authenticity of “looted goods” is often difficult to discern).
