"The perception of museums as rapacious acquisitors of ill-gotten goods"

James Cuno provides details of the purpose of his new edited book, Whose Culture? The Promise of Museums and the Debate over Antiquities (Princeton University Press, 2009) [website].

It is the purpose of this book to challenge the perception of museums as rapacious acquisitors of ill-gotten goods and to argue instead that our public museums build their antiquities collections responsibly and for the public’s benefit.

Later in his introduction he acknowledges:

... some high-profile museums—the Metropolitan Museum of Art; the J. Paul Getty Museum; and the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; among others—have negotiated for the return of dozens of antiquities to Italy ...

This issue may be addressed in detail by the contributors to this volume:

• To Shape the Citizens of "That Great City, the World" by Neil MacGregor
• "And What Do You Propose Should Be Done with Those Objects?" by Philippe de Montebello
• Whose Culture Is It? by Kwame Anthony Appiah
  
• Antiquities and the Importance--and Limitations--of Archaeological Contexts by James C. Y. Watt
• Archaeologists, Collectors, and Museums by Sir John Boardman
  
• Censoring Knowledge: The Case for the Publication of Unprovenanced Cuneiform Tablets by David I. Owen
  
• Exhibiting Indigenous Heritage in the Age of Cultural Property by Michael F. Brown
• Heritage and National Treasures by Derek Gillman
• The Nation and the Object by John Henry Merryman

But it is worth remembering that well over 100 items - not "dozens" - of antiquities have been returned to Italy from North American collections. [See my earlier overview of these returns.]

How could so many high-profile museums have placed themselves in this position? I look forward to reading the full justification in this volume ... but I suspect it will not be there.