ABSTRACT

This chapter aims to explore the extent to which there is a conflict between individual and collective rights and, if so, what implications are to be drawn from it. An aspect of cultural rights is the protection of “cultural property.” Cultural property requires protection to the extent to which it forms the objectification of a right to collective expression and identity. Anthropologists have been considering indigenous conceptions of the “ownership” of cultural practices. The notion of authenticity as an original state that should be preserved at all costs has also been challenged by those who would see a contested and dynamic nature in the meaning of cultural heritage. The turn in academic discourse toward discussing objectification of culture, of knowledge as intellectual and cultural property, has been linked to recognition of cultural rights in the public sphere and in turn to the political implications of the rise of a “heritage culture”.