The Destruction of Mali's Cultural Heritage

Unveiling 'Shadow Powers' in the Analysis of Looting During Modern Warfare

Résumé

In Mali, and throughout West Africa, ongoing illicit trafficking movements and violent conflicts have necessitated a call for new protective measures and policies to protect cultural heritage. Traditional strategies of customs regulation and restriction on the antiquities market have been previously based on economic and legal issues enmeshed in trafficking networks and transnational crime processes. However, these do not reflect the realities of Malian daily life, nor do they go beyond the onedimensional stance framing the actions of looters and traffickers as a facet of these processes. What is ignored are the underlying motivations for looting and illicit antiquities trafficking and how these motivations are affected by, and enacted through, the ever shifting socio-political climate that has been Mali’s system of government since its independence from the French Sudan in 1960. This paper explores the realities of looting throughout Mali, ongoing debates concerning the representation of Malian antiquities in the transnational art trade, and the ways in which both national and international bodies have attempted to thwart ongoing heritage destruction.