France and the restitution of African cultural property: a critical race theory view

ABSTRACT

In 2020, French senators voted to return 27 objects held in the country’s museums to Benin and Senegal. When speaking to the French Press, the French Minister of Culture, said, “the bill is not an act of repentance, but an act of friendship and trust (Selvin).” Without repentance, how can France hope to build friendship and trust with its former African colonies? Although extant literature (Curtis; DeBlock; Hicks; Maaba; Maples Munjeri; Nevadomsky; Roberts; Shyllon; and Thompson) provides insight into how France could restitute African cultural property, this literature has not explicitly considered the role that anti-Black racism plays in France’s resistance to the restitution of African cultural property. Therefore, we investigated the research question: in what ways might Critical Race Theory (CRT) inform policies and practices on the restitution of African cultural property from France back to African nations?

KEYWORDS:

• African cultural property
• colonialism
• France
• racism
• restitution

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).