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Temple looting in Cambodia: Anatomy of a statue trafficking network
journal contribution
posted on 2020-09-18, 05:47 authored by Simon MackenzieSimon Mackenzie, T DavisQualitative empirical studies of the illicit antiquities trade have tended to focus either on the supply end, through interviews with looters, or on the demand end, through interviews with dealers, museums and collectors. Trafficking of artefacts across borders from source to market has until now been something of an evidential black hole. Here, we present the first empirical study of a statue trafficking network, using oral history interviews conducted during ethnographic criminology fieldwork in Cambodia and Thailand. The data begin to answer many of the pressing but unresolved questions in academic studies of this particular criminal market, such as whether organized crime is involved in antiquities looting and trafficking (yes), whether the traffic in looted artefacts overlaps with the insertion of fakes into the market (yes) and how many stages there are between looting at source and the placing of objects for public sale in internationally respected venues (surprisingly few). © The Author 2014.
Funding
Global traffic in illicit cultural objects: developing knowledge for improving interventions in a transnational criminal market
European Research Council
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Preferred citation
Mackenzie, S. & Davis, T. (2014). Temple looting in Cambodia: Anatomy of a statue trafficking network. British Journal of Criminology, 54(5), 722-740. https://doi.org/10.1093/bjc/azu038Publisher DOI
Journal title
British Journal of CriminologyVolume
54Issue
5Publication date
2014-01-01Pagination
722-740Publisher
Oxford University Press (OUP)Publication status
PublishedContribution type
ArticleOnline publication date
2014-06-13ISSN
0007-0955eISSN
1464-3529Language
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