Heritage and interculturality in EU science diplomacy

Abstract

In recent years, culture and heritage have explicitly entered into science diplomacy debates and initiatives within the EU system and in EU’s foreign policy. For EU’s external relations heritage offers opportunities for developing partnerships based on shared, entangled histories but also challenges posed by dealing with difficult pasts of domination and colonialism. The paper, therefore, presents a new conceptual model for European science diplomacy that can enable more equitable ways of dealing with colonial heritage in relations between EU countries and partners outside Europe. It does so by combining recent literature on science diplomacy, heritage diplomacy, decolonial thinking, and on the concepts of interculturality. We argue that to engage successfully with colonial legacies and heritage, the concept of science diplomacy needs to be developed from a traditional “diffusionist” understanding towards a dialogical approach, which is epismologically open and acknowledges the inequalities in global knowledge production. In the second part of the paper, the practical implications of the theoretical framework are fleshed out in a discussion of three cases involving colonial heritage: The Tendaguru Fossil Collection, the Royal Museum for Central Africa in Brussels, and the work of Canadian indigenous artist Sonny Assu.

Digging deeper into colonial palaeontological practices in modern day Mexico and Brazil

“…We argue that fossils add to local heritage in the form of scientific and even historic and cultural importance or value. The idea that natural history should be considered ‘global heritage’ stems from the systems that aided the construction of the colonies as ‘living laboratories’, where research practices and experiments that would not have been feasible in the colonizing countries would have been carried out without limitations [ 3 ]. In the modern world, this line of thinking would lead to a form of neocolonial pillage of the palaeontological resources in countries that are unable to protect them [ 138 ]—an archetype of scientific colonialism.…”

“…In the modern world, this line of thinking would lead to a form of neocolonial pillage of the palaeontological resources in countries that are unable to protect them [ 138 ]—an archetype of scientific colonialism. This would not only be destructive to the local scientific community, but also to individuals that make use of these fossils for cultural purposes [ 3 , 139 ]. The inadequate, or complete absence of, law enforcement aimed at protecting palaeontological resources has allowed nations with considerably greater access to funding to exploit these resources, hindering scientific development in the country of origin and leading to the skewed pattern of global knowledge production in palaeontology we observe today [ 14 ].…”

“…Although colonialism is frequently described in political, social and military contexts, it is also present in many scientific practices still in use today. The development of scientific disciplines, educational programmes and academic organizations were all products designed to benefit colonial advancement [ 3 ], e.g. advancements in geological tools allowed colonial powers to uncover and exploit several natural resources in colonies.…”