Paper short abstract:

This paper introduces the current restitution debate in Austria. It discusses the legal situation of African cultural objects acquired in colonial contexts and the instruments available to organize restitutions and formulate general rules.

Paper long abstract:

In January 2022 the Austrian government established an expert committee to study the colonial heritage in its federal museums. Although Austria is a country not considered to have an extensive colonial past, Austrian museums hold large collections of ethnographic objects and human remains from Africa and the rest of the world that they acquired during the heydays of colonialism. The federal museums are also involved in the Benin Dialogue Group.

This paper introduces the current restitution debate in Austria through a legal lens. It discusses the legal situation of African cultural objects acquired in colonial contexts and the instruments available to museums and the federal government to organize restitutions and formulate rules. From a comparative law perspective, the specific history of Austria might turn the currently-evolving Austrian approach into an interesting example for other countries with public holdings of cultural objects from colonial contexts but without a history of direct colonialism.