As the above discussions show, both development and archaeology are invested in providing support, empowering and enabling forgotten communities, either within the current political structure or in the historical record. In this manner, the intersection of both disciplinary interests belies a much broader structural apparatus that secures the reproduction of old neocolonial interests but in slightly different ways. It is, of course, contained within these slightly differing manner of political identification and distribution of resources that hope for a more democratic future is embedded, one in which all native communities, not only oppressed ones will be more able to espouse and live their cultural values without genocidal fears and exclusion.
In this same way, the three discussions above exemplify the different manner in which the development-archaeology interaction has varied effects on populations throughout the world. Even though most look to exclusively highlight the progressive empowerment of native communities, this process is far from simple or politically neutral. At the same time, most development projects intertwined with archaeology fail miserably, albeit productively. As the Cochasqui case exemplifies, these projects end up having other powerful results that are equally complex, ethically and politically speaking. Finally, although unequal emphasis has also been placed upon the shifts impacting in the archaeological realms of the third world, the first world is equally affected and perhaps more so in a nuanced and silent fashion which needs to be made explicit before it further serves to reinsert the uneven exchange of ideas and resources prevalent in the world today. Because as the Maori might say (paraphrasing the proverb quoted above), the world is the home of all (and not only some) humans.
See also: Europe: Paleolithic Raw Material Provenance Studies; Identity and Power; Native Peoples and Archaeology; Who Owns the Past?.
World History
