Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Is Duty-Bound Good Enough? Considering Archaeological Ethics Beyond Codes And Laws, Angela M. Labrador

Angela M Labrador

As archaeologists we are bound by professional codes and legal statutes, which typically presume the primacy of the archaeological record and grant us some level of authority over it. Some scholars have critiqued this normative core by questioning who the archaeological record serves and to what greater goods archaeologists should contribute. Such critiques have led to wider acknowledgement and consideration of the social responsibilities that archaeologists have toward various stakeholders. However, in practice, archaeologists often become de facto managers of stakeholders, complicating the archaeologist’s own position as stakeholder and the multiplicity of moral codes that the stakeholders bring to the …