In his article, “The Value and Valuation of Maritime Cultural Heritage”,Footnote 2 Stefan Claesson discusses methods by which the relative or absolute value of submerged cultural sites like shipwrecks might be established, to provide rational bases for decisions about their management. He emphasizes systems used in ecosystem valuation, notably an average individual's projected “willingness to pay” (WTP) to preserve something and “willingness to accept” (WTA) its loss. He suggests that systems to apply such measurement devices be built into things like the procedures for addressing impacts on historic properties under Section 106 of the U.S. National Historic Preservation Act.
I am skeptical of such objectifying systems in general, but here I want only to respond to Claesson's use of a particular example in support of his proposition. On page 73, Claesson says:
Sovereignty laws, bilateral agreements, and war graves acts also provide international measures to protect shipwrecks and serve to deter treasure hunting and salvage of historic and archaeological sites.
Note the easy equation of “salvage” with “treasure hunting,” both of which Claesson seemingly takes for granted as desirable to “deter.” He goes on:
However, in the recent case of the salvage of the HMS Sussex by Odyssey, Inc., the United Kingdom effectively relinquished its sovereign immunity rights to Odyssey in exchange for a small percentage (20%) of cultural objects and remuneration, thereby limiting protection of the public's interest in and rights to access its cultural heritage.
After a bit more discussion, Claesson wonders:
What would have been the costs and benefits of in-situ preservation or a state-sponsored salvage operation of the shipwreck? What is the public's WTP for such options? What is the public's WTA for destruction (even if by archaeological means) of its national heritage?
These may be legitimate questions, but the way they are phrased reveals prejudices that, if they influenced the way data on WTP and WTA were measured, would almost certainly bias the results.
Let me acknowledge that I have my own prejudices. I have known Greg Stemm, cofounder and chief executive officer of Odyssey Marine Exploration, Inc., for some 30 years and find him a thoughtful, responsible scholar and businessman whose views on responsible shipwreck management merit considerable respect. I have visited Odyssey's operations, reviewed its methodology, and helped edit the research design for the Sussex salvage project. I have served, (and suppose I still serve, though it has been pretty quiescent lately) on the Sussex Archaeological Executive, a group of professional archaeologists from the United Kingdom, United States, and Canada chartered jointly by the British Ministry of Defense and Odyssey to oversee the proposed salvage operation and ensure the quality of its archaeology.
I should also note in passing that the Sussex salvage excavation has not yet taken place, due to disputes with the government of Spain, and that it is not entirely certain that the wreck is really that of the Sussex. But my intent here is to consider the attitudes that inform Claesson's reference to the case and how such attitudes could bias the use of “objective” tools like WTP and WTA.
In a nutshell, Claesson apparently subscribes to the widespread assumption that leaving wrecks in situ or subjecting them to excavation by government is good, while permitting their salvage by commercial operations is bad. This assumption is implicit in his statement, without stated rationale, that the UK, by entering into a salvage contract with Odyssey, accepted “limiting protection of the public's interest in and rights to access its cultural heritage.” Claesson's subscription to this assumption is made more explicit when he goes on to allude to the UK's “willingness to accept (WTA) the loss of its sovereign immunity, future public access to the shipwreck site and its materials, and the destruction of a war grave and archaeological site in exchange for archaeological documentation and 20% of recovered cultural materials and precious metals.” Odyssey's excavation, to Claesson, would have destroyed the (putative) war grave and (undoubted) archaeological site, while apparently a “state-sponsored salvage operation” would not. And leaving the wreck unmolested on the sea bottom would have protected the public's “interest in and rights to access its cultural heritage.”
But are Claesson's assumptions not correct? Is it not true that leaving wrecks in situ is good? That state-sponsored salvage is also good? That commercial salvage is bad? After all, these assumptions undergird the UNESCO Convention on the Protection of the Underwater Cultural Heritage—2001,Footnote 3 and they are piously articulated by virtually every major archaeological organization on the planet.
Well, consider the following:
1. The wreck-that-may-be-Sussex (WTMBS) lies at a depth of 821 meters (2,694 feet) in the Strait of Gibraltar.Footnote 4 This has three practical results:
(a) The public is unlikely to access the site any time in the foreseeable future.
(b) The cost of any kind of recovery is extremely high.
(c) Investing in such an operation is a risky proposition.
2. To judge from my observation of Odyssey's operations and from the reports it has published, Odyssey conducts archaeological fieldwork, documentation, analysis, and conservation that compare favorably with anything done by any state-sponsored or other academic or pure research organization.Footnote 5
3. Wrecks on the bottom of the ocean do not just sit there unscathed, awaiting the attentions of the interested public or pure researchers. Even after a wreck has deteriorated to a condition of general stasis (assuming such a condition exists), it is prone to having things dropped on it and, more seriously, dragged over it.
(a) Odyssey has recently documented the widespread destruction of wrecks in the English Channel and its approaches by beam trawlers and other deep sea fishing operations;Footnote 6 this destruction is, as far as I can tell, being ignored by the academic and pure research communities that bewail the terrible effects of commercial salvage.
(b) While the WTMBS has not evidently been trawled, it has become festooned with a good deal of junk discarded by shipping passing overhead.Footnote 7 Even if beam trawling or its equivalent is never employed in the Strait of Gibraltar, what may be dropped on the wreck in the future is anyone's guess. And the wreck (whose cannon have deteriorated to mere husks) continues to deteriorate, albeit slowly.
4. As I understand it, the British government did not give up its sovereign immunity in the Sussex case; the arrangement with Odyssey is for a joint venture in which the UK retains title to the wreck—assuming the wreck is in fact the Sussex.
5. Odyssey's agreement with government is a good deal more complex than the 20% deal Claesson reports. It features a sliding scale in which the government's share ranges from 20% to 60% depending on the value of the recovered cargo. Moreover, the government has first right of refusal to purchase the entire collection or any portion it selects. Odyssey, of course, agreed to bear all the costs of excavation, conservation and analysis, and had already sponsored the intensive survey required to find the wreck in the first place (Greg Stemm, personal communication 2011).
6. Assuming the wreck is that of the Sussex, its status as a war grave is dubious; the Sussex went down in a storm while on a diplomatic mission, not as the result of enemy action. And for what it is worth, no human remains have been detected during Odyssey's detailed robotic survey and testing of the site (Sean Kingsley, personal communication 2011).
7. Odyssey's policy is to place recovered artifacts and other objects into the stream of commerce only after they have been fully documented, described, analyzed and conserved. Moreover, only manufactured objects with limited research or interpretive value once documented and analyzed—for instance, coins and bottles—go readily into the stream of commerce. Artifacts with greater research potential, if not selected by government, can be sold only to academic and research institutions, and then only with mechanisms put in place for tracking them down if anyone needs to study them in the future (Greg Stemm, personal communication, 2011). A substantial part of each collection is kept together and made accessible to the public through exhibits in museums and in facilities developed by Odyssey itself.
Would the public be willing to accept Odyssey's WTMBS salvage if the above factors were presented to it? Conversely, what would be its willingness to pay for a state-sponsored salvage effort, which would certainly cost many million euros? What, too, would be its WTP considering the uncertainty about whether the WTMBS is really Her Majesty's long-lost warship? And what would be its WTP for state sponsorship of the detailed surveys necessary even to identify such wrecks, carried out in this instance by Odyssey at no direct cost to the public?
The devil in valuation schemes, I believe, lies in details like these. WTA and WTP based on the easy assumption that in situ preservation is good and commercial salvage is bad would almost certainly diverge widely from WTA and WTP based on more nuanced assumptions and knowledge of the facts of any given case. If objectifying systems like WTA/WTP are to be used in decision making about things like shipwreck management, it would—I think—be important to ground them on objective data rather than on mere prejudice.
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In his article, “The Value and Valuation of Maritime Cultural Heritage”,Footnote 2 Stefan Claesson discusses methods by which the relative or absolute value of submerged cultural sites like shipwrecks might be established, to provide rational bases for decisions about their management. He emphasizes systems used in ecosystem valuation, notably an average individual's projected “willingness to pay” (WTP) to preserve something and “willingness to accept” (WTA) its loss. He suggests that systems to apply such measurement devices be built into things like the procedures for addressing impacts on historic properties under Section 106 of the U.S. National Historic Preservation Act.
I am skeptical of such objectifying systems in general, but here I want only to respond to Claesson's use of a particular example in support of his proposition. On page 73, Claesson says:
Sovereignty laws, bilateral agreements, and war graves acts also provide international measures to protect shipwrecks and serve to deter treasure hunting and salvage of historic and archaeological sites.
Note the easy equation of “salvage” with “treasure hunting,” both of which Claesson seemingly takes for granted as desirable to “deter.” He goes on:
However, in the recent case of the salvage of the HMS Sussex by Odyssey, Inc., the United Kingdom effectively relinquished its sovereign immunity rights to Odyssey in exchange for a small percentage (20%) of cultural objects and remuneration, thereby limiting protection of the public's interest in and rights to access its cultural heritage.
After a bit more discussion, Claesson wonders:
What would have been the costs and benefits of in-situ preservation or a state-sponsored salvage operation of the shipwreck? What is the public's WTP for such options? What is the public's WTA for destruction (even if by archaeological means) of its national heritage?
These may be legitimate questions, but the way they are phrased reveals prejudices that, if they influenced the way data on WTP and WTA were measured, would almost certainly bias the results.
Let me acknowledge that I have my own prejudices. I have known Greg Stemm, cofounder and chief executive officer of Odyssey Marine Exploration, Inc., for some 30 years and find him a thoughtful, responsible scholar and businessman whose views on responsible shipwreck management merit considerable respect. I have visited Odyssey's operations, reviewed its methodology, and helped edit the research design for the Sussex salvage project. I have served, (and suppose I still serve, though it has been pretty quiescent lately) on the Sussex Archaeological Executive, a group of professional archaeologists from the United Kingdom, United States, and Canada chartered jointly by the British Ministry of Defense and Odyssey to oversee the proposed salvage operation and ensure the quality of its archaeology.
I should also note in passing that the Sussex salvage excavation has not yet taken place, due to disputes with the government of Spain, and that it is not entirely certain that the wreck is really that of the Sussex. But my intent here is to consider the attitudes that inform Claesson's reference to the case and how such attitudes could bias the use of “objective” tools like WTP and WTA.
In a nutshell, Claesson apparently subscribes to the widespread assumption that leaving wrecks in situ or subjecting them to excavation by government is good, while permitting their salvage by commercial operations is bad. This assumption is implicit in his statement, without stated rationale, that the UK, by entering into a salvage contract with Odyssey, accepted “limiting protection of the public's interest in and rights to access its cultural heritage.” Claesson's subscription to this assumption is made more explicit when he goes on to allude to the UK's “willingness to accept (WTA) the loss of its sovereign immunity, future public access to the shipwreck site and its materials, and the destruction of a war grave and archaeological site in exchange for archaeological documentation and 20% of recovered cultural materials and precious metals.” Odyssey's excavation, to Claesson, would have destroyed the (putative) war grave and (undoubted) archaeological site, while apparently a “state-sponsored salvage operation” would not. And leaving the wreck unmolested on the sea bottom would have protected the public's “interest in and rights to access its cultural heritage.”
But are Claesson's assumptions not correct? Is it not true that leaving wrecks in situ is good? That state-sponsored salvage is also good? That commercial salvage is bad? After all, these assumptions undergird the UNESCO Convention on the Protection of the Underwater Cultural Heritage—2001,Footnote 3 and they are piously articulated by virtually every major archaeological organization on the planet.
Well, consider the following:
1. The wreck-that-may-be-Sussex (WTMBS) lies at a depth of 821 meters (2,694 feet) in the Strait of Gibraltar.Footnote 4 This has three practical results:
(a) The public is unlikely to access the site any time in the foreseeable future.
(b) The cost of any kind of recovery is extremely high.
(c) Investing in such an operation is a risky proposition.
2. To judge from my observation of Odyssey's operations and from the reports it has published, Odyssey conducts archaeological fieldwork, documentation, analysis, and conservation that compare favorably with anything done by any state-sponsored or other academic or pure research organization.Footnote 5
3. Wrecks on the bottom of the ocean do not just sit there unscathed, awaiting the attentions of the interested public or pure researchers. Even after a wreck has deteriorated to a condition of general stasis (assuming such a condition exists), it is prone to having things dropped on it and, more seriously, dragged over it.
(a) Odyssey has recently documented the widespread destruction of wrecks in the English Channel and its approaches by beam trawlers and other deep sea fishing operations;Footnote 6 this destruction is, as far as I can tell, being ignored by the academic and pure research communities that bewail the terrible effects of commercial salvage.
(b) While the WTMBS has not evidently been trawled, it has become festooned with a good deal of junk discarded by shipping passing overhead.Footnote 7 Even if beam trawling or its equivalent is never employed in the Strait of Gibraltar, what may be dropped on the wreck in the future is anyone's guess. And the wreck (whose cannon have deteriorated to mere husks) continues to deteriorate, albeit slowly.
4. As I understand it, the British government did not give up its sovereign immunity in the Sussex case; the arrangement with Odyssey is for a joint venture in which the UK retains title to the wreck—assuming the wreck is in fact the Sussex.
5. Odyssey's agreement with government is a good deal more complex than the 20% deal Claesson reports. It features a sliding scale in which the government's share ranges from 20% to 60% depending on the value of the recovered cargo. Moreover, the government has first right of refusal to purchase the entire collection or any portion it selects. Odyssey, of course, agreed to bear all the costs of excavation, conservation and analysis, and had already sponsored the intensive survey required to find the wreck in the first place (Greg Stemm, personal communication 2011).
6. Assuming the wreck is that of the Sussex, its status as a war grave is dubious; the Sussex went down in a storm while on a diplomatic mission, not as the result of enemy action. And for what it is worth, no human remains have been detected during Odyssey's detailed robotic survey and testing of the site (Sean Kingsley, personal communication 2011).
7. Odyssey's policy is to place recovered artifacts and other objects into the stream of commerce only after they have been fully documented, described, analyzed and conserved. Moreover, only manufactured objects with limited research or interpretive value once documented and analyzed—for instance, coins and bottles—go readily into the stream of commerce. Artifacts with greater research potential, if not selected by government, can be sold only to academic and research institutions, and then only with mechanisms put in place for tracking them down if anyone needs to study them in the future (Greg Stemm, personal communication, 2011). A substantial part of each collection is kept together and made accessible to the public through exhibits in museums and in facilities developed by Odyssey itself.
Would the public be willing to accept Odyssey's WTMBS salvage if the above factors were presented to it? Conversely, what would be its willingness to pay for a state-sponsored salvage effort, which would certainly cost many million euros? What, too, would be its WTP considering the uncertainty about whether the WTMBS is really Her Majesty's long-lost warship? And what would be its WTP for state sponsorship of the detailed surveys necessary even to identify such wrecks, carried out in this instance by Odyssey at no direct cost to the public?
The devil in valuation schemes, I believe, lies in details like these. WTA and WTP based on the easy assumption that in situ preservation is good and commercial salvage is bad would almost certainly diverge widely from WTA and WTP based on more nuanced assumptions and knowledge of the facts of any given case. If objectifying systems like WTA/WTP are to be used in decision making about things like shipwreck management, it would—I think—be important to ground them on objective data rather than on mere prejudice.