Digital Heritage, Decolonization, and International Law: Restitution, Authority, and the Transformative Potential of Digital Surrogates

Abstract

The growing reliance on digital technologies in cultural heritage governance has introduced new possibilities and new risks for post-colonial restitution debates. This article argues that digital engagements with heritage can meaningfully contribute to decolonization only when they are shaped by, and serve the interests of, communities from which cultural objects were taken. Absent such conditions, digitization risks reproducing colonial hierarchies by reinforcing external control over heritage, even while appearing progressive or inclusive. The article contends that international law has a critical role to play in embedding ethical commitments to reparative justice, provided it moves beyond ostensibly neutral legal categories such as authenticity and access, which often operate to legitimize continued colonial possession. The analysis centres on proposals for digitization advanced in the Sarr–Savoy Report on the restitution of objects held in French museums, where digital surrogates were, in some instances, framed as a prerequisite to physical return. Drawing on the report and the diverse responses it generated, the article critically examines whether digitization can function as a form of reparation and emancipation, or whether it instead risks entrenching asymmetrical power relations by shifting value creation and control away from source communities. The article explores how digital surrogates generate new forms of cultural, symbolic, and economic value, and questions who controls that value in contemporary restitution arrangements. It argues that without legal frameworks that prioritise community authority, consent, and benefit-sharing, digital heritage initiatives may undermine rather than advance decolonization. The article concludes by proposing a reorientation of international legal approaches to digital heritage, one that foregrounds restitution, community governance, and the transformative potential of digital tools as instruments of justice rather than substitutes for material return.