Restitution Process Research Articles

Restitution and the Treaty of Versailles: Restitution from Germany to France, 1918–1928

This article proposes a re-examination of one of the most controversial cases of reparations: the Treaty of Versailles. By focusing on Article 238, which stipulated the restitution of objects stolen or displaced by the German army during the First World War, we can see that the treaty helped to solidify norms concerning the protection of civilian property in wartime and gave civilians a right to have a voice in international law. However, the process of restitution was beset with both practical and political challenges and its success hinged on the role of public authorities, the nature of the objects returned and the impact of social class dynamics. Through this study, we are able to gain a more nuanced understanding of the possibilities of restitution, its potential as well as its limitations.

Methodological Approaches to Structural Change: Epidemiology and the Case for Reparations.

Scholars, activists, and policymakers have long called for reparations - a process of repair and restitution for harm and injustices done - to descendants of enslaved Africans in the U.S. as a structural intervention to address historic and ongoing injustices. However, there has been very limited epidemiologic work examining reparations. We explore some of the epidemiologic benefits and challenges of using causal inference frameworks to model reparations as an example of a large-scale, structural intervention that pushes the limits of what is considered "well-defined" and may violate key identification assumptions. Finally, we weigh these methodological limitations with the utility of assessing public health implications of reparations policies and conclude by discussing implications for future epidemiologic research.

Ties to the Territory and Peacebuilding in Land Restitution Processes. The Case of the Municipalities of La Unión and Carmen De Viboral in Colombia

Ties to the Territory and Peacebuilding in Land Restitution Processes. The Case of the Municipalities of La Unión and Carmen De Viboral in Colombia

Valstybinės žemės nuomos instituto susiformavimo prielaidos ir raida

The research work analyses the preconditions for the formation of the institute of lease of state-owned land, discussing the historical context of the emergence of such regulation, reviewing the development of legislation of this institute, the case law interpreting it and the jurisprudence of the Constitutional Court. 
 The formation of the institute of lease of state-owned land was mainly influenced by the prohibition of ownership of land by legal persons in the original wording of Article 47 of the Constitution, as well as by the peculiarities of the restitution and privatisation processes, which prevented the formation of private land masses, and became a prerequisite for the separation of the property complexes (i.e. the ownership of a land plot and the buildings on it).The authors of the paper, having studied the development of the regulation of state-owned land lease from 1992 to 2022, described state-owned land lease as an independent civil law institute, which combines the public law regulation method and strict principles of state property management with the general principles of civil relations (equality of the parties, inviolability of property, proportionality), and seeks to ensure the correct balance between the interests of society and the rights of the owner. The specific regulation of state-owned land lease in the legal system of the Republic of Lithuania and the wide spread of state-owned land lease relations have prevented the real implementation of the Roman law principle superficies solo cedit in Lithuanian property law: although this principle is established in the Civil Code, its exceptions are applied very often, thus preventing the actual dominance of the principle in the legal system of Lithuania.

Historical memory and restitution of community land in the peasant community of Pararin (Ancash) in the decade of 1960

This paper is situated within the field of historical anthropology and examines the process of land restitution of the peasant community of Pararin, in Northern Peru, in the context of peasant movements in their struggle for land. The people of Pararin are considered as actors of their local history with capacity for agency. Thus, in the decade of 1960, this peasant community used their historical memory to come together, and undertook a process of struggle to reclaim what their regarded, historically, their agricultural lands in the Fortaleza valley. Ultimately, they obtained the recognition of the State, but not without some unexpected difficulties during the process.

Two Decades of Church Management in the Context of Restitution Processes

Abstract This study examines the transformation of the economic relations between the state and church in the Czech Republic, focusing on changes since 2012 when a legislative framework for the separation of state and church was accepted. Our article aims to assess the changing financial relations between the church and state by emphasizing future development financial scenarios for churches in the Czech Republic based on two decades of financial data describing transfers from the public sector to the church regarding its current economic value and structure of sources. We confront quantitative results with the qualitative reflection of church representatives for whom this situation is very challenging.

Yugoslavia and the Restitution of Monetary Gold After the Second World War

During the Second World War, the Axis states looted a great deal of gold in various forms, both from individuals and countries. Following that war, the western allies established the Tripartite Gold Commission (TGC) to organize the restitution of monetary gold that had belonged to central banks in occupied Europe. One of the claimant countries was Yugoslavia. Drawing upon hitherto unused TGC records, the article examines the looting of Yugoslav monetary gold and its restitution via the TGC, which is a little-known episode in postwar history. Of the four Yugoslav claims submitted to the TGC in 1947, the majority were recognized as valid, yet the final adjudication was not published until 1958. The reasons for this protracted process of restitution and for the rejection of some of the Yugoslav claims are set out and note is made of the issue's recrudescence in the 1990s, when the TGC sought to distribute the final Yugoslav share. The break-up of Yugoslavia made this concluding allocation of gold a demanding task, and it did not end until 2004. By comparing it with other claimant countries, the article demonstrates that in some ways Yugoslavia was in a better position than the states behind the Iron Curtain.

Storia dello spettacolo e architettura. La restituzione virtuale della macchina del mare del teatro barocco


 
 
 The aim of this article is to propose a hypothesis of virtual restitution of the “maritime machine” of Renaissance and Baroque theatre based on the specific case of the opening performance of the Farnese Theatre in Parma (1628). The celebrations of the wedding of Odoardo Farnese and Margherita de’ Medici culminate in the opera-tournament Mercurio e Marte, written by Claudio Achillini, set to music by Claudio Monteverdi, with scenes and machinery by Giovan Battista Aleotti and Francesco Guitti. It is a composite performance, with a strong symbolic value, conceived to celebrate the patrons and in which the main elements of the Renaissance “intermezzo” (music, dance, stage wonder) merge. The first part of the article – by Benedetta Colasanti – highlights the extent of the stage machinery, the phenomenon of technological precipitation from the construction site to the stage and the role of the state technician, tracing the story from a historical perspective and the analysis and intersection of sources (treatises, notebooks, correspondence, iconography), an operation aimed at providing the necessary data for the virtual restitution process. The second part – by Beatrice Cecchelli – describes the process of virtual restitution from a more technical point of view, illustrating the role of digital technologies and their application to the history of the performing arts.
 
 

Community Awareness and Restitution of Isanzu Ancestors’ Human Remains from the University of Göttingen Collections to Mkalama District, Tanzania

This paper investigates the restitution of Tanzanian human remains from colonial contexts in the Anthropological Collection at the University of Göttingen, Germany. This collection contains 66 human remains from Tanzania whereby 22 of them are from the Isanzu ethnic group. This paper focuses on the Isanzu human remains from Mkalama District in Singida Region and examines the circumstances of acquisition and their historical background. This interdisciplinary research combines methodological approaches from critical historical provenance research and cultural anthropology to study the Isanzu remains. We include investigation of the Isanzu ethnic group's awareness, emotions, opinions, and concerns over the restitution of their Ancestors’ remains back to the community. This paper proposes a plan for best practices in restitution and urges that wisdom, agreement, and negotiation results of Isanzu stakeholders should be taken into account to bring the restitution process of Isanzu's Ancestors to fruition.

RESTITUTION OF PROPERTY IN SERBIA TO CITIZENS OF THE FORMER SFRY REPUBLICS

In the 1990s, the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (SFRY) was broken up into constituent republics. After gaining independence, all the newly formed states, with the exception of Bosnia and Herzegovina, initiated procedures for the return of seized property and compensation to the former owners, or their legal heirs. Slovenia was the first to begin the comprehensive restitution process, followed by Croatia, North Macedonia, Montenegro and Serbia. If we exclude Bosnia and Herzegovina which still has not passed a law on restitution, Serbia was the last to start solving this extremely sensitive issue. The return of seized property in the Republic of Serbia to applicants who are foreign citizens is regulated in such a way that the right to return is held by natural persons – foreign citizens; in case of their death or declaration of death, the right passes on to their legal heirs, under the condition of reciprocity. It is assumed that there is reciprocity with the country that did not regulate the restitution of property if a domestic citizen can acquire property rights and inherit immovable property in that country. This paper presents and analyses data on the current course of returning seized property and compensation to citizens of the former SFRY republics.

Analysis of the Mechanism of Restitution and Its Impact on the Financial Recovery of the State Due to Corruption Offenses

This research aims to examine the effectiveness of the restitution mechanism, as regulated in Article 18 of Law Number 31 of 1999 on the Eradication of Corruption, as amended by Republic of Indonesia Law Number 20 of 2001 on Amendments to Law Number 31 of 1999 on the Eradication of Corruption, in reducing state financial losses due to corruption offenses. This study examines the implementation of the restitution process and its impact on state financial recovery using a qualitative normative juridical method. The researcher demonstrates that imposing restitution as an additional sanction is crucial in recovering state financial losses caused by corruption. However, challenges arise in the form of substitutionary penalties that reduce the effectiveness of restitution, as well as the tendency of offenders to choose imprisonment over fulfilling their obligation to make restitution. The lack of coordination among relevant parties also affects the implementation of restitution. To enhance the effectiveness of restitution, a comprehensive approach is needed, strengthening legal compliance and coordination among law enforcement agencies, judicial institutions, and auditing institutions. By addressing these challenges, the restitution mechanism can significantly contribute to reducing state financial losses caused by corruption

Confronting historical legacies of biological anthropology in South Africa-Restitution, redress and community-centered science: The Sutherland Nine.

We describe a process of restitution of nine unethically acquired human skeletons to their families, together with attempts at redress. Between 1925-1927 C.E., the skeletonised remains of nine San or Khoekhoe people, eight of them known-in-life, were removed from their graves on the farm Kruisrivier, near Sutherland in the Northern Cape Province of South Africa. They were donated to the Anatomy Department at the University of Cape Town. This was done without the knowledge or permission of their families. The donor was a medical student who removed the remains from the labourers' cemetery on his family farm. Nearly 100 years later, the remains are being returned to their community, accompanied by a range of community-driven interdisciplinary historical, archaeological and analytical (osteobiographic, craniofacial, ancient DNA, stable isotope) studies to document, as far as possible, their lives and deaths. The restitution process began by contacting families living in the same area with the same surnames as the deceased. The restitution and redress process prioritises the descendant families' memories, wishes and desire to understand the situation, and learn more about their ancestors. The descendant families have described the process as helping them to reconnect with their ancestors. A richer appreciation of their ancestors' lives, gained in part from scientific analyses, culminating with reburial, is hoped to aid the descendant families and wider community in [re-]connecting with their heritage and culture, and contribute to restorative justice, reconciliation and healing while confronting a traumatic historical moment. While these nine individuals were exhumed as specimens, they will be reburied as people.

Restitution process in conservation: Exploring the historical adventure of Derik Former Government Building

Derik Old Government Building, with its architectural structure, is one of the leading examples of civil architecture that reflects the local architecture and construction technique of Derik district of Mardin. The building was registered as the 1st Group in 2006 and is not used today. It has been used in different functions by the local people until today and has taken its current form with the additions made in different periods. In the archive records scanning, no information or document was found that the restoration project was drawn. In this context, it is necessary to reveal the historical evolution of the building in order to ensure the sustainability of the building and to maintain its historical identity. The aim of the restitution research of the historical building is to determine the changes that the building has undergone until today, to find its original state based on scientific data, to find the periods it went through and to lay the groundwork for the restoration work. As a method in the study, comparative studies were made with examples of similar periods, and determinations were made about the structure in line with the existing traces in the building. In addition, oral interviews were conducted with the people living in the region in order to better understand the historical process of the building. In the results of the study, it was determined that there were two periods related to the structure. It is understood that the upper floor was built later, since the traces from the building, the door and window alignments, the construction technique and the wall alignments of the lower and upper floors are not in the same direction. It is not known exactly when the ground floor was built, but according to the inscription on the mosque next to it, it was built before 1846. It is estimated that the first floor was built at the end of the 19th century.

Arresting Actors: A Sámi Drum and its Complex Relations

ABSTRACT The article centres around a well-known artefact in Sámi history, the more than 300-year-old drum that once belonged to Poala Ánde/Anders Poulsen, that has recently been returned to Sápmi after a long restitution process. Sámi drums were deemed sorcerers’ devices and routinely confiscated and destroyed during seventeenth century Danish autocracy; their users prosecuted and sometimes executed. In the early 1690s, the drum was seized and sent to Copenhagen and the Royal Danish Art Chamber, whereas the owner was killed in custody while awaiting the judicial decision. The case involves one of very few preserved Sámi drums accompanied by a contemporaneous indigenous voice conveyed in the trial document. Paradoxically, at the same time as Sámi drums were confiscated and, in many cases, destroyed, some were embarking on journeys as attractive collectors’ items. Today, Sámi drums are frequently “arrested” in museum exhibitions as “shamanistic devices”, often echoing old tools and tropes of othering. The article argues that there is a tendency to translate actors like Poala Ánde/Anders Poulsen and the drum into categories that immobilise them, and which prevent historical configurations to enter the narrative. It also contends that discussions about what the figures on the drumhead represent have dominated the reception and steered attention away from individual aspects of the drum and its vibrant materiality. In line with the biographical approach of the exhibition Ruoktot ­– The Return of the Sámi Drums by the Sámi Museum in Kárášjohka, I explore the entangled agency of the drum to help consider material aspects and concurrent meanings.

Wiersz "Ach! cóż nieszczęśliwy znaczę na tym świecie" Erazma Słowackiego – próba kulturowo-teodycealnej interpretacji

The article combines two elements in the interpretation of Erasmus Słowacki’s poem “Ah! What Poor Me in this World”: the cultural and the theodicean. Granted, not all major theodicean concepts are included in the poem by the poet himself, and neither can they be applied to it in the act of interpretation. Theologically speaking, however, it is possible to see in the poem a theodicean concept of divine recompense for the evil suffered (an example is the recompense given to Job after the trial he was subjected to). The possibility of seeing compensation stems from the observation that his tragedy (the loss of his ten children) was too great for the poet to still be able to write literarily complex works of a public nature about it (and the poem in question is such a work). The fact that he writes about it, and in this way, proves that a specific mental and emotional healing process has started in him, which can perhaps be seen as a manifestation of the beginning of the process of restitution. Part of it is a reconsideration of one’s future, an increased sense of power, an attempt to contact dead children (which could prove the poet’s opening to a theistically oriented process of experiencing miracles), a belief in the existence of non-material reality (and thus, indirectly, a recognition of the possibility of meeting dead children after death).

Rat tight junction proteins are disrupted after subchronic exposure to okadaic acid.

Okadaic acid (OA), a lipophilic phycotoxin distributed worldwide, causes diarrheic shellfish poisoning and even leads to tumor formation. Currently, the consumption of contaminated seafood is the most likely cause of chronic OA exposure, but there is a serious lack of relevant data. Here, the Sprague-Dawley rats were exposure to OA by oral administration at 100µg/kg body weight, and the tissues were collected and analyzed to assess the effect of subchronic OA exposure. The results showed that subchronic OA administration disturbed colonic mucosal integrity and induced colitis. The colonic tight junction proteins were disrupted and the cell cycle of colonic epithelial cells was accelerated. It is inferred that disruption of the colonic tight junction proteins might be related to the development of chronic diarrhea by affecting water and ion transport. Moreover, the accelerated proliferation of colonic epithelial cells indicated that subchronic OA exposure might promote the restitution process of gut barrier or induce tumor promoter activity in rat colon.

Pesquisa IṢẸ́: contribuições da terapia ocupacional afrorreferenciada nos processos de formação e restituição das subjetividades negras

Abstract Historically, in the Brazilian diaspora, training, professional practices, and the production of knowledge have not prioritized epistemologies, knowledge, and ancestral black practices, neglecting rights, singularities and needs inherent to black people. Statistically configured as the majority in Brazil, this population should be the target of political, academic, and practical actions that contemplate their unique ways of being in the world, reversing universal logics. This manuscript aims to present how the Iṣẹ́ Research: construction of clinical, cultural and educational approaches aimed at the black population, linked to the Lab-Iṣẹ́/UFRJ, has contributed to the processes of formation and restitution of black subjectivities in Brazil. The research method is qualitative with a cartographic approach. The proposal is to carry out the mapping of black theoretical and conceptual bases in scientific, clinical, cultural, and educational productions in undergraduate courses in the country. For this article, the focus was on the occupational therapy undergrad course at UFRJ, more specifically at Lab-Iṣẹ́, as it is the first occupational therapy laboratory in Brazil dedicated to the black population. In addition to the survey and analysis of theoretical and documentary materials, the narratives of the laboratory team made it possible to consider as a result how much afro-referenced occupational therapy has been an important construction leading to the processes of formation and subjectivation of black people involved in the actions of the Laboratory. It is hoped that this work will inspire the entire field for the reformulation of its whitened practices.

Property rights in theory versus practice: the current process of evaluation and compensation of property in Albania

In the latest and current attempt to solving the 30-year-old problem of the process of restitution of the rights of former owners in Albania, the Government has implemented a new methodology of evaluation of properties to be compensated. However, despite the remedy being in place for more than 6 years now, the domestic authorities have failed to materialize their predictions, with most intermittent deadlines having been missed, due to poor initial planning, numerous delays in implementation, poor execution, as well as necessities in amending the law. At the same time, these delays, especially the Government taking more than a year and a half to institute the necessary amendments to the law, pursuant to the findings of the ECtHR and Constitutional Court, have also put at risk the implementation of the law as a whole and the missing of the final deadline of 2026, for the finalization of the process.

On the Doctrinal Principles of Property Restitution

This article aims to establish the reasons and demonstrate the necessity for restitution and its basic beginnings in Ukraine. The article emphasizes that process of restitution, which is undoubtedly needed in Ukraine, should be conducted in accordance to the principle of fairness in order to prevent a violation of private property rights.

World War II Art Restitution Exhibitions


 
 
 Art history is about more than just the works of art that are currently on display in art galleries and museums. It is also about all the works that have been lost, stolen, or destroyed due to tumultuous chapters in human history. One of the largest chapters in human history to affect art history were the events of World War II. In order to help heal the wounds caused by this war, art historians and museum professionals across Europe and North America have dedicated their time to provenance research in order to begin processes of restitution. Two museums that have allocated time and money for provenance research and art restitution are the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art in Kansas City, Missouri, USA, and the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, England. This paper will examine these two museums and the exhibitions that resulted from their provenance research, as well as their restitution and repatriation work. By exploring the efforts made by the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art and the Victoria and Albert Museum, one is given a glimpse into how art historians and museum professionals can help make amends with those affected by tragedy.