Conservation decisions and choices can be political

In the April 6, 2017 issue of The New York Times, Rod Nordland wrote about the project to restore Kabul, Afghanistan’s destroyed Darulaman Palace, a 1919 building that combined neo-classical with Moghul and other eastern influences (“Saving Pockmarked Palace (Only Afghans Need Apply“). The project is funded by the government of Afghanistan and all of the people leading and working on the project are Afghani. President Ashraf Ghani has called the project “an exercise in national pride”. The work that the conservator does may be apolitical, but conservation decisions and choices can be political.