Crime and its objects: Human/object relationships and the market for illicit Latin American antiquities

Dealers and collectors of Latin American antiquities are, by definition, white collar actors. It would be a logical next step to say that people in those groups who knowingly engage with the illicit trade are white collar criminals who are unlikely to self-define as such and are equally unlikely to see their actions as crimes. This leaves us with more questions than answers. The question of how these white collar actors justify their actions and classify themselves as non-criminals is covered elsewhere (Mackenzie 2006, 2014; Mackenzie and Yates 2016a). For the remainder of this essay, I am going to consider not how they do this, but one possible reason why. Moving away from classic ideas of white collar crime as being financially motivated, I want to consider the development of human/object relationships as a motivating factor for engagement in the illicit market for Latin American antiquities, and indeed in the grey market (Mackenzie and Yates 2016b) for antiquities more generally.