Here in Germany there is some reluctance to investigate WW2 sites (bunkers,
etc., associated with the West Wall; the battlefield in the Hürtgen, etc.),
in part because of the danger of associating with "amateur" groups that can
sometimes be a little "brown."
Among the other complications in Cologne, there has been a tendency to try
to bulldoze everything that isn't "Roman"; the situation surrounding the
synagogue excavations is complicated to the extent that a potential investor
backed out of helping to fund a museum because it is intended to show the
daily life of Jews in a medieval German city and their generally peaceful
coexistence with Gentiles, rather than focusing specifically (as is the case
in so many other "Jewish museums") on ritual objects.
Then, of course, there is open opposition to archaeology by
investors/developers, and now the lack of a law forcing payment for rescue
excavations...
And the general lack of "theory" in German archaeology because of its
"associations" with the racist archaeology of Kossina & his followers with
the brown shirts...

-----Original Message-----


Aside from broad generalities such as I mentioned, I am curious if there are
examples of current historic archaeological research altered in some way by
the political atmosphere of the last few years that anyone can provide? Here
I am thinking of the absence or reduction of cultural evolutionary models in
American archaeology during the somewhat elongated period (1917 to
mid-1950s) of the Red Scare in America.