I am a coastal archaeologist who has worked along North America's Pacific shore for a decade and a half. I've seen at first hand the catastrophic destruction of archaeological sites from erosion, development and other taphonomic forces and, like many of my colleagues, am deeply concerned about how best to chart a course of action that effectively addresses our maritime heritage crisis. Before agreeing to write a review, Richard Hutchings’ Maritime Heritage in Crisis: Indigenous landscapes and global ecological breakdown seemed an easy fit for my interests. In reality, Hutchings’ short but powerful book made me, and will likely make many academic and cultural resource management (CRM) archaeologists, very uncomfortable. I see this as a good thing: Hutchings’ offering is an exercise in self-reflexivity, which can help us critically analyse how and why archaeology is performed and whether our models and justifications should be rethought. Rather than use interdisciplinary science, particularly geology, coastal geomorphology and environmental archaeology, to investigate and build a roadmap for addressing the loss of maritime cultural heritage, Hutchings employs critical theory to conclude that archaeology, in all its forms, ‘is complicit in the systematic destruction of . . . cultural heritage’ (p. xiv).

Hutchings begins with a chapter describing how he became interested in the maritime heritage crisis along the Pacific Northwest coast of North America, hoping, like many of us, to offer his expertise as a geoarchaeologist and through his many years of CRM. Grappling with his unease of traditional archaeological methods and influenced by his exploration of critical heritage studies literature, Hutchings realized that he needed to redefine the problem. For Hutchings, archaeology is part of the problem, and not a solution to the crisis.

In chapter 2, Hutchings lays out the myriad of taphonomic forces affecting maritime heritage landscapes. These include not only anthropogenic climate change, erosion, sea-level rise and other natural transformation processes, but also rising human population densities and coastal sprawl. The mainstream response to coastal change is resource management, an argument Hutchings lays out in chapter 3. Drawing on the historical development of CRM in British Columbia, Hutchings identifies a problematic relationship between archaeology and development. He argues that the focus on the research or scientific value of the archaeological record ‘presumes that science is the limiting factor in the heritage crisis’ (p. 45).

In chapter 4, Hutchings examines the heritage crisis along the Salish Sea, focusing on shíshálh (Sechelt) First Nation territory north of Vancouver, BC. After summarizing the archaeological records of his study area within three discrete units, Hutchings draws conclusions about the types of impacts to heritage sites, the responses of resource managers and the effectiveness of these responses. Ultimately, he finds that the vast majority of archaeological sites are disturbed, despite decades-long efforts by resource managers and stewardship by the shíshálh. He argues that, for archaeologists, ‘disturbed’ sites are essentially destroyed sites, a position that stands in stark contrast to the shíshálh Nation, who view all sites as significant, regardless of the level of disturbance.

For Hutchings, archaeology and the CRM community are part of ‘neoliberal statecraft’ designed to advance economic development and systematically clear landscapes of Indigenous heritage, an argument he draws out in chapter 5. Rather than saving our world's cultural heritage, Hutchings maintains that CRM and archaeology view archaeological sites as commodities. If a site is undisturbed, it holds scientific integrity and should be preserved as an important resource for understanding the past. If a site is disturbed, it lacks scientific integrity and can justifiably be destroyed to make way for economic development. For Indigenous communities, the result is the slow destruction of their cultural heritage and connections to place—an act of state-sponsored violence.

Where do we go from here? For Hutchings, finding solutions requires first agreeing on the problem. For archaeologists, the problem is that archaeological sites are being lost due to development and coastal change without adequate scientific documentation. We, therefore, need to do more archaeology and gather more data. For Indigenous communities, the problem is the loss of both archaeological sites and imbued cultural landscapes—the fundamental loss of their heritage. We, therefore, need to find ways to preserve and protect sites and landscapes, and not to do more archaeology. For governments and developers, the problem is a bureaucratic or financial one. In the final chapter, Hutchings explores these dynamics and concludes that there will be no easy solutions. Even as more archaeologists have joined the profession since the 1950s, more Indigenous cultural landscapes have been destroyed. Hutchings concludes that modern archaeology and CRM are a ‘sham’ and their practitioners are ‘mercenaries’ for the state. The only way out of this paradox is for Indigenous communities to gain sovereignty over their traditional territories and challenge archaeology and CRM for control over their heritage. Hutchings views this as a revolutionary paradigm shift and leaves the reader with little sense of optimism that change can happen before it's too late.

Whether or not you will agree with Hutchings’ arguments and characterizations of modern academic and compliance archaeology, Maritime Heritage in Crisis is a worthwhile read that certainly will challenge you to view our profession through a new lens. At times I was uncomfortable, shocked, or even angry about the description of our discipline as a ‘trade bead in the pursuit of profit’ (p. 101) and other such damning generalizations. But, having engaged in archaeology as a CRM crew member, project manager and as a university professor, I agree that there is much that we can do to confront the maritime heritage crisis more effectively and help save rapidly disappearing maritime cultural landscapes. It will be difficult conversations arising from viewpoints such as the one presented by Hutchings that can help us move forward.