Indigenous Repatriation and Reburial Movements in South America

A key issue in recognizing the rights of Indigenous peoples concerns the appropriation and unequal treatment of Indigenous human remains and cultural heritage. Beginning in the second half of the twentieth century, Indigenous nations around the world have organized and mobilized for their right to decide the future of their ancestors’ remains and material culture, which have been deterritorialized and patrimonialized as part of colonial and postcolonial processes. This global Indigenous movement for social justice and human rights has been referred to as the “repatriation movement” (Mihesuah Reference Mihesuah2000), which is centered on Indigenous claims for respect, dignity, and the restitution of human remains and cultural materials, challenging the legality and ethics of museum collections (Fforde et al. Reference Fforde, McKeown and Keeler2020).

In South America, the repatriation movement began to take shape in the 1980s. As in the Global North, Indigenous demands for the non-excavation, non-exhibition, or the restitutionFootnote ¹ and reburial of human remains in the region have embedded and catalyzed broader negotiations about the political-cultural legitimacy of Indigenous identity claims (Arthur and Ayala Reference Arthur and Ayala2020). In Chile and Argentina, Indigenous demands for the respectful treatment, repatriation, and reburial of their ancestors have been at the forefront of the repatriation movement. However, in other South American countries, restitution processes have been led by national governments, as is the case in Peru and Bolivia (Higueras Reference Higueras2022), as well as Colombia (Franco Arce Reference Franco Arce2025) and Uruguay (Verdesio Reference Verdesio2011).

This report examines repatriation movements in Chile and Argentina, emphasizing how Indigenous activism has encouraged contemporary debates regarding the ethical treatment of ancestral remains and items of cultural significance. More specifically, it provides an overview of how these discourses have prompted transformations within the scientific and museum communities of both nations, advancing the recognition of Indigenous rights and fostering reflections on the responsibility of the scientific community to redress historical injustices. Though similar movements cut across South America, the selection of cases is based on two primary criteria: first, the authors’ collaborative experience with Indigenous communities in Chile on matters of repatriation; and second, the status of Argentina as a regional benchmark on the subject. These same criteria dictate the granularity with which each case is analyzed in the present report.

Argentina was the first South American country to promote a federal restitution law (Ley 25.517), which was enacted in 2001. Prior to this law, there were other cases based on specific agreements between parties, leading to the enactment of specific laws applicable only to those cases (Endere Reference Endere2022). Mapuche, Tehuelche, Mapuche-Tehuelche, Rankülche, and Aché communities (Ayala and Curtoni Reference Ayala and Curtoni2025; Chaparro Reference Chaparro2023; Crespo Reference Crespo2018; Jofré Reference Jofré2020; Rodríguez Reference Rodríguez, Jofré and Gnecco2022) made the first successfully completed repatriation and restitution claims, which date to the 1990s. Despite these advances, this law conflicts with the national law on archaeological and paleontological heritage (Ley 25.743/03), enacted two years later, which regards Indigenous ancestral remains as cultural heritage assets. This legal framework, adopted without the consultation or participation of Indigenous peoples, authorizes the exhumation of human remains without consent from Indigenous communities and organizations.

Chile represents a different case. In the absence of repatriation legislation, restitutions are carried out on the basis of specific agreements between national and international institutions and the Indigenous communities concerned. With the first repatriation claims dating to the 1980s, processes were primarily led by international institutions and the Chilean government until the 2010s. Subsequently, Indigenous peoples asserted their leadership over the process, harnessing the emergence of a repatriation movement to reframe and institutionalize the repatriation debate as a matter of national interest. As a response, the Chilean government implemented a policy to transfer collections from the Museo Nacional de Historia Natural to state museums located in Indigenous territories (Tuki and Arthur Reference Arthur, Fforde, McKeown and Keeler2020).

Despite these accomplishments, Indigenous repatriation efforts continue to be hampered by the Ley de Momumentos Nacionales (National Monuments Law; No. 17.288), which, mirroring the Argentine case, regards Indigenous ancestral remains as state property and objects of scientific interest. Although the government recently consulted Indigenous communities regarding a new heritage framework—wherein the consulted peoples reached a consensus that repatriation should be recognized as an inherent Indigenous right—significant challenges remain. Parallel to this process, the Comisión de Derechos Humanos y Pueblos Indígenas de la Cámara de Diputadas y Diputados (Human Rights and Indigenous Peoples Committee of the Chamber of Deputies) commissioned a report on comparative international legislation regarding the safeguarding and protection of Indigenous remains (Rojas Reference Rojas Castillo2024). Nevertheless, the proposed legislation persists in privileging state and scientific authority over Indigenous rights by categorizing ancestral remains primarily as bioarchaeological assets.

The Repatriation Movement and Scientific Communities

Professional scientific societies have reacted in different ways to Indigenous demands for the respectful treatment of their ancestors. In Argentina, the Asociación de Antropología Biológica Argentina approved a Declaración en Relación con la Ética del Estudio de Restos Humanos (Declaration on the Ethics of the Study of Human Remains) in 2007, defending their research rights against the claims of Indigenous communities. However, they recognize that it is desirable to facilitate the restitution of remains of known identity and to address claims of non-exhibition. In 2009, the Asociación de Arqueólogos Profesionales de la República de Argentina approved a Code of Professional Ethics, which establishes that human remains should be treated with particular respect. This document includes a clause on ethical concerns based on the Federal Restitution Law, which states the obligation to obtain free and informed consent, to respect human remains, and to avoid participating in work that may compromise international human rights recognized by the national constitution (Aranda Reference Aranda, Arthur and Ayala2020). While these professional bodies appear receptive to Indigenous claims, they fail to contest the prevailing legal frameworks that define Indigenous ancestral remains as objects of scientific inquiry.

Similarly, the Sociedad Chilena de Arqueología in Chile has a code of ethics from the 1990s that barely refers to Indigenous populations—it includes only a brief mention of the need to provide a copy or summary of the information obtained to the communities. On the other hand, the 2013 Code of Ethics of the Colegio de Arqueólogas y Arqueólogos de Chile holds that researchers should promote the responsible study and handling of bioanthropological remains, avoiding their unnecessary collection, excessive manipulation, or inadequate storage. The 2015 “Proposal of the Sociedad Chilena de Antropología Biológica on the Treatment of Bioanthropological Heritage” reaffirms the national ownership of this heritage, although it expresses a willingness to engage in open dialogue with the communities and to assess the ethical and philosophical implications of the study of human remains. Additionally, the proposal recognizes the ILO 169 Convention and its mandate to consult and elicit the effective participation of Indigenous peoples in decisions that affect them (Abarca-Labra et al. Reference Abarca-Labra, Maturana, Montt, Millahueique, Chiguay, Mellico, López, Aróstica, Cancino, Carmona, Arthur and Ayala2020). Finally, the Colegio de Antropología Física y Biológica de Chile refers to human remains as bioanthropological collections and expresses its willingness to collaborate with Indigenous communities among other stakeholders.

Indigenous Repatriation Movements and Museums

Indigenous repatriation activism has provoked important transformations in museums in both countries. In Argentina, the Museo La Plata is emblematic of the impact of the Federal Restitution Law, leading to several cases of restitutions of human remains to different Indigenous peoples (Chaparro Reference Chaparro2023; Endere Reference Endere2022; Magallanes and Stella Reference Magallanes and Stella2022). The museum has also implemented institutional changes, such as revisions to its museography and the elaboration of an institutional restitution policy. Further, it has opened spaces for dialogue with Indigenous communities and state offices. In 2006, the Museo La Plata decided to remove all human remains of American origin from exhibition. Similarly, the Museo Etnográfico in Buenos Aires has a Collections Treatment Policy for the management of restitution requests. This policy resulted from a process of reflexive dialogue with Indigenous communities, an internal reorganization and prioritization of the inventory of human remains, and their removal from exhibitions (Beron et al. Reference Beron, Perogago and Correa2019).

In Chile, museums have been incorporating culturally relevant protocols for the ethical treatment of human remains over the last two decades. In 2005, Ruka Kimvn Taiñ Volil, the Mapuche Museum in Cañete, began a collaborative process of revitalizing and redesigning its permanent exhibition. During this period, Mapuche communities requested the removal of human remains from museum exhibitions, as well as their reburial. In 2010, the museum opened its new museography, resulting from a collaborative process that also encouraged the museum to design a culturally relevant protocol for the appropriate care and treatment of human remains (Obreque and Muñoz Reference Obreque, Muñoz, Arthur and Ayala2020).

In 2007, the Council of Atacameño Peoples requested that the Instituto de Investigaciones Arqueológicas y Museo (IIAM-UCN) remove human remains from its exhibitions. Atacameño museum staff partook of this demand (Cárdenas et al. Reference Cárdenas, Ayala, Ogalde, Candia, Salinas, Yere, Aguilar, Espíndola and Cruz2025). In response, the museum’s collections unit and Atacameño staff developed a protocol oriented toward the culturally appropriate treatment of human remains, which signaled a milestone in a new museological approach and opened new paths toward recognizing the rights of the Atacameño people and restoring the dignity of their abuelos, or ancestors (Cruz et al. Reference Cruz, Anza, Cruz, Cruz, Arthur and Ayala2020).

In 2020, during the restoration of San Lucas Chapel in Toconao, 29 human remains were found and temporarily relocated to the Museo Arqueológico R. P. Gustavo Le Paige by mandate of the Consejo de Monumentos Nacionales (CMN). As part of its institutional commitment and a formal collaboration agreement, staff members of the museum and archaeologists from IIAM-UCN worked with the Atacameño Community of Toconao in the development of a reburial protocol. Further, IIAM-UCN drafted an institutional policy regarding the collection and future findings of human remains. This document affirms IIAM-UCN’s respect for Indigenous peoples and their right to the repatriation and reburial of their ancestors’ remains, as well as its commitment to ensuring the dignified treatment of human remains under its custodianship and to jointly defining procedures for their restitution and reburial.

In 2011, the first repatriation program in Chile was formed on Rapa Nui (Easter Island), the result of over 20 years of repatriation activism on this Island. In response to the lack of national regulations for repatriation and reburial in Chile, the program established its own procedures, informed by international regulations and guided by Rapa Nui cultural protocols. The program’s policy was then adopted by the Museo Antropológico P. Sebastián Englert. Through a Memorandum of Understanding, the museum committed itself to advancing toward the culturally appropriate and respectful treatment of Rapa Nui tupuna (ancestors) held in the museum and to collaborating with the Rapa Nui Repatriation Program on future repatriations (Arthur Reference Arthur, Fforde, McKeown and Keeler2020). The protocol developed by the Rapa Nui Repatriation Program stood out as the first repatriation policy in Chile, inspiring the development of repatriation and relocation policies by the Servicio Nacional de Patrimonio Cultural.

In 2012, the Museo Histórico-Arqueológico de Quillota led a series of collaborative projects to effectively address concerns raised by the excavation of the archaeological site Estadio de Quillota. In 2009, the renovation of the Estadio Municipal de Quillota resulted in one of the most relevant funerary findings in central Chile. Recovered archaeological materials and human remains were relocated to the museum by law. This event resulted in the development of guidelines intended to avoid the unnecessary manipulation and exhibition of human remains. Based on this experience, the museum established strict mechanisms for the reception of archaeological materials and human remains, developed codes of conduct for researchers, and regulated sampling procedures (Abarca-Labra et al. Reference Abarca-Labra, Maturana, Montt, Millahueique, Chiguay, Mellico, López, Aróstica, Cancino, Carmona, Arthur and Ayala2020).

In 2017, the Museo Nacional de Historia Natural in Chile implemented a collections policy stating that the institution is governed by the guidelines of the International Council of Museums Code of Ethics concerning sensitive cultural materials. Further, it asserts that research, conservation, and any exhibition of human remains and materials with ritual significance must be carried out with respect and consideration for the groups to which these collections are provenanced.

Final Reflections

Indigenous movements in South America have galvanized important debates on the ethical treatment of human remains that continue to reverberate through Indigenous, policymaking, museum, and scientific communities. The repatriation and reburial movement in South America has motivated the passing of repatriation legislation in Argentina, the incorporation of repatriation as a matter of public interest in national legislation in Peru and Bolivia, and national policies on restitution and repatriation in Chile. Additionally, a number of national and state museums in the region have engaged in processes of transformative reflection with concerned Indigenous communities, some of them resulting in the incorporation of culturally relevant protocols for the ethical treatment of human remains in their collections.

Scientific societies in the region have also participated in these debates. Some have enacted responsive codes of ethics that invite sound reflections on the responsibility of the scientific community toward Indigenous peoples, both past and present. However, others continue to hold to the protection of an assumed universal interest of science, in many cases denying legitimate claims for repatriation. Indigenous peoples’ long and committed repatriation activism has opened up spaces for a greater understanding of the responsibility of science to redress historical injustices structured by academic practices. Despite notable progress, Indigenous repatriation efforts continue to be obscured by a legislative status quo that reifies ancestral remains as bioarchaeological assets, a framing that systematically privileges scientific sovereignty to the detriment of Indigenous self-determination and human rights.