Anaïs Mattez 

Areas of Specialization: International Law, Cultural Property, Legal History, Asia, Southeast Asia, Museums and the Law, Property, Socio-Legal Methods, Heritage Framework and Policy, Digital Humanities

Work Experience

Dec 2024–ongoing. Associate, Harvard Asia Center. Current Project: Culture and Sovereignty in Southeast Asia

Sep 2024–ongoing. Consultant, UNESCO Bangkok, Culture Unit. Current Projects: Shared Heritage in Southeast Asia. 1970 UNESCO Convention on the Means of Prohibiting and Preventing the Illicit Import, Export and Transfer of Ownership of Cultural Property.

May 2021- ongoing. Expert Member ICOMOS ICIP

Sept 2022- Aug 2023. Associate Editor, Michigan Journal of Law and Society (MJLS), Ann Arbor, USA

Sept 2017–Jan 2018. Assistant curator at HANYI Art Space, Wuhan, China

Jan 2017–Jul 2017. Research Intern at UNIDROIT Headquarters, Rome, Italy. 1995 UNIDROIT Convention on Stolen and Illegally Exported Cultural Objects. Internship Grant Wallonie-Bruxelles International.

Feb 2016–Jul 2016. Intern at UNESCO Regional Office for Education, Bangkok, Thailand. Implementation of 1970 UNESCO Convention, Cultural Property in Asia.

Education and Research Experience

Sep 2019–Oct 2024. PhD The University of Hong Kong (HKU), Faculty of Law. Dissertation title: The Restitution of Cultural Property in the Age of Internationalism and National Identities.

Research Visits:

·Harvard Law School (Nov 2023- Jul 2024)

·SciencesPo Paris, France (Sept 2022- Jun 2023)

·University of Technology Sydney (UTS), Sydney (Feb 2023-April 2023)

·Max Planck Institute, Heidelberg, Germany (Oct 2020-Jan 2021)

Sep 2013–Sep 2015. Master of Arts in Philosophy UCLouvain

Sep 2011–Jun 2014. Master of Law UCLouvain / KULeuven

Sep 2008–Jun 2011. Bachelor of Law UCLouvain

Awards and Scholarships

·HKU Post-Graduate Scholarship (PGS) Awardee for Doctoral Studies (Sept 2019)

·USA National Science Foundation (Oct 2022)

·HKU Certificate Course of Teaching and Learning in Higher Education (CTLHE) (May 2021)

·Italian Ministry of Culture for the survey on the Neapolitan cultural heritage (Jan 2020)

Publications

 Articles

· (2025). Indigenous Advocacy and the Compliance Mechanisms of the World Heritage Convention, The International Journal of Cultural Property, Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0940739124000250

· (2024). Restitution of Cultural Property: The Rise and Fall of a Cosmopolitan Ideal, International Journal of Heritage Studies: IJHS, Routledge. https://doi.org/10.1080/13527258.2023.2284715

· (2022) Ethnonationalism and Cultural Heritage Law in Myanmar. Santander Art and Culture Law Review, 217–244, 2022. https://www.ejournals.eu/SAACLR/First-View/2-2022/art/22610/

· (2020). Unidroit at 25: A Matter of Equilibrium. The Journal of Art, Crime, 24, 2020, 85–87 (co-authored with G. Giardini)

Book Chapters

· (2024). Cultural Treasures and Their Place of Origin: Crimean Treasures Return to Kyiv, in Heritage in War and Peace. Legal and Political Perspectives for Future Protection, ed. M. Sadowski and G. Mastandrea Bonaviri, Springer. link.springer.com/book/9783031473463

Book Reviews

·  (2025). Cultural Objects and Reparative Justice: A Legal and Historical Analysis by Gerstenblith, P. 2024, International Journal of Cultural Property.

· (2023). Implementing the World Heritage Convention: Dimensions of Compliance by E. Hamman and H. Holleland, Asian Journal of International Law, 13(2), 395–396. Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/S2044251323000267

Reports & Policy Papers

·UNESCO (2016). Regional Report on Disaster Risk Reduction of Cultural Heritage in Asia and the Pacific. Regional Report

Blogs and Press

·(2024). When Did Everyone Start Talking About Heritage Restitution? And What Does International Law Have to Do with This? in International Law, Völkerrechtsblog. Doi: 10.17176/20240522-005009-0 (peer-reviewed)

Works-in-Progress

· (2026). Restitution of Antiquities: Cultural Property Nationalism and the Quest for Sovereignty in China. Asian Journal of Law and Society, Cambridge University Press. (project presented at the Oxford China Conference May 2024) 

· (2025) Implementing NAGPRA: The Legal Consciousness of the Antiquity Museum Curator.

· (2025) Buddhist Art of Afghanistan: Looting and Restitution in Times of Conflict (presented at SLS Oxford 2023)

Professional Networks and Memberships

· Law & Society Association (LSA)

· Asian Law & Society Association (ALSA)

Conferences Papers, Public Talks, and Guest Lectures

· 22-25 Global Meeting on Law and Society (LSA), Chicago, Illinois, USA.

· 28 Feb 2025. Legal History: Conservation of cultural relics in China. LPE Emerging Scholar Workshop @Harvard Law School.

· 6-9 Jun 2024. Global Meeting on Law and Society (LSA), Denver, Colorado, USA.

· 31 May 2024. Oxford University, School of Law. China Conference ‘Cultural Property in China.’

· 23 Apr 2024. MIT Climate Nucleus, Earth Day Guest Lecture.

·23 Feb 2024, Harvard Law School, workshop and lecture ‘From Imperialism to Nationalism: Cultural Property in China 1912-1976.’

·27-30 Jun 2023. Society of Legal Scholars, 114th Annual Conference, Oxford Brookes, Oxford, UK. Paper presentation: Looting and Restitution in Times of Conflict (Criminal Justice).

· 12-16 Jun 2023. Sciences Po Forms of Memory and the Role of Law / Mémoire(s) ET Rôle(s) Droit. (Guest Lecture)

· 8-9 May 2023. EUI Bridging Epistemic Divides in Cultural Heritage Protection: An Exercise in Confrontation and Conversation, Fiesole, Italy.

·12-13 Dec 2022. International Boundary Conference, Geography, King’s College, London, UK.

· 3-4 Nov 2022. Heritage in War and Peace: Legal and Political Perspectives for Future Protection, McGill University, Montreal, Canada.

· 7-8 Oct 2022. New Directions in Law and Society, UMASS, Amherst, USA. Doctoral Workshop.

· 6-9 Sept 2022. Society of Legal Scholars, 113th Annual Conference, King’s College, London, UK. Paper presentation: The Triumph of Cultural Heritage Nationalism - The Chinese Case.

· 16-25 Jul 2022. International Osnabrück Summer Institute on the Cultural Study of the Law.

· 6-10 Apr 2022. Annual Conference of the Socio-Legal Studies Association (SLSA), University of York, UK. Paper presentation: The Vexations and Victories of Cultural Nationalism.

· 20-21 May 2021. UNSW Canberra, Australia - Asian Society of International Law (Asian-SIL) Biennial Conference PhD Workshop. Paper presentation: Afterlife of Cultural Objects. A Case Study of Chinese Funeral Artefacts of the Warring State Period

· 5-7 May 2021. The University of Hong Kong - HKU Legal and Political Theory Postgraduate Conference. Paper presentation: Restitution of Cultural Objects in the Age of Internationalism.

Language Skills 

·  English, French, Thai: Full professional proficiency

·   Dutch: Independent User, partial professional proficiency

·  Chinese (Putonghua): Basic User

·  Italian: Basic User