P047. From Compliance to Complicity: Insider Threat and the Challenges of Due Diligence in the Art Market

• In Event: Poster Session & Ice Cream Social

Abstract

Art crime encompasses three primary forms: theft and plundering, vandalism, and fraud or forgery. Despite its frequent occurrence, art theft remains an understudied domain with significant research gaps. A recent example is the museum heist in Assen, Netherlands (January 25, 2025), where thieves used dynamite to steal priceless Dacian gold artifacts.

The limited international oversight, weak market regulations, and high financial incentives create an environment where art theft and smuggling persist. Apart from the irreplaceable cultural heritage loss, estimates suggest that art theft, fraud, looting, and trafficking generate annual losses of approximately $8 billion (Houck et al., 2021).

This qualitative research examines the persistence of art theft and smuggling through the lens of responsibility-taking, moral entanglement, and due diligence practices. Specifically, it explores how individuals cope with value incongruences inherent to the art world, leading to varying degrees of moral entanglement, proportionate responsibility, and passive insider threats. These coping strategies influence compliance with or circumvention of due diligence measures, shaping security risks in the art market.

The research adopts a multi-level approach, analyzing coping strategies at the individual, organizational, and national/international levels. Key stakeholders include law enforcement officers, customs officials, private security consultants, and curatorial and security staff in museums, galleries, and auction houses. Empirical data will be collected in Belgium and possibly other European countries to examine how different actors navigate tensions arising from art market-specific situations.

As this project is in its early stages, this poster will primarily outline the theoretical framework and proposed methodology guiding the research.

Author

• IULIA ANDREEA VESCAN, KU Leuven