Transnational legal controls over the protection, use, enjoyment, and transfer of cultural property, particularly art and archaeological material, have developed steadily in recent years. Despite this development, controls remain haphazard and dependent upon the rather unfettered discretion of sovereigns and intergovernmental and nongovernmental organizations. The most important of these organizations is the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), whose role in a lengthy dispute over Israeli excavation in occupied Jerusalem is instructive to artists and lawyers alike.
