This study To preserve or not to preserve, an archaeological study on damage to the forest's cultural remains aims to problematize and understand the reasons why damage to ancient and other cultural-historical remains in the County of Västernorrland maintains at a high level, despite the fact that laws concerning ancient monuments have been expanded and strengthened several times since 1942. A hermeneutic qualitative analysis and inductive method is used to increase our knowledge and understanding concerning the underlying processes in order to explain why prehistoric and historic sites continue to be damaged and destroyed. To answer this one has to put Swedish legislation regarding cultural remains in a broader socio-historical context. The result shows that there are more factors that oppose any attempt to protect cultural remains than factors that favor conservation.

Uppsatsen problematiserar 1850-årsgränsen i den svenska kulturmiljölagen (1988:950) och dess konsekvens för bevarande av fasta lämningar daterade efter årtalet som inte får lagskydd. Texten analyserar möjligheten för arkeologiska undersökningar av kontexten kring de fasta lämningarna från nyare tid. Det teoretiska perspektivet betonar värdet kring dessa lämningar. Metoden i uppsatsen är en komparativ analys mellan denna situation i Sverige och Norge. Eftersom det senare landet har ett kapitel i motsvarande kulturminneslag som har möjligheten att skydda lämningar oavsett tidsperiod. Resultatet visar på att 1850-årsgränsen generellt har en påverkan på fasta lämningar nyligen förfluten tid, men bevarandet och möjligheten till arkeologiska undersökningar påverkas även av övriga föreskrifter i lagen och andra faktorer. / The thesis problematizes the 1850 dating provision in the Swedish Historic Environment Act (1988:950) and its consequences for conservation of remains with no law protection, dated later than the year. The text analyzes the possibilities for archaeological research of the context of remains from recent time periods. The theoretical perspective aims to recognize the value of these recent remains. The method in the thesis is a comparative analysis between the situation in Sweden and Norway, because of the latter's chapter in the country's Act concerning the cultural heritage with the possibility to protect remains from every time period. The result is that the 1850 provision has an effect on recent remains, but the conservation and possibilities for archaeological investigation depend on other provisions in the law and other factors as well.