This book examines the legal limitations for archaeological fieldwork permits and how different state or national heritage agencies in Austria, Hesse and Baden-Württemberg misapply their respective heritage laws to subject archaeological field research to an illegal state permit regime. It discusses various aspects of - in particular Austrian - heritage protection legislation and the absurdities caused by its repeated revision, conducted without proper understanding of both the legal limits and archaeological realities in practice, which lead to much of current heritage management practice being both ineffective and in many cases strictly illegal or unlawful, and indeed in some strictly unconstitutional. The book concludes with suggestions for changes to Austrian heritage protection law which would allow to solve the problems identified in this study and would create a much more effective and modern system of preventative archaeological heritage management.