The French West Indies (F.W.I.) were French colonies with a specific legal frame until 1946 when they became French departments. Since that time the legal frame in force concerning archaeological heritage protection is exactly the same than in metropolitan France. In this system all the laws relating to cultural heritage are grouped in the "Code du Patrimoine" (Heritage code), which contains several topics such as archives, museums, archaeology and historic monuments. Some articles refer to the Penal Code, the Code of Urban Development, the Environmental Code or the Mining Code. These laws are supplemented by various decrees that define the applying conditions for different areas: rescue archeology (decree 2004-490), INRAP , advisory bodies, the content of the field reports, penal provisions, etc ... The heritage laws have been created in 1917 (Historic Monuments) and 1941 (archaeology). The law on rescue archeology is in force only since 2001 and is an application of the European Convention of Malta (1992). However, the implementation of the regulation and of the institutions in charge of is application in the French West Indies is fairly recent. In this presentation after a general presentation of the archaeological heritage protection French system we will focus on the different aspects of is application in F.W.I.: difficulties linked to the application of a system suited for metropolitan France, the level of the French West Indian people implication in the archaeological heritage protection and the future perspectives.