Key Concepts of Museology - ICOM

and the people of the area in which
it is located. The public museum is
essentially the property of the people;
it is fi nanced and administered by the
people through its representatives
and by delegation, through its management.
This system is most strongly
present in Latin countries: the public
museum is essentially fi nanced by
taxes, and its collections are part
of the logic of public ownership (in
principle they cannot rightfully be
removed or deaccessioned, nor can
their status be changed unless a strict
procedure is followed). The working
rules are generally those of public
services, especially the principle of
continuity (the service is required to
operate continuously and regularly,
with no interruptions other than
those provided for in the regulations),
the principle of mutability (the
service must adapt to changes in the
needs of the general public interest,
and there should be no legal obstacle
to changes to be made to this end),
the principle of equality (to insure
that each citizen is treated equally).
Finally the principle of transparency
(communication of documents about
the service to anyone who requests
them, and the reasons for certain
decisions) signifi es that the museal
establishment is open to all and
belongs to all; it is at the service of
society and its development.
In Anglo-American law the prevailing
notion is less that of public
service than that of public trust,
principles which demand that the
trustees have a strict commitment to
the museum, generally organised as a
private enterprise with the status of
a non-profi t organisation, and that
the activities of the board of trustees
are aimed at a certain public. This
museum’s main point of reference,
particularly in the United States, is
more an idea of community than that
of public, the term community often
being taken in a very wide sense (see
Society).
This principle of public interest
causes museums worldwide to see
their activities carried out, if not
under the aegis of public authorities,
then at least with reference to
them, and most often to be partly
run by these authorities, which in
turn obliges museums to respect
a number of rules which infl uence
their administration and a number
of ethical principles. In this context
the question of the private museum
and that of the museum managed as
a commercial enterprise allows the
assumption that the different principles
connected with state ownership
and the nature of public authorities
mentioned above would not be
encountered. It is from this perspective
that the ICOM defi nition of
museum presupposes that it is a nonprofi
t organisation, and that many of
the articles of its code of ethics have
been drafted according to its public
nature.
2. As a noun the word ‘public’ refers
to the museum users (the museum
public), but also, by extension from
its actual user public, to the whole
of the population addressed by the
71