The Status of Museum Collections

The law relating to the museum sector is complex. This is due in part to the variety of governance structures; for example, amongst other possibilities, museums may exist as a company or charitable trust, or both, or may be under local authority control. Objects in the collection may be on loan, or they may be held on trust, or owned by a company, or by a local authority. Furthermore, whereas special legislation applies to national museums, different statutory sources need to be considered in relation to local authorities. Yet there is no book covering both law and museum ethics to help guide museums in relation to the management of their collections.

Museums strive to maintain public trust and confidence in a challenging financial climate and the need for information to assist them in arriving at informed judgments has never been stronger.

The results of this project will include, amongst other outputs, a book discussing how legal and ethical principles apply to museum collections, and a Report on the Legal Status of Museum Collections. The book will make a unique and scholarly contribution to the fields of law, museum studies and cultural studies.

The book will provide information and practical advice for museums. A number of public bodies in the museum and charity sector have expressed strong support for this work and I will consult these bodies, and others, as this work progresses. I will provide opportunities for professionals to raise issues which concern them, such as by participating in the Museums Association's annual conference and at other national and regional conferences and workshops. This level of consultation will ensure that the contents of my outputs remain relevant.

Museums currently have insufficient guidance on a number of topics. For example, many museums possess items which were collected in the past but where no record exists in relation to their acquisition. This is a problem which has created immense difficulties for museums. The book will address these pressing concerns, providing legal and ethical guidance for curators, managers and governing bodies. In this context, it will explore the possibilities for law reform, examining recommendations made by the Scottish Law Commission and considering the potential for a more limited legislative reform for all museums in the UK.

In a fast-changing world, museums are expected to develop new strategies to enhance public access to their collections. This research will therefore cover legal and ethical issues relating to art loans, providing guidance and discussing pitfalls. It will also provide impartial information relating to legal structures. For example, charitable status may offer independence, financial advantages, and better protection to the collection. The recent court decision involving the Wedgwood Museum Collection has highlighted the risks involved where a public collection is affected by a company insolvency. The decision demonstrates how important it is to disseminate information about the law to ensure that there is responsible decision making.

Although this project is ambitious in scope and addresses entirely underresearched areas, it is manageable because it builds upon my accumulated expertise. I acquired knowledge relating to deaccessioning and sale of objects from museum collections, together with experience of working with public sector bodies, during the course of a 50% AHRC Placement Fellowship. I have written on the law relating to acquisition of cultural items by museums in a book discussing strategic measures to combat the illicit trade in art and antiquities. Some matters, such as the law relating to insolvency and corporate governance, involve drawing on expertise gathered when I wrote a substantial book on the law of commercial fraud. However, the outputs from this new project will also involve a close examination of museum ethics and how these principles interact with the law.

Various bodies in the museum sector, as well as the Charity Commission, were involved in the preparation of a 32 page booklet entitled Report on the Legal Status of Museums Collections in the United Kingdom. It was edited by Jeremy Warren at the Museums and Galleries Commission, and published in 1996. Although museums have relied upon this Report in the past, it is now out of date. The museum sector and public bodies need a new Report, which takes account of recent legislation and other changes in law and practice, and which has a wider scope to include not only company, charity and trust law but also linked issues relating to ownership and good governance. One output from this project will be a new Report on the Legal Status of Museum Collections. The Museums Association ("MA"), the Arts Council and the Collections Trust are keen to provide input as I progress. The Report can be made available for any museum to freely download, or any other interested person, from websites such as those run by the MA and the Collections Trust.

However, museums and public sector bodies need more than a brief summary of key elements of the law relating to museum collections. This project will therefore include the production of a book which explains how the law applies in particular situations. Using the electronic discussion forum on the MA's website, or taking advantage of regional meetings of the MA and other public bodies, or consulting individual museums, I can collect a series of hypothetical case studies to use in the book. As the royalties will be paid to the MA, museums will have an incentive for engaging in dialogue and contributing ideas. I hope that they will see the book as "their" book in the sense that they will have influenced its direction and content.

As ethical principles play such an important role in museum practice, the book will disentangle legal principles from ethical ones, subjecting them both to equal scrutiny, and discussing how both would apply in particular situations. As a consequence, the book and other outputs should have a provocative effect in stimulating debate in relation to law and museum ethics within the museum sector.

The wide-ranging nature of this project, covering many different areas of law and their relationship with ethical principles, means that I will be in a position to respond to new issues as they arise. For example, I am discussing with the MA whether we could have a Question and Answer session on legal and ethical issues surrounding collections at their annual conference. I could sit on a panel of experts and we can solicit questions in advance via Twitter as well as during the session. The wide and ambitious scope of the project provides a great impetus for running and participating in conferences, seminars and workshops. For example, I will be running a two day conference on Vulnerability and Cultural Heritage on 9 and 10 May 2013 with a specific focus upon strategic measures to combat heritage crime. The conference will draw a number of interested people together, including not only academics from abroad, but also representatives from the museum sector and charities such as English Heritage. I plan to run a conference and workshops in 2014, bringing museums, public sector bodies and academics together to discuss specific issues. These debates will be part of a process of enhancing knowledge and understanding of the principles and values which do or should guide museums in dealing with their collections.

This project will be helpful to international networks such as the International Council of Museums and the Network of European Museum Organisations as well as museums overseas, which often need to grapple with the same problems as their UK counterparts. This pioneering research will put the UK at the leading edge in museum practice. and may stimulate similar initiatives by academics overseas, thereby benefiting museums in other countries.