Ethical debate: Governance
The Museums Association (MA) code of ethics states that ‘governing bodies should be familiar with the code in its entirety’, but recent cases such as Bury demonstrate there is a lack of knowledge from some who govern museums. How far should museum staff go to make sure governing bodies know the code?
Ideally all governing bodies should receive training in museum ethics
but in practice this is often difficult to achieve. Trustee bodies may have more joy getting their trustees to sign up to specific training sessions, but local authority elected members have many other calls on their time.
Officers have other ways of ensuring that their governing bodies are aware of the code of ethics. It was re-written in 2002 to make it more
relevant to current museum operations, notably the emphasis that
museums should serve society. This makes it a useful document for
reference or inclusion in a range of planning and policy documents.
The Norfolk Museums and Archaeology Service (NMAS) includes the ten Ethical Principles in the introduction to its annual service plan as
key principles that govern the service. This places ethics at the heart of what we do.
When the NMAS was developing its Collections Rationalisation Strategy
the MA’s ethical guidelines for disposal were used as the basis of the NMAS’s policy and strategy.
My elected members welcomed the ethical approach — ultimately,
elected members will understand the role and content of the code if it is used regularly by their officers to guide operations and strategy development.
They will then understand what the code is for and that it is relevant to the successful operation of their museum.
Vanessa Trevelyan, head of museums, Norfolk Museums and Archaeology Service
It is imperative for museum staff, the professional partners, to ensure that governors, often the lay partners, are familiar with the code of ethics. This passing on of knowledge should be done in a manner commensurate with the willingness of the members of the governing body to become familiar with the code.
This needs to be further qualified by a commonsense approach to the likelihood of the governors having to apply the code in the governance of the organisation.
In other words, all governors need to know that the organisation operates within the framework of a code of ethics and at that level a fairly general overview would suffice.
But when the code of ethics has a direct bearing on acquisition or disposal for example, then staff must make sure that the issues are covered in appropriate detail.
Once the link is established, governors then have a duty to satisfy themselves that they are in possession of as much information as they need to allow them to make the decision in an informed manner.
Lexie Scott, chairman, Northern Ireland Museums Council
Ideally all governing bodies should receive training in museum ethics
but in practice this is often difficult to achieve. Trustee bodies may have more joy getting their trustees to sign up to specific training sessions, but local authority elected members have many other calls on their time.
Officers have other ways of ensuring that their governing bodies are aware of the code of ethics. It was re-written in 2002 to make it more
relevant to current museum operations, notably the emphasis that
museums should serve society. This makes it a useful document for
reference or inclusion in a range of planning and policy documents.
The Norfolk Museums and Archaeology Service (NMAS) includes the ten Ethical Principles in the introduction to its annual service plan as
key principles that govern the service. This places ethics at the heart of what we do.
When the NMAS was developing its Collections Rationalisation Strategy
the MA’s ethical guidelines for disposal were used as the basis of the NMAS’s policy and strategy.
My elected members welcomed the ethical approach — ultimately,
elected members will understand the role and content of the code if it is used regularly by their officers to guide operations and strategy development.
They will then understand what the code is for and that it is relevant to the successful operation of their museum.
Vanessa Trevelyan, head of museums, Norfolk Museums and Archaeology Service
It is imperative for museum staff, the professional partners, to ensure that governors, often the lay partners, are familiar with the code of ethics. This passing on of knowledge should be done in a manner commensurate with the willingness of the members of the governing body to become familiar with the code.
This needs to be further qualified by a commonsense approach to the likelihood of the governors having to apply the code in the governance of the organisation.
In other words, all governors need to know that the organisation operates within the framework of a code of ethics and at that level a fairly general overview would suffice.
But when the code of ethics has a direct bearing on acquisition or disposal for example, then staff must make sure that the issues are covered in appropriate detail.
Once the link is established, governors then have a duty to satisfy themselves that they are in possession of as much information as they need to allow them to make the decision in an informed manner.
Lexie Scott, chairman, Northern Ireland Museums Council
