Training in cultural administration and management: situation and outlook [CE-2008-2]

In France, since the 1980s, training in cultural management and administration has greatly expanded, in step with the cultural sector’s growth and increasing professionalisation, and the public’s liking for culture in general. Some three hundred courses, mostly level one (professional masterships), have been listed and described – their time in operation, number of trainees, field covered, subject area where relevant, nature of instruction. For the most part, training is associated with universities, although decentralised business schools have recently begun to enter the market. The surge in training courses needs to be viewed against a two-fold background: first, a European training context issuing from the Bologna process accompanied by the ‘BMD’ (Bachelors, Masters, Doctorates) educational reform which appears to have stimulated a proliferation of such cultural courses in the universities; second, a territorialisation of training policies entailing greater regional involvement. The interest of the cultural sector, as of the students drawn to this type of training, lies in the fact that the cultural management and administration job market has become more highly valued quantitatively and better ordained qualitatively. Moreover, the respective goals of higher education and the labour market meet togetherthrough a regular process of evaluation. This form of regulation enables labour supply more closely to match demand.