Develop orientation documentation for your museum: the scientific and cultural project

Today, most of the information on the development of a CSP can be found in the museo fiche prepared by the Direction des Musées de France (2007) as a download opposite.

The development of a scientific and cultural project is:

• compulsory in a number of regulated cases, in particular a museum project (construction or renovation), where access to state subsidies for the project is conditioned by the existence of a PSC;

• highly recommended in most situations : justification for acquisition or restoration, strategic choices for prioritisation of actions, museum presentation or cultural programming, maintenance of stability or increase in the number of staff assigned to the establishment.

On each subject, the existence of a scientific and cultural project is an important asset for the institution:

• instrument of dialogue and negotiation, it offers more visibility to the community on which the museum depends: it is good for the material conditions (investment, operation, staff); it is good for the position of the institution in the institutional network (community, regional and national);

• it offers more visibility to scientific and professional partners and their networks; it is the ideal time to create or consolidate partnerships;

• it is a lever for the museum’s actions: acquisitions, restorations, as a result;

• it allows access to the subsidy of the Ministry of Culture and Communication: various works;

• it is a tool for the collective investment of staff in the health of the institution, and is based on the buy-in of all.

The scientific and cultural project defines the main orientations and strategies of the museum. It analyzes the interactions between collections, audiences, the environment and the museum building. It must reveal three elements:

• a review of the existing situation, as comprehensive as possible;

• the expression of a concept, of a museum identity, which makes a museum unique;

• the presentation of a project for the period concerned (which must not exceed five to six years), with a few priorities.