Hungarian museum regulations

The museum law and regulations relevant in the museum field

 

Main act: 1997. CXL. act about museum institutions, public library services and community culture

„Goods belonging to our cultural heritage are irreplaceable resources of knowing our past and present, inseparable components of the entire national and general cultural heritage, the intellectual occupation of these goods is elemental right for every citizen. All-time society’s duty is to safeguard, preserve and maintain these values, furthermore to open them up for the public expansively.”

 

The act aims to:

• ensure social well-being and sustainable development
• foster life-long learning
• improve quality of life
• rule over accession, preservation, academic processing, transmittance to the future and social exploitation of cultural goods   
• rule over museum institutions’ activities and assignments as well as accessing cultural heritage in public collections
• identify assignments of museum institutions supported by the state, local government or other maintainer, as well as set professional and financing principles

 

The scope of the law covers the following museum institutions and stakeholders:

• maintainers
• museum workers
• elements of cultural heritage in museums
• people using the services of museum institutions
• other organisations, picture and sound archives related with cultural heritage

 

Museum institutions:

• attend on the society
• are open for the public
• hold intercourse with communities and settlements
• are not funded for profit
• ensure access to cultural goods

 

Tasks of museum institutions in ensuring access to cultural goods:

• main tasks: academic processing, documentation, preservation, exhibiting
• making scientific research possible
• contributing to life-long learning by distributing culture
• organising cultural events and other programs
• cooperating with education institutions and helping out-of-school education by  museum education programs
• fostering economy by using their touristic allure

 

Classification of museum institutions:

• national museum
• national specialized museum
• thematic museum
• regional museum
• county museum
• museum exhibition of public utility
• museum collection of public utility