Privatizing the Muse ‘and all that Jazz’

Abstract

Privatization has become one of the major developments in society almost all over the world. In the post-communist countries, in particular, privatization is changing all sectors of society, ranging from heavy industry to culture, and within culture all sub-sectors, from printing firms to museums. But in western countries, too, privatization has been one of the key issues since the 1980s. Most people are familiar with the British privatization model, selling off formerly nationalized industries or public utilities to private investors. Other modes of privatization are less well-known. Most people working in the cultural sector have experienced the increasing call for less dependence on state subsidies and the increasing dependence on box-office income and private sponsorship — also a mode of privatization. Most people in the cultural sector are also aware of a trend of ‘autonomization’, as in the case with Dutch state museums, which can be seen as a kind of privatization in a wider sense. Thus, the general reader may be already familiar with three kinds of privatization!