Hybrid Organizations in the Italian Regional Context: A Case Study from the Cultural Heritage Industry

Abstract

This chapter deals with a case study located in the context of cultural heritage industry. The organization under scrutiny is a Regional entity for Cultural Heritage acting in one of the Italian Southern Regions, established in 2003. Since 2016, the organization under scrutiny was transformed into an in-house company entirely controlled by the regional government, switching from a public-private company to a company whose sole shareholder is the Region. In this chapter, we analyse the organizational hybridity from a twofold perspective: first, with reference to forms of governance model, and, second, we witness the paradox of a publicly owned organization which had to work in dynamic and project-oriented settings and under “private” constraints and regulations, while adhering to a more rigid regulative framework typical of public contexts.

Appendix: The State of Affairs of Regulation of Cultural Services—Italian Context

In Italy, cultural heritage is mainly managed in a unitary manner at the national level, although recently several reforms have introduced the involvement of different levels of government and the intervention of a variety of entities and stakeholders. As a matter of fact, this industry in Italy has been considered as a public sector domain of intervention (Bertacchini et al. 2016). Direct intervention by national or local governments has been the dominant organizational model of cultural heritage for long. For decades, cultural institutions like museums have not been managed as autonomous having no own budget. Revenues and sponsorships were mainly channelled at the central government. In the 1990s severe cuts to public expenditure were implemented in the country and outsourcing auxiliary museum services (bookshops, catering, etc.) was the first law in Italy allowing in the cultural field. From reforms taking place in the year 2000 (legislative decree 42/2004) onwards, the state has exclusive responsibility for heritage protection while preservation-related activities may be jointly supported and performed by the state and other public and private partners. Heritage management in Italy is currently the responsibility of different institutions. State involvement takes place through the Minister of Culture and Tourism (MiBACT), which operates through locally detached organizational units—called Soprintendenze—that are meant to coordinate cultural policies and cooperate with the local government in tourism and urban development issues. The subsequent code of cultural heritage and landscape has established a distinction between the activities of protection and those of enhancement. In particular, in the management of a cultural site, there can be activities that are part of the protection domain, such as proper conservation actions and restoration, and activities that belong to the enhancement domain, such as the promotion of the site, ticketing and cleaning. Enhancement activities are increasingly wider, including revenue-generating services on the sites, publishing and sales service regarding reproductions of cultural heritage and the creation of catalogues and other informative material, services concerning book and archival assets, cafeteria, catering, wardrobe and sale of other related merchandizing. What usually concerns hybrid organizations created as permanent or project-based public-private partnerships are enhancement activities, such as the organization and management of exhibitions, and more generally service provision related to cultural assets in order to have cultural heritage reaching the highest possible number of visitors.

On the local side, the Regions are in charge of the legislative power in the area of the enhancement of cultural and environmental heritage and promotion and organization of cultural activities. The Regions cooperate with the Ministry in the exercise of the protection functions and share the administrative functions for the protection of landscape assets.