A Study on the Legal Character of Museums and Art Museums under the Promotion Law for Museum and Art Museums of Korea: Focusing on Non-for-Profit Character

In August 2022, the International Council of Museums (ICOM) held a general meeting and adopted a new museum definition, which emphasized “diversity”, “sustainability”, and “ethics”, while the expression of “non-profit” was changed to “not-for-profit”. Discussions on non-profit or not-for-profit of museums and art museums are not new, but discussions on whether non-profit or not-for-profit is a prerequisite for museums and galleries under the Promotion Law for Museum and Art Museums of Korea are supposed to intensify in line with ICOM’s revision of definition of museums. In particular, considering that many of the materials of museums and art museums of academic, artistic, educational, and historical value, including national treasures, are held in private museums or private art galleries, controversies over for-profit activities of museums and art museums are expected to intensify in the future. Therefore, it is more necessary than ever to reconsider the scope and allowable making-profit activities of museum and art museums under the Promotion Law for Museum and Art Museums of Korea, taking into account the role of museums and art museums and various environmental changes surrounding museums and art museums. In this regard, this paper reviewed the fact that the introduction of non-profit or not-for-profit prerequisite for the registration into the Promotion Law for Museum and Art Museums of Korea could be a problem in terms of legal stability and excessive restrictions on freedom of occupation in current situation, where private or for-profit corporations have been registered and operated as private museums or art museums under the Promotion Law for Museum and Art Museums of Korea. However, terms of non-profit or not-for profit does not mean banning of all profitable activities, and thus detailed standards need to be prepared, considering that the criteria for for-profit activities are unclear and it is not easy to evaluate for-profit activities in the business plan in the course of reviewing museums and art museums to give supports and aids to them. In addition, it is necessary to revise related articles for the overall reorganization of the registration and support system for museums and art museums.