Blake:

In drawing up the International Code of Museum Ethics for ICOM, 1984-86,
we gave careful consideration to the provision of the then recently
adopted Museums Association (UK) Code of Ethics for Museum Curators which
demanded an equal and "balanced" presentation of both sides of an
controversial matter covered in a museum exhibit.  No doubt the UK rule
was based on the legal requirement that insists that in broadcasting the
BBC must offer "balance" - ensuring that e.g. an appearance on a radio or
TV programme by a politician from one political party was "balanced" by an
opposing view.

Within the Committee (which I chaired) drafting the ICOM Code of Ethics we
quickly reached the view that a so-called "balanced presentation" rule
would be quite impracticable.  Just think of the possible examples. Should
half the exhibition space in military corps commemorative museums be given
over to the peace movement and should neo-Nazi groups be allocated half
the floor area of the National Holocaust Museum? Should contemporary art
museums give equal space to the views of people unredeemable hostile to
anything more modern than early 19th century neo-classicism?

Plainly such a "rule" is nonsense, (and in fact I do not know of a single
example where the UK "balance" rule has in fact been applied).

In fact, I would argue that on ethical grounds while museums should seek
to involve all who have a genuine contribution to make, they should
equally vigorously resist attempts by special interest groups to try to
impose myths and unsupported traditions, however strongly felt.

Looking back again over the Smithsonian's "Enola Gay" debacle it seems to
me that one of the most worrying aspects of all was the Air Force
Association's attack on plans in the earlier versions of the proposed
script to reproduce the actual US intelligence estimates, prepared in late
spring of  1945 that there was a risk of up to 50,000 casulties in the
event of a Normandy-type invasion of the Japanese mainland.

Instead, lobbyists demanded on the grounds of claimed "patriotism", the
relacement of genuine contemporary intelligence assessments with the
myth of "half million Allied lives saved" a figure which was in fact an
invention of the defeated British prime minister, Winston Churchill, well
over two years after Hisoshima and Nagasaki in his "History of the Second
World War", seeking to justify retrospectively the use of atomic weapons.


Patrick Boylan

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On Sun, 12 Apr 1998, Collection Care Management wrote:

> Subject: controversy

> I am student at the University of Iowa and am currently working on a paper
> about controversy in the museum.  I am interested in the decisions museum
> management personnel make concerning the interpretation of controcersial
> objects and displays.  Specifically, I am interested in examining whether
> or not museums have an obligation to contact and include the views of all
> parties influenced by the controversy.
>
> Thank you for your time.  I thank you in advance for your response.
>
> If you would rather reply off list:
> Blake Cooper
> [log in to unmask]
>