Federal cultural institutions

In the case of some Austrian cultural institutions, the state is either the direct or indirect owner for historical and/or contractual reasons. These federal cultural institutions are independent as far as their art-related and organizational set-up is concerned, but receive substantial funding from the federal budget so that they can continue providing their services to the public. For the Division, this entails first and foremost the supervision of the business practices of these institutions and their compliance with the legal requirements in the interests of the Republic, but also the responsibility for creating suitable framework conditions. In recent years a set of measures for establishing effective public corporate governance has been implemented and the corresponding regulatory policies for national museums and the Austrian National Library have been revised. Along with new museum rules, a public corporate governance code for the state was adopted by the Federal Government in November 2012, agreements on overall goals were introduced for the first time, project reports were adapted, and procedural rules for boards of trustees were suitably reworked and restructured. All of these measures enabled the creation of a set of clear and transparent regulations for the supervisory committees of national museums and the Austrian National Library.

Free admission to national museums for children and youth has worked out extremely well and has drawn substantially more visitors of all age groups to culture. A series of construction measures has made cultural institutions more attractive to visitors and created better working conditions for employees.

More Information is provided in German.