How sustainable are cultural organizations? A global benchmark

Figures & data

Figure 1. The sustainability star: a model of the sustainability of cultural organizations.

Note: The model consists of three spheres: the governance sphere (grey), with four strategic dimensions for embedding sustainability in cultural organizations; the social sphere (yellow), with eight social dimensions; the environmental sphere (blue), with eight environmental dimensions. Together with a scoring system, the model represents the progress of a cultural organization, or the whole sector, toward sustainability: the closer the scores to the white ring, the higher the sustainability.

Figure 2. Sustainability benchmark of cultural organizations according to the sustainability star model.

Note: Scores for all organizations in the sample combined (N = 206). Note the low score of the environmental sphere. Box plots showing distributions are in Figures S2 and S3 in the supplemental material.

Figure 3. Scatterplot of social vs environmental sustainability scores of cultural organizations in the sample, with regression line (N = 206).

Note: Names of organizations ranking above 70 for both the social and environmental sphere are revealed with their approval. Note the concentration in the bottom-left quadrant and the relative absence in the “environmental champions” quadrant. High environmental scores are typically related with high social scores. Of the 14 organizations with social and environmental scores above 70, six are in the UK. Table S6 (supplemental material) provides full details.

Figure 4. Sustainability scores by world region (N = 206).

Note: Differences between individual world regions are not statistically significant, due to the significant variance of scores within regions and the small number of cases (n < 10) of several regions. The strong presence of organizations from Europe and North America in the sample is a result of their greater number among the universe of organizations contacted and their above-average response rates (see supplemental material).

Table 1. Regression models for sustainability scores.

	Standardized beta
	Governance	Social	Environmental	Composite
Predictors
Government rules	0.07	0.15*	0.15*	0.14
Green team	0.20**	0.20**	0.25**	0.23**
Strategic relevance	0.15*	0.12	0.09	0.11
Controls
Museum	0.02	–0.08	0.04	–0.04
Age	–0.03	–0.01	0.02	0
Size	0.23**	0.15	0.22**	0.23**
Mixed funding	–0.03	0.06	0.09	0.06
Location in UK	0.19**	0.08	0.15*	0.15*
Wealth	–0.11	0	–0.02	–0.02
Political rights	0.08	–0.07	–0.10	–0.05
Adjusted R^2	0.18	0.14	0.25	0.21
Df	183	187	187	183
F	5.13**	3.99**	7.29**	5.97**

Note: *=p < 0.05, **=p < 0.01. Beta denotes the standardized coefficient for each predictor and is a measure of the weight of each predictor in the model on a range from 0 to 1; R² denotes the percentage of variance in the sustainability score explained by each model. Detailed statistical results can be found in Müller and Grieshaber 2024a. All predictors are defined in Table S7 in the supplemental material.

Table 2. Best practices of cultural organizations identified in semi-structured interviews.

Sphere	Dimension	Best practice	Examples
Governance	Commitment	Hiring a sustainability officer	La Monnaie, V&A
		Develop a sustainable visit guide to explain the process and give examples of good practices to visitors and employees	Teatro Solis
	Implementation	Provide dedicated training to staff members	Musée d’ethnographie de Genève, V&A
	Transparency	Create a dedicate website page for sustainability commitments and reporting	Guggenheim Bilbao, V&A, La Monnaie
		Publication of extensive report of its sustainability strategy and accomplishment in line with the GRI standard.	Guggenheim Bilbao
Social	Access	Developing guidelines for accessible exhibition design	Smithsonian
	Integrity	Include Indigenous Peoples as collaborators and co-curators in equal partnerships	Musée d’ethnographie de Genève
	Learning and inspiration	Making a short introduction speech on the SDG and their importance before every show	EcoTeatro
Environmental	Carbon	Hiring consultancy to realize your carbon footprint (scopes 1, 2 and 3)	V&A
	Energy	Reinvest money from energy saving in changing light bulb to LED	Teatro Solis
	Biodiversity	Preserving external space fully devoted to nature	Biomuseo
	Waste	Acquire new partner and funding for a full waste program	MASP

Müller, M., and J. Grieshaber. 2024a. Culture for the Planet: A Global State of the Art of Sustainability in Cultural Organisations. Université de Lausanne. https://serval.unil.ch/fr/notice/serval:BIB_0FBB8A0C8F61.

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Data availability statement

The datasets and statistical outputs are posted on Harvard dataverse (see citations in the reference list). Interview transcripts can be shared upon reasonable request.