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40 U.B.C. L. Rev. 421 (2007)
Totems and Teapots: The Royal British Columbia Museum Corporation

handle is hein.journals/ubclr40 and id is 425 raw text is: TOTEMS AND TEAPOTS: THE ROYAL BRITISH COLUMBIA MUSEUM CORPORATION ROBERT K. PATERSONt I. INTRODUCTION Recent years have seen increased turbulence surrounding the normally placid lives of museums.' Many institutions confront difficult financial challenges in the face of dwindling attendance and declining government grants.2 While the acquisition and display of objects remain major priorities for most museums, many now also seek to redefine and examine their role in relation to their client communities and constituencies. These pressures and changes have sometimes been reflected in debates surrounding controversial exhibitions and have been accompanied by increasing numbers of claims for the return of objects by t Faculty of Law, University of British Columbia and Member, External Advisory Board, UBC Museum of Anthropology. I One of the best known instances of such controversy was the Sensation exhibition of contemporary British art at the Brooklyn Museum in 1999, which led to its condemnation by the then mayor of New York, Rudolph Guiliani, who attempted to close the exhibition. This, in turn, led to a successful court challenge by the museum on constitutional grounds. For background to these events, see Peter Levine, Lessons from the Brooklyn Museum Controversy (2001), online: <http://www.publicpolicy.umd.edu/IPPS/Summer00/brooklynmuseum controv ersy.htm>. The International Council of Museums (ICOM) Code of Ethics for Museums defines a museum as a non-profit making permanent institution in the service of society and its development, open to the public, which acquires, conserves, researches, communicates and exhibits, for purposes of study, education and enjoyment, the tangible and intangible evidence of people and their environment: (January 2006) at Glossary, online: <http://icom.museum/ethics. html>. 2 See Martin Knelman, Flaherty Scrooge to Canada's Museums The Toronto Star (27 September 2006) El.

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