Abstract

The article deals with the legal transformations of the cultural sector starting from the administrative decentralization introduced in Italy by the Constitutional reform of the Title V, to the introduction of additional services in the public museums in the mid-1990s, to the most recent reforms made by the Minister Franceschini about the museums administrative autonomy and the introduction of the Unique Superintendency. Bringing back the thought of Paolo Leon, the article critically discusses the historical evolution of these transformations, the complexity produced by the opposition of the ministerial bureaucracy and the academy, the inability of the Regional Administrations and the Local Authorities to seize the opportunities produced by the reforms.