Analysing productivity and technical change in museums: A dynamic network approach

Abstract

The efficiency evaluation of cultural institutions is proving to be a highly fertile area for theoretical and applied research. Nevertheless, few studies have thus far focused on the dynamic analysis of efficiency and on estimating productivity to gauge how receptive these institutions are to technological progress. The present work provides an approach to these two goals for a sample of public museums in Spain by applying a non-parametric technique, the dynamic-network DEA model, and by calculating the corresponding dynamic Malmquist indices. This involves positing a production function broken down into production activities and time intervals, with inputs that are inter-related horizontally (production links) and vertically (time carry-overs). Results show that museum productivity remains practically stable over a long period of time, thus partly confirming the hypothesis of Baumol's cost disease adapted to these activities. Nevertheless, breaking down the indices into catch-up and shift-frontier effects reveals substantial growth in productivity at the stage involving the creation of the cultural supply, due to a displacement of the results frontier as well as significant improvements in museum efficiency at the stage involving the provision of services geared towards attracting visitors. This also reflects a change in museums’ functional priorities, where the goals related to visibility and activities involving dissemination and social impact prove to be particularly important.