| Summary: | Since the 1940s, French natural history museums have experienced a series of regulations by which they have been reorganized, re-classified or controlled. They have been placed, successively, under the supervision of different ministries (Instruction publique, Éducation nationale, Recherche, Enseignement supérieur, Culture et Communication). The history of the management of museums in France since the creation of the Service national de muséologie and the Inspection Générale des Musées d’histoire naturelle de Province (1948) at the Muséum national d’Histoire naturelle (MNHN) of Paris, and up to the museum law of 2002 and the the Code du Patrimoine (2004), allows us to observe the homogenisation of the practices and the status between art museums and scientific ones. It allows us to identify the actors in this history, and to understand the gradual recognition of natural history collections as heritage. But this convergence between ‘science and culture’ is still challenged when scientific collections are held by institutions of varying supervision structures, status and organisation (MNHN, NHM, universities, colleges, high schools, museums). The various actors in charge of the management and conservation of these collections have extremely heterogeneous training backgrounds. They can sometimes be in professional competition with each other: curator, conservator, university lecturer,...).
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