Each year’s International Museum Day theme is proposed by ICOM’s network and aims to promote museum issues within society.

In 2015, the event will celebrate the theme: Museums for a sustainable society.

One of the most important contemporary challenges shared by people all over the world is to adapt new ways of living and developing within the limits of nature. This transition towards a sustainable society requires inventing new methods of thinking and acting. Museums play a key role in this transition, promoting sustainable development and serving as real laboratories for best practices. Modern museums must take a strong position in this context and make their voices heard.

The theme Museums for a sustainable society recognises the role of museums in raising public awareness about the need for a society that is less wasteful, more cooperative and uses resources in a way that respects living systems.

Bringing museums to the forefront of this model of a sustainable society, the International Museum Day theme aims to foster awareness among the whole society about the current consequences of human action in our planet and the absolute necessity of changing its economic and social model.