Challenging the impossible

In recent years, many museums in the Netherlands have engaged with their colonial pasts and their collections, particularly through exhibitions that centre their own complicity in ongoing colonial systems of oppression. This has been driven by social movements like Black Lives Matter , which, amongst other things, demanded public institutions to decolonise. However, also within the museum sector , decolonisation has become a central topic, as the Decolonial Working Group by the International Council of Museums (ICOM) that was created in 2023 illustrates. Since this is still a work in progress, most museums are practising decolonisation without clear operational guidelines or policies. Therefore, this thesis explores the question: How do Dutch museums negotiate the calls to decolonise amidst external and internal institutional pressures? By building on postcolonial and decolonial theory - especially on the concepts of coloniality of power, of knowledge and of being - as well as existing literature on museum history and critique, the research examines how institutions navigate the complexity of decolonisation processes. Drawing on seven semi-structured expert interviews with curators, educators, programmers and policy employees across varying Dutch museums, I conducted a thematic analysis to map decolonial practices in the areas of institutional structure, curatorial and research practices and participatory programmes. By not examining one department or museum type in isolation, the holistic approach revealed the intersection of hiring policies, the structural organisation, collection management and community engagement. The research provides an understanding of the possibilities and limitations of institutional change by introducing common approaches. It also revealed that museum professionals are passionate about making a difference in the field by committing to more inclusive and self-reflective practices, yet they are often constrained by the fixed structures and hierarchies of their institutions. Furthermore, the lack of comprehensive frameworks for decolonial strategies that is still prevalent causes tensions between the mission or goal and the concrete actions. By centring a holistic exploration of decolonial museum practice in the Netherlands, this thesis adds to the ongoing conversation about what it means to decolonise museums. It offers insight into how Dutch museum professionals are interpreting and operationalising decolonial goals in their daily work and how these efforts are shaped - and sometimes limited - by questions of institutional identity, legacy, and public accountability. It underscores the need for an ongoing and reflexive dialogue about decolonial theory and its adaptation to museum practice with diverse participants to further drive change.