Diplomacy by proxy: Satellite museums as cultural–political infrastructures

Satellite museums have expanded rapidly over the past two decades, yet they remain conceptually underrecognised in both museum studies and diplomacy research. This article argues that satellite museums should be understood not as cultural exports or branding instruments but as diplomatic infrastructures: assemblages in which governance, heritage, mobility, urban politics and ethical claims are materially organised to produce international cultural relations. The purpose of the study is to provide a structural, comparative vocabulary capable of explaining how these institutions enact diplomacy in practice. The analysis examines 15 satellite museum initiatives using a comparative–typological methodology that treats each case as a relational configuration of actors, instruments and narratives. A multi-source documentary corpus was coded to identify diplomatic intent, governance provenance and policy framing. The resulting typology is expressed through six analytical axes – governance, mobility, heritage, subnational projection, ethical–environmental engagement and silence – which reveal diplomacy not as a singular logic but as a set of negotiated and sometimes contradictory practices. Findings show that diplomatic work emerges through patterned constellations rather than stable models: treaty-based satellites consolidate nation-branding; municipal projects operate as forms of city diplomacy; corporate partnerships function as hybrid geopolitical-commercial infrastructures; and community or Indigenous collaborations articulate diplomacy from below. The article concludes that satellite museums are consequential political actors whose legitimacy and effectiveness depend on how authority, recognition and participation are distributed along these axes. Reframing them as diplomatic infrastructures offers a more accurate account of their global function and provides a framework for future research, policy designs, and institutional decision-making.