Flash 23 - International Council on Archives (ICA) · mously endorsed in plenary session on 10...

As you will already know, the GeneralConference of UNESCO unani-mously endorsed in plenary sessionon 10 November the UniversalDeclaration on Archives proposed bythe International Council onArchives. This landmark decision is avery important step forward inimproving public understanding ofarchives. It should enable the inter-national archival community to raisestill further awareness of archivesamong the general public and keydecision-makers. It is undeniably oneof the most significant developmentsfor archives at the international levelfor many years.The Declaration is a powerfulsuccinct statement of the relevanceof archives in modern society. Itemphasizes the key role of archivesin administrative transparency anddemocratic accountability, as well asthe preservation of collective socialmemory. While not neglecting thetraditional concern with meeting theneeds of historical research, theDeclaration repositions effectivearchives management as an essen-tial function which underpinsmodern public administration, goodpractice in private business, andready access to information by citizens. I am proud that the UniversalDeclaration has been endorsed by

UNESCO during mytime as ICA President,but the credit for this

great achievement should properly goto others in the global ICA network. Itis a pleasure for me to thank themhere. Colleagues in Québec didpioneering work in developing a proto-type declaration on archives in 2007,which served as model for theUniversal Declaration on Archiveslater on. At the CITRA in Québec inNovember 2007, SPA took on theresponsibility for developing aDeclaration as a document with widecross-cultural appeal. Didier Grange,Christine Martinez and Henri Zuber,as successive SPA Presidents,showed considerable drive and deter-mination in getting the documentapproved by ICA as a whole. Thepainstaking work of putting theDeclaration together was carried outby a small but highly motivated work-ing group, comprising DianeBaillargeon and Denys Chouinard(both Canada), Kim Eberhard(Australia), Didier Grange(Switzerland), Abdel Kader BKapadonou (Bénin) and ColleenMcEwen (Australia). Special mentionshould be made of Colleen’s role,because she acted as projectmanager for the initial developmentacross three languages, and also over-saw the production of the first posterpublicizing the Declaration.After the Declaration was endorsedin principle at the Malta AGM inNovember 2009, it was given finalapproval by the AGM in Oslo inSeptember 2010. (Continued on page 3)

A Hectic Week in the Life

CITRA 2011: Keeping Archives Alive in a Digital World

The first Forum ofNational Archivists metin Toledo in October 2011

The CITRA conference inToledo through the eyesof a Flying Reporter

Digital Recordkeeping Programme: a PCOM Proposal to Face TogetherCurrent and Future Challenges

Join the “Curator’s workbench” community!

A Chronology of Photographic andAudiovisual Media

Advancing archives and humanrights: The ICA Human RightsWorking Group

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23December 2011

ISSN 1728-533X

icaMartin BerendsePresident of [email protected]

Flashnews from ica

Universal Declaration on Archives endorsed by Unesco!

international council on archivesconseil international des archives

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Flash - Number 23 - December 2011 ica2

PeopleNew National Archivists have been appointed in the followingcountries:

Australia➜ David Fricker (Director General)

Cambodia➜ Lim Ky (Deputy Director)

Czech Republic➜ Jiří Úlovec (Director)

Kyrgyz Republic➜ Orunbai Ahmedov (Head)

Papua New Guinea➜ Vicky Puipui (Acting National Archivist)

Thailand➜ Sureerat Wongsangiem

Tunisia➜ Hedi Jallab (Director General)

WelcomeNew category B members:

Luxembourg➜ ALBAD – Associatioun de Lëtzebuerger Bibliothekären,Archivisten an Dokumentalisten (Association ofLuxembourgish Librarians, Archivists and Documentalists.)

Spain➜ Asociación de Archiveros de la Comunidad de Madrid

New Publications Role at ICA Secretariat

The Secretariat was pleased to welcomeStephen O’Connor back to Paris at the begin-ning of October as the new SeniorPublications Officer at ICA. Stephen worked inthe Secretariat from 2000 to 2001 as SeniorProgramme Officer while on secondment fromthe UK Public Record Office (National

Archives). Until September of this year, he was head ofMedieval and Early Modern Records at The National Archives,but has continued to maintain his links with ICA, and workedas a volunteer in the extended Secretariat at the KualaLumpur Congress. He will be working part-time in Paris andwill initially be responsible for editing Flash as well as join-ing Margaret Turner in undertaking a review of ICA publica-tions. When not at ICA, Stephen teaches medieval Latin andPalaeography at the University of East Anglia in Norwich.

FlashEditor: International Councilon Archives (ICA)

Publication Director: David A. Leitch

The International Council onArchives (ICA) is dedicated to theadvancement of archives throughinternational co-operation.Archives, by providing evidence ofhuman activities and transactions,underlie the rights of individualsand states, and are fundamental todemocracy and good governance.In pursuing the advancement ofarchives, ICA works for the protec-tion and enhancement of thememory of the world.

Flash communicates news on ICAactivities and highlights currentissues in archives. It is thecomplement to the in-depthprofessional reflection, reportsand debate in Comma.

Flash is published twice a year asa membership benefit by ICA.Contents may be reproduced andtranslated in part or in whole,provided that credit is given.Information in this issue of Flashwas current at the closing datefor production, 9th January 2012.

Translation is assured by volun-teers alone: please think of offe-ring your help for just a fewhours every six months!

ICA60, rue des Francs-Bourgeois75003 Paris, FranceT : +33 14027 6306F : +33 14272 2065E : [email protected] : www.ica.org

Graphic design: Raphaël MeyssanT : +33 6 20 49 12 15E : [email protected] : www.editorial-design.org

Impression: DEJA-GLMC

Garges-lès-Gonesse, France

Photos copyright: NationalArchives of the Netherlands,National Archives of Korea, NormaFenoglio, Tim Padfield, ICA FlyingReporters, Margaret Kenna,Photos copyright, PAAG, ALA,EASTICA, EURBICA, PARBICA,SARBICA, SAN, SPA, SPP, SUV.

ISSN : 1728-533X.

3Flash - Number 23 - December 2011 ica

(Continued from page 1) I would like tothink that I played a minor part here,since I was in the Chair when it wasapproved unanimously. In the light ofthe Oslo decision, the internationalarchival community worked tirelessly tohave the Declaration adopted byUNESCO. The vote at UNESCO was theculmination of intense efforts led byPapa Momar Diop, the Ambassador ofSenegal at UNESCO and the formerNational Archivist of Senegal (andPresident of WARBICA). He was ablysupported by Jens Boël, Head Archivistat UNESCO, and national archives andprofessional associations throughoutthe world, who used their influence

behind the scenes to ensure that theircountry’s delegation at UNESCO votedin favour of the Declaration.The challenge now is to use theDeclaration to maximum effect, so thatarchives shake off outdated percep-tions of their role and finally take theirrightful place as a major player at heartof public administration and the centreof social memory. As I write these lines,the Declaration on Archives is availableon the ICA website in twenty-two differ-ent languages, and I would be pleasedto see this already impressive totalincrease still further in the comingmonths. I know that Kim Eberhard hasset up a blog for the Universal

Declaration, and that Eric Ketelaar,Honorary President, has been “tweet-ing” in its praise. It is good to see socialnetworks being used to spread themessage of the Declaration. TheDeclaration should be the centrepieceof archives awareness campaigns andof celebrations of InternationalArchives Day in 2012.We now have to make the most of thisgolden opportunity to move archives tothe centre of the stage at national andinternational level. In that sense we arestill in the early stages of our collectivetask, but in the Universal Declaration onArchives we now have an excellent basefrom which to make more progress.

ICA Reconnects with the International

Institute of Archival Science

For the last quarter of a century,the International Institute ofArchival Science (IIAS), whichwas originally based in Maribor,Slovenia, and relocated to Trieste,Italy, in 2005, has made animportant contribution to thedevelopment of the archivalprofession in central and easternEurope. Every year it organizes aconference on topical subjects,which is the basis of itsheavyweight publication Atlanti. It also provides trainingopportunities and administers aterminology database for thelanguages of the region. ICA hasin the past enjoyed close contactswith IIAS and has great respectfor its achievements. BothSlovenia and Italy play a majorrole in ensuring that IIASoperates on a sound basis.

Iwas therefore absolutely delighted tobe asked to address the IIAS partici-pants for the second year running

last November – or perhaps the partici-pants are gluttons for punishment! I was

asked to summarize the present situa-tion of archivists in the modern world – avast subject that gave me plenty ofscope. In my presentation I emphasizedthat the work of the modern archivist inthe electronic environment begins at avery early stage, when systems aredesigned and before any records arecreated. The traditional mindset of somearchivists, based on the primacy ofhistorical research, can sometimes be ahandicap in making this necessaryadjustment. Archive services need to beat the heart of their parent bodies,whether in the public or private sector,rather than being consigned to theperiphery.

The conference themes this year wereEuropean archival projects and the roleof archives in society. Once again I wasimpressed by the high quality of thepresentations, most but not all of whichwere delivered by colleagues fromcentral and eastern Europe. Oneconclusion I drew is that it makes verylittle sense to speak of “Europe” as amonolith in the field of archives, ascolleagues are working in administra-

tive traditions and political contextsthat can vary enormously. My colleagueChristine Martinez spoke eloquentlyabout the development of the ICAcompetencies model, and later in theweek Adele Torrance of the UNESCOArchives delivered a brilliant two-daytraining course on the ICA-AtoM soft-ware. The conference also provided avaluable opportunity to network withcolleagues from countries as far afieldas Australia, Sabah, Ukraine, Belarus,Spain and the United States.

I hope that the new spirit of co-operationbetween ICA and IIAS will become evenstronger in the coming years, and thatIIAS itself continues to flourish, as a newgeneration of committed archivists incentral and eastern Europe resolutelymeets the challenges of managingarchives in the Information Age.

David A. LeitchSecretary General of [email protected]


There were many elements whichcontributed to a productiveCITRA week in Toledo lastOctober. The rich and stimulatingprofessional conference on themajor professional concern ofpreservation demonstrated thebreadth and depth of expertisethat ICA members collectivelypossess; the new Forum ofNational Archivists was launchedsuccessfully; and a full socialprogramme offered numerousopportunities for informalnetworking. To these elementsshould be added the bolddecisions that were taken at themeetings of the various ICAgovernance bodies throughout the week.

The ManagementCommission Prepares the Ground

On 23 October the ManagementCommission (MCOM) assessed thetwo bids received to host the 2013Conference and agreed that, whileboth of them had positive features,

further work on them both was neededbefore they could be accepted. For thisreason bids from other candidatesshould not be ruled out. MCOM alsoconsidered the proposed conferenceon the Digital Heritage being organ-ized by UNESCO in Vancouver inSeptember 2012. While welcoming thismajor initiative, it noted that many

conferences on this subject had takenplace recently and that the conferencewould take place very soon after theBrisbane Congress, which was themajor priority for ICA in 2012. MCOMalso endorsed the way forward for theICA-AtoM project proposed by GeirMagnus Walderhaug as the responsibleExecutive Board member.

Executive Board Toledo, 2011.Executive Board Toledo, 2011.

CITRA Toledo, 2011.

Toledo:

A Hectic Week in the Life of ICA


The Executive BoardStrengthens its Commitmentto Reform

On 24 October the full Executive Board(EB), which is responsible for the strate-gic direction of ICA, gave the green lightto the development of proposals for thereform of the ICA constitution, especiallyin the light of the recommendation of theAudit Commission that the remits of theEB and MCOM need to be clarified. Atthe same time ICA needs to refresh itsexisting strategy and to strengthen itsorganizational structures, so that all ICAworking groups have clearly definedterms of reference and a reporting line tothe appropriate governance body. TheEB therefore decided to set up a newConstitution and Organization WorkingGroup, which was tasked with deliveringa complete reform package, including anew constitution for the approval of theAnnual General Meeting (AGM) inBrisbane in August 2012. This shouldmark the completion of a lengthy processof internal reform and enable ICA to bemuch more outward-looking after the2012 Congress.

The EB also approved a new translationpolicy proposed by the Secretariat, nowavailable for members on the ICAwebsite. Translations of ICA documentsin any language are always appreciated.However, the priority has to be the trans-

lation of ICA reference documents andstandards into the six main languagesrecognized by UNESCO (English,French, Spanish, Russian, Arabic andChinese). It is also essential that anytranslation published on the ICA websiteor in hard copy has to be subject to inde-pendent quality control.

It noted the proposals for the reform ofmembership dues that the Vice-President Finance intended to present tothe AGM later in the week and approvedthe creation of new Working Groups onMembership Services and RevenueRaising.

It approved proposals for the futuredirection of the professional programmepresented by the Vice-PresidentProgramme, as well as the budget andactivities cycle. In addition, it endorsedthe terms of reference for a new studyconcerning archival statistics.

It approved in principle the broad posi-tion statement on intellectual propertyissues that had been written by the rele-vant working group in a remarkablyshort time.

It also was very pleased to hear that aMemorandum of Understanding hadbeen signed by ICA and the World Bankand looked forward to the further devel-opment of this partnership.

The Annual General Meeting has the Final Say

The AGM approved reports from theVice-President Programme and Vice-President Finance, as well as theChair of the Audit Commission.Trudy Peterson, the Chair of theWorking Group on AccessPrinciples, updated members aboutthe process and t imetable forconsultation of this important state-ment. George Mackenzie, ICA’sconstitutional expert, skillfullyguided the AGM through the four-teen changes to the constitutionneeded in order to abolish theCITRA and to replace it with the newstyle Annual Conferences, and tomake provision for the new Forum ofNational Archivists.

The AGM approved the route mapand t imetable for the reform ofmembership dues, including a three-year transition that will start in 2013.A full scheme, applying the criteriaof per capita income and populationsize to all category A members, willbe submitted for the approval of theAGM in Brisbane. Meanwhile thecurrent scale of dues, including thereductions for the top ten contribu-tors approved at the Oslo AGM(September 2010), will be applied forthe final time in 2012.

The AGM approved by an overwhelm-ing majority the Executive Board’srecommendation that Korea shouldbe selected as host for the 2016Congress (see article below). It alsoapproved by acclamation the nomi-nation of Alicia Casas de Barran(National Archivist of Uruguay) as aFellow of ICA (see article below).

David A. LeitchSecretary General [email protected]

Executive Board Toledo, 2011.


The FIDA Trustees met in Toledo on25th October 2011 to consider 20applications from colleagues

from Western, Southern and EasternAfrican countries, from Eastern Europe, from Latin America and from the Pacificregion. The range of applications wasvery wide from individual archivists andresearchers; they were concerned withhistorical archives, audio-visualarchives, current records managementand appraisal matters, as well as train-ing for and the digitising of material.FIDA now accepts applications inFrench, Spanish and English but wereply in English which is our workinglanguage! This way of communicatingseems to work in the internet age andmeans that we can now reach theAmericas, and French-speaking Africaand Asia. We are writing to applicantsnow about their proposals and hope toannounce some awards shortly.

Please see our presentation about FIDAin French, English and Spanish aspresented at the ICA conference inToledo by Vitor Fonseca and SarahTyacke available on the ICA website.

Because we only have a small pot ofmoney ourselves, as yet 25,000 Eurosper year, much of our work is designedto help colleagues by funding part oftheir own development programmes in,for example, public sector recordsmanagement and in appraisal inGuyana, rather than providing all thefunds necessary. In other words we canprovide international approval of theirdevelopment plan and give them somemoney; also, most importantly, in somecases, “leverage’’ for them to raise somemore money or support locally or eveninternationally. It’s surprising what youcan do with a little.

The requirement for the training or what-ever development needs to come fromthe people themselves: it is not FIDA’srole to give money to external providerswhere there is no request from the localarchivists themselves. Of course, often itis external providers, who are sometimesvolunteers from the ranks of ICA andarchivists from across many countries,who actually deliver the assistance andtraining needed, in the hope that thosetrained will become trainers locally

themselves. This approach has beenespecially successful in our first year ofoperation: with the help of the NewZealand National Archives, archivists inthe Pacific region, where there is little orno possibility for colleagues to receivethe training they need locally in particu-lar archives skills, are receiving trainingwith FIDA’s support.

The Trustees are all volunteers in thiswork, giving something back to thearchival world which in its turn nurturedthem over their own careers. They are allin some way distinguished and come atpresent from Brazil, USA, Japan,Tanzania, UK, and France.

They will be carrying on the good workuntil August 2012 and then reviewingtheir initial period of work at theBrisbane ICA Congress.

Sarah TyackeChair of Trustees of [email protected]

FIDA Trustees met in Toledo

South Korea is selected to be Congress Host in 2016

For the first time in the history ofICA, an open bidding process toselect the host country for an

International Congress has beenconducted. At the beginning of 2011, theinvitation to bid was published on theICA website. Then the selection criteriadrawn up by the Secretariat were rein-forced by the Executive Board inPanama (March 2011), who wished tounderline the importance of making theCongress accessible to everyone, irre-spective of nationality. At theManagement Commission meeting inThe Hague (July 2011), it was agreed thatthe financial model supporting theCongress had to be extremely robust.Throughout the process the bid fromSouth Korea was considered to be verystrong, especially as it enjoyed solidsupport from its national government ata very high level. There was no doubtabout the organizational capacity of theNational Archives of Korea (NAK), after

it hosted a highly successful ExecutiveBoard meeting in Seoul in June 2010.The attractive and eye catching public-ity materials packaging the Korean bidwere accompanied by a detailed finan-cial plan that provided all the assur-ances that ICA was seeking. Above all,ICA was impressed by the quality of thehighly motivated team at NAK and itssteely determination to host theCongress. On 24 October the Executive Board

unanimously recommended to the AGMthat Korea should be selected as theCongress host in 2016. The AGMadopted this recommendation by anoverwhelming majority and with consid-erable enthusiasm on 28 October.We congratulate Korea on organizingsuch a powerful bid and are grateful forits commitment to ICA. Everyone in ICAlooks forward to working with Koreancolleagues in order to ensure a success-ful Congress in 2016.

M. Berendse, D. Leitch and the Korean delegation at the AGM Toledo, 2011.


Alicia Casas

de Barran: ICA

Appoints its First

Fellow from Latin

America

On 28 October the AGM unani-mously approved the nominationof Alicia Casas de Barran as a

Fellow of ICA. Alicia has been Professorof Archival Studies at the University ofUruguay since 1988 and Director of theNational Archives of Uruguay since2005. She was a Fulbright Fellow in 1993and has carried out extensive researchin the national archives of the UnitedStates and the United Kingdom. Shehas also been extremely active in ICA,serving as a member of the ProgrammeManagement Commission (2000-04), theCITRA Bureau (2006-2010) and theProgramme Commission from 2008onwards. She hosted the extremelysuccessful PCOM meeting inMontevideo in the spring of 2009 and,under her direction, the staff at theNational Archives have translated manyICA documents into Spanish. All of those who have had the pleasureof working with Alicia will know that shereally deserves this award. She isalways courteous, helpful and construc-tive. ICA has greatly benefited fromboth her professional knowledge andhuman gifts. Alicia becomes the second femaleFellow of ICA, of which there are nownine in all, and the first from LatinAmerica. Although she was unable tobe present at the AGM and accept heraward in person, ICA intends to organ-ize a ceremony in the coming yearwhen the President will bestow thishonour upon her.

ICA at WIPOCopyright is probably not asubject that is close to thehearts of most archivists, but itis nevertheless an important one.Documents that are less than 50years old are certain to be incopyright in almost all countries,and in many countries mucholder documents will be incopyright too.

Copyright gives rights to anowner. Unless they are limitedin some way, those rights

restrict what archivists may do withdocuments in their care. Archivistsmay not copy a document withoutpermission, nor may they publish it,translate it or make it available on-line. However, international treatiespermit countries to introduce limita-tions and exceptions to the rights ofcopyright owners, so long as they donot interfere with the author’s normalexploitation of a copyright work orunreasonably prejudice his or herlegitimate interests. All countrieshave some limitations and exceptions,but there are very wide variations inwhat they allow.

In 2008, the World Intellectual PropertyOrganisation (WIPO) published a reporton the limitations and exceptions forlibraries and archives that were providedin the laws of 184 countries. The reportfound that these varied greatly, and 21countries had no library and archiveexceptions at all. The report is availablea t : w w w. w i p o. i n t / e d o c s / m d o c s /copyright/en/sccr_17/sccr_17_2.pdf

WIPO has since recognised thatlibraries and archives, and throughthem society at large, would benefitfrom an international treaty settingminimum standards for limitations andexceptions that assist them to preservetheir materials and make them availableto the public.

In November 2011 WIPO’s StandingCommittee on Copyright and RelatedRights (SCCR) dedicated three days tointensive discussion, to which the ICAcontributed, of various texts prepared bymember states. These were supple-mented by an unofficial text prepared bythe International Federation of Library

Associations in cooperation with otherlibrary bodies, the ICA and the Society ofAmerican Archivists. Significantprogress was made in these discussionsand more discussion will follow at themeetings of the SCCR in 2012. It is to behoped that the SCCR will in the next fewyears be able to agree a draft treaty textthat can be recommended to WIPO’sGeneral Assembly for consideration.

So far as archives are concerned theprincipal elements of a treaty wouldpermit:◗ the making of as many copies as arerequired, in any format, of all kinds ofcopyright work for preservationpurposes only, a preservation copy to betreated as if it were the original so thatall other exceptions would apply to it;◗ the making of a single copy in anyformat of any kind of copyright work fora user for limited purposes, and thetransmission of the copy to the useranywhere in the world; and◗ the making of copies of ‘orphan’ works,that is to say of copyright works whoseowner is unknown or untraceable evenafter a diligent enquiry, and the use ofthose copies for instance on-line, withthe proviso that if the copyright ownerreappears he or she would have the rightto require the use to cease or to receivefair compensation.

Tim PadfieldCopyright Officer and InformationPolicy ConsultantThe National Archives, [email protected]

Members of a delegation from IFLA and the ICAmeet the Director General of the World

Intellectual Property Organisation. Left to right:Jennefer Nicholson, IFLA Secretary General,

Martin Berendse, ICA President, Ingrid Parent, IFLA President, Francis Gurry, WIPO Director

General, Tim Padfield, ICA representative atWIPO, Winston Tabb, past Chair, IFLA Copyright

and other Legal Matters Committee.

Alicia Casas de Barran.


This conference was the last inthe old CITRA format before ICAmoves to the new AnnualConference in 2013, which willplace greater emphasis on theprofessional programme. TheCITRA bureau met for the lasttime to confirm arrangements for the Toledo professionalprogramme and governancemeetings. Members and the Vice-President, Nolda Römer-Kenepa,were thanked for their work overthe past three years.

The theme of the conference wasmanaging the preservation ofarchives in all media and the

challenges this poses to archivists in the21st century. Proceedings began with akeynote speech from David Bearmanwho warned the audience that no one isyet keeping electronic records success-fully, because they are not beingcaptured at the moment of creation. As aresult we are left with ‘sculpted’ records,which are untrustworthy. Based on hisperiodic testing of the waters of digitalarchival preservation, Dr Bearman’sopinion is that things have got worseover the last 15 years.

Proceedings went on to discuss themessuch as security and user copies, digitisa-tion as a preservation tool, concrete andvirtual archive facilities, disaster planningand response and the benefits of usingstandards. Several common themesquickly began to emerge, including:

◗ The question of dealing with the tran-sition from analogue to digital, and with

records born digital at one and the sametime, still has to be resolved

◗ In order to do so, a well –trained multi-disciplinary workforce is required

◗ Partnerships are vital: both with sisterprofessions such as ICCROM and IFLA(both of which were represented amongthe speakers), but also with outsidebodies ranging from local fire services toUN agencies

◗ Digitisation is NOT simply scanning

◗ That there is a danger of rushinginto digitising material too quicklywithout realizing the on-going costs ofpreservation

Vladimir Tarasov shared the findings ofhis survey of surrogate record creationwhich indicated that there is no commonstrategy for creating security and usercopies of archives regarding format(microfilm or digital). He also discussedthe issue of criteria for deciding what tocopy: physical condition; frequency ofuse; or overall project costs.

In a session comparing concrete andvirtual archive facilities, Claire Béchuand Jean-Luc Bichet presented plansfor the new French National Archivesbuilding and Jerry Handfield describedthe digital archive building inWashington State. The latter illustratedthat expansion space is not just ananalogue issue since digital holdingsincreased from 3.5 million documents in2005 to 103 million in 2011.

The profession’s ability to react quicklyand work co-operatively was clearly

demonstrated in the session on disasterplanning and response. Speakers fromJapan, the Blue Shield Committee,Cologne, Heidelberg and Francedescribed experiences and demon-strated that ICA Members can respondwell to requests for help following adisaster, although there is still room towork more strongly in that field.

There were two sessions giving partici-pants the opportunity to learn aboutcurrent ICA projects and programmes invarious parts of the world. One of thesewas a plenary session on current proj-ects on appraisal, vital records and ICA’semergency management programme.The other offered parallel presentationson the draft Principles of Access toArchives and how to successfully applyfor FIDA or PCOM funding. There werealso workshops on ICA AtoM, ICA-Reqand disaster planning (one specificallyfocusing on tropical climate and theother more general).

The programme was well-received byparticipants who clearly enjoyed theopportunity to interact with so manyvaried and interesting speakers.

Margaret Turner ICA Publications andTranslations [email protected]

Margaret CrockettICA Deputy SecretaryGeneral, [email protected]

CITRA 2011: Keeping Archives Alive

in a Digital World

CITRA Toledo 2011.


The first Forum of NationalArchivists (FAN) took placeduring the final InternationalConference of the Round Table onArchives (CITRA) in Toledo inOctober 2011. With over 75participants the Forum was ableto discuss in depth threeimportant issues which facemodern archives. The uniquenature of these discussions wasdue to the fact that these issueswere being addressed at the levelof the directors of nationalarchives. Since they are theindividuals who are responsiblefor the success of theseinstitutions both strategically andoperationally, the discussionswere able to link the technicaldemands which govern the day-to-day work of archives with themanagerial dimension which isresponsible for fulfilling theirstatutory obligations.

T hree themes were tackled bythe forum: the impact of opengovernment on archival prac-

tices, the principles of successfularchival appraisal, and the challengesposed by digital preservation and thedevelopment of reliable digital reposi-tories. In all these cases, bothpresentations and discussions werestrongly influenced by the pressurescoming from the ever-present digitalenvironment.

The national archivists of the USA,Belgium and Brazil led on the firsttheme. Their presentations focussed onopen government and its repercussionsfor the role of archives as well as for thework of archivists. What emerged wasthat the notion of open governmenthighlights a dimension which has untilnow been little touched on in the work ofpromoting archives, namely the growingimportance of the legal frameworkwhich supports access to the docu-ments which are deposited in archives.Although this is not a new issue, it hasacquired greater prominence both inthe current digital environment and

through the practice of open govern-ment which has become increasinglypopular among western democracies.This has forced us to take a stand on therights of access, as people now expectto have immediate access to everything.Also following from this is the need tolook into developing even faster ways ofmaking available what is contained inour documentary heritage. Whereaspreviously we have served a body ofusers who were in somewhat less of ahurry, expectations are now more imme-diate and force us to rethink our busi-ness models for giving speedier accessto the material which has beendeposited with us. Finally, the papersand discussions highlighted the issue ofthe organization of archival materialand questions relating to selection,since it is clear that users are increas-ingly overwhelmed by a mass of infor-mation in which they can so quickly andeasily get lost.

The second theme was presented by thenational archivist of the Netherlands,the librarian and archivist of Canadaand the director of the historicalarchives of Mozambique. This session,which focussed on archival appraisal,demonstrated that the timescale forarchiving documents, the point at whicharchival work begins, has shifted. Withdigitization, we must start work in theinitial stages, and archivists must inter-vene much earlier if they are to collectdocuments of historical value beforethey are lost. Discussions later turned tothe fact that the digital world has led toan explosion of document productionand that as a consequence, we must, ifwe are to remain relevant, review theprinciples of archival appraisal. To dothis, there must be greater collaborationwith those in our society who areinvolved in the identification and preser-vation of documentary heritage.Collaboration therefore becomes anessential element in the successfulconstruction of a documentary heritagethat is representative of the views ofsociety.

The third theme was the subject of

three presentations by the nationalarchivists of Switzerland, Finland andNew Zealand. This session addressedthe question of a reliable means ofstoring digital records. The papersmade a number of observations. First,and very simply, we have not yetproduced a ‘definitive’ solution – weare still at the exploratory stage. Next,it is clear that the location of docu-ments, that is, the physical dimensionof preservation, is becoming a blurrednotion, and this raises new issues ofsearchability, description and security.The archive of the future might well bevirtual. Finally, and as a consequence,digital preservation forces us to reviewour business models for the whole ofour operations. A global and integratedapproach to archives management,from acquisition to access, is part ofthe new environment.

In conclusion, two big questionsconstantly appeared as a backdrop tothese discussions. First, how do weensure that the staff in our institutionswill have the requisite skills to do theirjobs in a changing world? Secondly, howdo we increase collaboration among ourpartners to make our work easier and tobenefit society? These two questionsshow how important an in-depth revi-sion of how we tackle new challenges is,and also the need to collaborate withcentres of learning to encourageresearch and to link research with thetraining of new professionals and thedevelopment of new approaches.

The Forum will next meet at Brisbaneand will follow up on the developmentswhich will have occurred during the yearrelating to these three themes. We shallthen tackle one or two new topics fromthe same angle.

Daniel J. CaronChair of FANLibrarian and Archivist

of Canada, Library andArchives Canada [email protected]

The first Forum of National Archivists

met in Toledo in October 2011


The CITRA conference in Toledo

through the eyes of a Flying ReporterThe annual CITRA conferencewas held in Spain this year. Theconference took place during thelast week of October in thebeautiful and historical city ofToledo. Toledo offered a wonderfulsetting and in the elegant HotelBeatriz a large variety of activitieshad been organized: workmeetings, Forum of the NationalArchivists, open sessions,lectures and workshops.

The theme of the conference was“Keeping Archives Alive in aDigital World – Archival

Preservation in the 21st Century”. I wasfortunate enough to experience it fromthe view of a Flying Reporter (FR). Thistime the group of archivists selected forthe task was fairly small: there were onlyfour of us. However, this fact proved tobe an advantage rather than a disadvan-tage. We quickly found each other andestablished very good cooperation,under the supervision of LourdesFuentes Hashimoto.

My other two FR-fellows, two Spanisharchivists, were Javier Requejo andJorge Gomez Garcia. Despite represent-ing very different backgrounds weformed a great team together. ChristineMartinez, main organiser of the FR proj-ect, with her friendly manner and highdegree of professionalism as well asbroad knowledge in the archival field,became a very important contact to usFlying Reporters, before and during theconference.

The staff of the ICA made us feel verywelcome and we not only received a lotof attention from them, but also frommany of the visitors to the conference in

general. We all gathered on Monday, the24th of October, and were on dutybetween Tuesday and Friday that week,although the activities lasted fromSaturday to Saturday. We not onlypublished articles and shorter updatesabout the presentations, but also inter-views with participants. We did get somecomments to our posts from enthusias-tic observers, which was a sign that ourwork was appreciated.

We had a busy week, but I cannotemphasise enough how fun it was. And Ithink we all saw it that way. Apart fromthe articles and interviews, we hadtranslations to think about and we usedTwitter, etc.

It was a week full of experiences andimpressions. Beside the professionalelement, and the opportunity to deepenour knowledge in a number of areas, Iwould also like to mention the social sideof the conference, with its benefits. AsFlying Reporters, we were given an

absolutely unique opportunity tonetwork and to make new contacts.

It was a wonderful thing to be able tomeet so many people from all corners ofthe world, with the same professionalbackground as oneself. The fact that wegot access to an otherwise, so to speak,closed circle of people, much higher upin the archival hierarchy than ourselves,was an opportunity I am grateful for.

I wish to thank Christine Martinez andmy colleagues in the FR-team for agreat week together. Furthermore, Iwish to thank the ICA for doing somuch in terms of building bridgesbetween young archivists from differ-ent countries in the world.

Martin StåhlFlying Reporter in Toledohttp://flyingreporters.ica.org/toledo2011The City Archives of [email protected] ICA Flying Reporters CITRA Toledo 2011.

Website of ICA Flying Reporters.


It is countdown time as we headtowards August, 2012 and theICA Congress – “A Climate ofChange”. The Australian archivaland information managementcommunities together with theProgramme Committee are keento provide a Congressprogramme that is innovative,informative, relevant and aboveall, one that provides a uniqueexperience to attendees from alllevels of experience andexpertise. Now is the time for usto make our aspirations for theCongress a reality.

Call for Abstracts

Our Programme Committee is review-ing those papers received to date viathe online Call for Abstracts process(www.ica2012.com). The Congressthemes are – Sustainability, Trust andIdentity. The program will be struc-tured around these themes.Sustainability seems to be a favouritetheme, with Identity next and somefewer being proposed under “Trust”.The type of subject matter that we seesitting under the ‘trust’ headingincludes ethics, good governance,accountability, developing standardsand gaining international acceptance,and the role of the archivist andrecords manager in e-government/administration/strategic information -issues that affect our day-to-dayprofessional work and environment.

Keynote speakers

The Keynote Speakers Program isexpected to provide a stimulating startto each day of the Congress.

Judge Baltazar Garzón Real is aSpanish jurist who, among otherthings, specialises in internationalcases involving genocide and crimesagainst humanity. His work has beensupported by archival documentationand we look forward to an inspirationalpresentation.

David Ferriero, 10th Archivist of theUnited States, expressed his view thatthe National Archives was at a ‘defin-ing moment with regard to our existingelectronic records, social mediacommunications, and emerging tech-nologies being used throughoutgovernment offices.’ We are keen tohear how these issues are beinghandled and provisions for the future.

Information and Privacy Commission-ers in our societies form an importantsafeguard to the accessibility of infor-mation to citizens. A strong keynotepresentation is being developedfeaturing the Australian InformationCommissioner, John McMillan, MiriamNisbet, Director of the Office ofGovernment Information Services(OGIS) at the National Archives andRecords Administration (NARA, US)and Jennifer Stoddart, PrivacyCommissioner of Canada. This presen-tation will be a must to attend.

Michael Carden from the DigitalPreservation section of the NationalArchives of Australia, has presented anumber of stimulating papers in manyinternational forums and will present athoughtful perspective on digital initia-tives and future outcomes and conse-quences.

Australia is recognized as a leader indeveloping innovative archivalmanagement, practice, policy andtheory and Australians are keen toenter the Congress conversations anddiscussions and offer their experiencesfor scrutiny and discussion.

We continue to strive for a programmethat is motivational and inspirational.Keep up to date via www.ica2012.comand check on the twitter link on thewebsite.

Key dates

◗ A Climate of Change, ICA Congress2012, Brisbane, Australia, 20th-24th

August.◗ Call for Abstracts closed on 31January 2012.◗ Early Bird Registrations close April2012.

Margaret KennaICA Deputy SecretaryGeneral, Congress [email protected]

Only eight months

to the International Congress!


Chiming with the programme-drivenapproach, PCOM submitted lastspring to the Executive Board theidea of a specific programme onDigital recordkeeping. The ideawas endorsed.

No wonder: digital recordkeep-ing is a major development forall countries worldwide, and

the issues that archivists and recordsmanagers used to face in a paper-basedsystem, while remaining the same, areeven more challenging. Though the ICAcannot be involved in the specific orlocal developments and projects in thisarea, it has, at a higher level, an impor-tant role to identify and support themost innovative approaches or impor-tant developments initiated by specificmembers, and subsequently act as amediator in making them available forother members so they could use themand help in strengthening their position.The ICA using its worldwide networkand expertise aims to provide memberswith a platform to exchange, share andbenchmark.

This is the purpose of the programmecreated in between two CITRAs, in Osloand Toledo, which brought together anumber of members to debate aboutdigital recordkeeping issues. Theprogramme embraces from beforerecords are created through creation,active maintenance, appraisal, and longterm preservation. Its scope includestrusted digital repositories, electronicrecordkeeping and archival processingtools such as ICA-AtoM. Programmeactivities will include ICA participationin and reporting about the professionalconferences of interest, surveys to iden-tify best practices and ongoing projectsand share findings and experience withmembers, and specific PCOM projectsin this field, aiming to develop standardsand tools.

What have we done so far?

New projects have been approved in theframework of this programme, includ-ing training sessions to promote the useof ICA-AtoM (delivered by AdeleTorrance, UNESCO, at the InternationalInstitute of Archival Sciences ofTrieste-Maribor); support to the followon phase of the ICA-Req toolkit (devel-opment of implementation scenariosand training modules which have beentested in various international confer-ences including the two last CITRAs);and the project “Curator’s workbench:engaging archivists through tools fordigital content” (see article). We hopethat the next PCOM call for projects,which aims to focus on the specificprogrammes, will attract new projectsin this area.

Our experts have been sent to someconferences relevant for the professionin 2011: Hans Hofman wrote a report onthe conference "Aligning nationalapproaches to digital preservation" heldin Tallinn on 23-25 May 2011, whileLourdes Fuentes-Hashimoto delivered apaper on “ICA-Req as a tool for auditsoftware functional requirements: eval-uating data and metadata to ensurelong-term preservation” at the PVInternational Conference (ensuringlong-term Preservation and addingValue to scientific and technical data)held in Toulouse (France) by the FrenchNational Center of Spatial Studies inNovember. ICA-Req, which was adoptedby ISO in 2010 as ISO 16175, will also bepromoted at the DLM Forum Conferencein Brussels in December, with a paperprepared by Margaret Crockett andHans Hofman. Ineke Deserno, memberof PCOM is representing ICA in theScientific Committee of this confer-ence. Reports about these events havebeen or will be published on the ICAwebsite on the programme page.

One of the important activities is forICA to remain up to date in the field ofstandardization: we need to develop thearchives input to this key technical areaand try to influence the development offuture standards. Not only is PCOMsupporting the ICA-Req toolkit projectaiming to provide members with thestandard in different languages andwith a range of helpful tools for a betterunderstanding and implementation ofit: PCOM is also maintaining the link toISO TC46/SC11 with a liaison expertregularly reporting to the Commission,or collaborating with the DLM Forumwhich has, at the European level, devel-oped the MoReq2010 standard.

Last, but not least, a survey on trusteddigital repositories has been launched onthe ICA website and list-serve. More than25 institutions or organizations havealready reacted and are keen to sharetheir more or less developed experienceabout creating a trusted digital reposi-tory. A second phase for this initiativewill be to encourage those who haveexpressed their willingness to contribute,to describe their project and providePCOM with short case studies availablefor members, as well as to use an ICAdedicated platform for their debates.

All this information is available on thededicated programme page on the ICAwebsite: visit it and help us to keep upto date!

Further information: www.ica.org/9079/digital-recordkeeping-programme/digit al-recordkeeping-programme.html

Christine MartinezICA Deputy SecretaryGeneral, [email protected]

Digital Recordkeeping Programme:

a PCOM Proposal to Face Together

Current and Future Challenges


Erin O’Meara, Electronic RecordsArchivist, and Greg Jansen,Software Developer at Universityof North Carolina at Chapel Hillwere awarded a PCOM grant toexplore partnerships in theUnited Kingdom surrounding therecently developed open-sourcetool, Curator’s Workbench.Curator’s Workbench is acollection preparation andworkflow tool for digitalmaterials. The Workbench helpsarchivists manage files beforethey are stored in a repository ordark archive. As files areselected, arranged, anddescribed, a METS file 1 isgenerated that documents theseprocesses. In addition,checksums and UUIDs 2 aregenerated for each object.MODS 3 descriptive metadata canbe created for individual objectsand folders or mapped to themfrom tabular data files.

Erin and Greg travelled fromNorth Carolina to the UK andled three meetings with

archivists and developers about theCurator’s Workbench. Greg Jansen isthe software developer for theCurator’s Workbench at UNC.

The goals of these meetings included: ◗ Promote the Curator’s Workbenchsoftware; ◗ Engage ICA members and UK highereducation institutions (with JISCparticipation 4);◗ Gather feedback regarding futureuses and features for the software;◗ Find partner institutions to developthe software;◗ Facilitate discussion of new

approaches to workflow for handlingborn-digital material.

Meetings were held in London, Oxfordand Glasgow. A wiki page was createdto keep participants informed aboutdetails of the meeting, https://github.com/UNC-Libraries/Curators-Workbench/wiki/ICA-JISC-Workshops.

Participants were interested in thetool as a way to demonstrate readi-ness for growth in repository develop-ment at their institutions. Some sawthe ingest tool as a way to showprogress in the area of digital preser-vation and to prepare data without aformal preservation repository. Aconsistent finding was that the toolprovides a better than usual overviewof digital materials, allowing archivistsand curators to make and visualizelinkages between digital materials.Another consistent theme was thatthe tool enables archivists to tacklemore technical steps that are usuallypassed to other staff. There wereseveral suggestions the participantssaid would make the tool more usefulto them. Incorporation of data miningand forensic tools would help archivist

find and protect sensitive information.

Many participants do not use MODSand need the ability to edit or mapmetadata to other schemas. Many alsoneed support for other export packages,such as Bag-IT or other METS profiles.

If you are interested in learning moreabout Curator’s Workbench, pleasecontact the authors. We are interestedin working with other institutions whoare looking at ingest tools for born-digi-tal materials.

Erin O’Meara Electronic RecordsArchivist, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, [email protected]

Gregory JansenSoftware Developer,University of NorthCarolina at Chapel Hill,[email protected]

Join the “Curator’s workbench”

community!

Screenshot of metadata mapping portion of Curator’s Workbench with MODS elements and user-supplied metadata.

1 Metadata Encoding and Transmission Standard(METS).2 Universally Unique Identifier (UUID).3 Metadata Object Description Schema.4 Joint Information Systems Committee.

Girona City Council through theCentre for Image Research andDiffusion (CRDI) and the CinemaMuseum, in collaboration with theInternational Council on Archives(ICA) through the Photographicand Audiovisual Archives Group(PAAG), celebrated the WorldDay for Audiovisual Heritage, 27th

October, with the publication of achronology of photography andaudiovisual media.

The chronology is in the form of aposter produced in fourlanguages (Catalan, English,

Spanish and French) presenting thehistorical development of audiovisualmedia: cinema, photography, television,video and sound recording. There is in addition a website, also infour languages. Here the informationhas been expanded with more text(including, for example, a separatechronology for amateur film), andmore images and audiovisual material.There are in all 280 chronologicalreferences, some 30 audiovisualrecords and 140 images. Bothresources, printed and electronic,allow you to view simultaneously thechronology of the key events in theevolution of the different media. The chronology of photographic andaudiovisual media not only provides acommon and universal tool forarchivists, but is also of benefit to thepublic by contributing to the manage-ment and preservation of photo-graphic and audiovisual heritage. Italso describes the morphology andfunctions of the materials used inestablishing information about photo-graphic and audiovisual records inorder to contribute to their betterpreservation. It helps to make peopleaware of the vulnerability of thisheritage due to the rapid obsolescenceand deterioration of the physicalmedia. It promotes awareness and itprovides tools for the work ofarchivists in the field of photographicand audiovisual records. And last butby no means least, it highlights theimportance of the development ofthose technologies as a means ofrecording the memory of the people.The participation of the PAAG and the

experience of the CRDI and the CinemaMuseum in creating similar resourceswas key to the success of this project.ICA's role was also crucial as, throughthe PCOM programme, it financed thetranslation of the resources into thefour different languages. It also has amajor role to play in helping to dissemi-nate these products widely among thearchival community and other institu-tions related to cultural heritage.

Website:www.girona.cat/sgdap/cat/patrimoni_audiovisual Poster: www.girona.cat/sgdap/docs/cartell_patrimoni_audiovisual_ENG.pdf

Joan Boadas I Raset PAAG Commissioner for photographic andaudiovisual [email protected]

David IglesiasPAAG [email protected]

A Chronology of Media



During the First InteramericanMeeting on Archives, whichoccurred in Washington DC, itwas proposed for the first time,and approved on October 17th 1961,to establish an interamericanarchivists’ association, and thosepresent declared themselvesfounding members of thisassociation.

In the Technical Meeting on theDevelopment of Archives, organizedby the Organization of American

States (OAS), in Washington DC, from July24-28th 1972, the “Charter of the AmericanArchives” was approved and again it wasrecommended that an association of LatinAmerican archivists be set up.

During the Multinational Seminar onPlanning and Reorganization of NationalArchives, on April 6th 1973, at Lima, Peru,an agreement was finally reached tofound the Asociación Latinoamericanade Archivos (ALA).

In 1976, at Santa Fe de Bogotá, ALA’sstatutes were approved and it was regis-tered in Colombia, as a professional andcultural non-governmental organization,

with the objective to “serve as a tool foran effective collaboration between itsmembers through the unification of stan-dards and the exchange of experiencesthat will improve the development ofarchival work as a whole and ensure thatLatin American documentary heritage iseffectively conserved and used”.

Soon afterwards, ALA became aregional branch of the InternationalCouncil on Archives (ICA). From 1985onwards ALA consolidated itself anddeveloped important projects such asthe publication of a magazine andspecialized publications, courses andseminars, the creation of a website, etc.

As a product of the Summit ofIberoamerican Heads of State andGovernment, at Isla Margarita andOporto in 1998, a multilateral fund wascreated to promote the development ofIberoamerican archives. The successfulProgram ADAI - Iberarchivos has sinceits beginning used ALA’s infrastructureto implement its grants.

In 2000 the International Seminar onArchives of the Iberian Tradition (SIATI)was created as an official event of ALA.

The 7th SIATI was held in 2011, at Rio deJaneiro, Brasil and the 8th SIATI willtake place in 2013 in Colombia.

ALA is currently continuing with itsstrategic plan for 2011-2015 to developitself by means of various activities suchas: stimulating the affiliation of newmembers and integrating more coun-tries; supporting research and theexchange of knowledge; creating and/orrestructuring its Technical Commissions(CTs) and Work Groups (GTs).

For more information, visit ALA’s newwebsite: www.ala-archivos.org.

Jaime Antunes da SilvaICA Vice-PresidentBranches, President of [email protected]

Virginia Chacón AriasVice-President of [email protected]

Association of Latin American

Archivists: Origins and Development

ALA General Assembly, Toledo, 2011.

EASTICA met again in November(15-18) this year in Tokyo for its10th General Conference. Theweather in this capital city ofJapan was most beautiful andwelcoming.

Anew team of management waselected during the 10th GeneralConference for another four-year

from 2011 to 2015. You can find details ofthe new team on the ICA website.

The theme of the seminar for this yearwas “Archives Today: Legislation,Access, and Preservation in DigitalAge.” Three resource persons wereinvited to speak in the seminar. BarbaraBerce, Policy and Strategic Projects

Director of the National Archives ofAustralia, spoke of the open governmentreform in Australia and the pressurefrom legislative reforms “forcing”government agencies to be more openand to make their information moreaccessible to the public. The other tworesource persons were both from Japan,Professor Akira Baba of the Universityof Tokyo and Professor Katsuya Uga,also of the University of Tokyo. ProfessorBaba spoke of the impact of digitalarchives on the knowledge society whileProfessor Uga explained the newlyenacted Records and ArchivesManagement Act and the challengesahead. In the “Country Report” session,Professor Simon Chu of the ChineseUniversity of Hong Kong commented onthe lamentable archival situation inHong Kong where the government,unlike its counterparts in the region, had“curiously” refused to provide a legalframework for the management andpreservation of records and archives.

Earlier in the year, EASTICA, in conjunc-tion with the University of Hong Kong,organized a course of study leading tothe award of a Postgraduate Certificatein Archival Studies (PCAS). This is athree-week course of full time studiesoffered once each year at the campus ofthe University of Hong Kong. This year’sprogram was held from May 30 to June18 in Hong Kong. Archival experts andeducators such as Dr Trudy Peterson(US), Dr Wendy Duff (Canada), Mr. JohnMcDonald (Canada), Dr Marian Hoy

(Australia), Dr Lee Sangmin (Korea) andMr. Simon Chu (Hong Kong) were invitedto give lectures and conduct seminars.17 full-time and 3 part-time participantsenrolled this year, most of them are serv-ing archivists coming from Hong Kong,Macao, Malaysia, China, Korea, thePhilippines, etc.

Another professional developmentventure of EASTICA was the custom-made training program EASTICA devel-oped for its Mongolian colleagues.Mongolia was making a serious effort tointroduce modern records managementthroughout its government, but has beenheld back by lack of training in interna-tional standards. In this connection,EASTICA had developed and delivered atraining package funded by the WorldBank for the National Archives ofMongolia in May 2010. It was a 2-weekintensive program of study comprisingabout 80 hours of lecturing and seminarand taught by leading experts fromarchives and universities in the US,Canada, Korea, Hong Kong andAustralia.

To find out more about EASTICA’s activi-ties and programs, go to www.eastica.org.

Simon F. K. ChuSecretary General of [email protected]

Meeting of EASTICA in Tokyo


EASTICA General Conference, Tokyo 2011.

EASTICA Bureau, Tokyo 2011

EASTICA General Conference, Tokyo 2011.


In 2011 EURBICA got especiallyinvolved in the APEnet LiaisonGroup, an EURBICA projectfunded by PCOM. Since January2011 the pilot of the ArchivesPortal Europe, that is developedjointly by 17 European nationalarchives within the framework ofthe APEnet project, is availableonline. You can search currently in9,380,998 descriptive units linkedto more than 771,747 digitalobjects from 49 institutions. Toinform and integrate moreEuropean archives, especially theones from non-EU Member States,the APEnet Liaison Group ofEURBICA has been initiated.

The first meeting took place inBern on April 12th 2011. 15 partic-ipants of eight countries partici-

pated in the meeting: Albania, Austria,Croatia, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg,Norway, Serbia and Switzerland. Sevenof these countries have already declaredtheir interest to be content providers ofthe Archives Portal Europe and two ofthem (Croatia and Norway) are going towork as project partners in APEX, thefollow-up project of APEnet.

The second APEnet Liaison Group meet-ing was a hands-on workshop on theAPEnet tools taking place during theCITRA conference at Toledo on Tuesday25th October 2011. About twentyarchivists from seven European coun-tries representing twelve different insti-tutions attended the workshop. Dividedinto morning and an afternoon sessions,the workshop showed the functionalities

and the tools designed to pool thedescriptive resources of the partnersassociated in the APEnet project.

Some participants used their own data(online finding aids), converted theminto APEnetEAD and becameacquainted with the dashboard. By using the testinstance of ArchivesPortal Europe they got an impression ofhow easy it is to get data into the portaland how their data could be publishedand presented at www.archivesportaleurope.eu.

The presentations held during thesecond meeting can be found on theAPEnet project’s website for more infor-mation (see www.apenet.eu/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=119%3Aapes-in-t oledo&cat id=3%3Anewsflash&lang=en).

Susanne WaidmannLeader of the EURBICA-APEnetLaison Project Group [email protected]

APEnet Liaison Group of EURBICA:

new content providers

for the Archives Portal Europe

APEnet workshop.

18th SARBICA executive boardmeeting and seminar onmanagement of electronic recordsManila, the Philippines.

The SARBICA family had itsgathering for 2011 in Maniladuring the 18th SARBICA

Executive Board (EB) Meeting whichwas held on 17th October 2011. TheNational Archives of The Philippineswas the host of the EB meeting and theorganizer of the International Seminaron The Management of ElectronicRecords with the theme ‘BridgingWorlds through the Management ofElectronic Records’, held in conjunc-tion with the celebration of ArchivesMonth, from 18 – 19 October 2011 at theHotel Pan Pacific, Manila.

The EB meeting was attended by 11Executive Board Members and 12observers from member countries. Mrs.Sureerat Wongsangiem, Chairman ofSARBICA, convened the meeting whichdiscussed various pertinent matters,including current and future projects ofSARBICA, membership, annualsubscription and publication of theExcusive Heritage Coffee Table Bookand the Journal of the Southeast AsiaArchives.

The International Seminar attracted 66foreign and 134 local participants andbrought together speakers fromNational Archives of The Philippines,Malaysia and Singapore who sharedtheir experiences and lessons learnedfrom their Electronic RecordsManagement Programmes respectively.We also had counterparts from industrywho spoke about latest digital technolo-gies, systems and equipment.Throughout the seminar it was acknowl-edged that managing e-records hasbecome an important task for Archiveswith different resources and capacities.Therefore the seminar made the follow-ing recommendations:

◗ The National Archives of the differentASEAN countries shall take the lead in

effectively addressing electronicrecords management issues in ASEANin general and in their individual coun-tries in particular in keeping with inter-nationally accepted standards.◗ Electronic records technology willbring conveniences which will enhancearchival operations but such recordstechnology must also be managedresponsibly.◗ Government agencies stand to benefitfrom coordinating with their NationalArchives to develop effective electronicmanagement systems in their agencieswhich take into account humanresource, technological (software andhardware) and policy and proceduralaspects.◗ Electronic records managementrequires constant vigilance especiallywith regard to technological changeswhich may render digitized recordsunreadable and obsolete.◗ Effective metadata management is anessential aspect of electronic recordsmanagement.◗ ASEAN National Archives shall takeadvantage of the enhanced capacityprovided by advancements in electronicrecords technology to share resourcesand experiences with each other, espe-cially given their shared histories andheritage.◗ Advances in electronic records tech-nology also empower ASEAN archives tointeract and share experiences andresources with other archives all overthe world.A bonus feature of the seminar was aspecial lecture delivered by Prof. AuroraGómez Galvarriato Freer, the DirectorGeneral of the National General

Archives of Mexico, on ‘Bridging theArchival Heritage of Mexico andSoutheast Asia through ElectronicTechnology’ which revealed new knowl-edge on the history of the NationalGeneral Archives of Mexico and on rela-tions between New Spain (now Mexico)with the Philippines and other parts ofAsia. Prof. Aurora cleverly related thesubject of her lecture to digital technol-ogy and related how digitization ofarchival documents helps to share ourcommon heritage.

All foreign delegates/participantsparticularly were treated to the besthospitality, the Philippines way. We werealso taken for both a professional visit tothe National Archives of The Philippinesand a social visit to the Ayala Museum.The SARBICA Executive Board wouldlike to thank Mr. Victorino M. Manalo, thenew Executive Director of the NationalArchives of The Philippines and his ablestaff for a job well done.

The next EB Meeting will be held inBangkok, Thailand, in May or June 2012.The National Archives of Thailand willplay host to next year’s meeting andseminar. Please visit our website orcontact the SARBICA Secretariat forfurther information on the next seminarand membership application.

Gowri PS ThangayaSecretary General of [email protected]

“KUMUSTA” and “MABUHAY”

from SARBICA


SARBICA Executive Board and Seminar, Manila 2011.


The PARBICA family wasreunited for PARBICA 14:Evidence and Memory in aDigital Age. Over 100 attendeesfrom 18 countries met for aweek of presentations,discussions and workshops,which addressed some of thechallenges and risks related tomanaging information in adigital age. We also continuedto work on developing thecapacity and competenciesrequired to support and improverecordkeeping in the PacificRegion using ourRecordkeeping for GoodGovernance Toolkit.

C onference participants reportedthey would be taking theconference learning back to

their respective countries to up skillthe recordkeepers and informationprofessionals in their governments.Concrete action identified included;work around developing disasterpreparedness guidance and enablinggreater access to informationthrough utilising digital technologiesand promoting digital literacy.

The conference reconfirmed thatstrong systems for the creation andmanagement of records and thepreservation of archives are key foun-dations of sustainable economicdevelopment and good business prac-tice, as well as essential to supportgood governance and collectivememory in all countries, states and

territories in the Pacific region.

The PARBICA bureau has undergonea period of change: we havefarewelled Setareki Tale, AdrianCunningham and Mark Crookston. Onbehalf of the membership I would liketo express our thanks for the signifi-cant contributions made by Seta,Adrian and Mark. A new Bureau waselected at PARBICA 14, full details ofwhich are available on the ICAwebsite.

The Bureau has taken the conferenceresolutions and is developing a busi-ness plan which focuses on 5 keyareas – Professional Developmentand Education, Co-operation andAdvocacy, Governance andMembership, Recordkeeping for GoodGovernance, and Archival Capability.

PARBICA has experienced a period ofgreat productivity and significantsupport from our funding partners.We have achieved great things forrecordkeeping in the Pacific throughthe Recordkeeping for GoodGovernance Toolkit. The focus of theBureau is now on consolidating thisgreat work and looking for ways toimplement the toolkit across thePacific.

For more information: www.parbica.org

Anna GulbransenSecretary General of [email protected]

PARBICA 14: Evidence and Memory

in a Digital Age

PARBICA 14, Apia 2011.


On 25 October 2011 the Sectionon Notarial Archives met inMadrid (Spain), welcomed byTeresa Diez de Los Rios de SanJuan, director of the ArchivoHistorico de Protocolos deMadrid, and the authorities of theGeneral Subdirection forArchives of the Comunidad deMadrid, in the very beautifulbuilding, renovated in 2003 forthe archives, of the old brewerynamed El Aguila.

The meeting took place duringthe 2011 CITRA held in Toledo,very near to the Spanish capi-

tal. Attending the meeting were twonew members : Lucia Maria Velloso deOliveira, from Brazil, and Marc Torras,for Catalunia (Spain). Even if MakhoneToure, who is representing Senegal,was unable to come, the sectionwelcomed him very enthusiastically,because he will be able to open thesection to Warbica. The chairwoman,Paola Caroli, wished to focus the meet-ing on PCOM’s project.

The project aims globally to present

to the archival community a pack ofresources on notarial archives. It iscomposed of actions alreadylaunched but also of new ones. Thesection tried to meet general interestpoints of view for the whole archivalcommunity, and not focusing onlyspecifically on notarial archives. Inthis regard, it decided to launch aninquiry on born digital notarialrecords with the help of theInternational Union of Notaries(UINL) and of the InternationalInstitute On Notarial History (IIHN),in order to understand better thestakes of preservation of the authen-ticity of the born digital acts. Asregards the dissemination of notarialarchives, the section wants to focusand contribute to a better under-

standing of the programmes of digiti-zation of notarial archives. There arealready a lot of experimentations inquite a lot of countries.

At the end of the day, the section wentto visit the magnificent ArchivoHistorico de Protocolos de Madrid,guided by Teresa Diez, director. We sawarchives on Cervantes, Lope de Vega,la Zarzuela and their notaries…!Muchas Gracias!

Marie-FrançoiseLimon-BonnetSecretary of [email protected]

Section on Notarial Archives

SAN Bureau, Madrid 2011.

Archivists know that they can nolonger assume that theircontributions to their institutionsare understood and valued. Forthis reason, the ICA Section onArchives of Universities andResearch Institutions (SUV)examined the importance ofarchivists becoming advocateswithin their own institutions, anotion called “inreach,” at its July2011 Conference, hosted by theUniversity of Alberta in Edmonton,Alberta, Canada.

While the call-for-proposalsemphasized inreach, it is notsurprising that there were an

equal number of papers on outreach,which has received much attention

since the 1980s. Still, as the conferenceproceeded and speakers discussed theiradvocacy activities, it became clear thatthe line between inreach and outreachwas unimportant. Indeed, most all activ-ities for support and building of usercommunities could provide significantinreach benefits if planned critically.Both internal and external advocacyprograms share many strategies andtechniques that build strong archiveswith engaged institutional support andcommitted public audiences.

The conference demonstrated that therewas little difference in effective execu-

Section on Archives of Universities

Gatis Karlsons, Latvia, presenting in regard to hisPCOM funded project on Student Records.


The second SPA WorldConference of ArchivesAssociations was held inEdinburgh between 31 August and2 September. The event washosted by the Archives andRecords Association (UK andIreland) as a separate stream atthe Association’s annualconference. Representatives fromassociations in Europe, NorthAmerica, South America, Asiaand Australia attended theconference where experienceswere shared and issues ofcommon concern discussed.

The program included sessions on:◗ The Universal Declaration on Archives◗ Developing a competency model◗ Managing associations in financialhard times◗ Government and archives politics◗ Merging records and archives associa-tions; merging archives and libraries.An Association Fair was included in theConference program where participat-ing associations displayed publicationsand other items developed for sale orgeneral distribution. The event also marked the 35th

Anniversary of SPA which was estab-lished on 29 September 1976 at a specialmeeting of the ICA InternationalCongress held in Washington. To markthe occasion there was a panel discus-

sion with past SPA Presidents: YvonneBos-Rops, The Netherlands, President1996-2000; Margaret Turner, UnitedKingdom, President 2000-2004; DidierGrange, Switzerland, President 2004-2008, and Christine Martinez, France,President 2008-2009. The session wastitled “Here’s SPA: Looking Back,Looking Ahead” and was chaired by thecurrent SPA President, Henri Zuber.Each panel member noted highlightsfrom their presidency and included thedevelopment of the ICA Code of Ethicsand the Universal Declaration onArchives and the establishment of theArchival Solidarity Project. All agreedthat SPA had played an important rolesupporting professional archives andrecords associations and helping themto promote and protect the interests ofthe profession. At the conclusion of theConference a birthday celebration washeld to mark the occasion. The SPA Manual was launched at theEdinburgh Conference. The Manualbrings together in one document all ofthe guidelines developed by the Sectionto assist associations establish soundadministrative structures and effectiveprograms for their members. The publi-cation has a number of themes:◗Good governance, with guidelines ondeveloping a constitution and conductingelections, and advice on setting up a recordsmanagement program and on developing anassociation retention schedule;

◗ Education and professional develop-ment, with guidelines on organisingconferences, training workshops andseminars and on establishing a mentor-ing program, and◗ Advocacy and promotion, with guide-lines on developing promotion strategiesand on conducting lobbying and publiccampaigns.The Manual is available in English,French and Spanish on the ICA/SPAwebsite at: www.ica.org/9217/profes-sional-resources/manual-for-associa-tion-management.html. Individual guide-lines are also available on the SPA website.

Colleen McEwenJoint Secretary of [email protected]

Section of Professional Associations

Panel of SPA Presidents at the EdinburghConference: D. Grange, C. Martinez, H. Zuber,

M. Turner, Y. Bos-Rops.

tion of inreach vs. outreach projects,whether exhibits, lectures, websites, orsocial media. Speakers reported onvaried activities, including “embeddedrecords management,” discipline/community-driven collection building,oral history in partnership with “story-book” memory projects, curriculumdevelopment, Facebook pages, andblogs. All successful projects dependedon clear strategic goals, sufficientresources were to complete the project,and realistic planning. Most importantly,advocacy programs that were successfulfor inreach all proceeded by researchingthe prospective audience and then build-

ing relationships, especially by turningthe target audience into partners.Perhaps the meeting’s most valuablecontribution was the emergence, basedon case studies, of commonalities amongthe successful projects.

The papers also demonstrated thatvirtually any properly conductedoutreach project could become a goodinreach tool. As one speaker noted,when a project emphasizes the contentof archives, it would show how evidenceforms a legacy, which then creates insti-tutional memory. In today’s competitivehigher-education market, this is an espe-

cially important service as universitiesseek to “brand” themselves by means oftheir institutional identity. When suchstrategic outcomes are part of thearchives’ planning of outreach, theresultant inreach will ensure that itsparent institution understands andvalues its contributions.

William J. Maher Chair of [email protected]

The Annual Conference of theSection of Archives and Archivistsof Parliaments and PoliticalParties (SPP) of the InternationalCouncil of Archives (ICA)Archives and Democracies inTransition was held at the Seimas(Parliament) of the Republic ofLithuania in Vilnius on 6-7 October2011, presided by a member of theSteering Committee of SPP, MsVida Kisuniene. The Conferencewas attended by 87 participantsfrom 14 countries around theworld, as well as by students ofhistory and archives fromLithuanian universities.

The Conference discussed theimpact of democratic processeson the activities of archives and

the challenges that preservation andcommunication of historical documen-tary heritage pose to these activities andtheir significance for democratic devel-opment. The Conference mainly focusedon the activities of parliamentary andparty archives in Central and EasternEurope over the past two decades, espe-cially on changes they experienced afterthe first conferences of the SPP held inthis region (Prague, Budapest, andWarsaw).

In his opening speech, Mr CeslovasVytautas Stankevicius, Deputy Speakerof the Lithuanian Seimas, underlined theimportance of the preservation andcommunication of archives, as well asthe role of the Conference in thecommunity of archivists. He also notedthat political parties in Lithuania shouldfocus more on preservation and commu-nication of their historical documentaryheritage. At the Conference, presenta-tions were made by representatives ofparliamentary and party archives, scien-tists, and historians from Austria,Germany, the Netherlands, Estonia,Latvia, the Slovak Republic, Georgia,Hungary, and Lithuania. During the twodays of the Conference, the participantshad an opportunity to share their profes-sional experience and cover relevantissues while holding discussions andpersonal conversations. The Conferencewas directly broadcast online and on theSeimas Television channel Seimas-tiesiogiai. Dr Günter Schefbeck, Vice-President of the SPP chaired theConference and gave an interview to theSeimas Television, which was preparinga report on the visit of the participants ofthe Conference to the Archive of theSeimas. The Conference was alsodirectly covered in the news programmeof the Lithuanian National Television.

During the Vilnius Conference theGeneral Assembly of the SPP adopted aResolution which is available on ICAwebsite in the member space :www.ica.org/5415/governance/archives.html

Marietta MinotosChair of [email protected]

Guenther SchefbeckVice-Chair of SPP [email protected]

Annual Conference of SPP

in Vilnius, Lithuania


SPP Annual Conference, Vilnius 2011.

SPP Annual Conference, Vilnius 2011.


The 2003 CITRA in Cape Townadopted a resolution on archivesand human rights violationswhich, in part, invited ICA andUNESCO to put in place aprogram to support thepreservation of archives thatdocument violations of humanrights. To implement thisresolution, ICA established aHuman Rights Working Group(HRWG). The Working Groupaims to raise awareness of theimportance of archives forhuman rights and to support thebetter and wider of use archivesin defense of human rights.

Starting in December 2009, the

Working Group began produc-

ing a monthly newsletter

reporting on human rights issues that

have an archives component. The

newsletter is distributed through the

ICA listserve and by UNESCO (to

subscribe, enter the required informa-

tion on the form at www.unesco.org/

archives/hrgnews/managesub.php). A

French translation of selected items in

each newsletter is available through

the Swiss archives association cour-

tesy of translator Cristina Bianchi; the

issues are available on the Swiss asso-

ciation website at www.vsa-aas.org/fr/

doku/archives-et-droits-de-lhomme.

The Working Group hopes to find a

volunteer to translate parts into

Spanish. News and information from

all parts of the world are actively

sought, and persons with items to

share are asked to send them to Trudy

Peterson ([email protected]).

Previous issues of the Newsletter

are online at http://new.ica.org/4535/

ressources/ressources-relatives-aux-

archives-et-droits-de-lhomme.html, on

the UNESCO website, and on the

Council of Europe’s electronic reposi-

tory ArchivalWare (http://128.121.

10.98/coe/public.jsp).

In 2010 the Working Group began a

project to build an on-line directory of

(1) archives that identify themselves

as human rights archives and (2)

archives that are part of a human

rights organization and are open to the

public. Aileen Cornelio (Canada) and

Tessa Fallon (United States) volun-

teered to lead the project. The ICA’s

International Standard for Describing

Institutions with Archival Holdings is

used for gathering directory informa-

tion, and the first round of entries is

complete. The Working Group decided

this autumn to expand the directory to

include institutions (excluding

national archives) that hold special

bodies of records relating to human

rights issues; the Working Group is

particularly interested in listing the

institutions holding archives of truth

commissions, international courts and

human rights commissions, secret

police, and land registries. Any institu-

tion that wishes to be part of the direc-

tory should contact either Aileen

([email protected]) or Tessa

at ([email protected]). The first

entries will be available via the ICA

website in early January 2012.

The Section of Professional

Associations (SPA) and the Human

Rights Working Group are undertaking

a joint project to develop a statement

of professional responsibilities for

archivists with regards to human

rights. The statement will be modeled

on the United Nations’ document,

“Basic Principles on the Role of

Lawyers,” (www2.ohchr.org/english/

law/lawyers.htm) and informed by the

UN Principles Against Impunity

(ht tp://daccess-dds-ny.un.org/doc/

UNDOC/GEN/G05/109/01/PDF/G05109

01.pdf?OpenElement).

Giulia Barrera (Italy), Montserrat

Canela (United Nations High

Commissioner for Refugees) and

Sigrid McCausland (Australia) are the

first members of the project team,

with one or more additional persons to

be added shortly. Persons interested

in joining the group should contact

either Henri Zuber, chair of SPA, via

the SPA page on the ICA website, or

Trudy Peterson at (trudy@trudypeter-

son.com). This statement is both

important and timely because the

United Nations High Commissioner

for Human Rights will soon be

appointing a Special Rapporteur to

look at the question of impunity, and

the role of archives in the fight against

impunity should be an important part

of that study. Having a statement of

professional responsibility will be

useful to the Rapporteur as a guideline

to archival thinking on the responsibil-

ities of archivists when handling

records important to human rights.

Trudy HuskampPetersonChaif of HRWG

[email protected]

Advancing archives and human

rights: The ICA Human Rights

Working Group


In 2012 there will be major newimprovements to the way in whichComma is produced and distributed

– and ones which will lessen the overallcosts to the ICA too. In common with

most professional journals Comma willnow be published by a commercialpublishing company; in our case theacademic publisher, LiverpoolUniversity Press . In practice thismeans, for the reader, an improved read-ing experience both in the paper version- and online. Comma will be availablethrough the ICA website as usual, butwith much improved access and naviga-tion between articles and individualissues. Behind the scenes the newarrangement will mean that the ParisSecretariat will have fewer administra-tion tasks to perform and will no longer

have to oversee the distribution process;editorial control remains, of course,solely with the Comma board. The firstissue to appear with LUP is theSAE/CITRA2009 issue on education andtraining and the Board hopes thatmembers enjoy the ‘look and feel’ of thenew product.

Margaret ProcterEditor in Chief of [email protected]

Changes for “Comma”

ESARBICA NewsletterIssue 25 Octoberonly in EnglishContact: Mr MphonNgoepe, DevelopmentBank of Southern Africa

(DBSA), [email protected] orProf. Patrick Ngulube, University ofSouth Africa – UNISA, [email protected]

WARBICAHalf yearly journalof the West AfricanRegional BranchN° 6, September 2011“The management of

audio-visual archives in West Africa:issues and perspectives”Available only in FrenchN° 7, October 2011The management of medical archives inWest Africa: issues and challenges.Available only in FrenchContact: Babacar NDIAYE, Director ofthe Archives of Senegal,[email protected]

ISAAR (CPF):International StandardArchival AuthorityRecord for CorporateBodies, Persons andFamilies, 2nd EditionThis standard provides

guidance for preparing archival author-ity records which provide descriptionsof entities (corporate bodies, persons

and families) associated with thecreation and maintenance of archives.Translation into Russian provided byBoris Yeltsin Presidential Library,Russian Federationde Russie. ISBN 978-5-905273-13-1

Publications of the Society of American ArchivistsContact: Society of American archivistswww.archivists.org

Encoded ArchivalDescription – TagLibraryVersion 2002 – RussianVersionPrepared and maintainedby the Encoded Archival

Description Working Group of SAA andthe Network Development and MARCStandards Office of the Library ofCongressSociety of American Archivists (2011),379 pp., ISBN 1-931666-00-8

I, DigitalPersonal Collectionsin the Digital EraThis book exploresissues, challenges, andopportunities in the

management of personal digital collec-tions, focusing primarily on born-digi-tal materials generated and kept byindividuals, as opposed to electronicrecords that are generated within andmanaged by formal organizational

record-keeping systems.Edited by Christopher A. LeeSociety of American Archivists (2011),379 pp., ISBN 1-931666-38-5

A Different Kind ofWeb, New Connectionsbetween Archives andour UsersEdited by Kate TheimerForeword by David S.Ferriero

Thirteen case studies describe archivists’experiences in creating blogs, wikis, andinteractive website. A series of shortessays present viewpoints of archivesusers - historians, educators, students, andgenealogists- as they consider the possibil-ities social media present for them to inter-act with archives in new ways.Society of American Archivists (2011),369 pp., ISBN 1-931666-39-3

Waldo Gifford Lelandand the Origins of theAmerican ArchivalProfessionEdited with an introductionby Peter J. WoshThis splendid basic brings

together Waldo Gifford Leland’s mostsignificant writings concerning archivesand archival methods, concentrating onthe period from 1908 to 1920, whenLeland was most involved in helping tocreate the American archives profession.Society of American Archivists (2011),398 pp., ISBN 978-1-931666-40-7

Publications

The Comma board, Toledo 2011.

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