LIBR256 Final Exam
Submitted by Hilary Henkin; August 9, 2010
Question 3 from the list:
How does the primary mission of the archives (institutional vs. collecting) affect archival
practice (acquisitions, processing, preservation, reference, etc.)?
The Society of American Archivists (2010) defines institutional archives this way: “a
repository that holds records created or received by its parent institution.” It defines a collecting
archives as “a repository that collects materials from individuals, families, and organizations
other than the parent organization.” Institutional and collecting archives serve different
purposes, and may have different access policies for researchers, different guidelines as to what
they keep, and different ways of providing information to researchers.
Institutional archives preserve the business records of their own organizations -- entities
as small as a family department store, or as large as the U.S. federal government. They can
represent a government, corporation, school, religious group, or other body. Collecting archives
hold “manuscripts collections and other ‘special’ collections, comprised of material created
outside the organization and subsequently donated to it” (Greene, 2007, p. 1). Institutional and
collecting archives may share a single repository; California State University Dominguez Hills
houses the archives for its own school records; collections of manuscripts (“special collections”),
and the records for the entire California State University system (CSUDH, 2010).
Institutional archives may be governmental, business/corporate, or otherwise preserving
the records of their parent organization. While all preserve the business records of the parent
organization, they have very different attitudes toward access: governmental records are generally
open to all (unless restricted for security reasons), while the others can restrict access as they
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choose. The activities and resources of corporate archives “must be focused on meeting the needs
of internal clients or customers rather than those of external researchers” (Tousey, 2007, p. 2).
While the 2002 Sarbanes-Oxley Act mandated that corporate records be retained for specified
periods, it did not “provide direct public access or have any requirement that corporate records be
retained for archival purposes after the legally established period of retention expires” (Peterson,
2007, p.3). More realistically, businesses have a direct interest in not allowing access to the
public; which could increase the potential for litigation, create bad publicity, or affect the ability of
the company to prosper. Conversely, “Most not-for-profit archives and publicly funded archives
have a mandate to serve the research and information needs of the public, regardless of who is
making a request and why information is being sought. … This access ethic represents a key
difference between these repositories and corporate archives” (Tousey, 2007, p. 2).
Another difference between institutional and collecting archives may be related to
primary and secondary value. Reto Tschan (2002) analyzes the theories of Theodore
Schellenberg, explaining that primary value is the value to the creator, while secondary value is
the value to others, after the creator’s need is over. However, Schellenberg also describes
primary value as of legal, fiscal, or administrative importance (p. 180). Institutional archives
continue to be concerned with these values even after the records’ active life. Collecting
archives focus on secondary historical value: evidential and/or informational value to others.
Collecting archives receive their funding from a variety of sources, such as the parent
organization, donations, and grants. Archives which are not publicly funded, particularly if
they’re institutional archives, have their costs borne by entirely their parent organization. “It is
imperative that corporate archives clearly communicate and consistently demonstrate their value
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to the business. They must directly link their mission, services and policies — particularly
access policy — to helping the company meet its business goals.” (Tousey, p. 2).
Differences are also found in acquisition policies. An institutional archive is governed by
a records retention policy dictated by its governing body. Its archivists don’t really decide what
to accession, even though they contribute to the formation of the retention policy. The archivists
don’t go searching for material; it comes to them. “These archivists have a mission to document
the work of their parent institution” and are typically created with a formal, founding document
that gives a broad indication of what should be placed in the archives. For example, the archivist
of the United States should “appraise, accession, preserve, and make available for research the
official records of lasting value” (McCoy, 1978, p. 59)
Collecting archives don’t save their own company’s work - they search outside the
organization for things related to their “collecting mission”, which may be related to geography,
subject, specific individuals, events or groups, media or other themes. The archivist in a
collecting archives has much more leeway in accession choices, and may even have the authority
to make such decisions without management or Board approval.
Institutional governmental archives have to answer to outside forces such as voters and
the press. Accordingly, having and consistently following a records retention policy is critical.
These archives may even be legislatively blocked from deaccesioning records. Collecting
archives don’t have to answer to users, but do coordinate with the parent organization. Instead of
a records retention policy, they have a collection development policy which guides acquisition
decisions. Deaccesioning a collection or refusing a donation may be an easier process, if they
can demonstrate that the donation doesn’t match mission guidelines. University special
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collections libraries, although defined as collecting archives, may also have legal limitations to
deaccesioning, because of their affiliation to the parent university.
The terminology of archival processing done by these two groups also differs.
Institutional archives deal in “record groups”, and sort materials on a “filing unit level” or
“document level.” Collecting archives acquire “collections”, and process them to the “folder
level” or “item level.” Regardless of whether the grouping is called a collection or a record
group, it refers to records from a single origin or creator. For example, NARA has a record
group for the Department of Labor, while the Huntington Library has a collection from Southern
California Edison company.
Access and use restrictions also depend on the type of archive. Collecting archives may
deal with many policies based on individual collection agreements, which may have restrictions
about living individuals, privacy issues, trade secrets, or other concerns.
For institutional archives, access guidelines depend on whether the archive is publicly
funded or business/corporate. Institutional publicly funded archives generally follow a principle
of “equal access.” “When access rules are established for categories of requesters, the access
rules apply equally to all persons within that category….That does not mean that each member of
the same category will get access to the same records, but it does mean their requests will all be
handled by the same process” (Peterson, 2007, p. 6). They also tend to practice “permanent
public release”: a document, once released to someone, is available to all. (Peterson, 2007, p. 6)
Publicly funded collecting archives also generally follow these same access guidelines.
Corporate institutional archives, if not restricted by legislation, may limit access to
employees, or require Board approval, on a case by case basis. While corporations acknowledge
the value of good public relations, they also protect their own business interests. Privately
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funded collecting archives, similarly unlegislated, have much more leeway than similar publicly
funded archives as to which researchers they grant access, and in what manner. They can decide
what requirements must be met for access, how long access may be allowed, or what materials
may or may not be released.
Both institutional and collecting archives strive to serve their researchers to the best of
their ability. “Access to information in the [corporate] archives will be provided to that
individual to the extent possible [emphasis in original]. (Tousey, 2007, p. 6) Both make their
services available remotely, but by different means. Public archives may have easily searchable
online finding aids and / or catalogs, and researchers may visit the archives to do their own
research with original materials. Private or business archives allow onsite research very rarely,
but will work with researchers via telephone, fax or email. Usually the archivist does the needed
research and sends the results to the user (Peterson, 2007, p. 3). “In many not-for-profit
institutions, -- particularly research and academic archives -- the archives staff are custodians of
records that others use as the source of their research. In corporate archives, the archivists are
not only the custodians of records but also the primary users of those records. They provide
reference services on behalf of and in service to their clients” (Tousey, 2007, p. 3).
Institutional archives, even government archives, may not make their finding aids
available to the general public at all: the City of Los Angeles’ finding aids are available only
through the city intranet. The public may use the archive itself, but must do so through the
archivist. Corporate institutional archives similarly will require contacting the archivist for
assistance, since finding aids may be even more restricted.
As to preservation, whether an archives is institutional or collecting will have little effect
on its preservation and conservation policies. Both will use the knowledge of the profession to
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protect the materials as much as possible. Both may make research copies of popular materials,
to preserve the originals. An archives such as NARA may even distribute copies to multiple
locations or regional branches; for example, each branch has a large assortment of microfilms of
frequently requested series. Both archives will make these decisions based on user need and
geographic distribution, fragility of the original material, and on available funds and staff.
Institutional archives and collecting archives, have different missions, purposes,
inventories, and users, but both pursue the same goals of preservation and access. They are
dually focused on saving the records deemed important for the future, yet guaranteeing access to
those records for current use.
References:
California State University Dominguez Hills. (2007, July 17). Dept. of Archives and Special
Collections. Retrieved August 10 from California State University Dominguez Hills web
site: http://archives.csudh.edu/
Greene, M. (2007, May 9-11). Access to institutional archives and manuscript collections in
U.S. colleges and universities. Paper presented at “Access to archives: The Japanese and
American practices” conference, May 9-11, 2007. Retrieved August 10, 2010 from
Society of American Archivist web site: http://www.archivists.org/publications/
proceedings/accesstoarchives/08_Mark_GREENE.pdf
McCoy, D. (1978). The National Archives: America’s ministry of documents 1934-1968.
Chapel Hill, NC: The University of North Carolina Press
Peterson, T. (2007, May 9-11). Attitudes and access in the United States of America. Paper
presented at “Access to archives: The Japanese and American Practices” conference, May
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9-11, 2007. Retrieved August 10, 2020 from Society of American Archivist web site:
http://www.archivists.org/publications/proceedings/accesstoarchives/11_Trudy_PETERS
ON.pdf
Society of American Archivists. (2010). Glossary of archival and records terminology.
Retrieved August 10, 2010 from Society of American Archivists website:
http://www2.archivists.org/glossary
Tousey, B. H., Adkins, E. (2007, May 9-11) Access to business archives: U.S. access
philosophies. Paper presented at “Access to Archives: The Japanese and American
Practices” conference, May 9-11, 2007. Retrieved August 10, 2020 from Society of
American Archivist web site: http://www.archivists.org/publications/proceedings/
accesstoarchives/10_B-TOUSEY_E-ADKINS.pdf
Tschan, R. (2002, Fall-Winter). A Comparison of Jenkinson and Schellenberg on appraisal.
The American Archivist, 65, 176-195
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