Challenges old and new: Managing archives in our times

Abstract

The author posits that three areas challenge contemporary archival communities: the need to come to grips with a balanced and effective policy and strategy for acquiring private archives; the need to develop the capacity for long-term preservation of electronic records; and the need to strengthen the role of archives in support of worldwide trends towards greater transparency, accountability, and responsiveness of governments and other organizations. He examines these three areas and how they have been reflected in recent archival discourse to show that pursuing effective action in these three realms, which he sees as being related, constitute the principal challenge to archival institutions and programs now and into the foreseeable future.