By Deborah Morrison

A rare gathering of Canadian archivists was held in January 2014 at the Munk School of Global Affairs at the University of Toronto. An estimated seventy people were gathered onsite, but surprisingly, another four hundred joined n through thirty regional sites linked via the Internet. Anyone who worried that the conference — organized by former Librarian and Archivist of Canada Ian Wilson — would be a dry conversation was instead pleasantly surpised.

Many readers will be aware of the challenges facing the archival community (or the “information industry,” as it now calls itself) due to cutbacks at Library and Archives Canada, the closing of interlibrary loan services, and increasing demands to provide more access through digitization, to name but a few challenges. Although these problems are real, the archivists had not gathered to dwell on them. Rather, the presentations and discussions were focused on the future of their profession and how best to serve the needs of Canadians in this rapidly changing technological universe.

It was generally agreed that the greater priority was not digitizing the records we already have but, rather, developing a strategy for collecting and storing the massive amount of new records being created today.

Ontario Information and Privacy Commissioner Ann Cavoukian was one of seventeen “agents provocateurs” who delivered short presentations on the issues a new national archival strategy needs to address. She spoke about the challenges of securing records related to key decisions of government — as evidenced by the highly publicized case of the Ontario premier’s office destroying all emails pertinent to gas plant closures at Oakville and Mississauga. It brought into stark relief the need to have enforceable policies and procedures in place if we are to have any documented record of public decision-making for tomorrow’s historians to analyze.

But the greatest threat to our historical record isn’t coming from these types of allegedly deliberate efforts to erase the past. Rather, it is coming from a complete values shift for those who have grown up in a world where information is “born digital,” as opposed to the rest of us who still try to apply the principles of paper and file folders to the digital age. The University of British Columbia’s Luciana Duranti and Corinne Rogers define the tipping point as occurring with anyone born after 1981. According to them, this generation “considers communication more important than memory, and the material it generates is supposed to have an immediate impact and be consumed instantaneously. Thus, there is no expectation of preservation, only a desire to generate output throughout each and every event….” Most of today’s records are ephemeral, and the longer it takes to create new processes for collecting and permanently storing them the greater the amount that will be lost forever.

Finding a solution means rethinking a lot of the things we have come to trust about archival records. Issues of provenance, authorship, copyright, and privacy must be redefined for a world where documents are routinely shared and edited. A generation of leaders — both in business and in the not-for-profit sector — need to invest in training and record-keeping systems to ensure that electronic documents endure. Everyday Canadians need to be aware of the importance of maintaining their own collections of photographs, blogs, and emails so that future generations can benefit from what these say about the lives we’ve lived. These efforts need to be coordinated nationally so that, in a world of diminishing resources, this is done as quickly and efficiently as possible. And finally — if government cannot be persuaded to support this effort — trustworthy private-sector partners need to be found to help.

Over the past year or so, the archival community has been unfairly stigmatized, largely because of what’s been happening at Library and Archives Canada. Coming together, so that archivists can see beyond those issues and restore confidence in their own capacities, was an important first step. Far from being passive observers of the modern age, archivists in Canada have demonstrated an impressive breadth of foresight and ingenuity. However, the community will need support to develop its strategies and solutions, and archivists need to know that Canadians value and understand the importance of this enterprise. Anyone looking to follow the discussion should visit Archivists.Ca.

Deborah Morrison is the President and CEO of Canada’s History.