Ensuring evidence through recordkeeping

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EVIDENCE
•Reliable records
•Records as proof
•Records everyday
•Records at work

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'Records are of, not about, activity. They are by-products of ongoing work and other social processes and must be managed as such.' - David Bearman, USA archive and museum informatics consultant.

Reliable records - What makes a record trustworthy?

Records are not just any old pieces of paper or electronic documents.

Because they provide evidence of actual events, records need to be constructed with special care. They must be complete, reliable and unchanging by-products of the activities that generated them.

Authoritative source documents are entered in databases or are analysed and summarised into management tools such as reports. Competent recordkeeping is needed to transform ordinary documents into reliable records that are trustworthy enough to perform this task.

Reliable records are the most versatile and powerful members of the Information Family Tree.

Characteristics of reliable records

There are ten characteristics of reliable records and the more of these a record possesses, the more valuable and important it becomes. A reliable record:

1. Has mature and sturdy technology ie. Recording media, tools & methods.

2. Has quality content ie. message is accurate & well expressed 

3. Uses a standardised and widely used documentary form, such as a letter, receipt, minute, contract, etc.

4. Involves a creator and recipient who are authoritative & reliable participants

This postcard sent by John Curtin to family friends Yatala and Jen Bruce about 1910 is a 'reliable record'. Curtin went on to become Prime Minister of Australia in World War II and correspondence such as this postcard provides evidence of his association with the Victorian Socialist Party of which Yatala, Jen and Curtin himself were all members.

5. Documents actions that are 'worthy of recording'

6. Is uniquely identifiable - uses metadata descriptors and codes that are attached to the record to distinquish it from all others

7. Has the intention and capability of being transmitted

8. Is readable and intelligible at time of creation and at time of receipt by intended recipient

9. Has successful and secure transmission 

10. Is managed by an effective recordkeeping regime - competent recordkeeping expertise, technology & processes with controlled routines for record integrity during:

• creation/recording, transmission & receipt
• access & use
• security, maintenance & storage
• auditing & authentication

(See later section on Archives - Recordkeeping Regimes for a fuller picture of effective recordkeeping)

SITES TO VISIT - find out more about the characteristics of reliable records on the School of Library and Archival Studies (UBC) website.

Safe and secure storage of
documents is an important aspect of caring for reliable records.

The relationship between seeing and believing can cause problems when it comes to giving evidence in a court of law.

SITES TO VISIT - find out more about problems with eyewitness evidence in an article by Gene Charlton and a research report from the National Institute of Justice.

Records as proof: Facts & truth through the ages

The rules of society often require members to demonstrate or 'prove' the facts and circumstances surrounding the accountable transactions of their lives and work.

Did you know that in today's developed world, being born and actually existing as a physical person does not automatically enable you to interact in the real world?

In fact, you cannot go to school, own property or travel overseas UNTIL a written record legally attesting to your existence is registered with the appropriate public authority. A valid record must 'prove' your legal existence as a person before you may exercise the rights of citizenship or receive the protection of law.

Prior to the acceptance of written evidence, this proving involved rituals, testimony and feats of strength. Physical ordeals of proof included such activities as combat in which greater might and skill gave proof of rightness, having respected citizens vouch for one's character and word, swearing of oaths over sacred objects, or undergoing an inquisition.

SITES TO VISIT - find out about ordeals of proof including those relating to Sir Lancelot, Joan of Arc and the Inquisition.

Certificate of Australian
citizenship

Looking back at these early methods of determining justice, we are horrified by their obvious bias towards punishing, rather then protecting, innocence. In modern times, most proceedings rely upon written records created in the natural course of events to bear the best witness to what happened. Because there are as many kinds of proof as there are types of human activity, what is considered a trustworthy record in evidence varies widely.

Whatever the event or circumstance, we have all watched enough crime thrillers to know that three factors interact to influence our assessment of the quality of recorded evidence and the prospects of a just outcome.

Factor 1: The quality of evidence

Factor 2: The persons and actions involved in the event

Factor 3: The chain of custody of the proof

Depending upon the seriousness of the events involved, the formality, complexity and setting of any 'proving' varies. Some provings are quite simple, such as showing housemates a receipt for the purchase of the weekly groceries. Others are conducted publicly, before a recognised authority, and are complex undertakings with strict procedures, such as a criminal or civil trial in a court of law.

SITES TO VISIT - Can we ever know fully what really happened? These sites explore the role records play in establishing the facts surrounding events and in seeking to know the 'Truth', especially in the anything goes world of electronic documents and texts.

These medical records documenting a naval officer's health during his career were later used to support his claim for an invalid pension (primary value). Later, medical researchers used the records to analyse the effects of particular medical procedures and drugs (secondary value).

Forgeries and Hoaxes

Forged records have always played a role in human affairs, great and small. Some of them can even be said to have influenced the course of history. Whatever the scale of their impact or celebrity, these deliberate distortions of fact undermine the public’s trust in individuals and institutions. Forgeries and their creators oppose everything professional recordkeepers hold dear- the authentic, reliable and accurate recording of phenomena, actions, thoughts and feelings. Yet their existence underscores the essential importance of authoritative records and recordkeeping expertise. In this segment you are invited to explore examples of forgeries that both intrigue and horrify.

The Protocols of the Elders of Zion (c. 1917)
The Protocols are a forgery made in Tsarist Russia to blame the Jews for the country's increasing misfortunes between 1905-1917. It plagarised then distorted French and German political satires to create a mythical secret Jewish conspiracy to take over the world.

The Hitler Diaries (1983)
In April, 1983 the thriving market in Nazi memorabilia thrilled to news that the respected German magazine Der Stern had made the greatest Nazi memorabilia find of all time: a diary kept by Adolf Hitler himself comprising 62 volumes and covering the crucial years 1932-1945. At last the secret thoughts of one of the most reviled figures would stand revealed.

Report from Iron Mountain on the Possibility and Desirability of Peace (1967)
In 1963, the Kennedy administration was said to have commissioned a select group of analysts and scholars to evaluate the problems inherent in a post-Cold War society ie. a world without an evil superpower. The resultant report was leaked to the press in 1967. Written in suitable 'think-tank-ese', the report asserted that actual or threatened war preserves social stability by controlling dangerous social dissidence and excessive freedoms. The war system enables rulers to achieve and extend political control by manipulating fear. In order to stay in office once peace is achieved, governing elites must devise and exploit a new menace to immediately, tangibly, and directly threaten the electorate into submission. The report advocated creating and exploiting 'outrage-incidents' to whip up fear and replicate the 'war spirit' ie. channel the resulting righteous wrath toward the new enemy, quash dissent and concentrate power in the executive branch, where elite control holds sway until the next election. The report hit the front page of the New York Times and was translated into 15 languages.

Donation of Constantine (c. 706)
One of history’s most infamous and influential forgeries, the Donation of Constantine, was made shortly before Pope Stephen II crossed the Alps to anoint the victorious Pepin the Short as King of the Franks in 754, thereby enabling, the Carolingian family to replace the decadent Merovingian royal line in law as well as in fact. In return, Pepin pledged to give to the Pope those lands in Italy that the Lombards had seized from Byzantium. The promise was fulfilled in 756. The documentary proof of Constantine's alleged gift made it possible for the Pope and his successors to interpret the deal with Pepin as a restoration of authority and lands wrongly alienated from their rightful owner - the Holy Roman Catholic Church.

Jack the Ripper/Maybrick Diary (1992)
Michael Barrett, a scrap metal dealer from Liverpool, UK, announced the existence of a diary reputedly written by a cotton broker named James Maybrick who therein confesses to being Jack the Ripper, the notorious Autumn 1888 serial killer of up to 8 London East End prostitutes. The Ripper was never identified and the murders ceased after 1889. Maybrick died of arsenic poisoning in May, 1889. The unsolved mystery has always fascinated the public and the Maybrick story was itself a 'ripper' of a yarn.

Howard Hughes Letters and Autobiography (1978)
Billionaire, aviator, playboy, eccentric and Hollywood legend-turned-hermit Howard R. Hughes always inspired great fascination in America and the world throughout most of his life. In his later years - the late 1960s to mid 1970s - he became a total recluse, hiding himself from the outside world for more than a decade. Public speculation was that he was dead or had gone completely crazy.

In 1971, American writer Clifford Irving claimed he had conducted hundreds of hours of interviews with the super-secretive billionaire recluse Howard Hughes and was facilitating and 'editing' the billionaire's manuscript into an 'autobiography'. Handwriting experts hired by Irving's publisher 'authenticated' letters that Irving said were written by Hughes. The publishing world went into a frenzy, falling over each other to acquire rights to publish, serialise and/or create films/TV programs from the manuscript.

Iraq War/Niger uranium documents (2003)
In late January 2003, US President George Bush claimed that Britain and the US had intercepted documents proving that, between 1999 and 2001, Iraq had attempted to buy five hundred tons of uranium oxide from Niger, one of the world’s largest producers. The uranium, known as 'yellow cake', can be used to make fuel for nuclear reactors; if processed differently, it can also be enriched to make weapons. Five tons can produce enough weapons-grade uranium for a bomb. The Niger documents 'proved' that Saddam Hussein was actively developing weapons of mass destruction.

Records, records: All day, everyday

Like the bulk of our interactions, most records are necessary but individually unmemorable. We don't need a record of what time we put out the garbage or brushed our teeth. What we do recall is the overall pattern and outcome of events - whether we did what was usual, whether things went well or badly - punctuated by memories of particular experiences that changed us in some significant way or which required us to account to others.

Try operating your life without records and see what happens! To understand the invisible power recordkeeping exerts over you, click on these common life activities.

Dining
Driving
Entertainment- concert/film/theatre going
Buying property
Renting

In short, day to day recordkeeping functions as organised the global society's neural network. Like the human nervous system, recordkeeping regimes enable society to plan and carry out coordinated functions over time. As acts and decisions flash over the network, records capture evidence of them to be stored and protected for selective retrieval as needed over time.

The Vindolana Tablets are everyday records that survived from Roman Britain; they comprise lists, letters, accounts, and reports made in the course of daily life, both military and personal, of the British Roman garrison at Vindolanda in the late first and early second centuries AD.

SITE TO VISIT - Find out more about the Vindolanda Tablets Online.

Records at work - Society's documentary glue

Records, old and new, come in many forms - paper, film, magnetic tape, optical disks, photographs, even multimedia- and, as the primary support for communication over space and time and means of proving identity and entitlements, records underpin all complex activity.

In the case of businesses or organisations, records are of critical importance. Such bodies cannot legitimately do business, hire staff, buy or sell property, goods and services until the appropriate records documenting their 'birth' and purposes as legal entities permit them to do so.
Individuals, businesses, organisations and government bodies make records to document accomplishments and to solve problems.

Humans use records to ACHIEVE A RESULT. As retired U.S. public archivist Elsie Finch explains, 'When we go to the hardware store to buy a quarter inch bit for our electric drill, we are really buying "quarter inch HOLES"!' Owning the capacity to make such holes enables a number of outcomes, now and in the future, the first of which might be mounting our new mirror on the wall.

Written records now provide proof of many human events and activities. Among the most important records are those documenting government revenue, such as these records a citizen must file to justify tax payments.

When people make and keep records, they do so because records 'work' to enable them to:

• establish or verify facts
• quantify and calculate possessions, resources, losses
• authorise, initiate, regulate actions
• endow and protect ownership, status, rights, entitlements
• act as reference points within a process to enable planning, reporting, evaluation of critical factors such as progress, productivity, achievement and risk.
• trace and enforce accountability
• ensure continuity of management, operations, culture

Records that make the world go round

How many of the following records are important in your life? Perhaps all of them!

Accounts/Invoices
Applications
Certificates
Contracts
Conveyances
Correspondence

Everyone uses records

The essential uses of records range over all of human endeavour and those who use them are just as varied. Click on the following user groups to understand that records and archives are of primary importance to many users. They are not just of interest to historians for historical research.

Personal and family recordkeeping

Personal and family records are of great value in telling family stories and tracing family histories. A narrow focus on protecting organisational records to achieve shorter term operational and legal accountability may encourage managers to destroy records of enduring value once they have served those initial purposes.

Similarly, institutional archivists concentration on safeguarding the 'official records' of governments and organisations in society can fail to include the equally important personal, creative and/or spiritual expressions by individuals that document society’s 'humanness'[1]. In fact, how to ensure that suitable documentation of societally important organisational and institutional archives AND of personal, creative, reflective and spiritual life is captured, protected and accessible to the public over the long term constitutes one of the greatest challenges recordkeepers face today.

SITES TO VISIT - Learn more about how to explore the history of your region, family and home and get expert tips on the BBC's Your History site.

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