Photo by cottonbro studio
This conversation was hosted by New Tactics, Grace Lile of WITNESS and the New Tactics community on archiving. Archiving and preservation have long taken a backseat to more urgent aspects of human rights documentation and advocacy. But that is beginning to change. Human rights archives are increasingly playing a pivotal role in advocacy. This role encompasses restorative justice, historical memory, and struggles against impunity. Archivists and activists alike are grappling with mounting challenges. A big challenge is the proliferation of digital documentation. How can we ensure that the critical documentation created today will be preserved and accessible in the future? Archivists shared tactics and methods used to preserve human rights information.
What is human rights archiving and why is it important?
In general, archives consist of records that have been selected for permanent or long-term preservation. This may be the on grounds of their enduring cultural, historical, or evidentiary value (source: Wikipedia). Human rights archives take many forms. But common to all, suggests one participant, is the idea that preserving truth is essential to protecting rights. This essential to seeking redress. As well as for supporting reconciliation or recovery in damaged societies. Grace Lile of WITNESS writes, “one of our goals as archivists is to make sure that documentation created today is not only used in current advocacy, but also preserved for future needs, be they legal or educational.”
Another participant suggested that the role of an archive can be properly thought of as a supporting mechanism for all other forms of human rights redress. Archivists are “shapers of historical memory.” This is a mission that closely coincides with human rights advocacy. The ultimate uses of documentation can be difficult to predict. A participant went on to explain that sound archiving practices are key to the survival and integrity of evidence. One participant also noted that the role in human rights archives in documenting the reality of what happened in a situation is itself a laudable and sufficient end. This can be apart from advocacy. Such information can be used to study a given history. It can drive new insights into important phenomena that are not currently well understood.
How have archives played a critical role in promoting or defending human rights?
One participant highlighted 5 key ways in which archives support and promote human rights:
- promoting accountability;
- supporting prosecutions and legal redress, through the preservation of evidence;
- ensuring historical memory;
- enabling and guaranteeing the right to know;
- preserving diversity.
Actively preserving the stories and experiences of people across the economic, political and social spectrum and not just those with economic or political power.
Examples of Human Rights Archives
Archivists can have a significant impact on holding the perpetrators of human rights violations legally and historically accountable. This accountability can be through virtually every archival function, one participant wrote. Here are two examples shared by participants:
- Guatemala National Police Archive: It has provided valuable information to identify perpetrators of human rights abuses; to assess command responsibility for abuses; and the atrocities within the Guatemalan context. More resources regarding this were additionally provided by another participant.
- Brazil – Nunca Mais: Assisting human rights through archival description.
Archiving is also used as a tool for education and reconciliation. Here is a list of examples shared by participants:
- Zochrot: An organization that collects documents and information about Palestinian villages before 1948. They bring them to the consciousness of Israeli citizens.
- Tahrir Monologues: Encourages activists who took part in the 18-day uprising in 2011. They sent their stories from the uprising via e-mail, Facebook or Twitter. This is bringing these stories to life in the form of theater and the performing arts.
- Syrian Martyrs: An online, browsable database of people who have been killed amidst the Syrian uprisings.
Archives are also being used for the purposes of human rights advocacy through the recording and preserving of evidence. Examples provided by participants:
There are many sound examples of archives promoting and defending human rights. But a participant added that there are also some unsound examples of records and archives. These actually aid or further human rights abuse. Adding to this, another participant suggested the importance of context as being key in archiving and documentation.
What are the challenges and opportunities for human rights archivists?
One participant took note of the main challenges they’ve faced when developing educational resources for activists. Ensuring the integrity and reliability of records. In some instances, even when materials have made it to the archive, it is too late. Particularly to capture robust descriptive metadata that will provide important context to the materials. To combat the onset of this, establishing more archival-minded practices. This requires more time invested by the organization up front. But this can save them time and energy later on. In countries where people are illiterate, collecting information may be very difficult. Especially if we take into account the pressure of society to keep silent, one participant argued. Questions of illiteracy and the collecting of information calls to mind the issue of access. The use of materials and the importance of oral history as documentation.
Another participant brought to light the potential issue of the destruction of materials outside the digital realm. The existence of materials kept and obscured from the general public. Particularly in the case of documents chronicling the activities of covert operations supported or instigated by repressive governments. Participants suggested information be protected destruction. One way is to use a service/tool such as Martus to securely back up the data to an offsite server.
Challenges for Archivists
Difficulty of standardizing vocabulary
The difficulty of standardizing the vocabulary of human rights terms in a unified manner is a current reality. There is currently no “one-size-fits-all” approach. As a response to this dilemma, the Human Rights Documentation Initiative has developed its own local vocabulary. It serves as subject headings instead of index terms. This has not yet become available to the public, however. A definition of descriptions can be found at The Society of American Archivists, another participant added. Such sources contributed to outlining some practices for using standardized vocabularies versus customized descriptions.
Security of information
Security is a paramount concern for human rights defenders documenting abuses and discrimination. Martus is a free, open source, secure information management tool developed by Benetech. It specifically addresses the vulnerability of sensitive human rights data.
Volume of documentation
One challenge for archivists is the multitude of documentations present on the web. It makes it more difficult to regulate the mass of information, one participant wrote. The volume of human rights documentation is far too large for any one or a handful of archival institutions to handle. Participants suggested the role professional organizations could play by working together. Such as ICA and SAA human rights interest groups as well as Archivists Without Borders. They could play an instrumental role in mitigating this issue by:
- Building a distributed network of professionals and institutions could help build archival capacity.
- Engaging human rights documentation creators. This would help respond to urgent human rights documentation preservation needs.
The rate at which human rights documentation is created with new technologies exceeds the pace with which the archival community can establish preservation of best practices, let alone standards. More collaboration between the tech sector and the traditional archival community to address issues such as preservation, privacy, metadata, particularly within the design of new technologies to mitigate this challenge, is necessary.
Resources on human rights archiving
- Archivists’ Guide to Archiving Video by WITNESS: Illustrated, easy-to-navigate, the Guide is intended to help activists, human rights defenders, and NGOs using digital video to better incorporate archiving into their documentation and advocacy work. It provides practical tips, resources and best practices on a range of digital archiving issues, including media management, file transfer, storage, cataloging, working with an archive, and more.
- Amara: A tool which can add caption to and translate any video.
- Box: “Simple Online Collaboration” to store and stream audio and video.
- B’Tselem: “The Israeli Information Center for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories”.
- CBA PracticeLink: “Collecting and authenticating online evidence”.
- Center for Research Libraries: “Global resources network”.
- Civil Rights Movement Veterans: “A project of Bay Area Veterans of the Civil Rights Movement”
- Columbia University Human Rights Web Archive: An effort to preserve and ensure access to freely available human rights resources created mainly by NGOs, NHRIs, and individuals.
- Dropbox: Website which store and stream audio and video.
- European Coordination Committee on Human Rights Documentation: “A loose network of organizations (IGOs, NGOs, academic institutions and human rights centers) doing human rights documentation in Europe”.
- ICT for Peacebuilding: “Exploring the use of information and communications technology for conflict transformation”.
- International Council on Archives: An organization “dedicated to the effective management of records and the preservation, care and use of the world’s archival heritage through its representation of records and archive professionals across the globe”.
- Internet Archive: Resource which uploads any amount of audio and video.
- Library of Congress: “Archiving cell phone text messages”
- Martus: “A free software technology tool designed to assist human rights organizations in collecting, safeguarding, organizing and disseminating information about human rights abuses”.
- Memoria Abiera: “Organization which organizes thousands of documents related to the state terrorism and makes them accessible through an online database as a way to raise public awareness about the period of state terrorism in Argentina (1976-1983)”. New Tactics resource: “Open Memory: Using inter-institutional cooperation to facilitate access to human rights”.
- Mukurtu: A “free and open source platform for managing and sharing digital heritage, built for indigenous communities, archives, libraries and museums”.
- New Tactics in Human Rights Tactic Case Study: “Open Memory: Using inter-institutional cooperation to facilitate access to human rights”.
- Parallel Archive: Tool which can store, manage and share digitized textual and photographic archival sources.
- Society of American Archivists: “North America’s oldest and largest national archival professional association”.
- WITNESS Media Archive provides media archive tools for human rights practitioners.
