BOGDAN-FLORIN POPOVICI LUCIA STEFAN E-GOVERNMENT: IS THERE ROOM FOR RECORDS PROFESSIONALS? THE ROMANIAN CASE

CONTENTS Why archivists should care? Terminology note E-government (attempts) Archivist’s remarks on E-gov attempts Supporting legislation for e-gov Zooming out and conclusions

WHY ARCHIVISTS SHOULD CARE?

Bookkeeper = low cost container IT staff = paperless office Archivists = paperless government – evidence-free memory??!1

TERMINOLOGY NOTE In Romania, Archives = records + archives Archivist = records manager + archivist National Archives = records management = archival science

CONTENTS Why archivists should care? Terminology note E-government (attempts) Archivist’s remarks on E-gov attempts Supporting legislation for e-gov Zooming out and conclusions

E-GOVERNMENT (ATTEMPTS) 1999: starting : legal framework : 6 bln. € for ‘parochial’ systems 2003: e-guvernare 2009: e-romania

E-GOVERNMENT (ATTEMPTS)

CONTENTS Why archivists should care? Terminology note E-government (attempts) Archivist’s remarks on E-gov attempts Supporting legislation for e-gov Zooming out and conclusions

SUPPORTING LEGISLATION FOR E-GOVERNMENT “here and now” solutions archiving = backup or zip “from now on, we shall never delete anything, because the storage is very cheap”

CONTENTS Why archivists should care? Terminology note E-government (attempts) Archivist’s remarks on E-gov attempts Supporting legislation for e-gov Zooming out and conclusions

SUPPORTING LEGISLATION FOR E-GOVERNMENT e-signature for 10 yrs Authoritative records without ‘authoritative environment’ E-archives Act

CONTENTS Why archivists should care? Terminology note E-government (attempts) Archivist’s remarks on E-gov attempts Supporting legislation for e-gov Zooming out and conclusions

IS ROMANIA’S SITUATION UNIQUE? Not at all, all over Europe the situation varies from one extreme to the other: To put Romania in context: Worst records management practices : International Organisations Somewhere in between in varying degrees: public administration in EU countries, including Romania Champions of good practices: banking industry and scientific organisations (OAIS standard has been developed by the space industry)

IS ROMANIA’S SITUATION UNIQUE? Why? Regulatory compliance and legal discovery are the main drivers for records management, in Romania and elsewhere. Good records management depends on how much compliance is required Records/Information management services are managed by IT Directors, who see them as a low priority (unless compliance is important) IT staff ignorance on digital archiving. Short term thinking: I won’t be here in 50 years from now, why should I care about e-records preservation?

WHAT DOES THE ROMANIAN EXPERIENCE TEACHES? It is necessary to: That public organisations bodies should be subject to mandatory legislation on management and long term preservation of e-records. This legislation should by provided through EU directives and integrated in the national legislation of EU countries. IT industry should not be allowed to dictate legislation in the area or electronic records management and archiving. The Romanian Law of Electronic Archiving is a good example of what happens when you let the IT lobby to legislate on e- records Develop academic programmes/modules on electronic records management and archival for IT students. Only by educating the next generation of IT specialists would be possible to close the gap between records managers/archivists and IT people

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