Records management in Iceland.

There is a growing demand in Iceland for easier access to information. Important developments and changes in records management have occurred in recent years. These developments have opened the eyes of managers within both public and private organizations to the need for quick and secure access to records in any form, old and new. The most important of these changes are the Icelandic government's policy (April 1995) recognizing the information society, the Freedom of Information Law that came into effect January 1997, and the foundation in 1988 of the Icelandic Records Management Association (IRMA).

Iceland, like other countries, has now entered the century of the information society, and the demand for information and records management is constantly growing. Therefore, the government of Iceland has issued The Icelandic Government's Vision of the Information Society, which addresses issues of the information society in an attempt to ensure that all citizens have the right to enjoy full and equal access to information.

In the policy declaration of the Icelandic government of April 23, 1995, the main vision of the future is that Iceland shall be in the forefront of the world's nations in utilizing information technology to improve living conditions and to increase prosperity. To reach this goal, five main objectives are put forward as a foundation for this vision of the future:

1. Icelanders shall have easy access to the information society. Its advantages will be utilized to strengthen democracy and to increase quality of life for the benefit of the public and the Icelandic economy. Information technology will be employed in all fields, whether for innovation, public health, science, the arts, or other aspects of daily life.

2. Complete equality shall be ensured between the public and private sectors in the field of information technology and the information industry. The government will, with the help of information technology, facilitate access to governmental information and services, and will not discriminate between individuals and companies with regard to residence and economic status.

3. Information and telecommunications technologies shall be utilized to improve competitiveness of the Icelandic economy, increase productivity, and proliferate the possibilities of exporting Icelandic inventiveness.

4. The educational system shall be adapted to changed social dynamics. General education as well as continuing education will focus on the advantages of the information society while, at the same time, keeping watch over Iceland's language and culture.

5. Legislation, regulations, and work rules shall be reexamined with respect to information technology to stimulate technological progress and protect the rights of individuals and companies.

The formulation of this policy on the issues of the information society is a permanent developmental project, not a campaign project with a defined beginning and end. Because much of Iceland's information resources reside in records - public and private - the need for records management expertise will be all the greater. Due to rapid changes that will occur in society and in the field of information and communication technology, the policy in this area must be continuously reexamined. The government is aiming high with this policy declaration; only time will tell how successful its implementation will be.

Records Management and the Law

In Iceland, a number of laws and regulations relate to records and the information they contain. Legislation on accounting records, income tax, public administration, and health and safety make demands on organizations to keep certain types of records accessible for specific periods of time. There are three acts, however, which influence directly the management of records of all public organizations.

The National Archives Law of 1985 states that the National Archives shall collect, preserve, and keep accessible all records of national history for the use of government, public agencies, and the public to ensure their interests and rights, and for research over time. The archives plays a leading role in the management regime for public records, regardless of format, and all public records must be deposited with the archives 30 years after their production (Island 1985).

The Freedom of Information Law of 1996 covers public access to most documents kept by government departments and public agencies, both old and new. It is, however, possible to limit access to records concerning the private affairs of individuals or when important national interests demand that records relating to national security, defense, or relations with other nations or international bodies be kept confidential. Records concerning private individuals shall be accessible 80 years after they were created and records relating to national security 30 years after creation (Island 1996).

The Privacy Law of 1989 aims to prevent that information about individuals, which is collected and systematically registered and stored, will be misused. The law also covers the right of individuals to see documents concerning themselves (Island 1989).

These laws provide the framework for public agencies and the National Archives to be accountable to the government and the public. In Iceland both the national and local governments, at the national and municipal level respectively, dominate the records management scene, although some of the larger business organizations also practice it.

The National Archives

The National Archives (jodskjalasafn Islands) was founded in 1882 and is located in Reykjavik, the capital of Iceland. The archives contains a great number of ancient documents, some on vellum. The oldest of these is Reykjaholtsmaldagi, an inventory of the property of the church at Reykholt. This is the oldest original text in Iceland, its first entry written about 1185.

The National Archives keeps records concerning all aspects of government: the legislative branch, the judiciary branch, and the executive branch. By law, all public records must be handed over to the archives within 30 years of their date of origin. The archives keeps records concerning economic history, developments of industries, and information concerning individuals, as well as political history and history of associations. The National Archives preserves references concerning the management of public affairs and most aspects of national life in Iceland for the past 200 years. Before that time, the records are not as complete, but they can nevertheless be used to draw up a fairly accurate picture of the history of the nation (Ingimundardottir 1996). The National Archives is extensively used by historians, genealogists, family historians, and other scholars for their sources on national, local, and personal history.

The National Archives supervises the creation, preservation, access, and disposal of all records produced in the process of government and by public agencies (Asgeirsson 1990). Since the new law on the National Archives was passed in 1985, services have improved greatly through the publication of reference books on different aspects of records and archives management, by educating the staff about the different public agencies on records management, and by assisting the staff in organizing their records in-house (Ingimundardottir 1996).

The National Archives bears the ultimate responsibility for the Reykjavik Municipal Archives (Borgarskjalasafn Reykjavikur) and 17 others of varying size and located outside the capital, that have been established in recent decades under the Archives Act. These archives contain mainly documents of regional government authorities and associations, along with local private collections of letters, diaries, manuscripts, and land ownership records.

National Library

The National and University Library of Iceland (Landsbokasafn islands - Haskolabokasafn) owns a large collection of manuscripts. According to the Library Law of 1994, two of the library's functions are the preservation of the manuscript collection that already exists and the further development of the manuscript collection (Island 1994). The manuscript collection contains diaries, letters, and records of associations as well as poetry and information resources on the ethnic culture. Printed catalogues of the collection have been issued.

The Arni Magnusson Institute in Iceland (Stofnun Arna Magnussonar a Islandi) was established in 1972 and took over the role of a former manuscript institute which had been in operation since 1962. The institute is named after the great 18th century manuscript collector (1663-1730) who collected the original manuscripts of the Icelandic sagas as well as those of Nordic history and Norse mythology during his travels in Iceland. Before he died, he donated his collection to the University of Copenhagen.

The institute operates as a center for research in the area of medieval Icelandic manuscripts and has two principal roles: to conduct research into the manuscripts in its care and into other aspects of Icelandic culture and folklore, and to publish comprehensive critical editions of the manuscripts. The institute has custody of the Icelandic manuscripts, both medieval and modern, which were returned to Iceland from the Arnamagnaean Institute in Denmark and the Royal Library in Copenhagen in accordance with the 1961 act passed in the Danish Parliament. With the return of all the relevant manuscripts from Denmark (the latest arrived in June 1997), there are approximately 1,800 manuscripts and parts of manuscripts in the collection.

Among the most famous manuscripts in the institute's care are Flateyjarbok, the largest of all the early Icelandic manuscript volumes and The Codex Regius of the Eddic poems. Among other important manuscripts is Skardsbok, a vellum manuscript, purchased in London in 1965, which contains accounts of the apostles (Magnussonar a Islandi 1992).

SYSTEM I

DIVISIONS

0       1     2     3     4     5     6     7     8     9

MAIN GROUPS

20     21    22    23    24    25    26    27    28    29

SUBGROUPS

240   241   242   243   244   245   246   247   248   249

[TABULAR DATA OMITTED]

The Registry System and Filing Classification Systems

The registry, where all incoming letters sent to a government agency were registered, came into being in Iceland in the late 18th century. As a document management strategy, the registry system shows Iceland's early interest in information storage and retrieval. In the beginning there were two systems in use: rentukammerkerfi and kansellikerfi. In the rentukammerkerfi model, letters were registered as they arrived, without consideration of content. In the kansellikerfi system, however, letters were classified according to subject matter or sender. Every case received its own unique alphanumeric designation, and related arriving and outgoing letters were classified under that number in chronological order (Ingimundardottir 1996). Historically, the registry principle is more widely known in Europe than in North America.

These systems have been supplanted by two principal types of filing keys or classification systems used by organizations in Iceland. Both systems are numeric-subject systems, based on subject matters of documents, which should always dictate where a document is to be filed. One of these systems is a decimal-based system with 10 divisions, and the classification numbers range from 0 to 9. Each class is then subdivided into 10 groups which are then subdivided into 10 subgroups and so on. A period is placed behind the third character in the number, (i.e., 000.1). (See System I)

The other system is a numeric system, which has infinite expansion possibilities. It can have indefinite divisions - externally and internally. Each division can then be subdivided into main groups, which can in turn be subdivided into subgroups and so on. Numbers are separated into parts by a period. (See System II)

An auxiliary relative index in alphabetical order supplements these types of filing classification systems. The index is the key to the filing systems and contains headings/names of every group the system covers.

Growing Professionalism

In recent years, a growing professionalism in records management in Iceland has emerged, and in 1988 the Icelandic Records Management Association (IRMA - Felag um skjalastjorn) was founded. The aim of the association is to increase knowledge and improve understanding of records management by individuals, enterprises, and public bodies. Furthermore, it aims to create a forum for those who work with records systems and collections. IRMA now has 160 members, one for every 1,675 Icelandic residents. This is quite high compared to other nations. For example, the Records Management Association of Australia has one member for every 8,500 residents, and ARMA International in the United States has one member for every 25,000 inhabitants (Stephens 1994).

In 1997, Icelandic Requirements on Information Technology (Islenskar krofur i upplysingataekni) was published. The standard will be part of the larger European Standard FN ENV 12005:1996 Information Technology - Procedure for European Registration of Cultural Elements. The scope of the standard states:

This standard specifies Icelandic requirements on information technology. It covers elements that consensus could be reached on, such as the alphabet, sorting rules and the input and output format of numbers, dates and time. The structure of this standard follows that of FS ENV 12005:1996 to make it possible to directly register its contents in the European Registry of Cultural Elements.

The standard is a helpful contribution in defining the uniqueness of Icelandic in the context of information technology. There are, for example, characters in the Icelandic alphabet