Using Archives to Inform Contemporary Policy Debates: History into Policy?

Abstract

Evidence-based policy-making has long been a significant method of government. Academics in a range of disciplines have contributed in supplying the evidence on which, in part, governments develop their policies. However, the arts and humanities, and in this case historians, are less well represented in this influencing role. In May 2008, The National Archives, in partnership with History and Policy, was awarded a grant from the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) to run a series of workshops under its Collaborative Research Training Scheme, on ‘Using Archival Sources to Inform Contemporary Policy Debates.’ The purpose was to explore the relevance of history—and the archival sources that underpin it—to policy-making and to identify areas where this had been done, more or less successfully. In describing the workshop and analyzing its outcomes, the authors identify emerging themes and explore ways in which other archive services might implement similar initiatives.

Acknowledgements

The authors express their debt to Christine Lawrence, former Grants Manager at The National Archives, who made a substantial contribution to the writing and success of the bid. The authors also express their gratitude to the Arts and Humanities Research Council for funding the series of workshops described in this article, and to the peer reviewers, whose comments substantially improved the article.

Notes

History and Policy is based at the Institute of Historical research and is a partnership between the Centre for Contemporary British History, the Centre for History in Public Health, and the History Faculty, University of Cambridge. For further information, see http://www.historyandpolicy.org/index.html. See also Pat Thane, ‘History and Policy,’ 140–145.

See for example, Richard Overy, ‘The Historical Present,’ 30–34.

Chambers, ‘‘Informed By, but Not Guided By, the Concerns of the Present’: Contemporary History in UK Higher Education – Its Teaching and Assessment,’ 89–105; quotation 93.

According to the author, 35% of respondents saw contemporary history as distinctive because of ‘closeness of events, within living memory, or conscious connections with issues of contemporary importance’. 96.

The authors found one overview, on twentieth-century British history teaching in the United States, though this focussed almost exclusively on content. See various authors contributing to ‘Roundtable: Twentieth-century British History in North America,’ 375–418.

For example, in the same issue as the roundtable cited elsewhere in this article, see Bill Luckin, ‘A Kind of Consensus on the Roads? Drink Driving Policy in Britain 1945–1970,’ 350–374.

Thane, ‘History and Policy,’ 140–145.

British International History Group Newsletter, 17 (May 2011).

For a discussion of this phenomenon, see Berber Beveridge, ‘Writing the Past Out of the Present: History and the Politics of Time in Transitional Justice,’ 111–131.

Ibid.

Chambers, ‘Informed By, but Not Guided By, the Concerns of the Present,’ 97.

Jeremy Black, ‘Contesting the Past,’ 224–254; quotation p.226.

Chambers, ‘Informed By, but Not Guided by, the Concerns of the Present,’ 98; and see also 100.

Mark Roodhouse, ‘Using Archival Sources to Inform Contemporary Policy Debates, AHRC Collaborative Training Scheme, Workshop Report,’ unpublished report; Adrian Bingham, ‘Rapporteur's Report,’ unpublished report.

Richard Roberts, ‘How We Saved the City: Lloyd George and Policy Responses to the Financial Crisis of 1914.’

Philip Withington, ‘Alcohol Consumption in Historical Perspective.’

Paul Carter, ‘Introduction to Home Office material’; Peter King, ‘Discretion and the Criminal Law.’

Steve Hindle, ‘Identity and Identity Theft.’

Philip Withington, ‘Alcohol Consumption in Historical Perspective.’

Pat Thane, ‘Pensions and Child Support.’

This is an insight from Adrian Bingham in his report, Adrian Bingham, ‘Rapporteur's Report,’ unpublished report.

Mark Roodhouse, ‘‘Anecdote and Hearsay’: The Invisible Crimes of Britain's C20 Underground Economy.’

Simon Szreter, ‘The Continuing World Policy Relevance of Early Modern English Poor Law and Parish Records.’

Dennis Wheeler, ‘Sailors, Storms and Science: How Royal Navy Logbooks Help Us Understand Climate Change.’

Philip Withington, ‘Alcohol Consumption in Historical Perspective.’

Sue Onslow, ‘How Oral History Enhances Our Understanding of Zimbabwe's Recent Past.’ Michael Kandiah was unable to get to the final workshop, but spoke to earlier sessions alongside Sue Onslow on ‘Oral History: A General Introduction and a Specific Example, Rhodesia.’

Bingham, ‘Rapporteur's Report.’

Mark Roodhouse, ‘Using Archival Sources to Inform Contemporary Policy Debates, AHRC Collaborative Training Scheme, Workshop Report,’ unpublished report.

Roodhouse, ‘Using Archival Sources.’

Roodhouse, ‘Using Archival Sources.’

Bingham, ‘Rapporteur's Report.’

Bingham, ‘Rapporteur's Report.’

See http://www.rcuk.ac.uk/kei/Pages/home.aspx [accessed 23 June 2011].

The pages of the main academic weekly, the Times Higher Education, testifies to this ongoing and heated debate.

The authors are grateful to one of the anonymous peer reviewers for this point.

Varun Uberoi, Adam Coutts, Iain McLean and David Halpern, eds. ‘Options for a New Britain’.

Bingham, ‘Rapporteur's Report.’

Roodhouse, ‘Using Archival Sources.’

Podcasts of some of the presentations can be found at http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/podcasts/. We are grateful to all the speakers who consented to share their work in this way.