Confronting Jenkinson’s canon: reimagining the ‘destruction and selection of modern archives’ through the Auditor-General of South Africa’s financial audit trail

ABSTRACT

The canonical work of Sir Hilary Jenkinson, Manual of Archive Administration, published in 1922, provided the basis of archival theory and practice in many countries, especially British colonies. In his canon, Jenkinson requested the archivists to evaluate the manner in which they select records for permanent preservation. With examples from South Africa, this paper intends to confront the canon about the selection and destruction of modern archives. A complementary method of appraising records based on an ‘audit or money trail,’ as best illustrated through the Auditor-General of South Africa’s audit reports of public entities such as the Armaments Corporation of South Africa, is proposed. This paper ruffles feathers and argues that contrary to established orthodoxies of records selection, financial audit trails provide the most reliable clues of which and what historical records ought to be set aside and preserved. The authors cite the limits of this ‘follow the money’ method and provide mitigation suggestions. The paper challenges existing appraisal paradigms and has a potential to influence policy, theory and practice of appraisal in developing and developed countries. It also offers a modern-day refurbished continuation and expansion of the ideas addressed by Sir Hilary Jenkinson in his seminal canon.

KEYWORDS:

• Archives
• appraisal
• records management
• Hilary Jenkinson
• audit trail

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. Harris, “Destruction of public records”.

2. Isa, “Records management and accountability”.

3. Ibid.

4. Greene, “History of Archival Appraisal Theory”.

5. Ibid.

6. Jenkinson, Manual of Archive Administration, 41 & 125.

7. Schellenberg,“Appraisal standards”.

8. Greene, “History of Archival Appraisal Theory”.

9. Ibid.

10. Ibid.

11. Cook, “Macro-appraisal and functional analysis”, 6.

12. Ngoepe and Nkwe, “;Appraisal of digital records”.

13. Harris, “State Archives appraisal policy”, 88.

14. Ibid.

15. Ngoepe and Nkwe, “Appraisal of digital records”.

16. Harris, “Riffing archive and legacy”.

17. Harris, “State Archives appraisal policy”, 88.

18. Jenkinson, Manual of Archive Administration, 41 & 125.

19. Ibid.

20. Ibid.

21. Van Vuuren, Apartheid grand corruption.

22. Ngoepe, “Records management and audit process”, 1.

23. Bezuidenhout, “Auditor General drawn into ARMSCOR deal”.

24. Ibid.

25. Harris,“Destruction of public records”.

26. Bell and Ntsebeza, Unfinished business.

27. Bezuidenhout, “Auditor General drawn into ARMSCOR deal”.

28. Van Vuuren, Apartheid grand corruption.

29. Ngoepe and Nkwe, “Appraisal of digital records”

30. Ngoepe, “Records management and audit process”, 11.

31. Ibid

32. Ibid.

33. Ibid.

34. Ngoepe and Ngulube, “Contribution of record-keeping to audit opinions”.

35. Ngoepe, “Records management and audit process”, 1.

36. Isa, “Records management and accountability”.

37. Ibid

38. Isa, “Records management and accountability”.

39. Ngoepe and Ngulube, “Contribution of record-keeping to audit opinions”.

40. Isa, “Records management and accountability”.

41. Phukubje, “Public sector audits”.

42. Ibid.

43. Derrida, Archive fever.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Mpho Ngoepe

Mpho Ngoepe is a professor and director of school of arts at the University of South Africa. Prior to his current position at UNISA, Ngoepe has worked for the United Nations Children’s Fund, Auditor-General South Africa, and the National Archives of South Africa to mention just a few. Ngoepe is serving in the national committee of the South African Society of Archivists (2009-2022). He also served in the board of Eastern and Southern Regional Branch of the International Council on Archives (2009-2019) as the editor of the journal. In 2020, he was awarded a Chancellor’s Prize for Excellence in Research, a coveted bi-annual prize that is given to outstanding and deserving active UNISA researchers. Ngoepe has published widely in archives and records management.

Lekoko Kenosi

Lekoko Kenosi is a PhD graduate from the University of Pittsburgh. He is the founding head of archival collections at Qatar Foundation. He previously worked as the university archivist at the King Abdullah University of Science and technology in Saudi Arabia. Prior to that, he was a lecturer at the University of Botswana.