Administrative History and Its Contribution to Archival Practice

Abstract

Administrative history, as an academic discipline, is undergoing rapid change. Initially confined to the study of government structures, processes and ideas, and mainly carried out by lawyers, it has opened up in recent decades to new actors (historians, sociologists, ethnologists) and new dimensions: the study of civil servants and their daily lives, the examination of administrative procedures and their implementation at the grassroots level, and the analysis of representations. Administrative history is essential to the daily work of records managers and archivists, whether in terms of acquisition, classification, description, or access of the holdings they are responsible for. But it is also enriched by the work of records managers and archivists who contribute to its development through the knowledge of institutions and their actors that they acquire daily. Finally, the article emphasises the importance for records managers and archivists to promote this skill and the value for them to take a particular interest in the history of archives as institutions.