Sonderband 2. International Council on Archives. Dritte Europäische Archivkonferenz, Wien 11. bis 15. Mai 1993. Tagungsprotokolle (1996)
2. Session /Séance. Regional (trans-border) Cooperation / Coopération régionale (transfrontaliere) - Brejon de Lavergnée, Marie-Edith: New economic Zones and their Archives / Nouvelles zones économiques et leurs archives (english 77 - français 100)
2. Session/Séance: Brejon de Lavergnée, New economic Zones and their Archives This inter-governmental organisation, created in 1815 occupies part of a property in Rhineland-Pfalz, which it shares with the regional Directorate of Cultural Affairs7. In the case of the archives of a secretariat, which are held in rotation, caught in a Brownian movement, there is a danger of Balkanisation, scattering and splitting up: like the eels which slip through the fingers before they can be caught, they run the risk of evading all forms of preservation. At least, it should not be necessary to make provision for this whirling category in „archivobuses“, they could be moved around and displayed as the secretariats wished with the risk of seeing them vanish in traffic accidents as happens in so many modern battles of Frèteval. The state monopoly in the field of archives was, in principle an excellent way of avoiding their dispersal and loss but it cannot be applied to all the citizens of Europe. This is the first time that the problem of a new organisation has arisen so clearly. For the time being, there may be no need to wait for archival legislation appropriate to the alterations in European zones. However, if a Europe without boundaries is faced up to with a philosophy based on a talent for resourcefulness, it is, without doubt, misleading to think that it will last. All the same, it would be necessary to be in a position to foresee the terms of a regional policy, that is to say, not merely responsible management of human, environmental and territorial resources but also of archival resources, which be in operation in zones already separated by a politico- institutional frontier, whose nature even now is undergoing fundamental change by the replacement of its function as a barrier with that of a point of contact between two or several politico-institutional systems or socio-economic sub-systems. But a frontier acting as a point of contact, requires preparatory arrangement to be made before it is able to become a reality. Now, archives, which form part of the sovereignty of the state, should as a result take part in all deliberations, which may deal with this idea. In the context of the archives of new economic zones or simply the archives of European regional zones, the question arises, re-arises or increases the delicate problem of relations between the authorities of the state and those of local authorities with the fear of seeing the national state as guarantor of the indepence of the country and of the liberty of its citizens, drained of its force by the twofold erosion by European bodies on the one hand and on the other by local communities and especially by regions, which, by virtue of the principal of subsidiarity as set out in the Treaty of Maastricht, systematically commit themselves to deflating the duties of the state in accordance with the principle of taking away from citizens and the bodies closest to them, the duties which they could well carry out so as to entrust them to a much 7 The Director of the Archives Départementales qualified to deal with the archives of the DRAC but not beyond that, warned the Minister for Foreign Affairs of this, who would be disposed to assume responsibility for their good preservation if he was instructed to do so (information given by Mr. Jacques d’Orléans, Director of the Archives Départementales of the Lower Rhine). 98
