• Journal of Korean Society of Archives and Records Management
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• v.4 no.1
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• pp.23-42
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• 2004

Lenin's decree of 1 June 1918 'On the reorganization and centralization of archives in the RSFRS' is appreciated as an institutional and conceptional basis for Socialist archival theory and practice not only in USSR but also in most countries of the socialist community. In spite of its importance to the making role to build the 'landmark' in the history of russian archives. This paper focuses on the activities and achievements of archivists in 'RAD Union(Union of Russian archives activists)' in revolutionary situation of 1917-1920. To preserve documental heritage with historical values in difficult situation of 1917 historians and archivists in 'RAD Union' voluntarily cooperated with new governments. This special situation led them to make more efforts at reformulating national archival system, namely, the state Archival Fond (Gosudarstvennyi Arkhivnyi Fond) as a new base for the centralization and arrangement of all archival materials throughout the country. Their experience was reflected in every articles of the archival decree of June 1918.

• The Korean Journal of Archival Studies
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• no.10
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• pp.324-370
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• 2004

This paper aims to research the historical development of the archival systems in the Soviet Union from 1917 to the 1920's. The Russian revolution was the turning point not only for the political and social changes but for the archival administration in Russia, as it provided the new Soviet regime with the chances to reorganize the archival institutions under Bolshevik rule. However, we must not forget the fact that the Russian Archival Workers' Union had taken part in the organization of the archival systems together with the Bolshevik revolutionaries. The Soviet government intended to transform the decentralized and poorly organized archival systems in the prerevolutionary years into the centralized and bureaucratized ones. In this meaning, the decree signed be V. I. Lenin on 1 June 1918 was estimated as the real basis for the Soviet archival centralization. Lenin's archival decree of 1918 encompassed the entire national documentary legacy, which was gradually extended to all types and categories of manuscripts and archival records by successive legislation. The concept of state proprietorship of all documentary records was designated "Single State Archival Fond"(Edinyi Gosudarstvennyi arkhivnyi fond), which was renamed as "Archival Fond of the Russian Federation" after the collapse of the USSR. The independent state administrative agency, that is, "Main Administration of Archival Affairs"(Glavnoe upravlenie arkhivnym delom) was charged with the management of the entire "Single State Archival Fond". While the Soviet Union reorganized its archival systems in the twenties, the archival institutions became under the severe control of the government. For example, M. N. Pokrovskii, the well-known Marxist historian and the political leader, headed the organizational work of archives in the Soviet Union, which resulted in the exclusion of the prerevolutionary specialists from the archival field in the Soviet Union. However, the discussions over the concept of "the Archival Fond" by B. I. Anfilov helped to develop the archival theories in the USSR in the twenties. In conclusion, the Soviet Union, having emphasized the centralization of the archives, developed its archival systems from the early period, which were the basis of the systematic archival institutions in Russia.