The rethinking of the organizational structure of the Ministry of Cultural Heritage responds to the need not only to strengthen the more specifically technical and scientific aspects, which have constituted the peculiar characteristic of this body from the outset, but also to provide a better and more rational management structure fostering the conditions required if a very rich legacy stratified over centuries of cultural sedimentation is to be communicated to increasingly large sections of the population.

In this perspective, the departments and their various general directorates are responsible for ensuring the coordination of activities on national territory and an integrated, homogeneous approach in all sectors.

In particular, the Department of Archives and Libraries is required to act as a link between these two sectors, which have been separated for too long by preconceived methodological barriers. While recognizing their specific identities, it is now essential to establish dialogue between them through a policy of full collaboration and interaction so as to give birth to a single combined system.

In other words, it is necessary to achieve more effective and functional management of the libraries and archives spread throughout national territory in accordance with guidelines based no longer on an outmoded drive for centralization but rather on efforts for harmonization whereby state bodies, local authorities and private companies can work together to increase the potential for preservation and promotion of the cultural heritage. This entails not only coordination of the Department’s general directorates so as to ensure the integrated development of their respective functions but also connections with the Ministry’s other departments and local authorities with a view to large-scale projects.

In particular, the Department of Archives and Libraries intends to perform a function of connection and interaction with the Department of Research, Innovation and Organization with a view to developing framework programme agreements in the sector of cultural heritage. Cooperation with the regions and the other public bodies at the local level is a prerequisite for the implementation of an effective cultural policy ensuring the coordination, harmony and integration of the various responsibilities and initiatives. In this context, the resources available to government bodies and those managed at the regional level (EU and CIPE funds) will come to concentrate on a number of large-scale joint projects for the surveying of archives and libraries, the digitization of archival and library materials, and the creation of databases for specific categories of material.

In accordance with the Department’s further aim to offer itself as a point of reference in relations with bodies outside the Ministry, there are plans to strengthen and develop the sector of scientific research with a view to signing suitable contracts for studies and financing programmes for promotion of the documentary heritage submitted by outside bodies and carried out in collaboration with the Department and under its supervision. This activity, which it is intended to extend to an increasingly diversified range of research sectors and items, can only take place with the essential support of the local bodies, which have a thorough understanding of the situation on the ground and can thus indicate projects of interest and monitor the different phases of implementation. The aim of these projects is the creation of a series of tools (inventories, guides, editions of sources, historical essays, etc.) serving to foster an awareness of Italy’s inexhaustible cultural heritage among increasingly large numbers of users. At the same time, they will provide a large number of holders of diplomas from schools of archival science, diplomatics and palaeography as well as graduates in archival and library science with an initial opportunity for working experience to test out their theoretical knowledge and training at the practical level.

The Department also intends to play a direct role in guiding the definition of standards for cataloguing and description, the application of new digital technologies, and the promotion and linking of existing information systems so as to contribute still further to the use of Italy’s libraries and archives. Particular attention will accordingly be focused on the national library service and archival system and their objective to create a network in which the processing of data and information, the sharing of the human and financial resources, and the interoperativity of participants will constitute the cornerstones of a structure geared to the needs of citizens. Efforts will also be made to strengthen the Italian Digital Library programme for the scanning and online availability of specific documents (historical catalogues, prints, musical scores, etc.) identified within the framework of a unified organizational plan based on cooperation between libraries and archives. The Department’s function of coordination will involve both ensuring the optimal integration of resources and active participation in the technical and scientific debate with a view to achieving reciprocal integration of the different operating systems.

Nor will there be any neglect of another crucial problem of our era, namely the preservation of digital records, which depend on rapidly developing technologies and fragile media and are hence exposed to the risk of loss if suitable measures are not taken to ensure future use. As pointed out in the resolution of the European Council of 25 July 2002, this problem can only be solved within the framework of close international cooperation based on the exchange of experience and a shared methodology. The translation into Italian of the Guidelines on the Production and Preservation of Digital Audio Objects will constitute an initial step in this direction. Again with regard to conservation, the Department intends to coordinate restoration activities connected with the protection of traditional paper-based material. These activities will be combined with efforts to support archives and libraries with training courses at different levels as well as the production of directives and explanatory circulars.

The Department will also perform a linking role for all the promotional initiatives designed to ensure broader use of archives and libraries. The organizing of and participation in exhibitions, conferences, book fairs and events both in Italy and in other countries will thus no longer take place in an episodic and fragmentary fashion but on the basis of a coordinated programme, thereby avoiding overlapping and the waste of resources.

The Department also intends to pursue a policy of greater efficiency and rationality with effective action to cut costs. As a centre of expenditure, it will seek to achieve economies of scale by combining functions previously assigned to the general directorates of both sectors. The Department has already taken over the responsibilities of the two separate consignees for libraries and archives and is currently looking into the possibility of extending this measure to other areas so as to avoid any duplication and ensure the most efficient management of expenditure. At the same time, there are plans to make use of mobility, on the basis of requests submitted by individual employees, so as to improve the distribution of personnel and thus gradually correct the critical imbalance in human resources between North and South, which is particularly marked in certain areas.

With a view to ensuring the optimal functionality and operativity of archives and libraries, the Department will take steps both to renovate their premises, with particular reference to the provisions of legislative decree no. 626 of 19 September 1994, and to improve the quality of their services through the introduction of a new organizational and procedural model for the integrated management of safety in the workplace. Wherever suitable conditions obtain, steps will also be taken to examine the possibility of housing library and archives in a single building, as is planned for Sassari and underway in Bari. In addition to a marked reduction in property costs through more rational organization of the spaces available, the creation of integrated cultural centres is intended as a response to the needs of users, who will be able to consult both books and records in the same place and move with greater ease from the examination of archives to the associated bibliographical texts of reference. The physical proximity of these two sectors will work at the same time to foster a sense among personnel of working toward the same goals and hence of the need for close collaboration so as to achieve broader participation in the use of the cultural heritage.

At the same time, the presence of a department responsible for both archives and libraries will also make it possible to launch a number of special projects aimed at the improved preservation and utilization of the vast amount of material located on the borderline where library and archival conservation functions intersect. This category includes, for example, both the archival fonds present in numerous libraries and the books held in archives. The creation of guides to illustrate these situations will serve to make the question of whether items should be returned to their “rightful homes” null and void by enabling virtual reconstruction of the mosaic of scattered fragments. At the same time, it will facilitate an approach in line with the specific nature of items involved and help to construct a system in which the respective methodologies can be integrated.

The Department of Archives and Libraries will also be able to act as a coordinating body for a special category of cultural items that have been somewhat neglected due to their borderline position between one sector and the other, namely the musical items held in a broad range of archives and libraries both inside and outside ministerial jurisdiction. The need for a coordinating body is being felt with increasing urgency due to the launching of a series of initiatives that, while praiseworthy, tend to be based on very different methodological criteria. For example, while the surveys of musical fonds present in regions such as the Marche and Abruzzi have brought to light a large number of repositories and material of a far more richly varied mature than one might have imagined, they have been carried out by following non-homogeneous pathways that must be standardized so as to provide the most unified and coherent overall picture possible.

In the sphere of relations with other countries, priority is accorded to the strengthening of international cooperation at the bilateral and multilateral level in a framework of connections resting on the will to rise above what divides and construct what can unite. Collaboration in this sense will take place, albeit not exclusively, within the framework of cultural agreements reached with other countries by the Foreign Ministry. There will be a major focus on the European Union and particularly its new member states, to which the Department will present itself as a primary partner in the sectors of professional training and information technology. Equal attention will be devoted to the countries that have for different reasons been involved in Italy’s history for such reasons as the occupation of different regions, trade, expansionistic aims, or migratory flows. In the non-European sphere, it is above all in the Americas that the existence of large Italian communities and strong economic and social ties with Italy call for incisive presence and initiatives. Hence the formulation of an integrated research programme for the identification and promotion (through publications, exhibitions, etc.) of sources for emigration in collaboration with the local cultural and academic institutions. The Department also intends to devote particular attention to relations with the Mediterranean countries, with which Italy has long-established and consolidated ties of collaboration. Attention should be drawn in this connection to the project for a Multimedia Historical Archives of the Mediterranean, the aim of which is to create an international centre of research and documentation for the history of the Mediterranean countries. This would be located in Sicily, which appears the most suitable place to host and develop this initiative by virtue of its central position, history and cultural heritage. The Department’s international activities will also include relations with the international bodies responsible for preservation of the cultural heritage as well as participation in the activities of technical and professional organizations active in the sector, where it intends to be present at the highest levels. Obviously enough, the greater the Department’s involvement in the international context, the easier it will be to obtain adequate financial resources making it possible to play a concrete and effective part in initiatives. Action will also be taken to strengthen and develop the role of the OPIB (observatory on international programmes for libraries), whose responsibilities will be also extended to cover the archival sector. In particular, greater space will be given to European programmes and projects, promoting the participation of all the parties involved both in the field of libraries and in the field of archives and harmonizing the collaboration of the other bodies concerned, ranging from central to regional and local government as well as universities world and research centres.