Triangulation and Technology: Analysing UNHCR Documents from and beyond the UNHCR Archives
This is the third in our series of posts about the UNHCR archives. See our previous posts from Sara Cosemans and Maja Janmyr, including a Q&A with the archivist team.
When I arrived at the UNHCR Archives in July 2023, I was overwhelmed when the archivists showed me two carts full of the binders, folders, and boxes I had requested. My mornings in the archives were a blur of taking as many pictures of documents as possible. In January 2024, I participated in the “Navigating the UNHCR Archives” workshop facilitated by Dr Sara Cosemans and hosted by the University of Oslo and the BEYOND Project. Through these experiences, I have learned that researchers can make the most of short visits to the UNHCR Archives by finding UNHCR documents in other locations and by using technology to scan and to later analyse these documents.
Triangulation: Finding UNHCR Documents Beyond the UNHCR Archives
At the workshop in Oslo, we discussed how triangulation is a valuable strategy to assemble a broader collection of documents, overcoming gaps in any one archive. For example, if a document is unavailable at the UNHCR Archive, a copy may be available in a recipient government’s archive. Beyond the research benefit of triangulation, historic UNHCR documents in other locations are often easier to access. Researchers searching for truly archival documents (i.e. documents created by UNHCR staff in their day-to-day operations) will still need to visit the archives in person or put in multiple digitisation requests over time. However, researchers who are unable to visit in person (due to capacity-related limitations to accessing the UNHCR Archives, the cost of travelling and doing research in Switzerland, visa issues, family responsibilities, etc.) can still enhance their research with historic UNHCR documents in other locations.
Online
Many historic UNHCR documents are digitised. However, these documents can be hard to find and are listed on many different websites with varying search functionality.
The United Nations Library and Archives Geneva has a Research Guide on Refugees and Asylum Seekers, with information on UN Documents, treaties, journals, databases, statistics, maps, and websites related to refugees.
UNHCR’s RefWorld, revamped in 2024, hosts legal instruments, case law, policy & guidance, and research & reports (mostly from the last few decades, with some older documents). Users can browse by country, document source, document type, keyword, or thematic area.
Beyond Fonds 12 at the UNHCR Archives, many files related to UNHCR’s Executive Committee are digitised. These include reports (reflecting consensus between the members), as well as summary records for more recent years (an overview of each Member State’s comments). RefWorld hosts digital text versions in English of all UNHCR reports to the UN General Assembly and all reports by UNHCR’s Executive Committee, whereas scanned PDFs of these reports are available through the United Nations Digital Library for those who wish to cite with specific page numbers or access the documents in other languages. The UN Digital Library also hosts Executive Committee summary records for more recent years. Note that the committee’s name has changed over time: High Commissioner’s Advisory Committee on Refugees (1951-1954), United Nations Refugee Fund Executive Committee (1955-1958), Executive Committee of the Programme of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (1959 to date).
Speeches by High Commissioners are available on UNHCR’s website and can be found by typing the name of the High Commissioner in the general search tool.
The articles from UNHCR’s newsletter Refugees Magazine from 1994 to 2007 can be found by searching “refugees magazine” on UNHCR’s website.
Libraries
Some university libraries and United Nations depository libraries around the world hold a significant collection of UNHCR publications and newsletters. UNHCR started publishing a regular newsletter in 1960, called different things over time (UNHCR Reports 1960-1968, HCR Bulletin 1968-1972, etc.). The easiest way to find these newsletters and publications is to write “United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees” as the author/creator in the advanced search tool on a library website.
Other locations in Switzerland
Researchers who are already travelling to Switzerland may wish to check other locations.
The UN Library Geneva holds an extensive collection of UNHCR and refugee-related publications, a set of 44 documentaries produced by UNHCR over the years, and a full set of Executive Committee documents, including the summary records for early years not available online.
The UN Archives Geneva hosts the UN Division of Human Rights Sub-series “Refugees, Displaced and Stateless Persons” primarily consisting of documentation related to the Convention relating to the Status of Refugees and the Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness.
The International Labour Organization holds some archival records on refugees and its relationship with UNHCR, especially related to refugee employment.
UNHCR’s archival film collection is not stored in Geneva because of technical requirements. This collection is hosted by the Cinémathèque Suisse at the Centre de recherche et d'archivage in Penthaz near Lausanne Switzerland. Most of the over 250 films (films, TV programmes, raw footage, etc.) in the collection date from 1950 to 1989.
Technology In the Archives: Scanning Documents for Future Analysis
The traditional archival research strategy of reading and taking notes is impractical at the UNHCR Archives or in any other archives where researchers have a limited amount of time. It becomes essential to take high-quality scans to read later. At the UNHCR Archives, researchers have access to a scanner to capture and save documents to a USB. Beyond the UNHCR Archives, I have used a phone stand and the Adobe Scan app to use my phone’s camera to scan documents as PDFs. We learned at the Oslo workshop about several best practices, applicable to all archives, to capture the best quality scans:
Capture all four corners of a page, including the folio number.
Ask the archivists to remove staples or paper clips as needed.
Place a blank sheet of white printer paper behind the page you wish to scan to increase the legibility of text, and to standardise the size and shape of the scans.
Scan all pages of a file in order, starting with a picture of the box or folder, to facilitate organising and citing scans later.
Technology at Home: Analysing Archival Documents
During the Oslo workshop, we learned about how software programmes can assist in analysing archival documents. Tropy is a free software designed for organising and analysing archival research photos. Researchers can add metadata to their photos (like fonds and box numbers), tag items with keywords, transcribe documents, and write notes. Text recognition (Optical Character Recognition or OCR) software makes it possible to turn archival scans into PDFs with searchable text. Searchable text allows for quantitative techniques, like counting frequencies of specific terms, but keyword searches can be equally helpful in qualitative analysis for determining which documents or pages to read in more detail. ABBYY FineReader PDF is a subscription-based software with advanced OCR. Before recognizing text, it can pre-process archival scans by straightening text lines and whitening the background. The Hot Folder feature can run OCR while your computer is sleeping. Adobe Acrobat Pro is especially useful for keyword searches of PDFs that have already undergone OCR. Beyond searches in one PDF, it is possible to search an entire folder (such as all scans from the UNHCR Archives) with the Advanced Search tool. You can then download a list of the results in order, with links to the PDFs.
Conclusion
Making the most of short visits to the UNHCR Archives, or getting around the inability to visit the archives, demands research strategies like triangulation and technology. Triangulation draws on multiple sources to expand the number of documents available, but it also takes advantage of UNHCR documents in other locations that are easier to access and not so bound by time limitations. Using technology to effectively scan archival documents and to facilitate analysis later makes the most of precious time in any archives and opens the potential of keyword searches. I hope the digitisation of archival materials that UNHCR has started will expand in the future, especially for Public Information materials like press releases. That would be a big step forward in promoting historical reflection on UNHCR and refugee issues, but even more importantly, in empowering refugees and other displaced people to access their own histories without needing to travel to Geneva.
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Funding acknowledgment: Rachel received funding for her archival research in 2023 from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, in part through the Local Engagement Refugee Research Network.
Images courtesy of Rachel McNally.
