Institutional memory at risk

Abstract

The dissemination of information produced in digital format, mostly stored on the institutions' websites, proliferates in federal public administration bodies. The study offers a reflection on the risk of institutional memory loss in the short, medium, and long term. The research goal is to present the survey and justifications of the main trends, uncertainties, and possible ruptures related to the preservation of the institutional memory of the Federal Public Administration until 2050. The research is descriptive and qualitative, the method was a bibliographic and documentary survey associated with surveys carried out by public agencies through an interview script. We identified and justified 32 future seeds, of which 16 refer to trends, 11 are uncertainties and four are possible disruptions. The main conclusion is that the institutional memory of the Federal Public Administration, especially in Brasilia, is at risk, configuring itself as a Megatrend. The formulation of an information policy aimed at its management and preservation, especially a digital one, associated with the librarian professional protagonist, working towards the preservation and management of digital information, would be ruptures that would minimize this loss.