Funding for Preservation of Collections

The Institute will receive a subsidy of 125.000 euro for the digitization of important  archives and a collection of periodicals from the Dutch trade union movement. This generous subsidy was granted by Metamorfoze, the Netherlands' national programme for the preservation of paper heritage. Included in the project are:

• the archives of the Socialist Youth International 1907-1946, containing correspondence with socialist youth organizations in all major countries
• the archive of the French anarchist Augustin Hamon 1880-1939, containing correspondence with Angelica Balabanoff, Ferdinand Domela Nieuwenhuis, Havelock Ellis, Emma Goldman, Karl Kautsky, Peter Kropotkin, Errico Malatesta and many others
• the trade union periodicals Grafisch Weekblad, Onze Strijd, De Bode, Mercurius,  Ons Vakbelang, valuable sources of information about the living and working conditions of various groups in the labour sector of society.

Thanks to this grant, fragile collections will be preserved and saved for the future. The digitized documents will be accessible for the public as soon as the project is finished.
In June 2014, the ABC Review Committee of Metamorfoze approved IISH's project proposal 'Trade Unionism in the Netherlands (1871-1950)' aiming at the conservation of three major trade union archives.