Problem wiarygodności teczek i opartej na nich narracji historycznej. Kilka uwag metodologicznych

In his paper, the author attempts to tackle the issue of reliability and specificity of documents (among them, the so-called “files”) stored at the Institute of National Remembrance, as well as the truthfulness of the narrative based on them. The paper consists of six parts. In the first chapter, the author critically analyses the objections raised by journalists and historians against the reliability of the archive records stored by the Institute of National Remembrance. In the second chapter, the author considers the reliability of the “files” in the light of Jerzy Topolski’s concept of the historical source. In the two successive chapters (third and fourth), the author characterizes the specificity of the documents produced by the communist repression apparatus by means of the two classifications of sources proposed by Gerard Labuda and Jerzy Topolski. The results of this analysis show that the “files” are not a new type of historical source and their discovery does not necessitate a radical reshaping of the existing sources classification and the introduction of new interpretation methods. However, Labuda’s and Topolski’s interpretations are useful, as they acknowledge the purpose of their creation, as well as the function that they performed in the political system of the communist state. In the fifth chapter, the author argues that the repression apparatus collected, selected, processed and stored information on social life, as it was believed that such data facilitated the exercising of political control over the society. Ignoring this aspect of the archive records led to historians’ methodical and heuristic errors – accepting the vision of social life and processes presented in the sources that are most often used in historical narrative construction. These errors are discussed in the sixth chapter. They do not result from any defects of the sources themselves or the shortcomings of the methodology of history, they stem from institutional and sociological factors – giving in to the social demand for fast presentation of the results of modern history analyses, as well as the axiologisation of historiographical discourse, which leads to the slackening of methodical reliability standards.