Sonia Combe

Sonia Combe's field of interest is Contemporary History. She is a Researcher at the Institut des sciences sociales du Politique (ISP-CNRS). Her research is concentrated on the history of Eastern European Countries under communism and the political uses of the past in the process of rewriting history in post-communist Europe. She was chief Curator of the Department of Archives/Research at the BDIC-University of Paris-Ouest (2000-2008). At the same university she teaches methods of working with public, private, oral, and audiovisual Archives. In the Spring semester of 2010 she taught a seminar at the Humboldt University of Berlin (Chair: Marc Bloch) on Secret Services files as sources for academic historiography.

In 1994 she published a book (Archives interdites. Les peurs francaises face a l'histoire contemporaine) on access to public archives in France, arguing against the abuse of privacy considerations. While restricted access to archives may be necessary to protect the privacy of individuals, it can also be an excuse for the government or its institutions for prohibiting access to documents that would damage the country's image (raison d'Etat). She advocates free access to public documents, and believes that archives that provide insight in the behavior of administrations and their officials must not infringe upon the privacy rights of persons. Moreover, she argues for the accessibility to the archives as a trustworthy indicator of the level of democracy reached by society. The third edition of Archives interdites will be published in 2010.