1 Computer Support for Document Management in the Danish Central Government Morten Hertzum Department of Computer Science University of Copenhagen Abstract . Document management systems are generally assumed to hold a potential for delegating the recording and retrieval of documents to professionals such as civil servants and for supporting the coordination and control of work, so-called workflow management. This study investigates the use and organizational impact of document management systems in the Danish central government. The currently used systems unfold around the recording of incoming and outgoing paper mail and have typically not been accompanied by organizational changes. Rather, document management tends to remain an appendix to the primary work and be delegated to a specialized organizational unit. Several factors contribute to the present document management practices, for example it takes an extraordinary effort to achieve the benefits, and few institutions are forced to pursue them. Furthermore, document and workflow management is applied most extensively in an institution with certain mass production characteristics, and the systems do not address needs specific to the civil servants. 1. Introduction People handle their personal documents in ways that are coupled very closely to their primary work, for instance piles on the desk are used as reminders of things to do (Malone, 1983; Hertzum, 1993). Contrary to this, organizations typically separate document management from the primary work (Bearman & Hedstrom, 1993; Waters & Nagelhout, 1994). Document management tends to be an appendix to the primary work, not a constituent of central importance to its coordination and quality. However, a closer coupling with the primary work is suggested as a much needed, quality-ensuring revolution of governmental document management (Waters & Nagelhout, 1994), and it is asserted that current technology makes it a practical proposition to combine document management with workflow management (Butler Cox Foundation, 1989). This study investigates the introduction of document management systems in the Danish central government which over the last 25 years has attempted to rationalize its document management. The central government institutions are under an obligation to take care that citizens on request get access to documents made or received by the institutions and to periodically hand over their closed cases to the Danish National Archives to preserve material from the public administration for future research. The document management systems currently in use reflect these obligations, i.e. they unfold around the recording of incoming and outgoing paper mail. Traditionally, this recording has been the responsibility of a specialized organizational unit, the document management unit, and current systems are directed toward these units. However, it is generally assumed that document management systems make it possible to delegate document management to secretaries and civil servants, an assumption vivified by the extensive closing down of specialized typing units after the introduction of text processing systems. The purpose of this study is to describe and seek explanations for the effects of document management systems on document management practices in the Danish central government. Special attention is paid to the organizational impact of the systems and the strategies governing their introduction. The study involves case studies of two very different institutions which have recently acquired document management systems (section 2); a historical account of the early, state subsidized efforts to provide the Danish central government with one standardized document management system (section 3); a survey of the present use of document management systems in the central government Information Infrastructure and Policy, vol. 4, no. 2 (1995), pp. 107-129 Preprint