In the course of its activities, UNESCO enters into legal agreements with member states, international and regional organizations, non-governmental organizations, universities, foundations, private companies and individuals. UNESCO’s General Conference also adopts international standard-setting instruments, including, so far, twenty-nine conventions, thirty-two recommendations, and thirteen declarations. In addition to this, UNESCO can be the designated depository for instruments adopted by other intergovernmental conferences. Member states then issue and send legal instruments to UNESCO in reponse to these standard-setting instruments. The Collection consists of legal instruments transferred to the Archives and registered by Archives staff in one of the following three series: A) Instruments signed with member states; B) Instruments signed with organizations, companies and private individuals; and C) Donations, bequests and legacies.

The collection consists of UNESCO records that were routed to and organized by a centralized Registry Section. The principal and system of classification used by the Registry was Universal Decimal Classification. The collection is further organized into three series based on three chronological periods: 1946-1956; 1957-1966; and 1967 to roughly 1989.