When the Water Recedes
The Danube has always carried history. This summer, it began returning some of it.
As water levels fell across central and eastern Europe, the river revealed what had long remained beneath its surface: mammoth remains near the Bulgarian village of Ryahovo, the foundations of a Roman bridge inaugurated in AD 328, medieval structures and German warships deliberately sunk during the closing stages of the Second World War. Some of the vessels still contain explosives. Reuters documented the discoveries in early August.
They are traces of very different pasts, exposed by the same event.
The consequences extend well beyond archaeology. The Danube crosses or borders ten countries and supports transport, agriculture, industry and energy production across the continent.
In Romania, falling water levels contributed to the closure of one nuclear reactor. The country redirected part of the river to keep its remaining reactor operating. Together, the two units would ordinarily provide around 20 per cent of Romania’s electricity. Reuters reported on the intervention.
In Hungary, the Paks nuclear plant was operating at only around 10 per cent of its full capacity before rising water levels allowed one turbine to begin restarting. The same river that had concealed centuries of history was now determining how much electricity a modern economy could produce. Reuters reported the restart here.
There is a parallel for institutions.
Organisations accumulate layers too. Strategies are introduced, teams reorganised and new systems placed over old ones. Some practices gradually disappear because they are no longer useful. Others disappear because attention has moved elsewhere.
Over time, it can become difficult to distinguish between what was deliberately retired and what was simply forgotten.
Periods of pressure have a way of bringing those layers back into view.
A tighter budget can clarify which activities carry the greatest value. A leadership transition can show how much knowledge has remained with particular individuals rather than within the institution itself. A change in demand can restore the relevance of a programme, partnership or capability that once appeared peripheral.
Constraint does not only clarify what needs to change. It can also reveal capabilities that an institution has overlooked.
This matters particularly in education, where institutional memory is often held by people rather than systems. A longstanding teacher understands the history behind a curriculum decision. An admissions officer recognises how families’ questions have changed over time. A former student remembers which traditions created a genuine sense of belonging. A member of the operations team may know why a process that appears unnecessarily complex was introduced in the first place.
Much of this knowledge is rarely contained in a strategy document. Yet it often shapes how an institution functions.
The OECD notes that excessive staff turnover can disrupt service delivery and weaken the retention of institutional knowledge, particularly in organisations where continuity is essential to long-term goals. Its research on public-sector workforces makes the connection explicit.
The distinction is important. Institutional memory is not the same as nostalgia.
The purpose is not to preserve every tradition, programme or way of working simply because it came before. Nor should history determine every future choice. The task is to understand what an institution has inherited before deciding what its next stage requires.
That judgement has become more important as education systems expand and their underlying assumptions shift.
Global participation in tertiary education rose from 19 per cent in 2000 to 44 per cent in 2024. Yet the proportion graduating increased much more slowly, from 17 to 27 per cent. Expansion created access, but it also revealed the difference between bringing students into an institution and enabling them to succeed within it. UNESCO’s 2026 analysis examines that widening gap.
The response cannot simply be to add another layer.
Institutions need moments in which they deliberately lower the water: revisiting decisions whose original rationale has faded, identifying knowledge that exists only in individual memories and examining practices that continue after the context around them has changed.
Transformation begins with understanding. Change is more likely to endure when leaders know not only what they are replacing, but why it existed, what purpose it once served and which parts may still hold value.
Progress does not require institutions to disregard their past. It requires the clarity to decide what should be carried forward, what should evolve and what can be left behind.
What emerges will not all need to be restored. Some inherited practices will have completed their purpose. Others may contain capabilities, principles or knowledge that the institution will need again.
The leadership task is to know the difference.
When the water recedes, what comes into view is not a substitute for what must be built next. It provides the context for building it well. Before institutions add another layer, they need to understand the ones already there: what they contain, why they formed and whether they still serve a purpose.
The future may require something entirely new. But the strongest transformations begin by seeing the whole institution clearly.
