Hi Ben, 

I'd argue the only defensible approach is to manage email messages the same
way you manage paper or Word documents: according to content, not medium.
You'd never keep all paper records for a year, or all Excel spreadsheets for
a year, irrespective of their content; same thing with email. 

The alternative/complementary consideration is that where email messages are
work product, draft content, logistical, or otherwise transitory, and where
the thing they relate to gets memorialized in another format, keep the thing
rather than the messages. For example, if email is used to send drafts of a
contract around for review and comment, the contract is the record, not the
email messages. This depends on how your organization treats draft content,
of course; if you keep drafts relating to the contract you'd keep the emails
as well. But again, the point here is to treat email identically to how you
treat other types of information. 

Regards, 

Jesse Wilkins
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