There is a
lot of worrying going on in LibraryLands all over the planet. Will there still be
libraries in ten years time?
To answer
that question for the Dutch libraryscene this year a comprehensive study was
carried out by The Netherlands Institute for Social Research, SCP. A very respectable institution advising the
government on a wide range of social and cultural issues.
From the
blurb:
‘The public
library is the biggest cultural institution in the Netherlands with around 4 million members and
130 million items lent each year. Yet despite this, the library is under
pressure; membership numbers and borrowings have been falling steadily for
several years. In the last six years the public libraries have been working
together with local, provincial and national authorities on a 'library renewal'
programme. From an organisation primarily concerned with lending books, the
library is being transformed into a cultural centre which is active in five
domains: knowledge and information, development and education, arts and
culture, reading and literature, and meeting and debate.
Meanwhile, rapid changes were and are taking place in society and in the world
of information and culture. This study describes relevant developments within
and outside the Dutch public library sector and relates them to each other. Based
on these observations, the report outlines two possible futures for the
position of the public library in the Netherlands ten years from now. In the first
variant, trends continue at the same rate and the public library gradually
loses support. In the second possible future, the present trends accelerate and
the threats are greater. These two future projections are followed by an
analysis of the deficiencies that could arise from a social perspective in both
cases. In conclusion, a number of suggestions are put forward for action by the
sector and the public authorities to counter these deficiencies. The central
focus is on the substantive renewal of the library service.’
It’s actually quite
a good report as far as reports on this subject go and has greatly contributed
to keeping libraries on the official government agenda.
The report
may be downloaded or ordered in print from the SCP website.
