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Showing posts with label blog review. Show all posts

Sunday, March 10, 2024

Review — Raymond Tanghe on Québec libraries and librarianship, 1952–1962

Pour un système cohérent de bibliothèques au Canada français by Raymond Tanghe. Montréal: Fides, 1952, 38 p.

Le bibliothécariat by Raymond Tanghe. Montréal: Fides, 1962. 117 p.

Raymond Tanghe (portrait at right c.1962) was born in France in 1898 and came to Canada in 1920 after serving in the French army during the First World War. He was an academic by choice and earned a PhD at the Université de Montréal in 1928.  His professional writings were in human and economic geography, especially urban planning, at the l’École des Hautes Études Commerciales de Montréal in the 1930s. He became a professor and later Director of the central library of the Université de Montréal from 1942 to 1953. He had a flare for popular and scholarly writing and worked with Radio-Canada during the Second World War. Tanghe worked to centralize holdings at the University and expressed his opinion that it would benefit faculty and students at the Quebec Library Association meeting in 1945. In 1948, he became President of the Association canadienne des bibliothécaires de langue française (ACBLF) for two terms before he moved to Ottawa in 1953 to become the Assistant National Librarian at the National Library of Canada.

In this more expansive role in Ottawa, he became better acquainted with Canadian librarianship and the close relationship many librarians had with bibliographic work during the 1950s. He served as President of the Bibliographical Society of Canada from 1958 to 1960. Under his editorship, the Bibliography of Canadian Bibliographies was published in 1960 with 1665 entries, almost half authored by library school students in two major centres, Montreal and Toronto. Tanghe began his third career after retiring from the National Library in 1963 to return to France by taking up the direction of the Maison des étudiants canadiens à Paris, where he mentored students in a congenial learning environment until his retirement in 1968. He died in Montreal in 1969 after a short illness.

Raymond Tanghe did not possess formal training in librarianship. Like many of his male predecessors in Canada, he was an academic, a man of literary tastes who learned about the operation of libraries from administrative experience and personal observation of an emerging profession. In the course of a decade, he penned three valuable library works: one to propose a plan for a province-wide public library system, one to describe and publicize the library profession, and one to outline the history of a professional French-speaking library school in Montreal. In many ways, Tanghe’s contributions to Canadian librarianship represent the nationalist sentiment and growth of secularism in Quebec during the 1950s and early 1960s. The fifteen years before the beginning of the ‘Quiet Revolution’ in 1960 was an evolutionary time to a more liberal, worldly-minded society in which the role of the Catholic Church was reduced. In 1945, Quebec society was deeply influenced by the Church; for example, parish libraries substituted as public libraries in most parts of the province, and the Index Librorum Prohibitorum continued as an authoritative catalogue to censor reading authors such as Émile Zola or Jean-Paul Sartre. Changes came gradually: in 1948, Quebec adopted its provincial flag, the Fleurdelisé; in 1952, Radio-Canada began television broadcasting from Montreal, which accentuated Quebec’s political, cultural, and social affairs; and in 1956, the Tremblay Commission called for greater provincial government control of social and financial affairs. Influenced by this report, Quebec eventually adopted its first general public libraries act in December 1959.

Tanghe’s major publication in 1952 by the firm Fides, Pour un système cohérent de bibliothèques au Canada français, first appeared as three articles in the 1951 issues of the journal Lectures. His pamphlet represented a blend of current and retrospective library views. The traditional concept of library service, parish libraries, had existed since the 19th century in Quebec communities, embodying a Catholic humanism that emphasized moral and spiritual principles. By 1950, mid-century modernist library thought invoked the concept of systematic operations, professionalism, and the more secular philosophy of public service. Generally, Tanghe was sympathetic to the traditional course but recognized libraries as basic public sector institutions. His introduction emphasized the need for libraries to educate both rural and urban workers. He believed it was important to elevate people’s reading to counter the harmful influence of cinemas or radio by enriching their intellectual, moral, and spiritual lives. As a primary starting point, Tanghe took up the cause of the brief ‘Manifesto’ published first in 1944 and again in 1947 by l’École de bibliothécaires (formed in Montreal in 1937) and supported by the Quebec library community he was most closely associated with, the ACBLF. This wartime statement expressed the idea that public libraries were essentially an educational responsibility of the province and its municipalities, although religious considerations, Catholic and Protestant, remained vital elements. The statement proposed that the Catholic Committee of Public Education organize a Provincial Office of Libraries, overseeing urban municipal library commissions and regional library councils in rural areas, responsible for one or more counties or a regional church diocese. Establishing a provincial body in conjunction with the formation of municipal and rural authorities would facilitate the promotion of legislation, surveys, policies, distribution of grants, and operation of libraries.

Tanghe elaborated on this basic scheme in more detail. He proposed provincial library legislation (p. 16) to:
(a) to authorize municipalities to establish and maintain libraries with municipal revenues after taxpayers first presented a petition to municipal councils to establish a library;
(b) to create a Library Service (“Service de bibliothèques”) within the Department of Public Education to be responsible for the administration of general assistance to public libraries, free of charge. A Board of Management (“Bureau de direction”) would head the Service and be admitted to sit on the Roman Catholic Committee of the Council of Public Instruction. The delivery of services would be the responsibility of larger ‘provincial libraries’ (such as the renowned Bibliothèque Saint-Sulpice in Montreal), a Central agency (to be organized), and local libraries used by the public in municipalities and parishes. The provincial libraries (p. 19–21) had a dual responsibility to serve the public directly and foster cooperative efforts with other libraries.

The formation of a central establishment (“Centrale”) was the heart of Tanghe’s système cohérent (p. 21–22). It was an efficient system for selecting, purchasing, binding, cataloguing, and distributing books by well-trained specialists. As well, it was charged with sending books in travelling libraries to municipal or parish libraries and book-impoverished rural areas (p. 24–26). At the head of the system, the Library Service needed competent personnel at five different levels (p. 29–31): administrators, ‘inspecteurs-propagandistes’ (people skilled in public relations and able to provide library advice), librarians, technicians, and warehouse workers. Interestingly, Tanghe recommended that technicians possess a diploma in library science to carry out clerical tasks such as recording loans. Librarians required good judgement and a broad culture for good book selection (an elitist view held by the author), classify resources, and acquire an in-depth knowledge of library resources and sources of bibliographic information. Librarian candidates (Tanghe seems to assume these came from the École de Bibliothécaires) needed to take an introductory course at the end of their studies in one of the provincial libraries.

In a nod to the practical reality of everyday life in Quebec, Tanghe accepted the continuation of parish libraries as ‘public libraries’ (p. 31–35) for mostly rural Catholic, French-speaking Canadians, hardly an innovative program even by 1950s conservative standards. In fact, a more influential contemporary, Edmond Desrochers, published a study, Le rôle social des bibliothèques publiques in 1952 which concluded that parish libraries should be replaced by municipal public libraries. These were different perspectives because Tanghe perceived Quebec’s parish system as a cohesive centre of life fostering solidarity in many communities. From his academic planning viewpoint, social collectivism was a primary goal which libraries could contribute to within the parishes (p. 13): “Dans la province de Québec, la paroisse est une collectivité socialement organisée, qui a un centre de ralliement, qui possède ou peut fonder des œuvres adaptées au groupe humain qui la compose.” Recognizing that many parishes were underfunded and could not form working libraries, he recommended small collections of about 1,000 volumes and provincial subsidies for parish libraries, which could sustain and invigorate their activities; for example, Tanghe calculated for $60,000/year about 500 parishes could be supplied with rotating travelling book collections on a monthly basis. But, in fact, most existing parish libraries held only meagre collections and were poorly administered, as the Tremblay Commission discovered a few years later in 1956. Chaired by Justice Thomas Tremblay, this report called for further study and the passage of public library legislation to form the basis of future growth.

Even with approval from Catholic authorities (Cardinal Paul-Émile Léger authored an introduction to the pamphlet), Tanghe’s systematic plan that included parishes did not attract much attention at a political level because many officials recognized the era of parish libraries was passing as society became more secular and the power of the Church lessened, and the role government increased. This transition is illustrated by the National Film Board 1959 production, Il faut qu'une bibliothèque soit ouverte ou fermée, which depicts the efforts of the townspeople of Montmagny to create a municipal public library. However, the ideas of a central commission, municipal libraries, and regional entities—a common North American trend by this time—as operatives of library services did foreshadow future directions. In 1959, the Quebec Legislature adopted a law for public libraries which contained three important clauses:
(a) the creation of a Quebec Library Commission to investigate problems relating to the establishment, maintenance and development of public libraries;
(b) the formation of a Quebec Library Service headed by a director of public libraries who can maintain staffing to carry out its proper functioning;
(c) the establishment of a budget line of $200,000 for the fiscal year 1960-61 to cover the cost of implementing the new law.

This law was a modest, progressive step. The many details and mechanics that Tanghe laboured to provide in his pamphlet were not dusted off for action, which was the fate of many reports. However, his underlying confidence that there was a French culture and identity for Quebec libraries to foster and maintain set his program apart from other contemporary Canadian library 1950s reports in British Columbia, Manitoba, Ontario, and New Brunswick. This belief was a lasting legacy in its own right.

Watch the 26 minute NFB film directed by Raymond Garceau in 1959, Il faut qu'une bibliothèque soit ouverte ou fermée, which illustrates the changing views on public library service in the small town of Montmagny.

* * * * *

Towards the end of his twenty-year library career, Tanghe published a work that revealed the nature of his views on librarianship after a decade at the National Library in Ottawa. In Le bibliothécariat, a short book—really an essay—of just over 100 pages that appeared in 1962 (reprinted in 1964), he outlined the major aspects of librarianship he had observed over almost two decades. This French language book was the first publication of its kind in Canada; indeed, it reflected a consensus of Canadian librarianship in mid-century. For the most part, Canadian trained professional librarians relied on publications from the American Library Association. Thus, Tanghe was breaking new ground, although his primary aim was to reach students, especially those in Quebec interested in choosing librarianship as a career, his own scholarly way of mentoring. In his introduction, he declared that he would primarily discuss the qualities and training required to be a librarian and offer his views on the true nature of librarianship (p. 7) instead of publishing a textbook. Then, he makes his case for librarianship in eight chapters: the general field, required skills and qualities, basic training, professional development, the actual work, administrators, salaries and working conditions, and a brief proposal for a collective services project for Quebec.

In his survey of the field in Canada, Tanghe raised some interesting points. He noted the shortage of librarian professionals to fill positions (a problem that existed throughout the 1950s) and made three observations (p. 16) that characterized librarianship at the time:
1) there was an overall lack of librarians in relation to the population served by all types of libraries;
2) professional librarians only accounted for a third of the total staff in public libraries;
3) positions were filled predominately by women.
Tanghe felt administrators were addressing the persistent shortage by having library assistants assume more duties. In a period when the demarcation between clerical routines and professional duties in North American libraries was known to be ambiguous, the author made his position clear for larger libraries (p. 18–19):
Library assistant duties: 1) short cataloguing, 2) classification of files, 3) circulation and loans, 4) checking-in periodicals, 5) controlling receipts, 6) inventorying.
Librarian duties: 1) directing library assistants, 2) detailed cataloguing, 3) classification, 4) reviewing magazines, 5) preparing bibliographies, 6) reference and orientation services, 7) acquisitions, subscriptions, exchanges, and 8) cooperating with other libraries.
Finally, he asserted that the traditional stereotypes associated with librarianship, often attributed unfairly to women, were no longer applicable. Librarianship now was more dynamic with challenging positions requiring more intelligence, initiative, and imagination on the part of young women and men interested in collaborative work in the humanities and sciences. However, despite this progressive view shared by most in the field, Tanghe restated the dated arguments that women were mostly responsible for lower salaries and that men were often candidates for administrative positions because women frequently left the profession for marriage (p. 20).

In discussing librarian characteristics and necessary skill sets, Tanghe declared libraries are service organizations, a generally accepted attribute by mid-century. Thus, a primary personal quality is serviabilité, the need to provide helpful assistance—service with a smile and an outgoing personality. The ability to approach work methodologically and follow directions were two more essential personal traits. Respect (perhaps love) for books was an obvious aspect of daily work given the state of collections in the 1960s. Intellectual curiosity and the need to be adaptable were also requisite personal attributes for success. With the idea of la tolérance, the ability to be fair, understanding, and well-balanced, Tanghe broached the subject of library neutrality and censorship at a time when societal changes were sweeping North America. He concluded that judgement about resources and a person’s right to read should be considered within the context of morality and the Index Librorum Prohibitorum. Notably, he was writing shortly before Canadian courts began ruling more liberally concerning the censorship of books and before the Catholic Church ended the authority of the Index in 1966. Finally, the author suggested that a stable, career-driven curve best served the individual librarian, especially from the standpoint of employers. One noticeable characteristic that appeared in the contemporary library literature that Tanghe ignored was the capacity for leadership, although he dealt with the practice of administration in a separate chapter. Otherwise, his six attributes were all conventional when Le bibliothécariat was published in 1962. But, with the passage of time, we know employers now look to different workplace requirements that situate his observations in a historical period of mid-century modernism which libraries have passed through.

Similarly, the book’s focus on basic training for semi-professionals and professionals now seems dated, although it was considered standard when he was writing. Possession of a degree before entering library school was a regular practice by 1960. He provides background on two French-language library schools in Montreal and Ottawa which were beginning to attempt to secure accreditation from the American Library Association (ALA). Today, the 1951 ALA requirements seem dated, but at the time they were not easily achieved in a Canadian context:
1) a library school must be an integral part of a recognized university;
2) a school must have secure financial funding, adequate premises and equipment;
3) a school must have a sufficiently large faculty with authority and jurisdiction to establish and conduct its programs.
It would be many years before the University of Montreal or Ottawa achieved accreditation, but their older histories are interesting in their own right due to their French-language emphasis. Also, Tanghe went into some detail about the need for professional development after entry into the workplace. He suggested that additional education and broader interest in the human sciences, namely anthropology, and social, economic and political science, would benefit many. He raised the issue of librarianship as a profession at some length (p. 57–61), citing the work of Father Jacques Lazure (University of Ottawa), a sociologist who had spoken to a conference of Quebec librarians in 1961. Lazure (and many others) stated librarianship was not yet a profession. Yet, Tange felt that professional status, especially the adoption of its ideals and the feeling of group solidarity, eventually could be attained. Librarians needed to be proactive and recognize that service was the essential feature of librarianship and required requisite collective professionalism. He pointed to the Quebec library group, L’Association canadienne des bibliothécaires de langue française, as an organizing force in this direction (p. 63).

A lengthy chapter (p. 67–91) on library work is now mainly of historical interest. Mid-century modernization in acquisitions work, cataloguing and classification of books, binding and other routine techniques were technical aspects that involved a large portion of staffing. Departmental responsibilities for public services involved reference, research, circulation of books, reader orientation, bookmobiles, and audio-visual service. Of more interest is Tanghe’s brief account of ‘information science’ or ‘documentation’ as it was better known at the time. He mentions the work of Mortimer Taube who developed coordinate indexing in the 1950s and wrote about information storage and retrieval. Tanghe believed scientific libraries were being established more frequently, and their newer concepts of library work would expand traditional librarianship (p. 83). Of course, the author noted the excellent work of the National Library, especially its union catalogue and close working relationship with the Public Archives of Canada.
 
A chapter on the role of administrators reveals a more personal approach by the author, who had worked as Assistant National Librarian for a decade. Tanghe knew it was a practical matter for aspiring librarians to recognize administrative ability and tasks to advance their careers. His ideas generally followed the classic public sector organizational theory, POSDCORB, developed in the 1930s. This management acronym stood for Planning, Organizing, Staffing, Directing, Co-Ordinating, Reporting and Budgeting. By applying these general tenets, Tanghe describes what he considered to be the main functions of management: (1) the recruitment of new staff and personnel direction, promotion, and management; (2) budgeting and financial control; (3) the organization of equipment, furnishings, and buildings; (4) the development of collections; (5) establishing and maintaining library policies and regulations; (8) and public relations. His mention of the Farmington Plan, a cooperative effort to acquire and store foreign language materials for American libraries, is of historical interest because it set a pattern for subsequent cooperative collection development programs before it ended in 1972.

Two brief chapters follow. One was on salaries and working conditions circa 1960, and the other was entitled Collective Services Project for Quebec. It offers some of his prescriptions for library development in his home province. Leading by example was a central point in Tanghe’s mind: in Le bibliothécariat he was passing the torch to a new generation of leaders at an opportune point in time. The École de bibliothéconomie of the Université de Montréal had just been founded in 1961; afterwards, more university-trained librarians began to adopt a scientific approach to their profession, and, in 1969, they formed the Corporation of Professional Librarians of Québec. Tanghe’s publication followed in the footsteps of Library Science for Canadians published in 1936 but his focus was upon the nature and working conditions of the profession, not the emerging academic field. These two publications were significant landmarks in the literature of Canadian librarianship before the rapid growth of the 1960s.

My earlier post on Library Science for Canadians, composed by two University of Western Ontario librarians, Beatrice Welling and Catherine Campbell, appeared in 2016.

Monday, February 26, 2024

Review — Public Libraries and Marxism by Joe and John Pateman (2021)

 Public Libraries and Marxism by Joe Pateman and John Pateman. London and New York: Routledge, 2021. 119 p., indexed.

Public libraries offer an amazing range of information and services in Western society, but to what end? Library organizations and librarians mainly focus on the functional aspects of library services and professional activity while ignoring power relationships and the institutional framework of libraries within society. Public Libraries and Marxism analyzes the public library from a Marxist perspective by challenging our conventional liberal-democratic views that focus mostly on delivering services while ignoring its hegemonic basis of authority. John Pateman has extensive administrative experience. He headed libraries in the UK before he came to Canada in 2012 to be the CEO of Thunder Bay Public Library in Ontario. He has written articles and books with a Marxist viewpoint, such as Public Libraries and Social Justice (2010) and Developing Community Led Public Libraries (2013). Joe Pateman is a professor of politics at York University in Toronto, Ontario, and his main research interest concerns the theory and practice of Marxism-Leninism. Together, they have crafted a valuable introductory handbook for those interested in a Leninist version of Marxism and public librarianship. As well, each chapter has a useful bibliography that readers can pursue to navigate the complexities of Marxism.

The Patemans’ argument unfolds in six chapters  — (1) Introduction (2) The Marxist Interpretation of the Public Library (3) V. I. Lenin and Soviet Socialist Public Library System (4) Kim Il-Sung and Socialist Public Libraries in North Korea (5) The Vanguard Library (6) Conclusion. The authors dedicated this book to V.I. Lenin with a following quote from the leading Marxist-Leninist historian of the 1920s, Mikhail Pokrovskii, concerning the importance of libraries. Pokrovskii is quoted from time to time but there is no mention that he suffered the fate of many Russian intellectuals—his work was quickly discredited and his historical school eclipsed during the 1930s then rehabilitated to some extent after Stalin’s death.

The Introduction provides the essential features of Marxist-Leninist ideology, the interpretation of Marxist thought developed by Vladmir Lenin that emerged from Russia at the beginning of the 20th-century. Some readers may be familiar with the terminology of (a) dialectical materialism and its three laws; (b) the base and superstructure of historical materialism; (c) the hierarchical order of class analysis; (d) the creation of a classless, stateless society under scientific communism; and (e) the revolutionary leadership of Vanguardism. This exposition has the quality of brevity and clarity; however, I find the claim that Marxism is a scientific account of social change to be highly problematic. For me, Marxism is essentially a speculative philosophy because of its well-known imprecision (it can lead to many deductions or variants, yet no critical examination can entirely refute it) and its reliance on patterns, purpose, and meaning in history which the vast majority of historians reject because they see no purpose of goal in history. Further, Marxism-Leninism is less a philosophy and more a political ideology that calls for the creation of a Communist state; it is action oriented and analytic thought is mostly a handmaiden. The authors conclude this chapter by discussing other theoretical approaches used in library and information studies (LIS), such as Western Marxism, which they firmly repudiate likely because it is less focused on class or political struggles and more on cultural-social development, philosophy, or art.

Chapter 2 focuses on the library and librarians as historical entities. From the typical Marxist model of the forms of society, there are ancient, feudal, capitalist or bourgeois (Traditional Library), socialist (Community-Led), and communist (Needs-Based) public libraries. Library professionals emerged during the era of capitalism, even in socialist nations, but eventually, in a communist society, the previously exploited working classes will manage public libraries. At the centre of this argument are the teachings of Karl Marx, who introduced the concept that human society consisted of two parts: the base (the economic substructure that comprises the forces of production which provide the necessities of life and give rise to the relations of production, that is relations between people) and superstructure (the political, legal, religious, and cultural institutions of society). Marxists hold that productive forces are fundamental and determine the superstructure; however, some Marxist theorists (e.g., especially the Frankfurt School) postulate that the superstructure is of more interest: it may gain some autonomy and, on occasion, influence the base. Applied to public libraries as part of the superstructure, this generally means that the economic base ultimately shapes the library’s societal goals and objectives, its policies and procedures, as well as its staffing and services.

Because Marx and his followers viewed human history as a long-term class struggle, the public library, in its various incarnations in capitalist societies, evolved as an instrument of the power of the ruling bourgeoisie to control the working-class proletariat which comprised the majority of people in most countries: “the public library, as a cultural institution, functions in order to stabilise the economic base and, by extension, the rule of the property-owning class.” (p.29) As part of the authors’ thesis, the ruling elites and acquiescent petite-bourgeois librarians mostly excluded and ignored the voices of the unserved, disadvantaged and minorities. This is consistent with the capitalist idea that the individual and competitive self-interest are the central ingredients in society.

Although the modern public library in Western capitalist countries is theoretically supposed to serve everyone in society, in reality the authors observe that its failure to do so is all too evident. The ‘Traditional Library,’ the state-supported public libraries that emerged in the mid-19th century, served the same function as the mechanics’ institutes — they were instruments of social control. Today, the public library as an institution is often widely regarded as a mainstay of democratic values (i.e., liberty, freedom, pluralism, and equality), yet critical scrutiny of its actual history in LIS literature belies this entrenched belief. Consequently, the authors propose transformative ideas to completely rework the practices of public librarianship and the unconscious operation of ‘capitalist’ libraries. The Marxist perspective emphasizes group conflict through class struggle and the eventual success of the proletariat in seizing the means of production. The authors assert, “It is only under communism that truly public libraries can exist.” (p. 26)

Chapter 3 outlines the Leninist model followed by socialist/communist countries in the 20th-century. Because Vladimir Lenin believed that socialist public libraries and librarians could be a leading force in developing the cultural, educational, and technical knowledge of the masses, the Soviet Union created a centralized, state-controlled library service that drew initial praise even in the West. After Lenin’s death, his widow, Nadezhda Krupskaia, a Communist commissar of education, was largely responsible for the direction of library development and better training for librarians. Her writings are quoted extensively throughout the book. She infused libraries with new ideas about their goals and functions and helped promote a rapid expansion of literacy in the Soviet Union before she was discredited during the dictatorial regime of Stalin. Krupskaia felt that understanding readers, selecting books to suit readers’ interests by promoting communist thought, and better organization of resources would improve services. Today, the basic Marxist-Leninist model she helped establish in the Soviet Union continues in socialist countries such as Cuba, China, Cuba, Vietnam, Laos, and North Korea.

Chapter 4 outlines one country’s public library system, North Korea. Kim Il-Sung (1912–94), the national Supreme Leader, was mostly responsible for its development. His concept, inspired by Juche, was self-reliance in a national context. Public libraries in the Korean state must build upon a revolutionary outlook and the leadership of the Workers’ Party of Korea focusing on ideology and, more importantly, the authority of the Supreme Leader, a sort of allegiance on steroids. This chapter is quite helpful in explaining the development of public libraries in North Korea, a topic seldom appearing in the Western library literature. North Korean libraries have diverged somewhat from Marxist-Leninist orthodoxy but they retain many characteristics of the conventional model.

Chapter 5 discusses the ‘Vanguard Library’ and its potential in capitalist and socialist societies, especially Cuba. Lenin developed the idea of Vanguardism as a strategy whereby highly motivated, key members of the proletariat formed groups to further the goals of communist ideology. Of course, there are elements of elitism in this approach, a matter which leads back to the issue of social control of the working class and variant Marxist views about how capitalism would falter and collapse. The Vanguard Library leads the evolution of public libraries from one Marxist stage of historical development to the next. As capitalism declines and disappears, under vanguard action the Traditional Library will evolve into the socialist stage of the Community-Led library that better meets the needs of the working class. At some future point, the highest stage of public library progress will be reached under classless, stateless communist conditions and the Community-Led Library will transition into the Needs-Based Library. This latter incarnation of the public library faithfully serves the entire public without limitations. In the context of Cuba, the Vanguard Library is said to have played a critical role after the 1959 revolution brought Fidel Castro to power. The government established a network of libraries which vitalized the working class and rolled back illiteracy in short order. Vanguardism raises working-class consciousness by educating workers and by creating a ‘new man’ entirely in sync with socialist ideology and motivated by the best principles of class consciousness.

Considering what a Marxist library service would look like in the Western capitalist countries of today, Public Libraries and Marxism provides insights that help us understand the revolutionary impact of the potential for transformation in Western public librarianship. The Patemans outline why and how Western public libraries can change organizational practices, indeed their culture and mission, to better serve those in need. That is an important Marxist message for librarians to keep in mind as new challenges arise. It is not a utopian vision, but a call to understand our place in history and our communities, to reach unserved minorities and the working class, and to strive to build an authentic public library service that will finally achieve what it claims to do, to serve everyone. However, the vexed issue of who will lead the Vanguard is left open.

Although the writings of Karl Marx form the basis for Marxist-Leninist thought, e.g., the concept that the material conditions of life determine the nature of human consciousness and society, readers should note that many ideas outlined by the two authors feature the ideas of Vladimir Lenin who championed the establishment of the dictatorship of the proletariat led by a revolutionary vanguard party. Lenin, moving beyond the usual Marxist doctrine, theorized this action as the political prelude to the establishment of communism. Public Libraries and Marxism gives us a view of how to work toward communist public libraries, but readers must keep in mind there are many variations of Marxism to chose and follow. But for librarians or LIS scholars who may believe in the ultimate triumph of communism, this book can be a useful starting point.

A selection of V.I. Lenin’s writings on libraries and contributions by Nadezhda Krupskaia is available at the Internet Archive in a work by Sylva Šimsová, Lenin, Krupskaia and Libraries (London: Clive Bingley, 1968). Šimsová was a Czech citizen who emigrated to the UK after World War II and worked in London libraries for many years.

Saturday, December 09, 2023

Review — In Solidarity: Academic Librarian Labour Activism and Union Participation in Canada (2014)

In Solidarity: Academic Librarian Labour Activism and Union Participation in Canada ed. by Jennifer Dekker and Mary Kandiuk. Sacramento, California: Library Juice Press, 2014; viii, 355 p., illus.

Collective action by faculty and librarians and their diverse organizations and associations has traditionally dealt mostly with academic standards and professional goals. With respect to economic issues, professors and librarians historically have engaged in individualistic pursuits. Until the 1970s, focused work to improve economic conditions was not considered appropriate activity for university or college faculty and librarians. The spectre of “trade unionism” loomed large at many campus meetings aimed at discussing collective action and improving salaries and working conditions. A further complication during this formative period—librarians’ predilection for creating associations no matter how small in membership—also impeded coordinated action towards certified and non-certified bargaining units (aka, special plans). However, after Canadian federal civil service workers attained collective bargaining rights and the ability to strike in 1967, the concept of public sector unions gained increased acceptance and faculty associations began to choose a familiar path of collective action.

It is within this background that In Solidarity delves into various challenging issues that academic librarians have engaged with over the years. The fifteen articles in this book are divided into four parts: (1) the historical development of labour organization of academic librarians; (2) case histories from various institutions; (3) current issues in labour activism and unionization; and (4) the practical complications and challenges that labour issues present in libraries. This general-specific pattern of articles in alternate sections is useful because context is provided, and the nitty-gritty of labour activism in the library profession (known chiefly for its conservative elements) on Canadian campuses is addressed for a various subjects and alternative analysis.

The two editors, Jennifer Dekker (University of Ottawa) and Mary Kandiuk (York University), provide a short introduction to the text and introduce the broader aspects of the volume, especially the common experiences of librarians relating to unionization. Labour activism can subdivide into many particular topics: salaries, benefits, pensions, general working conditions, workplace security (aka, deprofessionalization), librarian workload, promotions, tenure, job classification, academic status, grievances, and even can be termed professional matters, like defining ranks, seniority, collegial governance, and general terminology (e.g., the transition over time from “professional librarian” to “academic librarian”).

The first section offers two papers:  Leona Jacobs traces the history of academic status and labour organizing for Canadian academic librarians. and Jennifer Dekker’s exploration of the crucial part the Canadian Association of University Teachers (CAUT) played in academic librarians’ escape from the campus isolation of a “library ghetto.” CAUT’s acceptance of librarians as partners in faculty associations in the 1970s was a fundamental step forward because the vast majority of university libraries only provided a few dozen positions for librarians and little (or no) bargaining power on campus. In contrast, other predominantly female campus professionals, such as nurses, could rely on provincial or national organizations for assistance. These accounts of librarians’ struggles for recognition demonstrate the fragile and fractured nature of collective action across Canada during the past half-century and provide valuable background for three other chapters.

The second part of the book features three case histories. These accounts highlight the earlier papers and explore issues at different institutions in more detail.  Martha Attridge Bufton outlines gender and status issues at Carleton University from 1948-75, a brief presentation based on her more detailed thesis. Harriet M. Sonne de Torrens discusses the quest for academic rights and recognition at the University of Toronto, a story of determination on the part of rank-and-file librarians after a mid-1970s mini-revolution. Two college librarians, Robin Inskip and David Jones, outline a successful effort to organize and achieve parity within the ranks of Ontario post-secondary college teachers and faculty. These articles offer insight into conflicts between administrators, faculty, and librarians that occurred during attempts to organize and provide a coherent voice for librarians at their home institutions. Not every campaign was successful because the recognition of librarians was often disputed.

The third section featuring collaborative articles by librarians from different parts of Canada, provides insight into contemporary issues that librarians continue to grapple with in an academic setting. Academic librarians are partners in the post-secondary sector, and this raises a variety of topics discussed by the contributors. The role of librarians as teachers, researchers and community members is one feature. Another is librarians as faculty association participants, a condition of representing minority views and priorities within a broader, more complex context. Collective agreements are studied in another paper, along with an examination of the complaints and collegiality of determining what the “quiet librarian” would do or think.

The final section presents four case studies emphasizing the broader issues in practice today concerning librarian rights and responsibilities in various campus situations. A strike at the Western University in London highlights conflicts in a library setting. Success and failure in labour organizing (including one paper that reveals resistance to unionization in the state of Louisiana) unfolds in this section, followed by the issue of collegial self-governance with the establishment of a Library Council at Brock University (CAUT has long supported the concept of library councils but their formation has been hampered by local considerations for decades).

Readers will find there are several takeaways from reading In Solidarity. One easy conclusion is that working conditions and status for librarians vary greatly in Canadian academic institutions. The case studies illustrate that the terminology for academic status or academic freedom is often defined differently in collective agreements. Nor are the requirements for research and service consistent by any means. Faculty views on the academic status of librarianship are also inconsistent. Further, although librarians are usually members of faculty associations, their level of participation and success is necessarily limited by their small numbers: The chapter on “The Mouse that Roared” is a descriptive epithet that does not apply in all cases.  The articles present arguments favouring strengthening academic status and participation in faculty associations.

While there is a complicated legacy and contemporary challenges inherent in contractual issues involving librarian workloads and academic participation, the general trend presented in these pages is a positive one, even though Jennifer Dekker worries at the outset that “the gains librarians made in the 1970s and 1980s are being dialed back today.” Of course, a review of the history of librarian labour activity shows that opposition to collective bargaining and academic advancement has existed for many years. The recent (i.e., after 2000) attacks on the rights of academic librarians (including unjustified terminations) at Canadian universities and colleges follow this entrenched “tradition,” but are no less painful in particular situations.

The literature on librarian unionization and collective bargaining in any Canadian setting—schools, government, post-secondary or public libraries—is sparse, so In Solidarity is a welcome addition. This collection is a worthwhile effort to document librarian union participation and activism, telling the story in many cases from a first-hand perspective, and offering helpful examples of successful action.

Friday, September 01, 2023

Review — Parents of Invention (2011) by Christopher Brown-Syed

Parents of Invention: The Development of Library Automation Systems in the Late 20th Century by Christopher Brown-Syed; foreword by W. David Penniman and conclusion by Louise O’Neil. Santa Barbara, California: Libraries Unlimited, 2011; xxi, 145 p., illus. ISBN: 978-1-59158-792-7 (paperback).

In Parents of Invention, Christopher Brown-Syed recounts developments in library automation from the 1970s to the 1990s, an important era in library computing dominated by what came to be called the integrated library system (ILS). After earning a BA at York University, Brown-Syed began his career with the emerging library vendors Plessey (a British firm that introduced an early version of the barcode) and Geac Computer Corp. (founded in Toronto in 1971). He knew firsthand about the revolution of circulation and catalogue functions that took place in libraries during this transformational period. Later, he turned to an academic career teaching at library graduate schools in the United States, at Wayne State and Buffalo, and earned his PhD in Library and Information Sciences at the University of Toronto in 1996. His dissertation, “From CLANN to UNILINC: An Automated Library Consortium from a Soft Systems Perspective,” reviewed the development of networking in Australia. Unfortunately, Brown-Syed died unexpectedly in March 2012 while he was teaching at Seneca College in Toronto.

Brown-Syed organized his historical account around interviews of librarians, computer programmers, and salespersons. He provides a Canadian perspective even though many of the fifteen contributors he interviewed are from the UK and Australia. There is a brief forward by David Penniman and a concluding chapter by Louise O'Neill (McGill University), who discusses important developments in library automation and the digital library, such as open-source software, open access, discovery tools, and Web 2.0. We learn how the “parents of invention”—librarians and vendors working collaboratively—implemented new technologies to improve library operations in technical services, and ultimately in public reference contexts. Parents of Invention unfolds in eight chapters as the author discusses the challenges facing early ILS vendors during the period of mini-computer dominance. Vendors and tech-minded librarians collaborated closely in a competitive marketplace and automated environment that changed libraries forever.

(1) Origin of Magic. The ILS first appeared in the mainframe era of computers: with the development of MARC (machine-readable cataloguing) standards it seemed possible to mechanize many aspects of a library. It was a magic of sorts that needed to be unravelled for computers to create records and share them between libraries. As mini-computers came into vogue, the Canadian firm, Geac, became a leader in this pioneer development. Networking became a logical library activity, and new acronyms, now well known, appeared: OCLC (Ohio College Library Center), WLN (Western Library Network), RLIN (Research Libraries Information Network), etc. Eventually, the mini-computer triumphed, and a new era of commercialization and innovation took hold.
(2) Customers' Perspectives. Brown-Syed outlines customers views on ILS based on many interviews with clients in Australia. He provides background comments on library automation and networking using CLANN (later UNILINK) as an example. CLANN allowed libraries access to mainframe computing, thus introducing automation locally. While computerized searching of external mainframes continued, the introduction of cd-rom technology permitted libraries to begin mounting databases locally on workstations (e.g., ERIC) and end their reliance on expensive online searches through dial-up access to DIALOG or BRS.
(3) At the Interface: Librarians and Vendor Environment. Librarians working for automation firms were an essential aspect throughout this period. Some had considerable library experience and would eventually take positions with Geac and Plessey. Previous success and an ability to travel and connect with people were essential ingredients. Managerial ability was another quality: some librarians became project managers for short periods, a challenging task but a satisfying experience.
(4) The Nature of the Vendor's Work. The author summarizes many interviews with the observation, “It is doubtful that they (the ILS vendors) could have operated successfully had employees not been willing to work long hours, to set and keep their own schedules, and to travel so widely when required to do so.” (p. 55) Workers, mostly tech-savvy computer professionals, were willing to go the extra mile to get the job done.
(5) On Company Time. The nature of work, collegial attachments, the ever-changing work environment, and personal satisfaction is outlined through many comments and Brown-Syed’s own experience. Employees learned to be flexible and accommodate schedules and travel.
(6) Transformations. Geac reached its peak in the 1980s. The Geac System 9000, the successor to the more limited Geac 8000 with fewer dedicated terminals, was introduced in the late 1980s for large libraries. “Turnkey” systems had truly arrived. The chapter gives insight into many details, such as batch processing, computer coding, bibliographic data, computer peripherals, circulation transactions, requests for upgrades, and so on. But the companies that included hardware and software expanded ILS capabilities beyond circulation to include acquisitions, serials control, cataloguing, etc.
(7) Consolidation and Lasting Achievements. The business of automation ultimately led to the rise and fall of innovative firms, such as Plessey, CLSI, and Geac. The introduction of microcomputers changed the business model for companies that relied to a great extent on hardware sales. Open-source development and the advent of Linux, Java, and Python also reduced customers’ costs. These improvements spelled the transition to a new era in ILS development. By the late 1990s, ILSs were including library users through OPACs (Online Public Access Catalogues) and web-based portals on the Internet. Despite the changing landscape for ILS firms and their employees, ILS sales continued to proliferate as library automation spread to every type of library, small or large.
(8) The Future of Library Technology. Louise O’Neil provides a concluding chapter about significant developments in library automation and the digital library, such as the Internet, open-source software, open access, and Web 2.0.

“The development of the ILS was a remarkable collaborative effort, in which designers and librarians as customers played often interchangeable roles. That process continues, but with new challenges and opportunities taking the fore.” (p. 127). In the 21st century, the Internet allows many small client machines and larger servers to distribute workloads. Users have home access to online catalogues or library databases to view their loans or find records on their topics of choice. The computing environment has completely changed. The personable interactions of librarians and corporate employees we encounter in Parents of Invention are an experience of the past.

Brown-Syed concludes by observing that the super mini-computer was perhaps a ‘sunset phenomenon,’ the like of which we will not see again, although we can learn from the history of its development and the dedicated efforts of ILS library and vendor pioneers.

Friday, June 23, 2023

Review — Confronting the Democratic Discourse of Librarianship: A Marxist Approach (2019) by Sam Popowich

Confronting the Democratic Discourse of Librarianship: A Marxist Approach by Sam Popowich. Sacramento, CA: Library Juice Press, 2019. 322 p.

“So long as we are a democracy we need intelligence; so long as we need intelligence in the community we need librarians; so we shall need librarians to the end of Time.” — George H. Locke speaking to university students in Toronto, October 1932.

George Locke’s assessment neatly encapsulated the thoughts of the “library community” in Canada, the United States, and Britain in the first part of the 20th century. Today, many people support the belief that public libraries provide beneficial free and equal access to resources for everyone in the community that the library serves. Library historians have also followed this line of reasoning, using the themes of  “temples of democracy,” “cornerstones of liberty,” or “arsenals of democracy.” But is it so simple? Readers of two classic Marxist histories, such as Georges Lefebvre’s The Coming of the French Revolution (1939), which dissected the ancien régime or E.P. Thompson’s The Making of the English Working Class (1963), might beg to differ. Yet, Marxist views about public libraries are seldom referenced because Anglo-American library histories are rarely written from the Marxist perspective. They are published from “the left” and present revisionist, radical views, but fall short of revolutionary analysis. Now we have a book written in the Marxist vein to reject the validity of the normative democratic discourse of librarians and challenge ideas that have pervaded Anglo-American-Canadian library statements for so long.

In Confronting the Democratic Discourse of Librarianship, Sam Popowich rejects the liberal-democratic tradition within librarianship which usually supports the concepts of library neutrality, pragmatism, and independence from social, economic, or political developments. A general ideological outlook—a historical myth perhaps—confines libraries and librarianship: the “library faith,” a long-standing belief that public libraries can provide materials (especially books) that could transform public attitudes, raise the cultural level, and develop citizenship, thus bettering  democracy.  For the author, the reliance on these ideas, especially mainstream library historians, must be dismantled to change the profession, libraries, and our society. “From a political perspective this allows us also to ignore the very real problems inherent in our social and political world: racism, sexism, intolerance, alienation, hatred, violence, and political manipulation” (p. 3). Popowich believes the traditional liberal-democratic order of governments masks the oppressive structures of society and sustains the capitalist order of exploitation. Thus, by extension, librarians and libraries play a complicit role in the social reproduction of capitalism and its ideology. But all is not lost: the author concludes with potential strategies for resistance to the standard democratic discourse and capitalist hegemony that might contribute to a better society, a liberating vision shared in Marxist themes.

The corrective, mould-breaking lens of Marxism presented in the Democratic Discourse unfolds over nine chapters:
(1) The Democratic Discourse of Librarianship; (2) Vectors of Oppression; (3) Liberalism and the Enlightenment; (4) Ideology and Hegemony in the Marxist Tradition; (5) Three Hegemonies of Library History; (6) The Library Myth; (7) Truth Machines; (8) Dual Power and Mathesis; (9) Conclusion: Lives and Time.

The first chapter explores whether we actually live in a democracy. It revisits the meaning of democracy and librarians’ tunnel vision on issues such as liberty, free speech, and intellectual freedom, issues often taken for granted. “True democracy cannot be partial, cannot be exclusionary, and I will argue that this is precisely what ‘liberal democracy’ has always been. The democratic discourse of librarianship, the idea that libraries are sacred to some actually-existing democratic reality, prevents us from working towards the achievement of this radical, total democracy.” (p. 49) In the second chapter, the concept of vectors of oppression, for example, sex, race, or gender identity, is introduced to show libraries have inherited oppressive ideas and practices inherent in capitalist structures which perpetuate an in-egalitarian society.

In the following two chapters, a critique of the Enlightenment search for universal truths, Capitalism’s relentless drive for profits, and Liberalism’s political and social successes/failures as opposed to a roseate outline of Marxist thought put the reader in the right place for reassessing the role of libraries. Popowich leads the reader through the contributions of 20th-century theorists to Marxist theory: Georg Lukács’ reification, Antonio Gramsci’s hegemony, Louis Althusser’s ideological state apparatuses and capitalist reproduction, and Frederic Jameson’s postmodern political unconsciousness (living in a ‘perpetual present’) and the idea of cultural logic. These thinkers have made significant additions to critical Marxist theory. Jameson provides a way forward because “we have to look at the political unconscious of library work, especially as it relates to the particular ‘cultural logics’ of the different periods of library history” (p.169).

This background leads us to the three (perhaps four) hegemonies of library history, a cookie-cutter view of the periodization of library history on the Anglo-American scene from the mid-1800s to the present based on the Marxist historical view.

1848–1914: Classical liberalism, industrial technology, factory work, the bourgeois library;
1914–1945: War and depression; the war library [a short period that could be combined with the mass library]
1945–1973: Embedded liberalism, the welfare state, mass work, the mass library;
1973–2008: Neoliberalism, postmodernism, the neoliberal library,

Popowich expresses more interest in the two latter periods, where capitalism and neoliberal philosophy prevailed in Western societies. In the “industrial library” period, he finds the development of ideas encouraging the education of a democratic society (ultimately a library myth) and the substitution of reliance on moral education in favour of library neutrality. The author investigates aspects of the neoliberal library in two chapters: the issue of postmodern epistemology and library science, as well as library labour in the age of “truth machines.” The binary logic of computing/cybernetics is applied to social control based on the reality of the outcome, true/false. In fact, “one of the things that makes libraries so useful to capitalist society: libraries are machines for the reproduction of ideology” (p. 274). The library’s mythic presence of political and social neutrality in support of liberal democracy is linked with the mechanical process of providing information and programs that reinforce the inequalities of contemporary neoliberal society. These two chapters are mainly devoted to the structures of society with brief, depressing context for librarians and libraries: efforts in the daily working environment (the machines of reproduction) do not effect real change to systemic issues such as racism, alienation, inequality, and sexism. It is a nuanced deterministic view, a common element of Western Marxist writings. 

The Democratic Discourse also points to the present, post-2008 period in its final chapters. Marxism posits that society moves through a series of stages and ultimately arrives at real freedom and a classless utopia. By adopting a Marxist viewpoint, Popowich believes liberation is possible. He believes we can employ two potential strategies for resisting capitalist hegemony and repudiating the democratic discourse of librarianship. The eighth chapter, “Dual Power and Mathesis,” considers utopian strategies to revolutionize the neoliberal library and jettison its democratic discourse. One co-existing power, capitalism (a repressive regime), can be offset by another liberating force, “mathesis,” in which libraries prioritize learning over rote education, thus establishing a radical, authentic democracy. Popowich concludes that we must cast aside our fictitious innocence, which determines how we think about “lives and time” (pp. 293–299). Economic exploitation ultimately has detrimental costs in both human life and the time frame we have to resist its oppressive framework and liberal-democratic norms. The critical step must be to recognize our current state. “Constituent power can and must struggle against constituted power, can and must make hard choices, but those choices have to arise from concrete, collective experience, and a joyful taking on of responsibility. They cannot arise from a fatal innocence.” (p. 299)

The Democratic Discourse is punctuated with a host of theorists that buttress the author’s arguments. In addition to a few mentioned previously, we should note Popowich’s reliance on the work of Paolo Freire, who wrote on the development of a critical consciousness about society with the end of creating a more democratic culture; Stuart Hall’s critical work on identities and political power; David Harvey’s interest in the postmodernization (post-Fordism) of culture and politics; Jacques Rancière’s anti-institutional criticism of political theory and suggestion of radical equality; and Giovanni Arrighi’s or Ernest Mandel’s critiques and outlines of capitalist development. In the same way, Popowich invokes many Anglo-American academics who have written extensively about library history: Wayne Wiegand, Alistair Black, Michael Harris, Sidney Ditzion, Dee Garrison, and Jesse Shera, to name a few. As well, the viewpoints of authors engaged in contemporary issues are brought into focus, particularly John Buschman, Ed D’Angelo, and Stephen Bales. Although some of these writers have been revisionist or critical in their approach to library history, they have not produced counter-hegemonic histories. Ditzion and Shera wrote during the “consensus” period of historiography in the United States that emphasized continuity and the achievements of American democratic capitalism. In this setting, libraries were reputed to be a force for democracy, equal opportunity, and individual achievement even though Bernard Berelson’s research for The Library’s Public (1949) revealed that American public libraries reached only a minority of the population, the better educated that he felt public libraries should focus on. As the 1970s dawned and social historians began to study things “from the bottom up,” (a Marxist theme in many ways) revisionists issued a challenge that public libraries had not addressed American problems or were initially fostered by the educated elite (aka, the power brokers) to enforce social controls in reading for the lower or working class. In Britain, Alistair Black authored a “new history,” one that eschewed narrative and advocated thematic, critical history in concert with the development of cultural studies and Raymond William’s Marxist pursuit of the social history of ideas, especially the interaction between intellectual life and communities. These are still valuable histories today, depending on one’s viewpoint: consensus vs. revisionism, narrative vs. analysis, social vs. institution, and modern vs. postmodern.

Popowich has authored a historiographic overview of library history intertwined with the culture of postmodernism and politics of resistance to neo-liberalism. Of course, he could have called upon others to support his ideas; for example, An Essay on Liberation (1969) by Herbert Marcuse, who decried the repressiveness of society in the postwar period and proposed new possibilities for human liberation, or Ian McKay’s influential prospectus for Canadian history, “The Liberal Order Framework” (2000) which highlights the liberal-democratic promotion of individualism, private property, and capitalist accumulation in nation building during the 19th and 20th century. As for democracy, there are many types that are attractive: participatory, social, liberal, representative, grassroots, radical, and so on. Popowich states that “Democracy, we might say, is in the eye of the beholder” (p. 2), yet he does not offer a specific preference for replacing the liberal-democratic status quo. His interest lies in ameliorating systemic inequities: “true democracy cannot be partial, cannot be exclusionary,” (p. 49). To explore the contested field of Canadian democracy I would suggest Constant Struggle: Histories of Canadian Democratization edited by Julien Mauduit and Jennifer Tunnicliffe, a collection of historical essays recently published in 2021 that raises questions about the concept of democracy.

Capitalism, Popowich asserts, must be overthrown before an authentic, truly democratic (utopian?) society can unfold. I would argue that The Democratic Discourse stands more in path of Western or neo-Marxist social theory rather than the developing field of Critical Librarianship. Critlib is reflexive and action oriented, but Sam Popowich goes further by setting forth a more powerful, transformative, innovative challenge to ingrained complacency in librarianship. Political awareness from a Marxist perspective: that’s not such a bad thing after all!

Sunday, April 30, 2023

Review — The Ontario Public Library: Review and Reorganization by Albert Bowron (1975)

The Ontario Public Library: Review and Reorganization. Prepared for the Ontario Provincial Library Council by Albert W. Bowron. Toronto: Information, Media and Library Planners, December 1975; p. 184; maps; tables; paper.

In June 1974, the Ministry of Ministry of Colleges and Universities approved a provincial research study on Ontario’s public libraries. Albert Bowron, a prominent library consultant, was hired to complete a general investigation. He was well qualified for the task, having worked in Ontario libraries for more than a quarter-century. Bowron had graduated from the University of Toronto Library School in 1949, worked at Toronto Public Library, and headed the Scarborough Public Library in the 1960s before establishing his consultancy in 1969. He was well known across the province, for he had served as president of the Ontario Library Association in 1966-67. By the mid-1970s he had issued reports on more than a dozen library systems in Ontario, large and small.

The proposed provincial survey was very broad. It was to encompass societal features relevant to the future development of libraries; to assess the quality and variety of library services; to evaluate legislation and financial support; and to analyze government programs pertaining to library development. Crucially, the library community as well as the Ontario government, wanted to receive advice and recommendations regarding the organization, financing, and coordination of public libraries that would outline a plan for development for the next decade. The current act, adopted in 1966, had emphasized regional development, but new developments such as automation, networking, and services to minorities were coming to the fore and often outstripped the resources of municipal and regional library services.

However, before Bowron began his major study, two major factors occurred: one at the provincial level, the other in Metropolitan Toronto. First, at the end of 1974, a new Ministry of Culture and Recreation (MCR) was established. The idea of placing libraries in a “Ministry of Culture” had been floated for some time, and the news that the Provincial Library Service Branch (PLS) would become a unit within the MCR in early 1975 came without much consultation, even though the library component consumed about twenty percent of the new Ministry’s total budget. For the PLS, this move was the last in a series of shuffles that situated it in three different ministries in four years. This reorganization occurred when the staff of the PLS had dwindled from thirteen in 1965 to eight in 1975. For Bowron, there were many unknowns because the new MCR would be developing its own program priorities. Second, in September 1974, the former Premier of Ontario, John Robarts, became chair of a Royal Commission on Metropolitan Toronto to review responsibilities in the two-tier structure encompassing the six boroughs and city. As a result, Metro libraries became less interested in Bowrons study because the Royal Commission took precedence. Regarding consensus, the Metro library and lower-tier boards had not agreed upon a metropolitan strategy. North York had consistently advocated that the Metro board support the technical services, research, and coordinated needs of borough and city libraries. In the city itself, the construction of the Metro Central Library, scheduled to open in 1977, had always been a major objective to provide resources and information. The new Commission effectively meant Bowron’s observations on Metro libraries would not have much impact.

At the same time, divisions were becoming more apparent in the library community. The Administrators of Large Urban Centre Public Libraries in Ontario immediately came together in April 1975 to present the MCR with a brief that indicated the proposed study did not sufficiently address important library issues, such as financial support for urban libraries that bore the burden of resource networking. A year later, in May 1976, another grouping of public libraries, Administrators of Medium-Size Public Libraries, formed to speak for its constituency.

It was against this backdrop that the Bowron study began in 1975. There were some positives. The MCR was offering library base funding in 1975 at $19 million. In addition, it would make $400,000 available to regional libraries for Canadiana. Money for Outreach Ontario programs in libraries would continue in the MCR, and a new program with $234,000 would be available for summer student employment. Many were relieved to hear that the MCR supported direct provincial conditional grants to public libraries rather than transfers to municipal councils which might reduce the amount distributed to libraries by the MCR. In October 1975, the Ontario Commission on the Legislature issued a report on government information service; it proposed that the government consider establishing a network linking libraries by telephone and telex to furnish public information and referral service. Its purpose would be to give every Ontario citizen a source to call for information on anything to do with all levels of government.

After a year, Albert Bowron produced a general investigative report with forty-three recommendations covering ten key areas. His report also covered general societal changes, an examination of Canadiana resources in libraries, and a review of Metro libraries; however, these chapters were mostly ignored in the debates that followed the submission of the what became known in early 1976 as the “Bowron Report.” Reviewers quickly noted that data used in the report often was not reflected in recommendations. For example, the composition of boards. In an analysis of 1,296 board members, Bowron found 19.2 % were housewives, 18.2% involved in education, 16.1% to be business persons, 12.6% were retired, 4.1% were farmers, 4% from skilled labour, and 25.8% “other.” Middle-income members prevailed: “The typical board member in Ontario in 1974 was a man, 30 to 50 years old, with a university or college education, who worked in the field of education.” (p. 80-82). Still, this observation did not lead to a clear-cut recommendation.

From the vantage point of almost half a century (2023) the Bowron Report is mostly forgotten: the fate of many reports. The library landscape he surveyed is mostly a matter of history. Of course, public libraries have been continually reshuffled in reformed ministries since the 1970s. Provincial library grants to boards have not kept pace with inflation, especially after the mid-1990s. Yet his report warrants re-examination because it did emphasize change and pointed to new directions that are firmly in place in the 21st century. Bowron stated libraries needed to adjust to changing societal trends and augment the traditional image as a place to borrow a “good book to read.” There needed to be concerted focus on cooperative work, technology, work with the disadvantaged and minorities, and service to students (p. 4-6). The image of libraries was an important element in transforming the its status with the citizens of Ontario.

Thus, a synopsis of all Bowron’s work, The Ontario Public Library, which is difficult to find in a library today, follows on a chapter-by-chapter basis.

3-1 MCR and a new Ontario Public Library Board (OPLB) and native organizations sponsor a study of their services and propose recommendations for future development. 
4-1 The MCR and local libraries work to develop better community services.
4-2 Regional system establish contact with MCR field officers and offer co-operative activities of mutual interest.
4-3 Standards for CICs be framed to permit local libraries to offer this service with supporting provincial grants.
4-4 The Minister of the MCR seek advice on the certification and recognition of librarians.
5-1 The PLS would be responsible for community information centers (CICs), thus becoming a Public Library and Community Information Services branch (PLCIS).
5-2 The branch would supervise library legislation and CICs; conduct research; support the proposed Ontario Library Board; and liaise with ministry officials. Additional staff for electronic data processing, networking, and CICs, was urged along with service to Franco-Ontarians.
6-1 The report advised the Minister to appoint an Ontario Public Library Board to replace the OPLC.
6-2 The Minister of MCR appoint all OPLB members.
6-3 OPLB members to usually serve four-year terms and be reappointed once.
6-4 The Director of the PLCIS would be sec.-treas. of the OPLB with appropriate staffing. The Board would establish minimum standards, coordinate research, study financing, and establish province-wide policies for public library and information service.
7-1 All library boards be composed of nine members appointed by the municipal council.
7-2 Union boards be comprised of nine members appointed by each council.
7-3 Five citizen board members be appointed for three years and frequent reappointments eliminated.
7-4 Bowron recommended that a board serving less than 15,000 receive a two-year provincial grant but must exceed its provincial grant with local revenue thereafter or contract for services or join a county system.
7-5 Independent boards under 15,000 population must provide twice the provincial grant financing after two years of operation.
7-6 Payment to board members should be allowed, and all boards should be composed of nine members appointed by municipal councils to ensure accountability. Appointing bodies should exercise care to make boards more representative of their communities.
8-1 New regional systems and OPLB adopt better program budgeting.
8-2 Funding separate from regular grants be spent on projects with possible long-term growth instead of supplementing ongoing expenditures on materials or equipment.
8-3 The provincial government continue to support regional systems and develop a province-wide network of libraries.
8-4 Provincial grants be transferred directly to local boards and be sufficient to allow for long-range planning of library service.
9-1 Bowron urged greater efforts by the MCR and other ministries to form county libraries.
9-2 The appointment of members to county boards by county councils, including lay members, after three years.
9-3 Library service in newly restructured regions should become the responsibility of the upper tier.
9-4 Service levels in local communities in new county libraries be supported at the same levels or better for three years.
9-5 Special funding for initial county development was necessary for three years.
9-6 The repeal of Part IV, Clause 52, Sections 1-3 [the process to form a county library established in 1966].
9-7 Provincial support for the legacy Simcoe County Library Co-operative be withdrawn.
9-8 The PLCIS encourage the formation of county systems.
10-1 The OPLB and PLCIS monitor electronic data processing to ensure a coordinated approach to automation.
10-2 Provincial support for cataloguing, inter-library lending, circulation control and acquisitions using automation be studied by working groups in concert with the University of Toronto Library Automated Systems development.
10-3 The OPLB sponsor a workshop to develop a unified approach to automation.
12-1 Franco-Ontario staff member be added to the PL and Community Services Branch to serve French-speaking citizens better.
12-2 Libraries established in significant French-speaking areas employed Francophone staff
12-3 An annual grant for Francophone library service be transferred by MCR to libraries where more than ten percent of the population is French-speaking.
12-4 Two members of OPLC be Franco-Ontarians, and Francophone membership on library boards be instituted where feasible.
12-5 A provincial study be undertaken to identify Franco-Ontarians’ needs.
13-1 There be an integrated public library system in all thirteen newly restructured municipal governments (Metro excepted).
13-2 The reduction of fourteen regional library systems to seven federated ones based on the new MCR’s regional offices.
13-3 There be one resource library in each federated system financed by the province.
13-4 Each resource library to be funded on a per capita basis as determined annually by the OPLB.
13-5 The OPLB establish meaningful qualitative and qualitative standards to act as minimum levels of service to be attained by public libraries.
13-6 The OPLB standards adopted by the MCR would be incorporated into legislation on which grant qualification would depend.

A variety of responses to the report surfaced extending into 1977. One weakness soon became apparent: a noticeable lack of public input into the actual report-gathering process. Fewer than forty briefs and letters were submitted during the survey, mainly from libraries, regional systems, or educational groups like the Ontario Library Association. Two major groups with conflicting views caught the attention of the provincial government. Some issues, especially unconditional grants, drew attention outside library circles. A new municipal group formed in 1972, the Association of Municipalities of Ontario (AMO), weighed in with its preference to deconditionalize grants. The Association believed that municipalities should have the right to appoint all board members and have the option to dissolve a board and to make it a committee of council. Further, the AMO rejected most of Bowron’s recommendations on county libraries. The AMO would remain vigilant on library questions by issuing reports countering ideas that library groups proposed. Another group, the OLA, also concentrated on funding, primarily increased provincial conditional aid for assessment-poor municipalities as well as capital grants for construction. Yet, the final report had little recognition of OLA’s specific funding suggestions. The MCR was prepared to receive post-report submissions, but the onus was on the OLA and library agencies to assess responses.

Generally, the library community was indecisive and reacted negatively to Bowron’s recommendations. It was felt that the report lacked clear direction, employed a somewhat faulty methodology, covered too broad a spectrum, and was seriously underfunded. Vociferous critics denounced the restructuring of regions, criticized the lack of reference to capital funding, and decried Bowron’s criticism of county library developments before 1974. Bowron had intended to “reduce the number, the types of library authorities, the ways in which members are appointed, to change the term of appointment and other regulations” (p. 69). He pointed out that in 1975, 308 boards were serving less than 10,000 people, a Depression-era number despite thirty years’ counsel about the wisdom of larger units. How would boards react to a change in the method of appointment that might lessen their independence?

The surveyor had made judgements that were difficult to construct a consensus about, i.e., the federated library systems. Meetings within regions often produced conflicting ideas related to coordinated services or the value of centralized processing. In northern Ontario, the achievement of basic service needed proper funding to overcome distances and income disparities, not further study as Bowron advocated. The lack of rationale for the seven federated regions and the complexities of board composition for the new regional entities puzzled observers who had spent most of a decade fostering closer relationships in the existing regional environment. Many trustees felt Bowron’s report did not sufficiently strengthen the PLS. Trustees and librarians were content with encouraging, not legislating, larger units of service.

Bowron’s analysis of pro-forma (non-operating) boards upset many library trustees who relied solely on provincial conditional grants. He had noted their formation in eastern Ontario, the Georgian Bay area, and along Lake Ontario had effectively stalled the creation of union or county boards. Another deficiency raised in the Bowron review was the interconnection with federal libraries and organizations outside the MCR. Public libraries across Canada sought new services supported by the National Library and the new $15 million national science library erected in 1974, the Canada Institute for Scientific and Technical Information. A recurring question during the review process was whether the provincial government would fund recommendations to make services more effective. Planning systems development and networking, automation projects, equitable funding, and revising provincial grants was not inexpensive.

An autumn 1976 session at the OLA’s Toronto annual meeting, “Bowron and Beyond,” agreed that a strengthened provincial library board and the MCR’s lead in networking development was necessary. Some issues, such as the need for standards or guidelines, were not contentious. There was also wide-based agreement on some points, e.g., networking and infrastructure need. But support was tepid: there were too many divisions of opinion and reliance on the status quo to fashion new legislation or fund large projects. Like many government efforts, the Bowron study was consigned to office shelves as current activities and events continued to unfold that diverted interest or steered energies in new directions.

Building consensus and unity was essential because the MCR was a new entity with different policies. The sixties and early seventies had been a search for general public library purpose, structure, and role definition: circulation had surpassed fifty million and almost eight million people were reached. Bowron had emphasized change, but it would be another decade (1984-85) before public library legislation would be entirely revised and a handful of his recommendations, such as the composition and method of trustee appointments, larger regional operations, service to indigenous libraries, strengthened Francophone service, improvements for minorities, and provincial funding for automation, was adopted. In his pursuit for change Bowron was partially successful and, in the long run, the public library benefited the most from his work and ideas.

There is an informative review by E. Stanley Beacock, “The Ontario Public Library: Review and Reorganization,” Library Quarterly 46-4 (Oct. 1976): 452–454

Terrence B. Verity, ed. Libraries at the Crossroads: Proceedings of a Workshop on the Report The Ontario Public Library, Review and Reorganization. Toronto: Ontario Library Association, 1976.

Bowron’s work is the subject of a review in the March 1976 issue of the Ontario Library Review 60, no. 1: 5-10 with a correction in the June issue p. 116.

A subsequent provincial study by Peter Bassnett, issued in 1982, is the subject of a previous blog. He studied many of the same issues which led to a new library act proclaimed in 1985 that remains the basis for current public libraries in Ontario.

Saturday, January 21, 2023

Review — Project Progress: A Study of Canadian Public Libraries, 1981

Project Progress: A Study of Canadian Public Libraries. Prepared for the Canadian Library Association and its division the Canadian Association of Public Libraries by Urban Dimensions Group Inc. Toronto, Canada. Ottawa: Canadian Library Association, January 1981. 120 p., ill. Issued in French as: Projet progrès.

My review first appeared with shorter text in Canadian Public Administration vol. 26, no. 2 (June 1983): 315-316 as follows.

. . . . .

In 1979 the Toronto-based Urban Dimensions Group Inc. was commissioned by the Canadian Library Association to study problems confronting public libraries in Canada. The group’s report, Project Progress, identifies a number of issues affecting libraries in a national context, and offers practical data as well as recommendations to respond to these challenges. Implicit in this survey is a muted call to action. Yet, in the introduction, the CLA Steering Committee members offer a guarded forecast: “the future is before us.”

There are good reasons to be wary. Consider a few results from the 1979/80 general survey of libraries presented in chapter three:
51.8 per cent of service points are open less than 20 hours a week
38.4 per cent of service points circulate less than 50,000 items per year
89.3 per cent of service points lent less than 250 books a year to other libraries
64.3 per cent of service points operate on less than $50,000 annually
77.1 per cent of libraries employ no full-time qualified public service librarians
94.6 per cent of libraries employ no full-time qualified librarians in technical services
84.0 per cent of libraries employ no administrative or “other” librarians
46.0 per cent of service points are less than 1,000 sq. ft. in size
41.3 per cent of service points hold less than 10,000 volumes
19.0 per cent of service points have no catalogue access to their collections
32.0 per cent of service points offer children’s programs/story hours
Is this progress? It is disquieting to learn that eighty years after the introduction of children’s programming in Canada less than one-third of our libraries provide story hours. Why? The members of the research team pass over this - and other alarming findings – without much discussion. Perhaps their own doubts about the potential for corrective measures are too firmly established to give palliative comments.

The bleak statistics in Project Progress lead up to a discussion of library cooperation and cost-benefit analysis at the end of chapter three. Project Progress rightfully notes that the existing volume of inter-loan traffic is low, that present national bibliographic information services are “unwieldy,” and that only “little growth or innovation” has occurred since 1972. Given some of the results of the survey above, it is doubtful whether cooperative efforts at resource-sharing will become a widespread activity outside larger urban and suburban communities.

Chapters four and six analyze the education, utilization, training and attitudes of library workers. Project Progress reports that the unionization of libraries is viewed by workers as having little impact. Indeed, the issue of professional status of librarians in relation to management has not been addressed adequately. Project Progress also identifies a possible weakness in library education concerning use of technology to improve services. No doubt library educators will disagree on this issue.

Two further chapters study usage of libraries by the public which incorporate some results appearing in previous surveys made by the federal government in 1975 and 1978. It is noteworthy that a full century after the introduction of free tax-based library services, the question, “Would you favour taxes being increased to cover necessary costs?’ instead of cutbacks, elicits a negative reply from 45 per cent of the respondents (2 per cent greater than those favouring tax increases). Little wonder Project Progress recommends a more explicit market orientation and effective performance measures to support budget requests! Further, it is revealed that people believe libraries are more important to the community (61.5 per cent) than they are personally (42 per cent). The irony is that most professional librarians and staff would agree that they exist to serve the needs of individual users, not communities. Thus it is no surprise that the 1981 Ontario Library Association conference theme was “Libraries Celebrate the Individual.”

Project Progress is the most important single document on public libraries to appear since Libraries in Canada; A Study of Library Conditions and Needs, the report of an inquiry chaired by John Ridington in 1933. In my view, most recommendations offer a sensible basis for further study and action. Nevertheless, there is an essential ingredient missing. Nowhere in Project Progress is there any serious analysis of the political process engulfing public libraries. Although all levels of government formulate policies, the financial realities impinging upon the majority of local municipal units limits the scope for leadership and innovation. The major policy actors – library trustees, librarians, school boards, councillors, interest groups such as library associations, and provincial civil servants – are largely concerned with administrative/internal decisions. In this milieu, political policy-making languishes. An opportunity has been missed to explore the political world of public libraries where detailed administrative expertise is the road to advancement for librarians, and where trustees (and their libraries) suffer low visibility. Because the by-word for action in the fragmented library community is unity, changes are exceedingly difficult to achieve.

Project Progress does close with the conviction that improvements can be implemented by good planning, basically through national or provincial agencies such as CLA. This is a step forward in raising political awareness. Fifty years ago the Ridington report sincerely believed that there was “nothing the national government can do” to create and maintain a national library at Ottawa. Clearly since then public libraries have come to recognize that meaningful rewards can be attained through moderate political action. But constructive changes continue to follow a sporadic course, because little is known about the political environment of libraries.

Postscript

In the mid-1970s, the Canadian Association of Public Libraries decided to conduct a study to ascertain the public library’s effectiveness and provide future recommendations. Unfortunately, this ambitious undertaking eventually raised less than half of the original projected financial goal after five years. CAPL, a small 1,000 plus member section of the Canadian Library Association, hoped a national study would boost decision-making, serve as a basic footprint for planning, and stimulate librarians/libraries to focus on changing societal conditions (especially the importance of information provision). The first three chapters centred on a brief introduction, an explanation of the data and methods, and a description of public library activity. Urban Dimensions examined 1,178 completed library questionnaires from 2,426 service points, conducted 90 personal interviews of library workers from 51 libraries, interviewed 200 people from the general public by telephone, and met with 18 decision-makers. The report concluded with twelve general recommendations, some of which did not appear to come from the data presented in tables and graphs.

The information presented was fairly general and the findings, which blurred the distinction between a library as an organization and the totality of service points. As a result, there was some discouraging reporting on the availability of library services. The report was released at the CLA national conference in Hamilton in June 1981 with some fanfare that future discussions about its recommendations would lead to new directions. However, this prospect did not materialize. A year later, at Saskatoon in 1982, CLA’s sessions on the report made little headway because conference-goers disagreed with some findings, such as the recommendation for professional librarians to form a national body equivalent to a licensing body. Many administrators surmised that the implementation of major recommendations would necessitate local initiatives which might vary across the country. The development of national strategies in a diverse public library community required financial resources that CLA, public libraries, related firms, and foundations were unable to provide. In retrospect, Project Progress was a valiant attempt to assess current strengths and weaknesses and offer guidance for future action; however, the report relied on subsequent activity at the community level and coordinated national leadership which CLA and leading library associations were not able to undertake.

Three additional important reviews:

Jean Tague and Sam D. Neill, “A Critical Review of Project Progress,” Ontario Library Review 66 no. 2 (June 1982): 84-87.

 Katherine H. Packer, compiler, “Project Progress: A Review,” Canadian Library Journal 39 no. 3 (June 1982): 129-133; with a “Reply to the Review” by the researchers, E. B. Harvey, Lorna Marsden, and Anne Woodsworth, 135-137.

S.D. Neill, “Project Progress and Professional Library Education  –  Continuing Education, Management Skills, Management Statistics,” OLA Expression 3 no. 4 (Winter 1982): 19-21.

Monday, August 15, 2022

Review — Ontario Public Libraries: The Provincial Role in a Triad of Responsibilities, 1982

Ontario Public Libraries: The Provincial Role in a Triad of Responsibilities. The Report of the Ontario Public Libraries Programme Review for the Minister of Citizenship and Culture. Toronto: Ministry of Citizenship and Culture, 1982. Executive Co-Ordinator, Peter J. Bassnett. Tables and appendices; xxxiii, 318 pp.

In September 1980, Ontario’s Minister of Culture and Recreation (MCR), Reuben Baetz, met with the Ontario Public Library Council (OPLC) to announce a two-year Public Libraries Programme Review (OPLPR). Scarborough’s chief librarian, Peter Bassnett, would be the director and work with a small intermediary group at the outset to plan the review process. Since 1975 he had been chief librarian at Scarborough. Before this appointment, he had managed systems at North York and worked in the UK for many years. The Minister believed a positive approach with abundant consultation would improve the delivery of library services throughout Ontario. The 1970s had been a time of controversy about the role of regional library services, the accountability of library boards, disputes with municipal authorities, the funding provided for libraries by the provincial government, and dissenting viewpoints about policies for future planning. A previous report on provincial libraries by Albert Bowron in 1975 had produced much discussion but no significant legislative changes. Revised public library legislation was the major objective because the older statute, enacted in 1966, had not proved to be as effective as originally expected.

The OPLPR established fifteen groups in search of consensus and solutions for many contentious issues. Some groups explored general provincial concerns: policy and social purpose (1), general delivery of services (2), governmental liaison (3), provincial financing and accountability (4), and field services (5). Task groups on planning and development for technological potential (6), electronic information (13), and co-operatives and processing centres (15) addressed technical and networking questions. Special considerations for northern Ontario (7), publishing and libraries (12), and access to resources (14) required separate groups. Finally, four groups studied cultural identities and services for French languages (8), Native services (9), multicultural programs (10), and disabled persons (11). Each group was responsible for a report to Peter Bassnett, who was charged with publishing a final report. In addition, Bassnett held 20 open sessions for discussion and received 368 briefs encompassing a wide variety of issues.

The OPLPR sets its course for a year-and-a-half with the knowledge that the Progressive Conservatives under William Davis had finally secured a majority government in a March 1981 election. Four years would be sufficient to develop new legislation for libraries. The OPLPR submitted seventy-five recommendations by August 1982. By then, there was a new Minister, Bruce McCaffrey, in charge, and, earlier in the year, in February 1982, the MCR had become the Ministry of Citizenship and Culture, with its Library and Community (MCZC) Information Branch relocated in the Arts, Heritage and Libraries division.

The OPLPR report, Ontario Public Libraries: The Provincial Role in a Triad of Responsibilities, was issued, mostly in microfiche to the consternation of many, by autumn 1982 for review by library boards, politicians, and librarians. The Bassnett report made clear-cut statements that cut across the entire spectrum of public library services. It found that the current provincial role performed by the LCIB or OPLC was deficient (p. 68–71). The Report indicated more specific legislation and guidelines were required (p. 93). Lack of awareness about the LCIB and OPLC and their inadequate authority had stalled communication and led to ineffectual provincial leadership. A strengthening of provincial direction within the Ministry through an enlarged staff component to plan and liaise with the library community was essential. A Public Library Services Division and a new advisory body would be required (rec. 7.72 and 7.73). Other recommendations for increased staff for data collection, French-language service, networking, services for disabled persons, aboriginal services, multicultural activity, management, and training responsibilities (p. 168–187) would permit the MCZC to deal with policies that it brought forward. Some ideas originated from background studies or were influenced by general developments such as the 1981 United Nations International Year of Disabled Persons theme ‘Full Participation and Equality.’ Assistance for non-professional staff, mostly untrained persons in charge of small libraries, was an important issue, the subject of one lengthy submission from an ad hoc group of consultants. In one case, the Task Force on Native Services, the main thrust urging the formation of a Council to oversee library services for natives at an estimated $290,000, was disregarded because the group insisted on working outside the framework of the LCIB. The OPLPR’s recommendations on northern Ontario conditions mostly bypassed the ideas from Task group 15 headed by Richard Jones, director of North Central region.

During the Programme Review, the regional role—now retitled the intermediary role—was gradually reshaped. A Network Development Office was transferred to the Ministry offices in July 1981 and some LCIB staff worked on a provincial study of union products for resource sharing in regional systems. The OPLPR was wary of multiple regional processing centres and bibliographic databanks. Task force 15 had recommended the Midwestern Region centre become a Crown Corporation. Instead, the OPLPR (p. 164–167) followed the Ministry’s internal report that recommended further study of Midwestern’s possibilities. A new path was clarified: automation and cooperative area networks were to become local level responsibilities supplemented with planning and financial assistance offered by the Province. Centralized regional acquisitions and processing utilities would no longer receive support. The Programme Review recommended intermediary involvement with basic services, such as rotating book collections, staff training, special collections, reference centres, programming for groups, and direct service to municipally unorganized populations. Some briefs authored by administrative groups emphasized long-standing issues such as resource libraries and centralized processing, but these positions were not conclusive. The key point was the Review’s statement that the intermediary role “is an extension of the Provincial Government’s responsibility and role in the delivery of public library services across Ontario” and that there were currently three types of regional service, “the northern, southern, and Metropolitan Toronto area” (p. 147–148). Northern distinctions warranted more proactive provincial library intermediaries. The southern systems were more complex, so the Review recommended a gradual phase-in over five years to one provincial agency with field offices, starting with Southwestern, Lake Erie, and Niagara (p.154–159). Metro Toronto required amendments to the Municipality of Metropolitan Toronto Act to repeal the Metro Library Board’s status as a regional library system and to authorize more sitting Metro Council members for the upper-level board. Provincial funding for the Metro Board would need an examination to determine what special purposes the province wanted to accomplish with its legislative payments (p. 160–164).

At the local level, the OPLPR made forty-two recommendations clarifying functions and management. Several recommendations would eventually make their way into the revised Library Act almost three years later in 1985. In place of standards, boards should embark on community analysis; boards should provide services their communities desired or needed; legislation for free entry to libraries and use of materials should be enacted; and services for particular groups (e.g., the disabled and Francophones) should be augmented with provincial assistance. Capital funds should be made available because only a few libraries had shared in the brief Wintario capital construction program in the late 1970s before the government redirected it to other purposes. Funding from programs such as Wintario and the Board of Industrial Leadership was important but episodic. Special funding for the creation of county-regional municipal systems and enrichment of per capita grants to northern libraries was a desideratum. Some recommendations addressed the composition of boards and their relationship with appointing bodies by affording municipal councils more control. The century-old traditional board of nine members, with the majority composed of public and separate school appointees from larger county school boards, was a leftover from the 1960s restructuring of school authorities. Now, municipal councils should make all the appointments (p. 116). In summarizing the provincial conditional grant to libraries, the Review found little change over ten years: the 1971 grant had totalled $8,552 million (20% of total support), and in 1981, $25,279 million (19% of total support). The Bassnett report recommended continuing payment of annual grants directly to boards. On the issue of non-operating boards, currently in 136 communities, the Report recommended the grant be paid only if municipal revenue matched its grant (p. 132–135). This policy, along with the promotion of larger units of service in counties and upper-tier municipalities, had the potential to halve the total number of boards.

The Bassnett report concluded by drafting a policy statement regarding public library service (p. 188–192). Ultimately, provincial goals should be:
▪ provision of public library legislation ensuring deww access and delivery of services;
▪ encouragement and support for municipal libraries;
▪ ensuring library collections reflect the population characteristics of their jurisdictions;
▪ encouragement and assistance for technological changes;
▪ development of a province-wide public information utility by networking municipal libraries; and
▪ provision of funding and staff support to achieve these goals.

The cost of expanding provincial support was not expensive: Task Group 4 estimated a 10.5% increase from $25.7 million to $28.5 million (p. 194). At the former regional levels, expenses could be reduced by 40 percent and be redirected to augment the proposed public library service division. In terms of the Public Libraries Act, the OPLPR recommended a complete overhaul. In response to the OPLPR, Bruce McCaffrey announced at the November 1982 Ontario Library Association conference in Toronto that his Ministry preferred to issue a ‘green paper’ for more discussion without any specific commitment to action, A Foundation for the Future/Réalitiés et Perspectives. This ‘green paper,’ released in December 1982, would form the basis for legislative changes. In February 1983, Wil Vanderelst, from the MCZC policy secretariat, became the new director of the LCIB, now shifted to the Ministry’s Culture and Regional Services Division. While the Ontario Public Libraries report had sought consensus on many issues, in fact, its author, Peter Bassnett, expressed dissatisfaction with the ‘green paper’ in the Toronto Star in May 1983. He felt many of his recommendations had been passed over or modified. Such was the fate of many recommendations in the OPLPR: finding consensus in the library community was an uncommonly difficult task.

There were, however, positive outcomes of the OPLPR. Municipal councils gained more control over library board appointments, thus ending a decade-long struggle. Free access to a variety materials became an important feature of new legislation enacted in 1985. The Province reiterated its support for conditional grants paid directly to library boards. The conflict and confusion about regional library boards was reduced when the province took control of southern and northern ‘intermediary’ services and began to deliver targeted policies, such as Francophone concerns, disabled programs, and improved service to indigenous communities. The review, which appeared at the same time when ‘turnkey systems’ were beginning to provide integrated solutions for library functions, proposed extensive automation projects be supported by provincial studies (p. 166). The idea of equalization of services addressed on large geographic scale came firmly into play. In fact, after almost four decades, very few changes have been made to the original 1984–85 legislation; again, one of the accomplishments that may be traced to the Bassnett report.