The Library in the Twenty‐first Century

This new edition of Peter Brophy's well known text, which first appeared in 2000, is much to be welcomed. In reviewing the first edition (for a different journal), I commented that the book deserved to be read by anyone with an interest in the future of libraries, and that it was essential reading both for practising library managers and for students of librarianship and information science. I believe that the same holds true for the new edition.

Brophy tells us in his preface that the new edition is a “wholesale rewriting”, rather than an updating, and a comparison of the editions shows this to be true. It is refreshing when an author is able to take the time and effort to do this, rather than to rely on the additions and tweakings which characterise many “new editions”. Nonetheless, he also tells us that what he wrote in the preface of the first edition remains valid, and the structure of the editions is similar. The basics of the situation he describes have not changed, though he acknowledges the great of amount of change, particularly technological development, which has occurred in the interim. He summarises the overall message as being that “libraries have survived – some have prospered – but most remain under threat from new technologies, new ways of working and, sadly, sometimes from neglect”.

The book is divided into two parts, under the general headings of “What is a library?” and “Future libraries”, respectively.

The first part includes a number of different perspectives on what a library is, has been and – to an introductory extent – will be. It includes six chapters, the first being a general introduction to modern libraries, and the second encompassing a brief survey of each of the various sectors of librarianship: national, academic, public, school and workplace. The latter, encompassing what were previously termed “special libraries” – arguably still a better term – is the weakest of the set, and does not fully capture, even in this summary form, the issues of these kinds of information services.

The next chapter is a consideration of general models for a library: as collection, as organiser of resource sharing, as provider of access, and as an “embedded” or “immersive” information environment. These are all rather general conceptual models, and expressed solely in words, but nonetheless provide an interesting starting point for more detailed analysis.

There is then an account of professional association viewpoints, based on a series of position papers and the like from the Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals (UK), the American Library Association, the Society of College, National and University Libraries (UK), the Society of Chief Librarians (England and Wales), and the higher education Quality Control Agency (UK). It may be felt that a wider, and more international, representation here might have been helpful.

There follows an analysis of the development of digital libraries, and a account of performance measures and quality management which help to answer the question “what is a good library?”.

Together, these chapters give a give a generally clear and insightful overview, centred on the UK with some limited international perspective. Perhaps, surprisingly, there is little discussion of the education and training of librarians, and the “profession's view” does not encompass much from the library education or research community.

The second part of the book also includes six chapters. These deal with: users, and how they can be “linked” to resources, with the library acting as intermediary; library functions beyond the intermediary role; a more detailed account of user issues; an account of the developing “information universe”, touching on a wide variety of issues, from Web 2.0 to open access to metadata formats to global information policies; with a final concluding and summary. The last includes the suggestion that libraries must move from being “user‐centred” to being “lifeflow‐centred”, fitting “each service encounter into the user's personal interests”.

All this is well argued and convincingly written. There hangs over it all, however, the question of how long the library's role as an intermediary between users and information resources – which Brophy suggests is still the library's most important role – will remain relevant, or even acceptable, when the “Google generation” become a major user group.

This is an excellent book. A nice complement to Facet's other recent offering in this area (Chowdhury et al., 2008) – though the latter is much more of a “straightforward” student text – it provides an excellent overview of libraries, suitable for students and reflective practitioners alike.