This paper presents an analysis of how library professionals in Sweden and Denmark perceive the democratic role of the library profession in the polarised political landscape of today. Relating to research on the democratic role of libraries, professional ethics and cultural policies, empirical data was gathered through seven group interviews with library professionals from eleven local libraries in south Sweden and Jutland in Denmark. Results indicate a commonly perceived discrepancy between general formulations of values found in professional codes of ethics, and practical librarianship. Dealing with threats and challenges against liberal democratic values in the public library requires professional ethical considerations that in individual cases may question the need for value-neutrality among library professionals if the basic democratic mission of the library is to be upheld.

This paper reports from a study produced within the currently ongoing project Public libraries in a changed political landscape – a democratic mission for a new era? The paper compares experiences of librarians and library assistants in Sweden and Denmark concerning how they perceive the democratic role of the library profession in the political landscape of today. Relating to research on the democratic role of libraries, library ethics and issues on neutrality, empirical data was gathered through seven group interviews with library professionals from eleven local libraries in south Sweden and Jutland in Denmark. Results indicate a commonly perceived discrepancy between general formulations of values formulated in professional codes of ethics, and practical librarianship. Dealing with threats and challenges against liberal democratic values in the public library requires an ethical toolbox that in individual cases may question the need for value-neutrality among librarians and library assistants if the basic mission of the library is to be upheld.

In 2015, the United Nations adopted a program of principles, Agenda 2030, to create a more sustainable world and better the living conditions for people. In this ambition, culture plays a crucial role. As such, the world goals seem to be an obvious topic for Danish public libraries, but this has not been the case until recently.

This study is based on a mixed-method approach including document studies, semi-structured interviews, and participation in a practitioners’ conference. It finds that Danish librarians strive to make the world goals comprehensible and articulate the parent institution as local communicators. Libraries are shown to be correctives to current commercial structures, but apart from this display great variation in how far the various libraries are advanced in their sustainable transformation.

The study concludes that public libraries inform citizens about the ambition of the world goals as a starting point for adjustments in the citizens’ actions. Public libraries have ventured into unknown territory, where previous practices do not hold much status. Many library professionals lack this awareness, which is necessary for our understanding of the United Nations world goals as a library policy task.

Die Vereinten Nationen verabschiedeten 2015 ein Grundsatzprogramm, die Agenda 2030, um eine nachhaltigere Welt zu schaffen und die Lebensbedingungen der Menschen zu verbessern. Dabei spielt die Kultur eine entscheidende Rolle. Dieses Ziel der UN scheint erwiesenermaßen ein Thema für dänische Öffentliche Bibliotheken zu sein, was bis vor Kurzem aber nicht der Fall war.

Diese Studie basiert auf einem gemischten Methodenansatz, der Dokumentenstudien, halbstrukturierte Interviews und die Teilnahme an einer Praxiskonferenz umfasst. Es wird festgestellt, dass dänische Bibliothekare bestrebt sind, die Ziele der UN verständlich zu machen und die übergeordnete Institution als lokalen Kommunikator zu betonen. Bibliotheken erweisen sich als Korrektive zu aktuellen kommerziellen Strukturen, weisen darüber hinaus aber große Unterschiede hinsichtlich des Fortschritts der verschiedenen Bibliotheken bei ihrer nachhaltigen Transformation auf.

Die Studie kommt zu dem Schluss, dass Öffentliche Bibliotheken ihre Bürger über die Ambitionen der Weltziele der UN informieren und als Ausgangspunkt für Anpassungen im Handeln der Bürger dienen. Öffentliche Bibliotheken haben sich daher auf unbekanntes Terrain gewagt, auf dem die bisherigen Praktiken keinen großen Stellenwert besaßen. Vielen Bibliotheksmitarbeitern fehlt jedoch dieses Bewusstsein, das für unser Verständnis der Weltziele der Vereinten Nationen als bibliothekspolitische Aufgabe notwendig ist.

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to investigate what democratic challenges the digitisation of thepublic libraries in Denmark has entailed. Using the concepts from a national library professional strategyfrom 2012, an analysis of 9 librarians’ experiences with digital dissemination in practice is conducted.

Design/methodology/approach – The paper is a part of a larger research project called “If digitisationis the answer, then what was the question?”. This sub study builds on the semi-structured interviews withlibrary staff members, case-descriptions of two central providers of digital public library materials, as well asliterature studies of missions, vision and strategies from different public library policy institutions. To framethe study, a literature review has been conducted.

Findings – The author detects the presence of several incompatible conditions in digital dissemination.These conditions are predominantly of an organisational nature, potentially containing major consequencesfor citizens’ free and equal access to information, knowledge and culture. Among other things, the Danishpublic libraries risk substantiating an already existing and problematic polarisation between technologicallycapable and incapacitated groups of people.

Originality/value – The digital transformation of society has only just begun. Therefore, it is important toexamine the consequences of the transition to digital media types for central cultural institution such as thepublic libraries. The present study is an early and minor contribution to the illumination of a processrequiring many more and large-scale studies.

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to investigate what con`sequences the digitisation of publiclibraries’ knowledge dissemination and the transition to online services has, for library staff members’perception of their skills. This discussion is interesting because library staff members, by politicians,stakeholders, and other opinion makers, have been appointed as key facilitators of citizens’ continuedattachment to civil society and the labour market.

Design/methodology/approach – This study is based on interviews with library staff members atDanish public libraries. Empirical data were collected through semi-structured e-mail interviews, basedon an interview formula, and via follow-up telephone conversations. Library professional rapports andresearch literature were identified and applied as a theoretical framework in the creation of theanalytical apparatus.

Findings – There were several different explanatory models available when respondents had to articulatetheir current challenges. The first model regarded the library staff members’ lack of skills as a political-organisational issue, occurring because of a lack of invest in their continuing education. Continuing educationhad therefore become a personal matter. The second model highlighted the library staff members’ lack ofskills as an individual, library professional problem, where the responsibility for solving the problem lay withthe individual employee.

Originality/value – Several studies have been conducted on library staff members’ skills and how theychange, due to the transition to digital forms of dissemination. The present study strives to give employees avoice, which is why the respondents’ experiences are the starting point for the analytical work. Such studiesare essential to understanding the extent and nature of the problem

Public libraries have a societal duty to promote the peaceful coexistence between population and are therefore involved in integration work. However, the question is whether the integration perspective is suitable for addressing current issues or if other perspectives are more adequate. To study this, I conducted a literature review of published articles on Scandinavian public libraries’ integration work, six semi-structured interviews with male asylum seekers and an email interview with the chief operations officer at three asylum reception centres in Denmark. Using a lifelong learning perspective, I was able to consider the six asylum seekers’ experiences with integration in new ways. It became evident how integration is an ambiguous concept, and how the integration process does not constitute temporary phases but rather initiates lifelong learning processes, just like the activities native Danes conducts in their efforts to handle their lives in late modernity. The lifelong learning perspective probably cannot replace the integration perspective, but it may help us understand which activities are appropriate for public libraries to engage in. The public libraries’ task is not to assimilate, but to promote new citizens’ opportunities for peaceful coexistence by facilitating people’s participation in society.

Introduction: The starting point for this article is the assumption that librarians who participate in integration activities not only activate their institutional values and LIS skills (Schreiber & Elbeshausen, 2006) but are also always personally involved. In a study conducted in spring 2019, I demonstrated how a major change in Danish society's administrative structures again directed the public libraries' focus toward rationalisation and efficiency processes and reshaped the relationship between the librarian and the public. Consequently, the reform led to larger but fewer library units, digitisation and higher levels of self-service. This contrasts with the focus on integration work that preceded 2008. However, integration work has not disappeared but exists in a transformed edition.

Methods: This article is based on two different approaches: a study of different theoretical perspectives on librarians' skills, as well as two semi-structured interviews (Brinkmann, 2013; King & Horrocks, 2012, pp. 35, 49-53). The first interview was conducted with an integration librarian mid-January 2019 and represents the main empirical findings. The second one was conducted in a series of interviews with asylum seekers at the end of July 2018. The latter interview function as a supplement. Ten research and dissemination articles on the evolution of the librarian profession concerning integration were verified and reviewed. I use these articles’ theoretical and practical observations to substantiate the analytical model I developed in the spring of 2019 – and apply it to analyses of the above-mentioned interview.

Findings: In my model, the librarians’ skills are placed in a field of tension between the librarian as generalist and specialist (horizontal axis) and between the librarian's professional skills (vertical axis). The analysis shows that the integration librarian is professional and uses both her generalist and specialist skills when involved in integration activities, e.g. facilitating individuals or communities by applying search and dissemination skills. Furthermore, the analyses show a deep, personal commitment. The integration librarian's professionalism systematically ensures equal treatment of individuals, while personal involvement means a commitment far beyond the LIS domain.

Conclusion: My study shows that the integration librarian is professionally involved in integration activities and uses both generalist and specialist skills to assist individuals and communities of other ethnic origins in their everyday life. Additionally, the integration librarian evinces a deep sense of personal engagement – with the benefits and challenges this entails. 

In an increasingly networked society, citizens expect to participate in open negotiations of what is right and proper whenever civil servants are about to make decisions affecting their specific life conditions. This expectation challenges the self-understanding that has hitherto been a part of contesting a public office. According to Schreiber and Elbeshausen, civil servants can react in different ways whenever their identities are up for discussion: 

1. They can struggle to maintain a monopoly of knowledge and practice in an effort to protect the practice field, e.g. against outside theories, methods and knowledge, 

2. They can adopt a laissez-faire approach and provide the public with what they want, whereby their relationship is commercialised, or 

3. They can engage in dialogues with the public to jointly negotiate what functions they are expected to perform (2005, pp. 15–16). 

In Scandinavian public libraries, the latter has been the case. During recent decades, citizens have gained more possibilities than ever before to participate in co-creating activities regarding public libraries’ raison d’être. Thereby, they enter realms that were previously reserved for professional practitioners. Library staff, conversely, increasingly become facilitators of the participation of the citizens. This raises the question what competences is required of library staff to meet this role. More specifically, what is required for them, i.e. to both contemplate the needs and wants of a more diverse and participating public and at the same time engage in negotiations about the framework for the fulfilment of these needs and wants. In this chapter, I provide a characterisation of thesocietal development which caused the shifts in the relationship between the public and library staff, with the aim of discussing the resulting need for a redefinition of library competence.

Introduction. Since the 1960s, intensified migration movements have changed the nation-states’ cultural composition, and this is why integration efforts have increasingly been targeting newcomers. In 2007, a reform of the public administration in Denmark entered into force and the purpose of this article is to initiate an investigation of what this initiative has meant for the integration work in public libraries.

Method. The article is based on selected research articles and reports on the changing missions, visions, and objectives of Danish public libraries and subsequently used as a theoretical framework for the analysis of an interview with an integration librarian.

Findings. The Structural Reform changed the public library paradigm and promoted an administration perspective that focuses on the public’s existing knowledge of libraries, requiring an upgrade of librarians as teachers to make library use more efficient. Vice versa, the integration perspective is based on target groups’ ignorance of the library and this is why integration activities strive to create equality through compensatory discrimination. This ambition requires initiatives to be personalised and an interest in target groups’ preferences.

Conclusion. When the professional attention shifted from compensatory discrimination to formalised education, the public libraries’ raison d’être was changed, too.