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No 18 - The public libraries as a meeting place in the digital age

by Hilde Ljødal

What position do the public libraries occupy in people’s everyday lives, and how is the library used as public meeting place?  How does the Internet influence people’s social life and their use of the library as a communal space?  These are some of the questions that Hilde Kristin Ljødal examines in her dissertation “The Public Library as a public meeting place in the digital age – a qualitative investigation”, for her Sivilbibliotekar (Master) Study Programme at Oslo University College in 2004.

In the introduction to her dissertation, Hilde Ljødal states: 
This work will examine the degree of importance of the public library in its role as a public, physical meeting place in the digital age.  During my many years working as a librarian I have lived through the rapid technological and social developments that have taken place over the past two decades.  It is  natural, therefore, to speculate on the direction in which the public library will develop in the future.  According to the Norwegian Media Barometer, four out of every ten people use the Internet on a daily basis, showing an increase in the use on an average day from 7% in 1997 to 42% in 2003 (Norwegian Media Barometer 2003).  Our society is becoming ever more dependent on electronic  technology, and more segmentedand segregated.  More and more aspects of our lives are affected by information technology – our professional and private lives, our work and leisure, at school and in education. 

One of the main conclusions of the Report “Power and Democracy in the Media”is that government by a representative majority has been weakened at all levels.  The power of local politicians has been diminished and in the population at large there is a general lack of interest in the political system.  Political parties are losing members, and there is a lower level of participation in organisations generally.

Globalisation is gaining power at the expense of the local decision making processes, while at the same time there has been a rise in the power of the courts (Østerud 2003).  From a rational and logical perspective, the developments that have led to this point may appear random, but it is a worrying fact that these same developments sometimes run counter to accepted basic ideals of humanity and society.  The question arises whether in an digital age there continues to be a need for public libraries and whether these have a future as a pluralistic, public sphere for our society.

During spring 2003 I attended a course on Information Economy, and was as a consequence inspired to investigate an aspect involving library and society as a topic for a future dissertation.  Further inspiration for examining the library in a sociological context was derived from the follow-up seminar held during autumn 2003, which was linked with Oslo University College’s project “The new Deichman” and the role of the public library in the 21st century.

Some of the presentations discussed during the course of the follow-up seminar dealt with the role and importance of large city libraries as a physical, public sphere, and others discussed ways in which the Internet can affect the social lives of its users.  What does the public library mean to people in their everyday lives, and to what extent is the library seen as public meeting place?  In library circles it is often asserted that the physical library will gain in importance as a result of new technologies; both new and old users will increasingly discover their local public library as a public arena and meeting place.  At a seminar held during autumn 2003 at Oslo University College on the topic “The role of the public library as an instrument for the creation of active local communities – the multi-cultural library”, the Danish library researcher Dorte Skot-Hansen (2003a) presented a paper on civil society and the role of the public library as a public sphere.  She raised the question whether it is the task of the library to uphold the spirit of the local community.  If the public libraries should indeed concern themselves with the maintenance of civil society, then such tasks must be defined, with new ways of thinking about and quantifying the functions of the library as a public, social sphere.

In concrete terms, very little is known about the importance of the library as a public sphere in society, and the term “library as a meeting place” is often used in differing contexts across the library field.  At an internal library seminar, for example, the project leader of the Deichman Library proclaimed the “The New Deichman at Vestbanen - a physical meeting place and a digital library” (Voronel 2003).  The “meeting place” receives mention in various departmental and public statements, and several public libraries talk of the meeting place function in their annual reports and action plans. However, the notion of a meeting place is nowhere properly defined.  There is no provision for the term in the Library Act, and the concept is complex and not self-explanatory.  The word “democracy” is also not directly referred to in the Library Act, although its Statement of Objectives indicates that the institution has significance for democracy in Norwegian society.  It is maintained that the library should be for the use of all, but arguments continually put forward in the library debate decry the role of the library as a “weather shelter” or a “gossip house”.

The motivation behind this study is a desire to search out what truly lies behind the notion of the library as a meeting place, and what the meaning  implies when viewed from different perspectives.  Against this background I wanted to investigate more closely which qualities and/or conditions stimulate the function of a meeting place.  What types of meeting occur?  How are they created?  How are the meetings seen from the point of view of the librarians who are responsible for the provision of library services?  What is the standpoint of the users and of the key individuals who co-operate with the library and, lastly, what is the perspective of the politicians who share in the allocation of resources and stipulate the structural framework of library operations?  The growth of the information society, the so-called “network society”, the increased reliance on electronic technology, and the multi-cultural society, combine to strengthen the need for new arguments and strategic planning to reinforce the public library and thereby the future of democracy.

Issues for consideration

• What is the importance of the public library as a public, physical meeting place in the digital age?
• How do the meetings originate and what is their importance?
• Which challenges do these issues pose for the public library as a cornerstone of the local community, against the background of ongoing developments in electronic technology and in society?

In order to investigate these questions, I carried out a qualitative case study, interviewing librarians, consultants and library users of the Deichman Library at its branches in Majorstuen and in Torshov in Oslo.  In addition, I interviewed key local community individuals and local politicians in the districts of Frogner and Sagene in the city.

What is a public library?

The Statement of Objectives of the Library Act states that “Public libraries shall be responsible for promoting knowledge, education and other cultural activities by providing access to information and by making available books and other suitable material, free of charge, to everyone residing in Norway.  Each library shall in its services to children and adults stress the importance of providing high-quality, comprehensive and up-to-date material.  Library activities shall be directed towards the public and the services shall be publicised.  Public libraries are part of a national library system” (The Norwegian Library Act 1985).

According to Duvold (2001, p. 172), a public library is a building (a “sphere”) containing books, and there is at least one of these in every commune in Norway.  The public library can be seen as a) a physical public sphere in the community, b) a collection of documents, and c) a social and cultural institution.

In addition, with each public library goes a librarian;  regardless of which of the three models is chosen for consideration, the library becomes meaningless without its librarian.  The most common view of a library is model b), i.e. that it is a collection of documents, a place that people turn to in order to use, borrow and/or read documents.  From this perspective, the central elements are the documents and the public’s use of these.  This perspective changes in the case of model c), where the library is seen as a social institution.  Here the focus is on the importance of the public library as an institution related, for example, to the value people put upon it as a societal institution, as a cultural institution or an educational institution.  User satisfaction with the provision of services and assistance belongs to this category.  Model a) presents a third perspective which views the library as a public sphere.  From this perspective, the public library assumes an important role as one of the few remaining public meeting places in society (Sennett 1977).

What is a meeting place and what is a meeting?

Karen Zahle defines cultural activities and hence meeting places as “themes directly related to the inhabitants lives, in order to draw them closer to each other and thus reinforce their belongings to the place and to a social entity” (Zahle 1994, p. 30, quoted in Carlsson and Persson 2001, p. 14).  According to her, these cultural activities stem from a structure in human lives, a structure that consists of 1) “the point”, or the starting point for every individual, which is the home, 2) “the line”, or a form of physical communication path as for instance a lift, a road, or a local transportation network which leads an individual towards other individuals, and 3) “the place”, or the “interface” where individuals meet.  It is this latter that is synonymous with a meeting place.  It may consist of a piece of ground, a room, a building, a number of buildings, a city district, or a city.  From a philosophical perspective, Aristotle depicts “the place” as a precondition for all existence (Greve 1998, p. 33, quoted in Akman 2002, p. 99).  Akman (2002) states in an article about different aspects of the townscape and urbanism that “the place” is a part of the human experience, and therefore has associated importance and values.  

This human aspect should also be emphasised in our understanding of what constitutes a place, although material circumstances such as its extent and limits will underlie the interpretation.  Excepting these natural preconditions, the concept of a place is created by humans.  The place exists in space, and the organisation and partition of different places are undertaken by human beings to satisfy our biological and social needs, and not least a psychological need to create order.  The concept of a place implies that there is something “outside” (cf. inside/outside for example the Garden of Eden), and furthermore that people or things may find themselves in the “right” or the “wrong” place, depending on which values and norms are associated with the place. 

A meeting is an abstract concept, often with many different dimensions, and the search for an understanding of what lies behind the idea can rapidly lead to philosophical contemplation.  It is not necessary for a meeting to take place by means of words or any form of verbal communication;  a meeting can occur through body language, images, or two people passing one another.  It has proved difficult to find literature and research which provide an in-depth analysis of what a meeting really implies.  The term does not appear to have been investigated within the communication sciences.  It is possible, however, to categorise different types of meetings according to the different roles adopted by the individual.   A meeting may be linked to various every-day pursuits such as education, leisure time, work, or the Internet.  A meeting may happen by chance, with individuals coming across each other accidentally, or they may be planned and structured, with a set agenda and a predetermined venue.  Meetings can also be conscious or unconscious, and the degree of intensity during a meeting can vary.  Examples of low-intensity meetings could be reading the newspaper side by side, exercising together, or sitting in a café without necessarily communicating.  Society is becoming more segmented, and we spend large parts of our lives in high-intensity venues in our own different sectors, such as at the workplace, at school, in politics and in various organisations.  In the high-intensity venues we do not meet “the others”;  you will not find Conservative voters in Blitz. And yet democracy presupposes the existence of low-intensity meeting places where we can meet across sector boundaries, permitting a view of one’s own allegiances, interests and values from the outside, and a recognition that values and interests other than one’s own exist (Audunson 2003).

Structure of the publication

Chapter 2 presents theories and various library researches which are regarded as relevant in the examination of the importance of the public library as a public sphere.  Chapter 3 discusses the methodology and the basic premises for the investigation, followed in Chapter 4 by an analysis of the interviews, making sense of these and reaching an opinion, a comparative analysis of the empirical data, a theory and a discussion.  To finish, Chapter 5 contains the conclusions.

The theories upon which the publication is based are linked to the specialist fields of sociology and political science.

The theories of critical publicity and of democracy present relevant and fundamental perspectives when analyses are to be carried out of a public social institution such as a public library which provides information, sources of knowledge, and culture. The public library is anchored to democratic principles through the Library Act (1985), whose Statement of Objectives provides that “...books and other suitable material (are to be made available), free of charge, to everyone residing in Norway”.  It is also a provision of the Act that all communes in Norway have a duty to operate a public library.

The library concerns everyone, directly or indirectly, and can be said to be among the most public and most frequently used cultural institutions in our society.  Because there is a public library in every commune, they represent an important point of access for social, physical and political involvement in society.  The Norwegian library system has long traditions of co-operation with various organisations at both the local, regional and national levels.  The public libraries can be said to be public in several meanings of the word, and with this in mind it is natural to link them to the theories of critical publicity and of democracy.

Chapter 5  
Conclusions:  Co-action, co-operation, democracy building

The interviews presented a rich and varied picture of the public library as a public meeting place.  The notion of the “library as a meeting place”, far from being self-explanatory as may appear to be the case when it is used in library debates, in public reports, or in the stated visions or action plans of individual public libraries, should rather be seen as one of the  functions of the library, and one with many different facets.  It makes more sense to talk of the function of the meeting place, since the discussion is then directed at one of the activities that takes place in the library, in line with other library activities as for instance user guidance and book lending.  On direct questioning about what they felt lay behind the term, none of the interviewees attempted to formulate a fixed definition of the library as a meeting place, a fact that illustrates some of the complexity and diversity of the concept.  The function of the meeting place has been insufficiently promoted, and yet its societal importance is such that it should not be permitted to remain an “invisible” library service.

This is precisely why a general raising of awareness and promotion of the role and status of the library as a public sphere is needed, in a society where democracy is said to be atrophying and individual citizens increasingly “bowl alone” (Putnam 1995).By employing Skot-Hansen’s model of different approaches to the concept of the civil society and different spheres in the library, I was able to develop a method of analysis that enabled me to place a selection of the libraries’ activities and initiatives within different spheres/venues.  The model would enable me to discover which different spheres were used, the value these had for the participants, and which synergistic effects they had for other participants, and beyond that for democracy and society as a whole.

The interviews also revealed how the meeting places are created, the key words being co-operation and co-action between the different levels of competence in different areas, and reaching across the professions and sectors, in the two districts of the city. This was emphasised strongly by the heads of libraries, several of the librarians, and was also remarked upon by the politicians.  By interrogating the various initiatives via the matrix, it is possible to establish the potential of the library as a stimulus for different initiatives to create differing and necessary public spheres.  The study shows that meetings not initially planned with this particular aim in mind, as for instance a meeting between the “Senior Surfers” and young people in Majorstuen, led to a spontaneous, unplanned meeting across the generations, centred on a common interest in computing.  This in turn generated an expansion of the structured, planned meeting place which became formalised into more structured meetings, where young people assisted their elders.  A synergistic effect was achieved between two polar groups – the younger and older generations – which is an essential element from the perspective of democracy building.  A similar statement can be made about the project in Torshov Library, where older people and children meet across the generations and across culture, exchanging and discussing memories of happenings in recent history.  Several of the library initiatives are furthering the integration of foreign language citizens into Norwegian society, helping to break their sense of isolation.  Beyond this, such initiatives are important at a social level.  With the help of the analysis, examples are also provided of the importance of the library as a catalyst in strengthening identity in the local community and in a variety of learning processes across a wide spectrum.  Several of the meeting places serve to help in building up the long-term involvement of individuals, as for instance in the activities of the Girls’ Group and in the language teaching to women of minority groups in Torshov.

The library as a meeting place opens the door for “legitimate peripheral participation”; you are free to sit alone and read the paper in the newspaper corner year in year out, or you can begin a conversation with other newspaper readers.  Perhaps you will join the University of the Third Age because you are interested in the lectures held there.  A scheme is now under way for more active participation in the available programmes.  The fact that all the library’s users are able initially to enjoy such a “legitimate peripheral participation” is a very important aspect of the library as a public meeting place.  The mere fact that it is possible to choose to join or leave a group according to individual need or desire, is also essential.  The library acquires an importance for a person’s identity;  an individual is permitted to remain an individual and is not reduced to a mere consumer, as described by Habermas in his portrayal of the decline of civil society, where human beings are changing from being capable of reasoned cultural reflection to mere consumers.  Several respondents in the study commented that whereas in the library you are a user, in the book store you are a customer, underlining the essential difference between the two concepts.  The fact that entry to a library is open and free of charge, and that there a free choice between having contact with others and being left alone, appears to have great importance.  The majority of the respondents reverted again and again to the social, informal function of the library as a public meeting place.  It is seen as a sanctuary, a place for a break, to relax and “let your hair down”, but also a place to be around other people, all of which bears witness to the fact that the library is an arena for low-intensity meetings in an everyday context.  Sitting at home alone in front of the computer is not the same as going to the library and browsing amongst the shelves, soaking up the atmosphere, being around other people, and also being able to converse and be companionable. 

The importance and function of the social, public sphere appear to be of greater importance to library users than had been my assumption at the outset of the study.  Several of the users and politicians wanted to see the public library as a more active, focused driving force behind initiatives to encourage user participation in the work and development of the library.  While it was seen as important that the library keep up with new technology, most of the respondents also did not want the library to reject its original values.  The “libraryness” factor, represented by traditional elements such as books, reading and silence must still be the rule.  Although the need for quiet represents an obstacle for open conversation and dialogue, which is often a precondition of inter-personal communication, this will not necessarily remain a problem in the future.  According to Skot-Hansen, one can plan “many markets within the market place”, or in other words future planning of library premises could allow for the creation of different physical spheres to cater for different activities and experiences such as conversation and discussion.  A library does not have to be either a quiet public sphere or a “gossip house” but can be both.

Many aspects of the library as a public, social sphere have features of Oldenburg’s “third place”.   Nevertheless, the principle of free lending, the library collections, the low “chatter” factor and the specialist competence of librarians are qualities that make the library into something more than a “third place”, or a “park with no outdoor café”.  On the contrary, the library can be seen as a “park with an outdoor café”, offering its users the democratic rights of borrowing books free of charge and to select freely among topical and varied materials, enabling them to form their own opinions and reach their own decisions.  The acquisition of knowledge through books and information is valuable and useful not only for the individual, but in the longer term also of benefit to society as a whole, and represents an important element in the strengthening of democracy.  Most of the initiatives and projects presented through the analysis are linked to learning and cultural values, whose effects are to underpin society.

Meeting places often emerge related the value based sphere (1), the social sphere (2) , and in the learning sphere (4).  The politological sphere (3) is less active; while it holds the important function of creating a direct dialogue between citizens and politicians, in practise this is often difficult to achieve.  In our times the public “debating sphere” appears to have been appropriated by the mass media and by the often personalised bold front page headlines in the newspapers.  Sennett in the 1970s pointed out that “the public sphere” had been invaded by various “demands for intimate detail”, or personal exposure in the media, and it is a fact that current debate is often presented in this way. 

It may appear an unequal contest for the library to compete in vigour with the  noisy debates carried out by the media, since the mass media have become a central arena in the struggle for political, and not least economic power.  It will therefore be a challenge to the library with its lower profile to incite political debate against the background of the high profile mass media which occupies the centre stage.  And yet, initiatives such as pre-election meetings between politicians and the local population, or the “Law bus” and similar mobile services which are there for example to inform new immigrants of election laws, are important elements in strengthening the democratic principles of our society. 

Several of the library users and politicians felt there is a shortage of cultural activities and cultural experiences available to the general public in the libraries.  The libraries, however, tend to target such activities at particular groups since, from experience, the general cultural activities such as author visits, lectures and similar, are prone to “drown” in the overall cultural activities on offer in Oslo.  It is a paradox, therefore, that several of the respondents in Majorstuen especially wish for such activities and want the library to promote and present itself as a cultural meeting place for the local community.  It is also felt that priority should be given to activities and initiatives aimed at children and young people.

Among the major factors that determine the function of the library as a public sphere in the two city districts are location, the population structure, and the structure of the division of the administrative districts in the city.  The Majorstuen branch library is a city library which operates over a wide area, whereas the Torshov branch belongs to a more “historical” area of the city, serving a more clearly defined local community.  It is a problem engendered by the administrative division of the City of Oslo into different districts that the natural, “historic” areas tend to be somewhat overlooked.  This is quite an important factor since projects to further a local sense of belonging and the strengthening of identity depend on natural, local borders as a backdrop to the creation of qualified public spheres.  It is quite clear that this has become a problem for the library structure in Oslo following the most recent reform of the city districts.

The public library as a public meeting place in the local community faces great challenges.  The heads of the libraries and the librarians must “keep the finger continuously on the pulse” of the local environment and be creative in the co-operation and co-action with other sectors, participants and professions at different competence levels in the local community.  With libraries under constant pressure from cutbacks and the reigning spirit of the market philosophy, it is easy to become distanced from the inherent values of the library as a place of education and knowledge, and adopt more instrumental and utilitarian arguments to defend the library budgets, as pointed out by Vestheim (1997).  This daily dilemma presents a severe challenge to the workings of the whole library system.  Thus it is important to promote and raise awareness of the role of the public library as a meeting place, a function which can then be employed as an explicatory model vis-à-vis the grant-awarding authorities.  This is necessary in order to legitimise the fundamental value and usefulness of the library for all those who belong to the local community, and for society as a whole.   Several respondents pointed out that that communal public meeting places are becoming ever scarcer, and are often private.  People tend more and more to stay within their own sub-cultural groups.  Public meeting places that reach across the local community are hard to find, and yet this is exactly the type of meeting place that for example many of the respondents in the Majorstuen branch were seeking.  The library has an important developmental role for society as a whole in its capacity as a disseminator of education and knowledge, a guarantor of freedom of expression, and as an institution that creates the appropriate circumstances enabling all citizens to elect to lead an active and meaningful life.

During the interviews, several interesting points of view were raised in relation to the use of electronic technology and the Internet, the raising of the profile of the library in society, the future role of librarians and the library, and so on, topics which in themselves should be subjected to further research in relation to the subject of the library as a public sphere in society.  Much ground remains to be covered in the task of increasing public awareness of the work of the libraries and finding a common language to explain to the grant-awarding authorities and to the general public the actual tasks and the overriding aims of the libraries.

According to Habermas, a critical publicity is not yet a finished chapter in post-modern society.  Nor is the development in the digital age of the public library as a public arena offering the possibilities of a broad range of public spheres, different experiences and meetings, and the availability of a shared fellowship where no-one needs to “bowl alone”.