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No. 20: The Libraries in 2020:  A report on a scenario-based strategy process

In conjunction with the work on preparing the national Library Report to be presented during Spring 2006, The Norwegian Archive, Library and Museum Authority has constructed a scenario process with scenario learning.  The idea behind this method is that it can give rise to new thought processes which in turn can contribute to new and different approaches to meeting future – and uncertain – challenges that will face the libraries over the next 10 to 15 years.

The objectives of the process were twofold, namely:

• To develop future situations, or scenarios, for the different types of libraries and their environment
• To develop strategic elements that can serve as tools for the preparation of the strategy document to be presented to the Department of Culture and Church Affairs

Through a process made up of a particular methodology mixed with creative futuristic images, elements of strategy can be developed which can provide useful knowledge and serve as a stimulus for the further choice of direction.   In addition, this method makes it possible to include more participants to pursue these thought processes.

Summary

The libraries constitute a central institution in Norway, playing an important role in the knowledge and information society and in cultural life, and they form a meeting place in many local communities.  Both the academic, special and research libraries and the public libraries must be ready to face changes arising from a broad range of the sometimes unpredictable evolutionary processes in society.  In respect of the challenges facing the libraries over the next 15 years, two particular elements of change emerge as being important and uncertain:  the status that will be given to the libraries in the ideological debate, and the type of library services which will be sought.  An analysis of these and of other elements of change has provided the basis for three possible scenarios facing the library sector up to 2020:  1) the “Spiritual Library”, where the library users and the authorities are seeking physical meeting places for the acquisition of knowledge, experience and creative power, and this type of public arena is offered by the libraries free of charge, 2) a “Library Fair” where the public seeks physical meeting places closely bound to information, knowledge and identity, but these are ruled by market forces and 3), the “Cordless Library” where the citizens and the authorities above all want speedy, direct and flexible access to knowledge and information.  In this last scenario the whole library sector would become virtually a digital sector, where physical meeting places have little importance.

In relation to the challenges facing the libraries over the next 15 years, the participants in the scenario process stressed the two elements of change that are at once uncertain and important.  These uncertain elements form the basis of the scenario construct:

• The status of the libraries in the ideological debate  How are libraries seen in political discussions?  Is there the will to give them high priority for the common good, or must the library arena also be included in the market place, with its demands for competitive ability, and so on?

• What characterises consumer requests to the library sector? Is it the need for speedily accessible information that leads the public to the library?  Or is it instead the provision of suitable physical arenas for knowledge, culture and creative expression?  The attitude of the political authorities will obviously determine the opportunities of the sector in terms of future development.  At the same time  it is reasonable to expect that the stance adopted by these authorities will reflect deeper ideological attitudes held by the population in general and by the authorities in particular.   

The extent to which the local and/or the central authorities view the libraries as being for the common good, but also being capable of contributing to the promotion  of differing or overriding political aims, can determine which structural conditions are imposed on the different parts of the library sector, and also the priorities given to the tasks by the sector itself.

Together, the academic, special and research libraries and the public libraries offer a broad range of services, from access to information and literature to the organisation of sources of knowledge, as well as representing a forum for cultural and subject related expression.

In addition, the librarian, as a member of a specialist body, possesses an invaluable skill in searching out and sifting knowledge, a skill that is becoming ever more important with the increasing volume of available information.  When we address these two uncertain elements that we have outlined, an outcome for the future of the libraries emerges.  We have attempted to analyse how the primary participants may well behave in each of the hypothetical possibilities, and what may be the result.  In this way the content of the scenarios can be established.  Three combinations have been chosen as being of special interest. 

In the first scenario, the Spiritual Library, the users seek physical meeting places for the acquisition of knowledge, experience and creative power. The authorities view the creation of arenas for both non-commercial development and knowledge-based innovation as a national task.  Much investment is directed to ensure that the academic, special and research libraries and the public libraries represent suitable arenas for the widening of knowledge and the stimulation of creative expression.  In our age, when books are becoming ever cheaper and more readily available, and when licences to copyright materials are becoming linked to particular premises and terminals, the character of the services and materials that are available through the libraries is changing.  Gradually, the lending of, and access to, advanced information and knowledge-based technological equipment are moving to the centre of library activities.  One of the unintended results of this investment into advanced technology and the non-commercial culture is that for many the threshold of the libraries has been raised;  the libraries have become providers of services to a cultural and technological élite.  Investment into the digital and seamless library has taken second place.

Physical meeting places linked to information and culture are also important in the second scenario, the Library Fair.  However, here it is the market that rules, and following the introduction of competitive tendering  for library services, the idea of free user choice has been firmly established.  Only limited attempts have been made by the authorities to formulate policies to develop these arenas into political tools. Library services form a part of a range of social services available to the public, and they are state financed up to a certain level by means of the so-called “Citizens Card”, used by the individual for payment for each service required.  Additional services are available for a fee, and any person is free to operate a library, subject to fulfilling the requirements set by the authorities for a library licence.  The urban population is offered a broad range of libraries, to a greater or lesser degree commercial in nature, including so-called library cafés which target different client groups.  Those involved in the education “market” highlight their libraries as being beacons of quality and exclusivity in their struggle to attract pupils, students and high quality researchers.   Investment in the National Library and in seamless and digital library services is rendered more difficult in a situation where the participants in the library market largely view each other as competitors.

In the third scenario, the Cordless Library, priority is given both by the citizens and the authorities to speedy, direct and flexible access to knowledge and information, with little emphasis placed on the library as an arena.  In a hyper-globalised world dominated by cordless and digital technology, the retrieval of information and knowledge is no longer linked with a physical location for the users. The Norwegian Digital Library (NDB) is a large-scale national investment programme in a “Norwegian universal knowledge society”, and all Norwegian citizens have direct access by way of their digital password to a wide range of materials covered by national licensing agreements.  Most of the physical library premises are gone, older materials have been converted to digital format whilst the originals have been stored in repositories.  Materials not capable of conversion to a digital format have been turned into museum exhibits.  Advanced academic, special and research libraries– partly aided by state subsidies – purchase licence agreements that go beyond what is covered by NDB.  The greatest worry surrounding the role of the library as a democratising institution relates to the so-called “digital illiterates” who lack the ability, possibility or will fully to use the digital opportunities available.

These three scenarios have served as a basis for some preliminary ideas about The Norwegian Archive, Library and Museum Authority’s introduction of long-term, robust and flexible strategies for the library sector.

A scenario-based strategy process works from “the outside-in”  because we proceed from scenarios set in the outside world, and follow these by a search for appropriate solutions by shaping and adapting these solutions to possible subsequent events. The process is also “downside-up”, in that we start by generating possible inputs to more overall strategies – in the form of various initiatives, prioritisations and choices that seem appropriate to one or more of the scenarios.  The elements that appear appropriate in all the scenarios, or that can be implemented without “tying one’s flag to the mast”, can channel the way to major strategies.

Work is about to begin on the overall strategy process, and this work will culminate in the launch of the Library Report next year.  In the course of this further process, decisions must be made as to how the sector can work to widen its opportunities and as to what are the best priorities and directions to choose from more realistic parameters.

In addition there will thus be a need to develop robust and flexible strategies necessary to enable the library sector to fulfil its task in the best possible manner regardless of which of the scenarios will most approach the actual situation in 2020.