Consortia: anti‐competitive or in the public good?
| Date | 13 June 2008 |
| Published date | 13 June 2008 |
| Pages | 164-183 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/07378830810880298 |
| Author | Catherine A. Maskell |
| Subject Matter | Information & knowledge management,Library & information science |
Consortia: anti-competitive or in
the public good?
Catherine A. Maskell
Leddy Library, University of Windsor, Windsor, Canada
Abstract
Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to report on research that examined the potential affects of
academic library consortia activity on the scholarly publishing cycle.
Design/methodology/approach – Semi-structured interviews of 30 university librarians from
across Canada and representatives from six federal government agencies involved in university
funding, copyright and competition policy, were used to examine consortia activity in the broad
context of the scholarly publishing cycle from the competing perspectives of the market economy and
the public good. The principles of competition and copyright were used to define the theoretical
premise of the research.
Findings – University librarians primarily see consortia activity as supporting academic libraries’
public good role of providing access to information as equitably and as barrier-free as possible. They
saw consortia as more than just buying clubs, but also as a means for libraries to share resources and
expertise. Federal government agency representatives saw consortia activity firmly anchored in the
market economy, levelling the playing field between libraries and publishers, and providing libraries
opportunities to leverage their budgets.
Research limitations/implications – This research was unique to the Canadian situation of
federal funding of universities and only a sampling of university librarians was feasible.
Practical implications – The results show a need to educate librarians and government funding
bodies and policy makers as to the goals and outcomes of consortia activity.
Originality/value – At the time of the defence of the thesis this work had not been done before.
Keywords Academic libraries, Purchasing groups,Competitive strategy, Publicinterest, Canada
Paper type Research paper
Introduction
Academic library consortia activity has become an integral part of how academic
libraries are acquiring reso urces and providing services f or their respective
communities. Consortia are involved across a broad span of academic libraries’
operations, including purchasing content for collections, building and maintaining
technical infrastructures, delivering services such as interlibrary loan and document
delivery, developing resource sharing agreements, and, establishing institut ional
repositories. As a whole, academic library consortia have come to assert increased
bargaining power over publishers, much stronger bargaining power than individual
libraries hold, providing libraries with considerable economic advantage. Through
institutional repositories and open source publishing, academic library conso rtia are
also, increasingly, acting as rival publishers themselves. Considering the roles
consortia play in academic libraries, a crucial question to consider is if and how
consortia may be changing the role of the academic library? Of more particular interest,
how could consortia be affecting the relationship between academic libraries and
publishers?
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available at
www.emeraldinsight.com/0737-8831.htm
LHT
26,2
164
Received 29 October 2007
Revised 14 November 207
Accepted 28 January 2008
Library Hi Tech
Vol. 26 No. 2, 2008
pp. 164-183
qEmerald Group Publishing Limited
0737-8831
DOI 10.1108/07378830810880298
Using evidence gained from in-depth interviews from a national sample of Canadian
University Librarians and from interviews with relevant Canadian federal government
policy-makers, this article examines academic library consortia activity in the broad
context of the scholarly publishing cycle from the competing perspectives of the
market economy and the public good. It considers whether consortia are viewed by
librarians and government as serving a public good role of providing information for a
greater social and cultural benefit or are they seen from a market-economic perspective
of changing power relations with publishers? The principles of competition and
copyright are used to define the theoretical premise. Are academic library consortia
viewed as participating in the market economy of Canada or not? Is their role such that
it should attract the attention of competition policy regulators?
Competition policy prohibits buying and selling cartels that can negatively impact
the free market on which the Canadian economic system, like other Western economies,
depends. Competition policy as part of economic policy is, however, only relevant
where we are concerned with aspects of the market economy. Traditionally, public
goods for the greater social and cultural benefit of society are not considered part of the
market economic system. If the activities of academic library consortia are part of that
public good perspective, competition policy may not be a relevant concern. The views
of librarians and government on consortia within this context provide a much-needed
“big picture” overarching view of consortia, the role they currently play in academic
libraries, and their potential for affecting academic libraries and information policy in
the future.
Academic library consortia: an overview
Within contemporary academic libraries consortia are playing an increasingly
important role. Bostick (2001, p. 128) describes them as a “way of life” for academic
libraries. Landesman and van Reenen (2000) state that consortia are an important
avenue for the way academic libraries do business and Alberico (2002, p. 64) notes that
consortia are having “profound programmatic and financial implications for most
campuses”.
One of the primary purposes of consortia, listed in many articles, is the leveraging of
library budgets to purchase more resources (mainly digital resources) than could be
purchased by any one member institution (Rowse, 2003; Baker and Sanville, 2000;
Alexander, 1999; Allen and Hirshon, 1998). The economic benefit of consortia lies in the
ability of libraries to take their budgets farther, spending less and getting more.
In addition to the economic gains, Westmoreland and Shirley (2004) list several
“non-economic” objectives for consortia memberships including: reducing redundancy
and the duplication of work; leveling the playing field between the haves and have nots
by providing access to the same core resources; enabling shared services such as
virtual reference and interlibrary loan; and providing opportunities for professional
development, policy and standards development.
Walters (1987) describes the economic and non-economic goals of consortia as a
conflict between competing belief systems. On the economic side, consortia activity is
supported by a belief system that no library can hope to collect everything and that
consortia are a means to acquire resources to fill the gaps. In contrast, the
non-economic view supports the belief that consortia have a responsibility to address
social issues such as the widening gap between the information rich and the
Consortia
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