Resisting neoliberalism: the challenge of activist librarianship in English Higher Education
| Date | 13 March 2017 |
| Pages | 317-335 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/JD-06-2016-0076 |
| Published date | 13 March 2017 |
| Author | Katherine Quinn,Jo Bates |
| Subject Matter | Library & information science,Records management & preservation,Document management,Classification & cataloguing,Information behaviour & retrieval,Collection building & management,Scholarly communications/publishing,Information & knowledge management,Information management & governance,Information management,Information & communications technology,Internet |
Resisting neoliberalism: the
challenge of activist librarianship
in English Higher Education
Katherine Quinn
University of Warwick, Coventry, UK, and
Jo Bates
University of Sheffield, Sheffield, UK
Abstract
Purpose –The purpose of this paper is to examine the political position of academic librarianship in the
context of recent changes in English Higher Education. The neoliberalisation of academic librarianship, both
as an academic discipline and profession, is considered. The emergence of the Radical Librarians Collective is
examined as a potential site through which to counter these developments and foster radical alternatives.
Design/methodology/approach –The paper draws upon Gramsci’s concepts of hegemony and praxis, and
post-structural critiques of neoliberalism, as a theoretical framework to guide data collection and analysis,
and observe developments within academic librarianship vis-à-vis broader processes of neoliberalisation.
Empirical data collected through interviews and participant observation are analysed using thematic and
critical discourse analysis.
Findings –The research finds that academic librarianship as a discipline and practice is undergoing a
process of neoliberalisation. An umbrella organisation of activist librarians, Radical Librarians Collective, is
found to be resisting these developments and has some potential to become a space through which radical
alternatives to neoliberal hegemony can be explored and fostered.
Research limitations/implications –The research demonstrates the utility of a Gramscian theoretical
framework as a lens through which to observe developments in the field of library and information studies
(LIS). Further empirical work would deepen the authors’understanding of such developments across a range
of institutions and locales.
Originality/value –The research makes an original contribution to critical research on the struggles around
the neoliberalisation of academic librarianship in the UK. The theoretically informed analysis provides
original insights into these processes, and makes a methodological contribution to LIS research.
Keywords Neoliberalism, Librarianship, Higher education, Academic libraries, Critical LIS,
Radical librarianship
Paper type Research paper
1. Introduction
At a time when the transformatory implications of the 2010 Browne review on higher
education (Browne, 2010) are being realised across HE in England, considerations of the
political position of the university are pertinent. In terms of both its centrality to university
life and its intrinsic connection to the formation and organisation of knowledge, the library
has enduring practical and symbolic importance, in spite of often being overlooked as if it
were a neutral depository of information. Whether in the form of physical books and
articles, in providing access to their electronic counterparts, or purely in providing space
where academic and social lives are performed, academic libraries exist within a political
context and communicate values through the way they are imagined, constructed, and
engaged with. On the disciplinary side, library and information studies (LIS) departments
offering professionally accredited courses are influential because they have the authority
to qualify, and thus shape, future academic librarians. As a discipline within the academy,
LIS departments are also in a position to intervene in academic and popular discussions
about the role of information, power, politics, and culture in academia and society
more generally.
Journal of Documentation
Vol. 73 No. 2, 2017
pp. 317-335
© Emerald PublishingLimited
0022-0418
DOI 10.1108/JD-06-2016-0076
Received 6 June 2016
Revised 3 October 2016
Accepted 14 October 2016
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on Emerald Insight at:
www.emeraldinsight.com/0022-0418.htm
317
Resisting
neoliberalism
This paper investigates the ways in which neoliberal processes related to competition,
managerialism, and student employability have infiltrated English Higher Education,
what effect this is having on the running of academic libraries and LIS departments within
the HE sector, and what opportunities there might be for resisting these developments.
By drawing upon the Gramscian understanding of hegemony in culture, as well as more
recent post-structural understandings of neoliberalisation, we aim to shine a light on how
processes of neoliberalisation are developing in the context of English academic
librarianship. We argue that the permeation of neoliberal values within English HE is
having a restrictive, and ultimately negative, impact on higher education and on our
understanding of the library’s role and function within it. We go on to consider the Radical
Librarians Collective (RLC) (n.d.) –a collective of “those critical of the marketization of
libraries and commodification of information”–and argue that the collective has potential to
help organise efforts to contest and subvert these processes of neoliberalisation and resist
the narrowing of the purpose and possibilities of academic librarianship.
2. Methodology
The paper aims to make an original and critical theoretical contribution to the LIS literature.
We develop a critical theoretical framework drawing primarily upon the Gramscian
concepts of hegemony and praxis, and post-structural critiques of neoliberalism, as a lens
through which to observe developments within the field of academic librarianship vis-à-vis
broader processes of neoliberalisation. We illustrate and expand upon our theoretical
arguments by drawing upon a small empirical study examining how senior practitioners
and academics in the field of academic librarianship, who between them have worked across
three English universities in the last decade, relate to these broader processes of
neoliberalisation. Further, we critically consider how participants in the UK-wide Radical
Librarians Collective (RLC) are working to contest some of the trends that we identify.
Rather than inductively generate or deductively test theory based on empirical
observation, the philosophical approach drawn upon in this study is critical, normative, and
abductive in nature. We aim to illuminate particular moments of neoliberal hegemonic
reproduction and contestation observed in our empirical research, through the lens of the
Gramscian analytical framework outlined in the following sections. In adopting this
philosophical approach in our research, we recognise that knowledge of the social world is
the outcome of many competing insights and knowledge claims. The objective of our
research is to contribute to the debate, rather than attempt to generate “scientific”
knowledge of the social. As such, while the findings are necessarily subjective, they are the
result of critical reflection and thus hold validity within the philosophical framework.
Qualitative data were generated through semi-structured interviews and participant
observation. Six interviews with individuals from three groups of actors were conducted: at
the time of the research, two were LIS academics who teach and research academic
librarianship, one a senior academic library manager, and three library workers and
researchers involved in the RLC. These categorisations reflect each participant’s primary
identification; however, some participants had recently changed roles or belonged to more
than one category. If appropriate, quotations in the paper therefore make reference to the
role that the participant was discussing at that point in the interview; a quotation from a
“Library manager”may therefore indicate any one of a number of participants talking about
a senior academic library management role they currently or previously held. Due to the
political sensitivity of the topics discussed, participants have been anonymised to general
categories, rather than through use of pseudonyms. Reflecting the concerns of the
Gramscian framework, interviews explored the nature of the interviewee’s role and
motivations, and their perceptions of the librarianship profession, higher education and its
purpose. Interviews also considered critical alternatives to neoliberalism in academic
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