IFLA - the Presidential Perspective continues
Yesterday I spent most of the day in the Management of Library Association’s session which has pretty much run the whole day. The main focus of the morning session was on advocacy, and it featured our own Sue Hutley as the major speaker. The other speakers were from Croatia, Lativa, Chile, UK, and India - all speaking about advocacy but from their own perspective and within their own context.As you can imagine each country was at a different stage of development in terms of their social development. While we may complain in Australia that times are tough and money is hard to get, we are streets ahead of our colleagues in less developed countries in terms of library services, and the stage of development and sophistication of our professional associations. Nevertheless, many of the problems raised by each of the speakers are similar. One particular problem that had ressonance was the engagement with decision makers. We seem to have done pretty well on this front in Australia given our engagement with government over the past 12 months or so. Given the way Sue was handing out her business card it was pleasing to see that some or our approaches could be adapted by colleagues in other countries. The afternoon session of the MLA stream focussed also focussed on but from the perspective of evidence based research. It certainly remined me that regardless of whether its a national issue being addressed by ALIA or a local issue in our own libraries we need qualitiative and quantitative evidence to support and substantiate our claims and issues.The weather in Gothenburg is warm, sunny, and on occasions wet. The locals certainly enjoy the sunshine but don’t seem too phased by the damp. At the moment the annual Gothenburg Cultural festival is on with free music and acts throughout the central city. Last night as I was returing from a catchup with colleagues at the IFLA nightspot - the basement of the central library, the streets were full people, old and young. It was raining and people were going about enjoying the music unphased by the elements!Now the Gothenberg Public Library was an interesting place. Its located close to one the main central squares near the concert hall and art gallery and its normal hours during the week are from 10am to midnght, yes midnight. As we entered the main door at about 9:30pm I thought people woud be in there sheltering from the rain. How wrong I was! (Well I think I was wrong) People were in there reading, playing computer games, and going about their normal library business.Graham Black, President