Read Online Monoculture: How One Story is Changing Everything by F.S. Michaels - Free Book Online

money, and a place for corporations to promote themselves and sell their products and services. 40
    When the library comes to think of itself as a business, it starts being discussed in terms of return on investment. The economic story says libraries should make money by developing their own revenue streams and opening bookshops, gift shops, and coffee shops. Libraries should also introduce user fees and charge for library cards. In the economic story, you are an individual, and as an individual, if you benefit from something like the public library personally, you should pay for that benefit personally. Though fees for library cards were controversial when they were first introduced because they flew in the face of the library principle of equal access to information, user fees now typically represent 10 to 15 percent of the average library budget. 41
    In the oil-rich Canadian province of Alberta, library user fees were introduced after government cutbacks in the 1980s. Even when the province became solvent and debt-free, posting multi-billion dollar surpluses and enjoying a reputation as the wealthiest province in Canada, the fees stayed. In the capital city of Edmonton, after user fees were introduced, library enrolment and circulation dropped significantly and had not recovered ten years later. 42 The smaller center of Banff, Alberta, chose to axe its library user fee; library membership soared 40 percent that year. 43 Although many libraries allow people to ask for the fee to be waived if it’s unaffordable, as one librarian said, “[As] someone who grew up in a poor family, I feel that asking people for proof of their poverty humiliates them. (Surely being poor is humiliation enough without having to identify yourself as such to get ‘special treatment’ in what I feel is our most democratic institution — the public library.)” 44
    In the economic story, libraries are encouraged to raise funds by selling named space to individual or corporate donors. This was already happening in libraries to some extent; library buildings were being named after donors. The Carnegie libraries were named for steel magnate Andrew Carnegie, who financed more than 2,500 libraries around the world. What is different now, though, is that library parts are for sale. 45 Naming opportunities include the circulation desk, individual meeting rooms, study rooms, window reading nooks, reading benches, and the picture book collection. That kind of private sponsorship, though it brings in revenue, also creates a vicious cycle; companies get a tax write-off for their donations, which means less corporate tax ends up in city coffers. With less money available in public funds, libraries typically find themselves on the chopping block again, making them even more dependent on private sector funding.
    In the economic story, the neutral public space that the public library once represented doesn’t stay neutral. Prior to the Vancouver 2010 Olympics, public libraries in Vancouver were asked to make sure the brands of sponsoring corporations were given exclusive play at library functions. A leaked internal memo read, “Do not have Pepsi or Dairy Queen sponsor your event…Coke and McDonald’s are the Olympic sponsors. If you are planning a kids’ event and approaching sponsors, approach McDonald’s and not another well-known fast-food outlet.” Libraries were also advised to try to meet official sponsors’ brand requirements. If only Sony equipment were available in the library, for example, instead of equipment made by official sponsor Panasonic? “I would get some tape and put it over the ‘Sony,’” the Vancouver Public Library’s manager of marketing and communications was quoted as saying, “Just a little piece of tape.” 46
    The economic story interprets the “public” in public library in a new way. It says the management of public libraries ought to be outsourced to the private sector, which is more efficient and effective.