The Delhi Library Association is to be commended for being a vibrant association with a vision. It is a model for other professional organizations. Thus it is a great honor and a privilege to be invited to deliver S.R. Ranganathan Memorial Lecture instituted by this Association. In all my professional life I have endeavored to spread the message and zeal of Ranganathan. This is a great and unique opportunity. I am grateful to the DLA Executive Committee, especially the President, Sh. Girja Kumar, and Secretary, Professor C.P. Vashisth for bestowing this honor on me.
Origin of the Laws
Ranganathan was highly impressed and influenced by the library services to each and every citizen of the U.K. given by its library system. I But despite the devoted teachers with best minds having wide and varied experience, Ranganathan found library science teaching a bundle of tricks in the School of Librarianship and Mhives, University College, London during 1924-1925. His inquisitive and analytical mind inured on philosophy and mathematics could not submit itself to what he considered unworthy practices and rules that were taught to be remembered by the rule of the thumb - take it as such or leave it. After a great deal of pondering and further experience of library work, he realized the lack of normative principles to guide and explain the myriads of library practices then prevailing. The prescription lay in formulation of normative principles to cure the hodgepodge situation. He realized that library is a social institution providing service to the society. By the late 19th century the scientific method had already been successfully applied to what later became social sciences.. Professor Pierce Butler (1886-1953) and his colleagues at Library School of the University of Chicago had already advocated the use of scientific methods to library management. Having diagnosed the malady, Ranganathan set out to discover and formulate the normative laws governing libraries. This, a stupendous task, required lot of intensive experience, insight, vision and a catalyst of intuition. Intuition helps the large number of empirical precepts to boil down to a few fundamental laws. Ranganathan with perseverance and keeping the problem in the subconscious mind analytically observed all the practical details to distil them into laws. This dramatic story of the origin and formulation of laws has been told and retold by Ranganathan.
Thereafter, Ranganathan set out to elucidate and deduce their general implications. Conformity of the deductions with the existing practices confirmed their validity. Subsequently these were fully developed and published in a book in 1931 with the title: The Five Laws of Library Science (Chennai : Madras Library Association, xxxii, 458p.) The book was an instant success despite the doubts of some sceptics on the scientific nature of our work. The second edition was brought out in 1957 when he had gained immense experience of teaching and observation of documentation work in R & D centers in India, Europe and USA. The second edition also contained a chapter on the nature of science and scientific methods to convince others that library service lay in this domain. It reached more hands than the earlier edition. There was even a unfulfilled demand for an American edition of the book in American English. Nevertheless, it got him deservedly famous. To quote Pauline Cochrane "If Dr. Ranganathan had done nothing more than publish the Five Laws of Library Science, he would have to be seriously considered for the Library Hall of Fame".
The Laws have stood the test of time as these became more and more acceptable as the time passed by. The popularity continued even after Ranganathan's death as evident from comments on them in different languages of the world, e.g., in Chinese. To say that they are mere slogans is to be ignorant of the nature and structure of scientific laws.These laws have not been dictated from above. These are not statements of opinions or mere ideals of a missionary. These are shared definitions of ideal conduct. These laws have been precipitated and sifted from actual practices in all categories of libraries. Ranganathan had an uncanny gift to do this.
Peter Achinstein, a philosopher of science, lays down the Following lingual characteristics of a stated laws:
- Laws are simple, precise, and few in number.
- Laws are essentially general in nature.
- Their subject is general.
- Syntactically they are general, as they generally begin with "All", "Every", or "No".
- A law expresses a generality which can be used to express other regularities.
Simplicity does not mean shallowness, but it is in unraveling the complex structure of universe in that discipline, and stating that in simple linear equations. Simplicity lies in the smallness of numbers of parameters and their interrelations.
How strikingly and easily the Five Laws qualify Achinstein test is too obvious. From philosophical and epistemological standpoints they fully hold the status of the laws. These are quite simple in appearance as the basic laws always are and should be. These laws are not anything invented or imposed but have been discovered and formulated. Struck by their simplicity many votaries wondered as to why these laws could not be formulated earlier!
Their acceptance as normative laws has been ack-nowledged by numerous library scientists and practitioners. With time not only these have attracted more adheres and advocates, but they continue to be valid in changing library environment. Laws inhere modernity and have self renewing power of applications. The laws are subject to the Quarnic principle of ijihad - a principle of reinterpretation.9 In his life time Ranganathan had shown them to be equally applicable to documentation work l0. In the succeeding era of intensive and proactive service of micro-documents by information canters his disciples and others have demonstrated the validity of laws by simply changing the parameter "book" to 'information". The laws have logico-deductive structure. They evince to hold latently, or as obvious corollaries, every practice current or future. They attest the dictum that a true theory is a repertoire of practice. The laws have proved fountainhead of his path breaking and voluminous work. They further attest Francis Bacon's conviction in the Novum Organum that "axioms rightly discovered... will draw after them trains and troops of work". They have prognostic value and portend towards the future trends as elucidated by FW Lancaster. These laws provided fundamental statements of goals that information services should strive for, and they are as relevant today as they were . . . years ago."" The Five laws hold the reins of every bit of theory applicable to information services. It requires a moderately inventive mind to deduce from them ) new principles from time to time. All the /ultra-modern services of information centers could be deduced from or validated by the Five Laws. Automated libraries have witnessed their applications more tangibly. But every invention is grounded in social milieu of its time. Is not the information society environment with virtual libraries radically different one?
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Information Society
Ushered by the information revolution, the information society has heralded a new era in human civilization. It has brought in wide and far reaching changes: new modes and technology of Communication, new life and work styles and new modes of education. It has been facilitated by democracy and free flow of information. Not only the outlook seems different, there is a clear shift in economic and social values. Information Technology (IT) has emerged as the most powerful agent of social change and economic transformation. The IT has made constantly swelling volume of knowledge ever accessible to the masses. New forms of telecommunications spread cornucolpia of information round the world in a split second and diffuse it with amazing' speed. The Internet has brought more knowledge in circulation than ever before.
Information society is witnessing the power of information and knowledge' at its best. Today the information is most valuable and sought after commodity and a resource. It is prime mover of the society. Production, distribution and consumption of information has multiplied to astronomical figures. Knowledge is now an international public good and its benefits extend to all those who can access it irrespective of political boundaries. Investment in its generation gives much higher returns than in production of industrial goods.Recent economic theories indicate that growth of knowledge can generate endless potential for economy.Knowledge growth is brought out by Institutions of higher education and research through R & D. Libraries help generate more knowledge by disseminating it. Investments in Knowledge creation and dissemination is becoming an engine of economic growth,sophisticated and systematic theoretical knowledge aides advances in every social sphere.
Economy, social mores and politics have been affected visibly. Social laws, values and attitudes are changing. Fast flow of information is radically changining social relations and have brought in new educational technology, especially for distance learning. The governments world over are acquiring new roles while jettisoning some old jobs. The MNCs are acquiring para governmental roles. Free and fast flow of information, easy and inexpensive means of transportation, fall of dividing lines have shrunk the world into a global village where everybody and place is connected and wired. Political structure need redesigning. This in turn has resulted in the emergence of world economy, cosmopolitan culture and international movements. New techniques in genetics and molecular biology have transformed the quality of life throwing both formidable geographical, cultural, ethical and legal issues. In fact a whole range of political issues have cropped up. Feminine, human rights, green peace movements, even international terrorism, and rampant cyber crimes are product of the information revolution. Today's wars are info-wars in many senses of the term. Social and cultural mobility brought in by globalization has been well stated by S.T.Hettige.
Today, the market forces plays significant part in the distribution of life chances in society. Almost unrestricted flow of information, media images and cultural goods into the country has facilitated the spread of --new life styles and consumption patterns. As. result consumption based life styles and social identities today openly complete with conventional life styles and identities based on social positions occupied by individuals. In the new environments, the dress, hair-styles, personal possessions, consumer tastes, hobbies etc may be even more important than the actual occupational roles individuals occupy.
This shift requires the enactment of. new cyber laws on the part of the governments and legislators.
Knowledge society is an ever learning society. Alvin Toffler has aptly said that the illiterates of the 21st century will not be those who cannot read and write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn and relearn. Eric Hoffer has emphasized the same value with a warning: "In a time of drastic change, it is the learners who survive; the learned find themselves fully equipped to live in a world that no longer exists". Its citizens have to constantly acquire new set of skills. Full literacy is the minimum basic requirement. Spread of participatory democracy moves in tandem with the knowledge and information revolution.
Alvin Toffler in a long drawn empirical and analytical study of the social and economic trends distils the following characteristics of the information society : .
a. Knowledge creation and transfer leads to creation of wealth.
b. Industrial production has become cyclic, customized and de massified with the use of IT.
c. Knowledge is a superior substitute for the conventional factors of production, such as land, labour, raw materials and capital.
d. Electronic information, being eminently fluid, has become a fine medium of exchange.
e. Managers, researchers and information professionals are the new heroes of the information society.
f. Producer and the consumer fuse into a "prosumer".
g. This global and wired society allows local production with global technology .
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New Features and Roles of Library and Information Centers
Libraries and information canters are the warehouses of the most valuable goods of the information society. Information production is in astronomical quantities leading to information overload in many cases. See how the internet is taking everybody in its fold. Its 195 million users in 1999 will grow to 300 million by 2005. Every third house in advance countries owns a PC. There are 800 million web pages; and 5,50, 000 books published every year.
Organic and inorganic materials have different physical and chemical properties under extremely high or low pressure or temperature. Systems, be they social or biological, have to be managed differently in abnormal environs. Is not this phenomena applicable to information, which is a pattern of mass-energy? Electronic information and libraries have the following distinct features:
a. Highly compact storage
b.Ease of reproduction. multiplication and manipulation
c. Contents can be easily detached from its container / media. and Put into other media without trace of the previous.
d. Ease of transmission. Communication and storage.
e. Hypertext and non-linear format allows a text to be fragmented and organized in a new mode.
f. Seamless integration of print and electronic media; and then of Audio, video, text and animation in multimedia.
g. Sophisticated and multi prong searches. through keywords, freetext, Boolean operators, class numbers, thesauri and their permutations and combinations.
h. Wall less libraries leading to the vision of multimedia global virtual library (MGVL) inaugurating an era of "death of distance".
i. Remote and wireless access transcends barriers of time and place.
j. Convergence of technologies: see the cell phone is getting more multifunctional and powerful than the PC.
k. Cost of technologies is decreasing while its power is increasing.
Power and nature of new media have a visible impact on the shape, wares, functioning and services of libraries. We are called upon to organize CDs and websites just as books and other documents. Traditional acquisition policies and methods are no more practical. Library and information use pattern has changed in face of information networks, wall-less libraries, powerful library systems, OPACs and convergence of technology. This technology is not static or stable. Metamorphic changes are still in the offing. Apex outcome of the new environment is virtual library.
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Virtual Library
A library is a growing social institution, as described by the 5th Law. The major stages in its evolution are:
* Pre-paper library: of clay tablets, papyrus, tree leaves, parchment, etc, etc.
*Traditional Library: of manuscripts, incunabula and printed books and documents on paper
* Hybrid Library: Individual and stand alone library of print, micro and electronic documents served mostly through automation.
* Virtual Library: Networked digital library configured in the cyber space from the collection of scattered physical libraries.
At the outset it may be made clear that it. has nothing to do with virtual reality, nor it is antithetical to the traditional or physical library. This library is a vision of technology with great potential for the future. Even the term has been challenged. 18 It is a computer based telecommunication linked practical library which provides services as any other library. As the name suggests it does not exist as any single housed collection, but is a medium to access information scattered in various physical collections. It has to be configured by an individual searcher, thus making an ultimate multimedia experience. Though a collaborative effort, it has to be configured and structured individually. Being a hypermedia, it provides much more services which a paper based library cannot. Therefore, it is rightly seen that "decades from now . . . the physical library will be less visible to the public than the virtual library. . ."19 Digital and virtual libraries hold a special promise for the developing countries. Their priorities include poverty alleviation, unemployment, public health, safe drinking water, disaster management, environment protection and human rights. Information and awareness on these issues can now more easily be given than ever before Digital technology provides the system developers a golden opportunity to develop a non-commercial mechanism to build and disseminate information for social development. .
Ranganathan's laws were sufficient and quite valid in the previrtual libraries days. But system behave differently in extreme environment or in paradigm shift. Ranganathan himself had visualized that normative laws are valid till the boundary conditions laid down by social needs remain the same. Kuronen and Pekkarinen have given the example that Newtonian physics is valid with small masses and velocity. In the space travel era these are subsumed by the theory of relativity. Take a social example, huge information with fast communication have changed the face of national and international money markets. "The amount of money transacted in international money market is at least hundred times greater than that in real economy". A similar situation occurs when the information - which is instant power - flows globally and is delivered or accessed at the speed of light. The five laws though still valid do not seem sufficient. Two Finnish authors with arguments have proposed two new laws in their various writings. these are:
6th Law: Every reader his library
7th Law: Every writer his contribution to the library.
Here, the reader means a searcher, and library means the virtual Variety.
First Law : Information is for use. It signifies availability of information and removal of barriers in its use. Information being a prime mover of the information society is the most valuable commodity and an asset. Information and knowledge industry employs more than the 65%, of the labour force in advance economies. It has devised methods and policies for the free flow of information overcoming the barrier of time and space. Information marketing and Knowledge Management square well with this law. The super highway of information at the moment is the highest manifestation of the 1st law. Inter and international digital divide is a matter of serious concern for all of us. Next comes the formulation of information policies - which India still does not have to our great national disadvantage and embarrassment. We do not have any policy to harness, utilize and control our greatest asset. As a nation we are somewhat flouting this Law. Libraries need to playa role in the development of national information infrastructure.
Second Law : Information is for all. Virtual library is an individual oriented library. It ensures accessibility of information. Information is a social commodity which needs a producer and consumer. Different channels of information TV, DTH TV Cable TV, cell phones, networks especially the Internet, intranets, LAN ensure information for all. In face of information overload, it is mandatory to customize information to suit individual need Information literacy programmes, IF LA's UAP are a step in this direction. E-books, navigation systems, and digitization programmes support this law. This law recommends users studies and education programmes. Search engines, subject gateways, e-mails, bulletin boards ensure information for all. Virtual library provides simultaneous access to, numerous documents through intelligent agents. IT has come as a great boon for physically or mentally challenged, and geographically isolated.
Third Law : Every byte of information its user. Second and third laws are based on democracy and service. Third Law, which supplements the first two laws, ensures usability of information. Information is effective when it is used. There are two users of information: a) Computers, b) Human Beings. With use it multiplies and produces knowledge which in turn produces wealth. In the market it - is a commodity strictly governed by the demand-supply law. No information will be generated for which there is no demand. -All the present research on user studies is to ensure the generation of that information for which there are likely anticipated users. Marketing of information products and services is in fulfillment of this law.
Fourth Law : Save the time of the netizens is to ensure timely information. Time is the most scarce, exhaustible and unreplenishable resource. All the information storage and communication technology is geared to save time. As the information grows exponentially, so quickly it becomes obsolete. So timely supply of information makes a difference in this competitive world. To save the time of the staff the policies are outsourcing, becoming a member of a network, consortia or a bibliographic utility like OCLC. OPACs offer a single interface to numerous databases with seamless integration of print and electronic sources save time of the user. CCF, MARC21, Metadata and various Markup Languages help standardization. Technology convergence is a great time saver. New tools and techniques are required to organize electronic knowledge for its timely delivery.
Fifth law : Library is a trinity of users, staff and collection. This law has a holistic approach. Information is growing. Information from the very beginning has the property of growing, multiplying and improving qualitatively. The information revolution, we are witnessing, is the highest manifestation of this law. Knowledge grows as the society grows and vice versa. Growth of knowledge and social change are intertwined - and cannot be seen separately. Growth is diversity in time. In that way it is linked with the 4th law. FW Lancaster's famous thesis of paperless libraries ensues from this law.24 not only new information and subjects are emerging, new media and communication services too are growing. Content Management (CM) is the technique developed to combat with ever changing information on the web and intranets. The virtual library is at the apex of this growth.
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Inadequacy of the Laws
But the laws are bit inadequate in face of high speed and flow of huge quantities of information, changing modes of its storage, access and communication. Ease of reproduction and rel11ote access, require new proprietary (lPR) laws. The two new laws proposed by the Finnish colleagues deserve serious consideration for their wide and insightful dimensions of the information society. They dwell on the new cooperative and interactive relations between the users and the documents of the virtual Library.
Sixth Law: Every reader his library. It is a supplement of the second law that is every reader his book. The new technology allows a searcher to navigate through and configure his set of information scattered in the cyber space. It recognizes reader's right and liberty to an individual library; librarians are obliged to recognize individual searcher as the center of the library and to empower them accordingly.
Seventh Law: Every writer his contribution to the library. The era of irrepressible information with free flow provides means to each author to a virtual library. It demands reader's participations in building and managing the library It is in turn deals with the individual's freedom of expression - a right more practically exercisable than in print media. This law guarantees in practice the freedom of opinion and expression. In the age of telecommunications, expression usually takes the electronic form. The line between expression and publishing is blurring specially using markup languages. It in fact strengths democracy.
If accepted, detailed implications of these laws need to be worked out.
It is apparent that information science, more than the library science, has made the value of the laws quite tangible and their applications more apparent. This shows Ranganathan's rationality of approach and vision. The Laws might as well find their tangible validation in the knowledge and wisdom society of the future.
Thank you, dear audience
M.P. Satija
satija_mp@yahoo.com
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References
I. Yogeswar, Ranganathan. S R Ranganathan, pragmatic philosopher.... Mumbai : Bharti Vidhya Bhavan. 2001. pp. 38-58.
2. Ranganathan. S.R. The five laws of library science, 2nd ed. Mumbai: Asia, 1963, p. 362
3. Ranganathan, S.R. "Library science and its development" In : Souvenir. State Book Festival in Ambala State Library, 1966, pp. 5-8.
4. Ranganathan, S.R. Prolegomena to library classification, 3rd ed. led. by M.A. Gopinath. Mumbai : Asia, 1967, Chap DB. pp. 115-122.
5. Cochrane, Pauline "Dr. S R Ranganathan" Lib. res & tch. Servo 14 (4) Fall 1970: 582-584.
6. Liu, J. "The 5 laws of library science in China today" JI of in!'. comm. & Lib. Sci. 4(3) 1998: 68-73 (Describes in Chinese language the implications of Ranganathan's laws in China).
7. Sen., B.K. "Five laws of library science?" laslic bulletin 47(3) Sept. 2002: 121-140.
8. Achinstein, Peter. Law and explanation: an essay in philosophy of science. Oxford: OUP, 1971, pp. 5-14.
9. Satija, M.P. S.R. Ranganathan and the method of science. New Delhi : Aditya, 1992, pp. 98-103
10. Ranganathan S.R. "Documentation" In: Social science research and libraries I ed. by Girja Kumar. Mumbai : Asia, 1960, p. 116.
11. Lancaster, F. W. I f you want to evaluate your library. . . . London : LA, 1988, p. 8.
12. World Bank. The Task Force on Higher Education and Society. Higher education in developing countries: peril and promise. Washington, D.C. : The Bank, 2000, p. 35.
13. Gill, Sucha Singh. In : The Tribune (Chandigarh), dated 14 Dec. 2002.
14. Hettige, S T. Globalisation, social change and youth. Colombo: German Cultural Institute, 1998, p.8.
15. Girja Kumar. Professor S. Dasgupta Memorial Lecture (5th:2002. Delhi Library Association), p.9.
16. Toffler, Alvin. Powershift : knowledge, wealth and violence at the edge of the 21st century. New York: Bantam Books, 1991, pp. 232234.
17. Satija, M.P. "Digital information and services". Introductory address given as Director Thematic sessions, National laslic Seminar (20: 2002: Patiala).
18 Brerude, R.M. "Virtual or actual: the term library is enough" Bull of Med Lib. Assn. 87 (I) 1995: 85-97.
19. Martel, Charles. "Going, going, gone" 11 acd. libship. 25 (3), May 1999: 224-25.
20. Witten, Ian, et al. "The promise of digital libraries in developing Countries". The electronic library. 20( I), 2002: 7-13.
21. Kuronen, Timo and Pekkarinen, Paivi. "Ranganathan's five laws of library science revisited: the challenge of the virtual library" Herald of lib. sc. 35(1/2) lan/April 1996: 3-17.
22. Kuronen, Timo and Pekkarinen, Paivi. "Ranganathan's revisited: a review article" 11 of libship & inf. sci. 31 (I) March 1999: 45-48.
23. Pekkarinen, Paivi. "on 'new' Ranganathan laws for structuring the content of the virtual library" In : International Study Conference on Classification Research (6th: 1997: London), pp. 144-146.
24. Lancester, FW "Library is a growing organism" In : Ranganathan's philosophy led. by T S Rajagopalan. New Delhi: Vikas, 1986, pp. 51-53.
25. Gorman, Michael. Our enduring values: librarianship in the 21st century. Chicago: ALA, 2000, p. 18-19.
