produced by academic rights holders. In 2007–2008, the 123 libraries comprising the Association of Research Libraries alone spent approximately US$870 million on current serial subscriptions.10 Libraries expend ever-larger portions of their increasingly stretched budgets on materials, especially scientific, technical, and medical serials, the costs of which have increased at staggering rates in the past decades. Rather than attempting to avoid paying rights holders, libraries are the chief source of revenue for academic publications. Libraries work with publishers to establish license agreements that allow interlibrary lending, which is factored into the price of the agreement. Overall, ILL offices work very hard to conform to agreements, laws, and guidelines in their practices, often erring on the side of not providing licensed content when lending rights are silent or unknown. As print subscriptions diminish, lending from licensed content will take on increasing importance to interlibrary lending. If there are more restrictions on lending of licensed content there will be a larger gap between the material available to local patrons and what can be shared through ILL. That distinction is new, as licensed content becomes the preferred format in collections. Library lending internationally is an important activity of research libraries. If limits are placed in the US on lending internationally, research libraries may find it more challenging to obtain materials from foreign countries to meet the research needs of their own users. Ultimately, this would serve to stifle research and limit creativity. Conclusion As noted previously, IFLA’s guidelines state that “each country has a special responsibility to supply its own national imprints to libraries in other countries” in order to promote “universal availability of published material,” and “that all reasonable efforts should be made to satisfy international requests.”11 These guidelines succinctly describe the mission and responsibilities of libraries in support of access to knowledge. Challenges to current international ILL practices could significantly undermine this carefully crafted and balanced set of important resource-sharing activities. Second, research and education is increasingly a global enterprise. As a result, there is an increased demand for international research resources and this demand blurs national borders. By engaging with our international partners, research libraries build relationships with libraries and institutions RLI 275 12 White Paper: International Interlibrary Loan ( C O N T I N U E D ) JUNE 2011 RESEARCH LIBRARY ISSUES: A QUARTERLY REPORT FROM ARL, CNI, AND SPARC
Previous Page Next Page