Newcomers at the library: a library perspective on the integration of new citizens

Introduction

Since their establishment in the mid-19_th century, the Scandinavian public libraries have, among other things, had the task of ensuring peaceful coexistence between different population groups (Jönsson-Lanevska, 2005). The first integration initiatives were articulated as a philanthropic action, but were at the same time an elitist project aimed at the moral disciplining and education of people from the lowest classes of society, as resources for the industry but also as more equal participants in the nation-state’s democratic processes (Harris, 1972; Pateman, November, 2005; Skouvig, September, 2007).

In the 1960s, global migration movements were intensifying, changing the populations’ cultural composition, and thereby the nation-states’ legitimacy began to weaken (Bryson, 2018, p. 3). Today, all Western nations seem to recognise multiculturalism as a condition, whether multicultural populations are considered either an advantage or a challenge. As a result, integration activities have changed character (Delica & Elbeshausen, 2017; Johnston, 2018). The aim of public authorities’ integration efforts remains to be peaceful coexistence, but integration initiatives are now focused on new population groups.

The Danish public libraries are one of several culture institutions that got involved in the ‘integration work’, as it is called in Danish, on the above-mentioned conditions: the liberal democracy’s concept of liberty allows the individual to pursue their own ambitions as far as abilities and possibilities go - provided this is done in respect for the nation-state’s self-narration. Public libraries have always tried to balance this duality by articulating their activities as facilitating people’s self-improvement and self-reflexive processes, within the framework of liberal democracy’s pronounced and unspoken terms to help the individual develop an adequate habitus in a Bordieuan sense (Bourdieu & Wacquant 1996, 29-30, 106-107).

This duality becomes visible in the last, major study of Danish public library’s integration work, Refuge for Integration (Refuge for integration: A study of how the ethnic minorities in Denmark use the libraries: Abstract and recommendations, 2001). The study was a joint venture project between the State Library in Aarhus, as well as Aarhus and Odense municipal libraries. The purposes were both to map the status of the integration work and to formulate recommendations that other public libraries could apply or be inspired by. Refuge for Integration was based on comparative studies, where different groups of newcomers - defined as both first and second-generation refugees and immigrants - and their use of the public libraries’ collections, services, etc., were compared with the Danish population’s use. The application pattern and frequency of the Danish population thus emerged as a vision for the integration work, especially on parameters where newcomers underperformed - which illustrates the above-mentioned paradox: on the one hand, respect for the target groups’ ethnic distinctiveness, and on the other hand, enforcement of the national state’s cultural values.

Refuge for integration managed to create a common base for the public libraries’ integration work, and at the same time gained attention from culture politicians, the public and other countries (e.g. Atlestam, Brunnström, & Myhre, 2011), an attention whose interest lasted until 2007, where a Structural Reform of the public administration in Denmark was implemented (The Danish Local Government System, February 2009). In the public library area, the Structural Reform led to the closure of library branches, a changed relationship with the public and - I assume - a changed view of the integration work. Thus, the purpose of this pilot study is to initiate a study of what consequences the Structural Reform had for the public libraries’ integration work after 2007. My ambition is to resume the studies of how the public libraries participate in integration activities because I have an assumption that the attention that was granted to integration activities during the 2000s was replaced by an interest in organisational and digital change processes after 2007.

This article is structured according to a classic, humanistic template. In the next section, Method, I briefly explain the methodological approaches I have chosen to apply. In the Building a research-based analytical framework section, I describe the theoretical basis on which my analytical apparatus is based and explain the concepts included in the analysis. These concepts are used to structure and analyse the interview and are reproduced in the Analysis section. The most striking result is that there are two paradigms at stake, each focusing on different parts of the public librarians’ dissemination work. In the Discussion section I deal with possible consequences and implications of my findings and conclude with a brief Conclusion.

Methods

A study of how the 98 library systems in Denmark handle their integration task in the transition from integration to an organisational perspective is not realistic within the framework of this study. I, therefore, carry out a pilot study based on a literature study, as well as a semi-structured interview with an integration librarian at a major, Danish municipality’s main library. The literature study included:

• Selected research articles on the public libraries’ integration work
• Reports on the influence of the Structural Reform for public libraries

This study was based on a selection of articles published between 2007, when the Structural Reform came into force, and 2018. Geographically, the study covered articles that affected the integration work of Danish public libraries. Articles on integration work often are the result of comparative studies between e.g. Scandinavian or Western countries’ public libraries.

The ‘The public libraries in the knowledge society’ [2010] report, which was prepared by an expert committee, set up by the Danish Agency for Libraries and Media, is at the heart of the transformation of the Danish public libraries. The committee’s task was to discuss possible library-related consequences of the reform and to prepare recommendations on how public libraries could act in the new administrative reality.

The reports and articles’ professional subjects were used as a framework for the analysis of an interview with a librarian who had worked with integration for approximately 15 years. The interview was conducted on 15_th January 2019 following an interview guide, and with a focus on personal experiences from institutional practice. The interview was recorded and transcribed and all quotes from the interview have been translated by the author.

There are several methods for analysing qualitative interviews: conversation analytical approaches may be applied as well as discourse analytical or subject analytical approaches to the empirical material (Brinkmann, 2013; King & Horrocks, 2012). In this article, the latter strategy was chosen. The respondent’s statement was initially coded based on the subjects identified in the research literature, after which the various subjects were adjusted in an iterative process. These iterations were clustered in relation to 5 recommendations from ‘The public libraries…’ [2010] and illustrative examples were selected, to support the answering of my problem statement.

Building a research-based analytical framework

Several reports on the consequences and potentials of the Structural Reform have been published, e.g. ‘Folkebibliotekerne efter strukturreformen’ (2008) and ‘Folkebibliotekerne i vidensamfundet. Rapport fra Udvalget om folkebibliotekerne i vidensamfundet (2010) and the English summary The Public Libraries in the Knowledge Society: Summary from the committee on public libraries in the knowledge society [2010]. The latter is particularly interesting because it was initiated by the highest library professional authority in Denmark and realised in cooperation with Dorthe Skot-Hansen, Casper Hvenegaard Rasmussen and Henrik Jochumsen, who developed a new edition of their four-room model. ‘The public libraries…’ therefore appears as an expression of how the public libraries’ self-understanding could be articulated within the new administrative structure.

As a political document, it is possible to identify its mission, vision, and objective in ‘The public libraries ...’ [2010]. According to John Bryson, mission and vision play two different but essential roles:

Mission... clarifies an organization’s purpose and why it should be doing what it does; vision clarifies what the organization should look like and how it should behave in fulfilling its mission. (Bryson, 2018, p. 122; see also Germano & Stretch-Stephenson, 2012, p. 73).

Correspondingly, Ray Prytherch identifies three components that the mission concerns in a library-related context: 1) the target group that is the object of the intended service, 2) the wishes and needs of the target group that are accommodated and 3) the services or products that are needed to meet the needs of the target group. These three components are concretised in different objectives that support the mission without necessarily being focused. An organisation can easily have conflicting goals, but they are always dependent on the overall mission of the organisation. (Prytherch, 2017, pp. 203-204).

The scientific interest in the public libraries’ integration work has been sporadic and none of the verified articles explicitly referred to the Structural Reform and its consequences. However, some of the articles dealt with aspects of the integration work that the Structural Reform affected. In a comparative study of Danish and Swedish public libraries from 2011, Ingrid Atlestam, Ann-Christine Brunnström, and Randi Myhre define the public libraries’ mission as a question of: ‘How we can... plan our media purchases and stock our libraries in order to meet the needs of our increasingly diversified societies.’ (Atlestam et al., 2011, p. 69). This study focused on selected libraries’ collections and their importance for the target groups’ literacy. Reading is considered a prerequisite for the acquisition of language, culture, and understanding of society as well as for maintaining the connection to the individual’s culture of origin. Learning and inspiration were explicitly stated as a special focus area in ‘The public libraries …’ [2010] as a starting point for lifelong learning activities.

A second subject is addressed by Kristian N. Delica and Hans Elbeshausen (2017), who conduct a comparative study of how Canadian, British and Danish public libraries developed into various forms of community centres. The authors assumed that the public library had changed in the direction of a ‘social library’ to fulfil its late-modern mission:

Compared to the classic library, which serves as an exponent of the national public and a symbol of an ‘imagined community’, community-oriented libraries have reconceptualized the library instead as a cornerstone of a defined community. (Delica & Elbeshausen, 2017, p. 237).

The vision was that the local public library should function as socially and culturally inclusive and be made accessible to everyone through better use of local resources. In ‘The public libraries …’ [2010], one of the recommendations was to allocate resources through increased Partnerships with public institutions, business, and civil society.

A third subject was touched upon by Jamie Johnston, who was interested in what integration is and how integration takes place. Johnston noted that the public libraries’ mission is to prevent segregation, exclusion, and distrust between populations, which is done by facilitating top-down processes. But the political climate in Scandinavia is becoming increasingly intolerant, which is why it is necessary to (re-)activate the civil society and facilitate processes bottom-up (Johnston, 2018). Because the Structural Reform can be interpreted as a centralisation of administrative powers, one of the focal points of ‘The public libraries …’ [2010] was how public libraries can counteract the negative consequences of e.g. fewer but larger library units.

The ‘The public libraries …’ [2010] report was based on an analysis of the Danish public library’s status in 2010 and describes the current mission and vision of the public libraries as the following:

In the knowledge society, the public library’s efforts to further enlightenment, education, and cultural activity is more important than ever before. Society’s value creation is to an increasing extent based on the citizen’s ability to transform information into knowledge and to use this knowledge to create new value. Due to increased competition, which is a result of the globalisation, this value creation becomes even more essential (The Public Libraries in the Knowledge Society: Summary from the committee on public libraries in the knowledge society [2010], p. 6).

The society’s need to prepare the population for professional life in post-industrial digital society meant that information, education, and cultural activity were more essential than ever before, and so public libraries’ offerings must be for everyone! With this in mind, ‘The public libraries …’ [2010] recommended 5 actions:

1. Open libraries referred to the need for increased accessibility and were articulated as a necessary consequence of the Structural Reform centralising public libraries into larger physical entities.
2. Inspiration and learning related to the continuing need to maintain and develop the public’s literacy skills, with a special focus on the digital transformation of society. Hence, ICT competencies were considered the starting point for the public libraries’ contribution to lifelong learning processes in late-modernity, which must provide the individual with the opportunity to preserve active citizenship and to remain an asset to a changeable labour market.
3. The Danish digital library related to the establishment of an actual digital infrastructure, which at the same time enabled digital dissemination of art and cultural experiences to the public and thus increased the possibilities for self-service via the Internet.
4. Partnerships concerned the possibilities of binding correlations between public institutions, business and civil society in the effort to optimise the use of local resources. The Danish public libraries have always been collaborative, but now partnerships were emphasised as a strategic focus area.
5. Professional development was aimed at the library employees’ need for competence development and the possibilities for further and continuing education, so that library employees could develop adequate activities (e.g. teaching skills), which some of the above-mentioned actions required (The Public Libraries in the Knowledge Society: Summary from the committee on public libraries in the knowledge society, [2010], pp. 9-13)

The terms ‘mission’, ‘vision’ and ‘objective’ are interesting because the respondent’s articulation of the main library’s integration work will uncover the links between cultural-political ideals and library-based practices, and at the same time uncover whether ‘The public libraries ...’ [2010] recommendations have had an impact on the integration work. Since the respondent has been an integration librarian for 15 years, her experience goes back to before the implementation of the Structural Reform. Based on the theoretical framework, it is now possible to set up the following model for analysing the respondent’s articulations:

Analysis

The city council adopted an integration policy in 2007, which was published in 2010. The first two paragraphs in the field of culture describe the municipal’s mission and vision for the public libraries’ integration work:

1. [The town’s] library must support citizens with ethnic origin other than Danish in their integration and active participation in society.
2. Users with ethnic origin other than Danish must be the same proportionate share of library users as of the total population (Integrationspolitik, [2010], p. 16 - my translation).

The respondent remembered the release but defined it as ‘… forgotten the following year!’ (Interview, 15/01, 2019). Because the main library never adopted its own integration policy, the respondent, together with changing teams of colleagues and in agreement with the dissemination manager, launched several initiatives to promote the integration of different groups of newcomers. In the interview, there were two statements that are central to understanding the practical integration work, because, despite the absence of a formal integration policy with a vision and mission, the respondent articulated both reasons and ambitions. According to the respondent, the main library’s task was to treat people equally in their efforts to enlighten, educate and be culturally active - and this could only be done through compensatory discrimination!

I think we can do it right by treating people equal by treating them differently... it has never been up for discussion... so you have a specific need and if you have to be treated equally, then you have to have some special things met.... So, it’s really the principle I work from… (Interview, 15/01, 2019)

This statement identified the mission of the respondent, co-workers, and dissemination manager. Target groups from especially non-Western countries are rarely familiar with the public library as an institution, its possibilities, and obligations, so the integration work can be regarded as activities designed to compensate for this lack of knowledge. In practice, the integration work became the compensatory discrimination that created equality and thus became part of a general education process.

The second statement contained the respondent’s articulation of the main library as a place where people can reside and unfold, within the framework of the cultural and social norms of the public library, without prejudice to each other:

[We] don’t have regulations... in Arabic, Turkish, or Farsi. It is also on purpose.... In my optics... we shouldn’t have anything... we must have a room... where it is obvious that this is how we act here (Interview, 15/01, 2019 - my emphasis)

Here, the respondent articulated a vision for the integration work as a general education project, whose purpose was to impart to individuals without prior knowledge of public libraries a cultural habitus that is both idealistic and practically consistent with the expectations from both the institution and native patrons. The compensatory discrimination of the integration work must facilitate newcomers’ individual self-formation processes - whereby the main library becomes a microcosm in relation to the surrounding society. I choose to refer to this process as ‘self-formation’ because the statement emphasises the individual’s transformation, not the acquisition of skills (learning), but as habitus - as something the individual may become (Bildung). At the same time, Prytherch’s three components are presented: the newcomers, their wishes/needs to be integrated, and the public libraries’ efforts to compensate the newcomers’ individual lack of knowledge (2017, pp. 203-204).

The two statements govern the initiatives that the respondent has initiated or contributed to. However, since neither mission nor vision was articulated, e.g. as institutional declarations of intent, they appeared implicitly, with the mission and vision of integration work known only by colleagues and the head of dissemination, at best the institution. What was visible to the public was the specific activities that library employees engage in.

Open libraries

In analysing the interview, it became possible to identify several initiatives that could be considered as ways to increase the accessibility of newcomers to library services. Not as outlined in ‘The public libraries …’ [2010] where changes in relations between the institution and the public were based on knowledge of the public library institution but as based on the lack of knowledge by newcomers, not acquainted with the public library’s possibilities and limitations (Skøtt, 2019 - in review; Aabø & Audunson, 2012). An example of this was the respondent’s initiative during the town festival:

We have a [town festival] where people get drunk... and I thought: no way! We also need something for the ethnic minorities, thus for several years, I have had... a tent out there. (Interview, 15/01, 2019).

This initiative had several functions, but in relation to the integration work, the respondent’s engagement in the town’s festival meant that library employees got the opportunity to facilitate newcomers’ social participation in a practice-related context. However, the integration work reached beyond newcomer non-users, which was illustrated by another set of activities, the monthly Meet a foreigner event. These events consisted of individual presentations followed by discussions focusing on encounters between people from different cultural backgrounds: ‘… and then we talk about cultural differences, food, everything…’ (Interview, 15/01, 2019) (see also Berry, 1997, pp. 9-12). Through Meet a foreigner, the main library opened a public space that provided the opportunity to convey cultural, social and ethnic characteristics to active patrons.

Inspiration and learning

‘The public libraries …’ [2010] stated a continued obligation for public libraries to create inspiration and learning spaces with a focus on basic ICT skills, as well as literacy. Together with extended opening hours, differentiated services and a focus on (digital) self-service were means to counteract the fact that fewer library units created greater physical distance and thus de facto less accessibility.

In contrast, the respondent formulated a somewhat broader learning and inspiration concept, especially for the juvenile target groups:

We only had 10 computers at the children’s library at that time and I... had computer number 10. It could only be used for homework or home assignments... If the other [computers] were busy we had to talk about what they could use it for... If it was one from Sri Lanka, then we looked [at] Google Maps... We talked about why we celebrate Christmas... just ordinary things... and it was also me who told them: Let’s stop those f-words! It’s intolerable listening to... Get your feet down from the table! It’s doesn’t look good. Don’t throw your bag there… (Interview, 15/01, 2019).

The extra features that the integration work provided the target groups in the inspiration and learning context related to a professionally-based library introduction for adequate library use as a supplement to teaching taking place elsewhere (e.g. in language schools). But it also related to a code of conduct and thereby to potential changes in the individual’s habitus. In this way, the integration work facilitated both intellectual, cultural and social qualifications as part of a lifelong learning project. The result of the individual’s learning process differed from the Danish patrons, but the process is comparable.

The Danish digital library

The Danish digital library related to the establishment of a digital infrastructure for the public libraries, including opportunities for digital dissemination of art and culture as an overall pragmatic solution that underpinned both Open libraries and Inspiration and learning. According to the respondent, the main library’s digital dissemination (e.g. ‘down-loans’ – the digital lending of e-books, query services, and e-learning modules) has been a great success. The website’s dynamic news carousels generate many reservations and loans, and the main library aims to further develop the system but the possible consequences of digitisation for the integration work have not yet been addressed in the research literature. The respondent maintained and developed the part of the site that related to the integration work (a link collection):

I [had] several places on the Internet where you could take free Danish courses [but] when they came with their parents, I could only remember three.... Then someone said to me: you need a blog (Interview, 15/01, 2019)

In isolation, the respondent’s link collection referred to free offers on the Internet, e.g. language training courses for people with Danish as their second language. But the main library’s website must first and foremost satisfy the average library-user’s expectations and the main library’s need for a marketing tool that generates visible results (see also Atlestam et al., 2011). The integration work has always been and still is way too small and specialised to satisfy this need and, therefore, the respondent’s link collection was placed on the third level in the web architectural structure.

Partnerships

Partnerships formed a network for the development of the integration work and ‘The public libraries …’ [2010] recommends more structured and systematic collaborations (also see Delica & Elbeshausen, 2017). The respondent was the contact person whenever it concerned national and regional inquiries regarding library projects in the municipality. She was the coordinator of the inter-institutional cooperation between the library, the culture house and museums, and the coordinator of the municipal integration network, whose participants included social workers, teachers, project and street workers: ‘I gather them, and we meet three times a year, where we exchange experiences… ’ (interview 15/01, 2019)

Professional development

Professional development stated the needs of library employees for continued education. To be able to meet the changing demands of society’s digitisation, library employees must upgrade their skills. In the integration work, professional development is about improving the interaction with the target groups and more precisely about relational competence and common interest (cf. Prytherch, 2017, pp. 203-204):

I’m a former children’s librarian. Maybe it’s a competence... because there you have it with relationships... and are able to say ‘no’.... And the ability to say no... is important because otherwise you easily let yourself feel intimidated (Interview, 15/01, 2019)

Being able to create and maintain relationships across cultural and social divisions was a recurring subject in the interview and the respondent repeatedly pointed out the value of being able to bridge barriers. Here, partnerships, e.g. the collaboration with street workers with high status in the non-Western communities, became an asset.

Developing interests in common with the target group was expressed as a genuine interest in matters that are of importance to the target group:

I watch a lot of football!.... So, whenever they played FIFA down here..., [they] were quite puzzled... by this old woman who knew something about football.... I also played a lot of table football with them. We had a table football [table] down here... and when I had beaten the first few Somali boys... they were just completely ‘...wow!’ (Interview, 15/01, 2019)

Johnston (2018) also emphasises common interests as a starting point for equal dialogue between people. Common interests (e.g. food, storytelling or football) may be the starting point for exchanging experiences and stories and hence become a contribution to the individuals’ new identity constructions. When asked directly whether the respondent had missed competencies, she replied ‘… yes... that I could speak Arabic!’ and immediately corrected herself: ‘… but again: so what!’ (Interview, 15/01, 2019).

Discussion

In comparing ‘The public libraries’…’ recommendations and the respondent’s answers, it became clear how the Structural Reform in 2007 heralded a change of course about the library professional focus in the Danish public libraries. And although different subjects are held in common, there is a big difference between how these subjects are handled according to whether an administration or an integration perspective is applied.

In an administrative context, Open libraries, Inspiration and learning require prior knowledge of the library institution: without basic knowledge of the library institution’s opportunities and obligations, it becomes difficult for the public to perform different forms of self-service. According to ‘The public libraries …’ [2010], Inspiration and learning must precisely focus on the further development of the competencies that the public has already acquired, to ensure their professional and civil relations with society. In an integration context, Open libraries and Inspiration and learning concern the target groups’ ignorance of the library institution, of the language and of society in general, and this is why the integration work also concerns non-users among the newcomers.

The Danish digital libraries and entering into more obliging Partnerships can be considered as technical-administrative solutions to some of the practical issues that the Structural Reform entailed. Digitisation of the public library’s infrastructure creates the basis for the development of digital administration and digital dissemination forms, to ensure an effective response to the negative consequences of the Structural Reform, while partnerships were meant to ensure better use of local resources across organisational boundaries - to make the public library more efficient. In an administrative perspective, digitisation may therefore be regarded as a ‘one size fits all’ solution to the public in general. In contrast, integration activities must be individualised or, as a minimum, directed to demarcated target groups, because their purpose is to create equality through compensatory discrimination, aimed at minimising ignorance.

Accordingly, there are two very different sets of competencies at stake in an administration and an integration perspective, respectively. In an administration perspective, ‘The public libraries ...’ [2010] recommends a formal and professional upgrading of library employees as teachers and guides focusing on the public’s acquisition of ICT competencies. ‘The public libraries …’ [2010] still accentuates information, education, and cultural activity, but with a focus on how people can translate information into knowledge to create more socioeconomic value in a growing global and competitive world. In an integration perspective, the respondent articulated her professionalism as based on professional specialisation as a child librarian, combined with a great personal interest in the target groups and on experience in practice. The respondent conveyed both mission (equality through compensatory discrimination) and vision (a place where everyone can unfold), exemplarily, through her physical presence and interpersonal interaction. A significant part of the respondent’s competencies cannot be learned through professional education but must be experienced through learning by doing.

Conclusion

How does the Structural Reform change the public libraries’ integration work? Subject to my study’s status as a pilot study, I can observe how the focus of the public libraries’ professionalism post-2007, was to optimise the organisational structure of the public libraries, which was reflected in the rationalisation of administrative and dissemination practices. The recommendations on binding Partnerships and Professional development expressed an organisational transformation, which, together with the Danish digital library, must optimise existing usage patterns and utilisation rates, as well as mitigate possible negative consequences, to ultimately qualify the public as participating and productive members of a digital society. This is an elitist project, whose demands for increased physical and digital self-service, and an upgrading of existing ICT competences among the public are elements in a universal, formal learning project.

In contrast, the concrete integration work was based on the target groups’ ignorance of the public libraries’ collections, space, and services. This work was described by the respondent as compensatory discrimination, whose vision was to provide newcomers – patrons as well as non-users – with an adequate habitus to ensure a potential free and equal access and use of the public libraries. Therefore, the compensatory discrimination must be individualised or at least be aimed at newcomers, in order to make sense. And the integration work at the public libraries thus becomes an egalitarian project, because the library employees must be as focused on their own experience formations as on the people and target groups they facilitate.

Basically, the administrative and the integrative perspective affects two different target groups, but the implementation of the reform in the public library area nevertheless creates a change in the integration work at the municipality’s main library. When the professional attention is shifted from compensatory discrimination to formalised continuing education with a focus on the public’s competence development, the cultural politicians, the library institution and the public’s consciousness change simultaneously, according to the nature and relevance of integration work. The need for integration activities does not disappear but obtains a different status and character, which the respondent’s answers are an illustrative example of.

About the author

Bo Skøtt is an assistant professor and post-doctoral researcher at the Department of Design and Communication at University of Southern Denmark, Denmark, and can be contacted at skott@sdu.dk.