02/21 Readings

"Public Libraries, Values, Trust, and E-Government"

Paul Jaeger’s and Kenneth Fleischmann’s “Public Libraries, Values, Trust, and E-Government” discusses the ethical implications of e-government access through public libraries. While Jaeger and Fleischmann state that e-government access in a communally trusted space such as a public library would make the government itself appear more trustworthy, they disregard the negative impact e-government access could have on the community-library relationship (Jaeger and Fleischmann 34).  Rather than making the government appear more trustworthy, e-government access could make public libraries look like yet another extension of the government. If current or potential users perceive their public library as being infiltrated by the government, they might be wary of using the library in general. 

"Community Leadership Through Public Library E-Government Services" 

Trust between libraries/librarians and users is an issue also broached in “Community Leadership Through Public Library E-Government Services.” The authors mention that assisting users with e-government processes, applications, etc, gives librarians more access to patrons’ personal information (Gibson, McClure, Bertot, McGilvray, and Andrade 5). Once again, e-government threatens to upset the trust between public libraries and communities. If a librarian were assisting a patron with an e-government application and the processing went awry, that patron might blame the librarian helping him/her and the public library at large for subsequent complications. That person then probably wouldn’t return to the library, would tell all of their friends how ineffective and untrustworthy the public library was, and a rift would gradually grow between the public library and the community it served. 

"Responsibility Rolls Down" 

Paul Jaeger’s and John Bertot’s “Responsibility Rolls Down” is largely concerned with the burden e-government places on public libraries, and how despite public libraries’ growing importance to their communities, their funding keeps getting cut. This article reminded me of another article from a few weeks ago, “Across the Digital Divide.” First, rather than making government materials more accessible, the transfer of all government materials and processes to the internet makes them more restricted. Second, cut backs in public library funding restrict the services public libraries can offer, limiting access to some electronic government materials. These two issues together contradict the idea that democratic government is open to all people and should therefore be easily accessible. For the portion of the population that needs the library in order to access the internet, e-government makes applying for unemployment, Medicare, and other aid more difficult. If libraries can’t afford the staff or other technology necessary to support e-government, then this demographic is out of luck. The government and the public library would both fail in their purposes. 

Jaeger and Bertot also mention in their article that individuals are forced to turn to public libraries rather than law libraries for government information because law libraries no longer allow public access. This undermines the democratic idea underlying libraries, especially law libraries. Law libraries exist so that there a place people can go in order to access government materials and assistance from qualified individuals. By limiting their services to a restricted group of lawyers, law libraries fail in their mission to make legal information accessible to all. This not only negatively impacts individuals at a technological disadvantage, but also has consequences for their more fortunate counter-parts needing access to government information.  Information, especially government information, should not be limited to the privileged few in a nation based on equality for all.