Facet Publishing

Summary

FREEDOM OF INFORMATION is about improving public access to government information. It is different in character to data protection and also to censorship and freedom of speech. We should be clear about the terms we are using, as there is often confusion between freedom of information and freedom of speech and expression. We might also include ‘intellectual freedom’ in this. Intellectual freedom is a term similar to freedom to read but being more inclusive and covering more, and concerns the right to read or view as we wish, without censorship. Freedom of speech and expression are the right to make utterances without censorship; they are obviously closely related to intellectual freedom and the freedom to read.

Freedom of information is different, although it does relate to restrictions on the right to read, as it is the name given first to campaigns, and latterly to laws, to enforce governments to release for public view information they have collected and hold. The matter of increased government secrecy has become a major issue in the last 30 years but has been the subject of campaigns for much longer. The cause of the concern is familiar: the increased volume of government activity, the extension of government action into many more areas of life, the effect of nearly a century of wars or near wars for most of the advanced industrial nations with the attendant paranoia about national security, and increased dem11ocratic concern about the accountability of those with power. The movement to increase government accountability is, like the movement to secure data protection, pursued from the ground up, and, as with data protection, the legislation was resisted and then introduced with reluctance. The difference is that in the case of freedom of information the legislation is aimed solely at the governments themselves and for its implementation is dependent on government goodwill and willingness to reveal what information it holds. The information is of two broad types, which overlap: the information governments collect, and that which they generate from their own work – the working documents of government.

Summary

INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY is an area of interest because governments have a different set of interests from those of citizens, and citizens themselves have conflicting interests according to the role they are playing. Citizens can be both consumers and creators of intellectual property, seeking to protect creators’ rights while simultaneously anxious to secure the widest possible access to products. Governments, acting also as both producers and consumers, do not have the same interest in protecting creators’ rights because they are not dependent on the income. Governments do have a secondary interest in creators’ profits because they may enjoy tax revenues from the creator's work or from by-products of it. Successful creative activity leads not just to books, films, paintings, other art and performances, but also to merchandising – the T-shirts and mugs – that mark an increase in economic activity and hence tax revenues. There are two other secondary government interests. One is concern that they may be pilloried for failing to protect both the economic interests of living artists and the rights to access that the mass of citizens wish to enjoy. The other is concern that the activities of artists may effect a disturbance in the political balance, as art often criticizes power, especially when the exercise of political power against those unable to respond evokes satirical artistic comment. What better way to guard against this than to ensure that artists are enveloped within the established system of national and community rewards and have maximum opportunities to create new work and to distribute it, while at the same time ensuring that the population at large has easy access to this work through the provision of free public libraries, museums and art galleries, and subsidized theatre performances?

This concern for the living artist and the art-hungry citizen may be the popular image of talk about intellectual property, but the reality is different, and the reality of government interest is different. Intellectual property law protects all intellectual property, not just that which can be labelled artistic. So, all new knowledge, all scientific work, all engineering and architectural realizations of new inventions and discoveries, and even all repackaging in new forms of existing knowledge (such as school textbooks), is covered by law, international treaties, and national and international organizations.

Summary

WE HAVE REVIEWED both macro and micro elements that influence the determination of information policy. There are other issues that we could have considered, most obviously the matter of how to determine the use of goods in common – that is, those that are limited in extent and which we all share. The broadcast spectrum is the commonly cited example of that. We have also taken the whole discussion from the viewpoint of a democratic society with a stable but powerful government and bureaucracy subject to some level of accountability to voters and legal procedures. Our discussion has also assumed that we are dealing with societies with effective, enforceable legal systems that are binding on all members of the society. The point about the law is threefold – first, that everyone lives ‘under the law’, second, that the law is an effective instrument, and third, that the spirit of the law that dictates the way the law is used is benign, reflecting a belief that law can be used as an instrument to bring about beneficial social change. The belief in the beneficial influence of law as an agent of social change has been available to us since the Enlightenment, but that view of law does not pertain in all societies, and in some instances law is still just an instrument of coercion.

Information policies in non-democratic societies

What do we say about societies where these points do not hold good? We can distinguish three types, which may not account for all instances but which certainly gives us some initial assistance in dealing with nondemocratic societies. First, there is the case where the normal institutions of a democratic society living under the law have broken down. In this case we can appeal to some previously held intention or understanding whereby although the prospect of immediate restitution of former values and practices is remote we can at least work with the spirit of those and gradually move back to a normal democratic environment as other conditions improve. Second, there is the case where these values never did exist and the apparatus of government is weak and lacks moral and effective coercive authority.

Summary

WE SHOULD BEGIN this review of information policy provisions for data protection by putting it in the context of social and government action. Unlike issues of censorship, which tend to be dealt with at government level and imposed largely at the behest of governments, data protection is an issue that gets its momentum from grassroots activism. We saw with Cohen's model for protecting speech that the main concern is over-regulation of speech, and that there are several issues relating to the character of the society that we live in that make it imperative to generate action to reduce over-regulation. Governments have a lazy interest in prohibiting speech – such action might reduce the risk of political dissent, and of discord and disruption of the civil order between sections of society, and it can protect the government's own interests where there is a need to protect national secrets or a desire to prohibit investigation of government action.

Issues of privacy and data protection are not matters of concern to government, except in so far as individual members of government have an interest in restricting public knowledge of and comment on their own actions. Beyond that the only government interest lies in ensuring a minimum of discord among its subjects or citizens, and by protecting data or recognizing privacy some small level of civil order may be maintained. Recent events in several countries, particularly the UK, have shown that governments or their agents or agencies are lamentably inept at protecting data about citizens. Records of millions of citizens contained on computers or computer readable media have been lost, found in rubbish dumps, or stolen. Such records often include sensitive financial or health information that might expose those whose names are on the list to financial loss or other distress. Governments are not alone: banks, which also keep huge files of the financial details of their customers, have also lost such data.

In most societies the only agency with the authority and power to protect data is the apparatus of the state. This includes the promotion and passage of legislation; the establishment of oversight agencies and responsible personnel; and the identification of illegal acts, penalties, processes of redress and if necessary punishment, and codes of conduct to ensure the safety of data.

Summary

IN THE SPRING of 2009 a protest in London, England, at the time of an international meeting resulted in the death of a man in the crowd. Later, it emerged that he was not part of the demonstration but had merely been walking home from work. Quite quickly, some video footage appeared showing him being struck and knocked to the ground by a policeman. Afew days later another short piece of grainy video appeared, showing a policeman first shoving a woman in the back with his hand and then striking her across the back of her legs with his baton. Quite clearly, this is a story about several different themes. First, it is about concerns over police behaviour; it is also a story about concerns over world economic conditions and the policies of world leaders. But it is also a news story, something that became an information item. As such it has a life, it has to be described and labelled in some way that allows it to be stored and then found again later. That, if you like, is about the management of the item, but we can also ask questions about the nature of the item. What exactly was being videoed? Did the person with the camera focus on just part of a larger scene? There is no sound with the video footage, so we do not know what the woman and the policeman said to one another – we do not have a complete picture, so we lack information about this event.

The policeman wears a coat with no identifying badge or number: it would be impossible to use the footage to isolate which policeman hit the woman, so immediately we want further information to complete our knowledge of the event. Should we get that? Is this selective footage the kind of thing that, contrary to the general interests of public order, dents confidence in the police, so much that we might want to suppress such video clips?

Summary

Introduction

In this chapter I provide an overview of the research process, involving working on the thesis through to completing and obtaining a doctorate. This chapter covers topics such as: the literature review, methodology, fieldwork, writing up, the viva oral examination, amendments and completing the doctorate. As explained in Chapter 3, the final research proposal will have been developed, possibly throughout the first year of the doctoral programme for PhD students, and perhaps as a result of a taught module for students completing a professional or practice doctorate.

This chapter is illustrated with examples from my own doctoral research experience and from colleagues who have been willing to share their experiences with me.

Moving forward

Once the research student has developed her study by identifying the theoretical framework, identifying a focus and designing the research, then she is ready to progress her thesis. In the initial stages this is likely to involve further work on the literature review, more in-depth reading of the research methodology literature, and planning the field work or experiments. This period of the research process may take a year or even more, and it is likely that the student will revise the focus of her research, her methodology and her methods. Planning the fieldwork or experiments may also lead to further changes in the research process. For example, a student may find that she does not have access to a particular organization, or that her original plans were too ambitious to translate into a real-life experiment and that they need to be amended.

The literature review is a central part of a doctoral thesis, and Wellington et al. (2005, 73)suggest that it enables students to:

Summary

Where we are now

Barely a week goes by without news of the digital publication of some sparkling cultural resource being splashed across the media – 2009 has been a particularly rich year. ‘World's oldest Bible published in full online’, reported the Daily Telegraph in July 2009, as the website with the Codex Sinaiticus was introduced to the general public (Daily Telegraph, 2009). ‘Frozen in time: historic images of polar exploration made public’, proclaimed the Daily Mirror, as the University of Cambridge published its stunning collection of images of early voyages to the Arctic and Antarctic (Daily Mirror, 2009). And the Independent newspaper marked the launch of the University of Kent's online archive of 20th-century political cartoons by reporting on ‘a century of satire, wit and irreverence’ (Independent, 2008).

Beyond the early blaze of publicity, some digitization projects have proved wildly spectacular, maintaining a considerable audience over time. The Complete Work of Charles Darwin Online, which provides access to numerous digitized documents relating to the naturalist (including several editions of The Origin of the Species), claimed 90 million hits between October 2006 and July 2009. The Old Bailey Online, giving extensive details of criminal trials in London's Central Criminal Court from 1674 to 1913, averages 6000 unique visitors a day, which means yearly visitors of just under 2.2 million.

More notoriously, the success of some sites in capturing widespread interest has caused some teething problems. The Vision of Britain site, which provides historic and social information on many places, large and small, in Britain, temporarily crashed after its creator appeared on breakfast TV to promote the site. And the same fate befell The National Archives’ 1901 Census site, a fact that really awoke the organization to the huge international interest in the rich seams of genealogical information it holds and proved a springboard for some spectacular digital successes. The blip was only a temporary one for the Vision of Britain site too – it now regularly achieves 80,000 unique users a month.

Summary

Introduction

The purpose of this chapter is to identify the range of skills required by research students in order to enable them to successfully complete their individual research and obtain a doctorate. These include information skills, the ability to access and use different resources and skills for different stages in the doctoral journey. In addition, research students need to develop a range of skills that will enable them to obtain employment either as academics or researchers, or within particular professions. Research students, especially those studying for professional doctorates, may also need to develop their employability skills, e.g. to enable them to move from management to strategic roles.

Training and skills of research students

In the UK in recent years concerns and initiatives have been aimed at developing the skills base and employability of research students. In Chapter 1 it was noted that doctoral education has shifted its focus from providing an experience enabling entry into an academic community and career, to providing a qualification for entry into the wider labour market. This puts emphasis on doctoral students gaining a wider set of employability skills (Chiang, 2003) and contributing to the knowledge-based economies after graduation. The need was identified by the UK Research Councils, who, working in collaboration with Vitae, previously UK GRAD, and the higher education sector, developed the Joint Statement of Skills Training Requirements of Research Postgraduates in 2001. This initiative identified the competencies that a postgraduate researcher should develop during the course of his doctoral programme.

As part of this trend the UK government commissioned a review to investigate the supply of people with science, technology, engineering and mathematical skills (the STEM subjects). The outcome of the review was the report Set for Success (Roberts Review, 2002), which recommended a number of developments in doctoral education, including additional training for doctoral students and postdoctoral researchers. One of the outcomes of this influential report was that the UK government provided funding from 2003 for the development of professional and personal skills in doctoral students. This led to the implementation in universities of research skills and professional development programmes for research students. In addition, it helped to fund initiatives such as the virtual graduate school, which are presented in Chapter 7.

Summary

Introduction

Today's researchers use a wide variety of tools to discover the information resources they require. These resources may be located within a physical library or available on the web and, if so, are available in a proliferation of formats and interfaces, which has often meant that users were directed to a number of different in-house or external systems to find the information they required. Over the past ten years libraries have, to a varying degree, sought to manage and expose this data, while attempting to dissuade users from flocking to the simplicity of Google (Scholar), Amazon, YouTube, etc. However, the provision of these different resource-discovery systems uses an increasing amount of the resources in today's academic library.

A review of the recent literature suggests that users prefer simple search interfaces such as Google (Nicholas et al., 2009). The implication here is that libraries often fail to make their resources discoverable and that this may in turn affect the perceived value of the library.

In a recent report for vice-chancellors and senior institutional managers the Research Information Network (RIN) stated that:

The usefulness of the content and collections provided by libraries and from other sources depends on how easily researchers can discover, locate and gain access to them. Institutions need to ensure that their researchers can readily make use, through the library and other providers, of services that enable them to discover, locate and gain access to information sources that may be relevant to their research.

(RIN, 2008)

However, do libraries have a sufficient understanding of their users to provide this level of support in the way the libraries users expect and demand? Is there a very real danger of information overload from the plethora of different systems or lack of intuitive interfaces driving users towards Google? Is this actually a problem? In a time of severe fiscal hardship how can libraries restore their importance and reclaim their position?

This chapter looks at both traditional methods of resource discovery and the next-generation systems entering the marketplace in 2009 and asks if these will be appropriate in the next five to ten years.

Summary

This chapter provides an introduction to this book and also to the world of research and research students. The book is written as a general guide and I suggest that you read this chapter and then skim through the rest of the book. You may then choose when to read individual chapters in depth. They are designed to be read and worked through in any order.

The aim of this book is to provide library and information workers in the higher education sector with an understanding of the research process and to help them support research students. Library and information workers in higher education institutions are likely to provide well established support services for undergraduate and postgraduate students on taught programmes. In contrast, support services for research students are often not so well established as those that are focused on students on taught programmes, and in some cases may be relatively novel, e.g. as a result of some higher education institutions developing and expanding their research student base. The support needs of research students have recently risen up the academic agenda and this is linked to a number of factors.

The traditional taught doctorate, the PhD, has been joined by a range of doctoral qualifications including the ‘professional’ doctorate such as the Doctor in Business Administration (DBA), the Doctorate in Education (EdD) and psychology (DClinPsy or DEdPsy), and this diversification has led to a more diverse student body, which now includes senior professional practitioners. Chiang (2003) identified that the learning needs of doctoral research students have undergone rapid change and development. He observed that doctoral education has shifted its focus from an experience enabling entry into an academic community and career, to a qualification for entry into the wider labour market. This puts emphasis on doctoral students gaining a wider set of employability skills. The issue of employability skills is explored in Chapter 5.

While the library and information profession is a graduate one, with many individuals having a taught Master's degree, a relatively small number of workers have a research degree.

Summary

Introduction

The aim of this chapter is to present and explore the idea of supporting research students in a virtual graduate school (VGS). The concept of a VGS is an online environment where research students can come together to access a range of resources, to meet and discuss common issues with each other and perhaps with their supervisors. Different approaches to developing a VGS are explored in some depth.

The development of virtual graduate schools

The concept of a VGS has developed as a result of a number of drivers, including:

Facet Publishing

Refine listing

Refine listing

Actions for selected content:

6023 results in Facet Publishing

8 - Freedom of information

Summary

Dedication

9 - Intellectual property

Summary

Part 3 - Conclusion

10 - Final considerations

Summary

7 - Privacy and data protection

Summary

1 - Introduction

Summary

References and reading list

Frontmatter

4 - Moving forward and completing the research

Summary

5 - Digitizing the past: next steps for public sector digitization

Summary

Index

5 - Research skills training

Summary

Contributors

Acknowledgements

6 - Resource discovery

Summary

Contents

1 - Introduction

Summary

7 - Virtual graduate schools

Summary

References and bibliography

Facet Publishing

Refine listing

Refine listing

Actions for selected content:

Save Search

6023 results in Facet Publishing

Summary

Summary

Summary

Summary

Summary

Summary

Summary

Summary

Summary

Summary

Summary