The National Information Infrastructure will bring information to the doorstep of every household. Librarianship must respond to this development through the National Electronic Library. Librarianship as a profession must set the information agenda if it is to be a viable and influential entity in the electronic environment. Traditional library services are being redefined by technology, and the concept of the National Electronic Library must combine the roles of the academic institution, public enterprise, and library education. This professional reference is a guide to assist librarians in planning for the future.

The volume maintains that the growing electronic environment is driving a cultural transformation in which libraries must examine and understand what libraries have been, what they are, and what they need to be. Libraries need to participate actively in this transformation in order to remain the central providers of information and related services. The book explores the National Electronic Library as a concept and formal organization. Library services, collections, and the physical facility are examined in terms of present and future needs based on the rapidly changing electronic environment, and the volume relates the future management of information to administrative structures, constituencies, public and technical services, collection development, education, and strategic planning.

Information technologies are having a profound impact on the ways libraries are providing traditional services. This book identifies emerging technologies and assesses their impact on two distinct yet interdependent entities, library service and library education. While other publications identify technologies and speculate on applications, this volume focuses on the impacts of information technology on several aspects of librarianship.

The book first delineates emerging technologies and their impact on reference services and bibliographic instruction. It then discusses the resultant restructuring of reference services and the relationship between librarians and patrons. Bibliographic instruction is presented as a new paradigm based on the imperative that no faculty member should teach and no student should graduate without being fully information literate. The work also discusses staffing, organization, and financial support, and the structural and political placement of the library within the parent organization.