College and Research Libraries DAVID G. E. SPARKS Academic Librarianship: Professional Strivings and Political Realities F acuity status for academic librarians often has been discussed in the litera- ture of librarianship, but little attention has been given to its relationship to three associated topics that bear heavily on academic librarianship: profes- sionalization as an aspect of the sociology of librarianship; the power rela- tionships within the institutions of higher education where academic librar- ians work; and the phenomenon of academic collective bargaining. This pa- per discusses briefly these topics as they relate to faculty status for academic librarians. FOR MORE THAN a quarter of a century academic librarians in the United States have been writing and talking about, and striving for, a larger recognition of their contribution to the work of the colleges and universities they serve. In substance, these efforts have been chiefly directed toward some form of recognition within the academy, usually the granting of faculty status to librarians. A great variety of opinions on these mat- ters has been expressed, 1 historical accounts of the status of academic librarians have been published, 2 and a few surveys of opin- ion and of fact have been undertaken. 3 In addition to these expressions of interest on the part of librarians, there have been occasional contributions by sociologists in- terested in the sociology of occupations and the phenomenon of professionalization. 4 From this abundant literature there can be dis- cerned certain trends in the occupation of librarianship, its advances toward profes- sionalization, and its role in the life of the academy and in the larger matrix of Amer- ican society. David G. E. Sparks, formerly director of li- braries at the University of Notre Dame, is cura- tor of the Medieval Institute Library at that in- stitution and a doctoral student at the Graduate Library School, Indiana University , Bloomington . 408 I There has not been as yet any notably effective synthesis, however, of the many ideas of librarianship expressed in this liter- ature. Most of the writers have been preoc- cupied with particular aspects of academic librarianship. The search for faculty rank, the definition of librarians as educators, a concern for collegial forms of governance are some of these aspects. These writers are joined by others who approach academic librarianship with borrowed concepts from the world of business and speak of participa- tive management or collective bargaining. All these facets of the world of academic librarians are interesting and almost all of the writers have made valuable contribu- tions t.p our understanding of the field. Nevertheless, there is a need, at present, to draw. together the results of these ·efforts into a larger view. It is such a synthesis that is attempted in this paper. Underneath the wide range of rhetoric in the literature of academic librarianship there are some pervasive realities . Society's ~ equivocal acceptance of .librarianship as a ' profession is one. The projection of that · estimate of our calling in the academy is another. A greater and more encompassing reality is the growth and change of the academy' itself and the tensions thus pro- duced in the domain of our professional ex- perience. It would seem that any discussion of academic librarianship and especially of faculty status for librarians should begin with these realities. PROFESSIONALISM The study of the growth of professional- ism in American society has interested sociologists for some time. There are numerous published discussions of the qual- ities that define an occupation as a "profes- sion," usually accompanied by lists of criteria. Greenwood has summarized these in his article "Attributes of a Profession,"5 which was reprinted in Volmer's more com- prehensive symposium on professionali- zation. 6 Both Etzione and Goode have given attention to the movement of librarianship toward professional status. 7 •1l In their view of the process of professionalization they see it as a movement along a continuum, with the four full-fledged professions (medicine, law, clergy, and university teaching) at the completion end. Goode would- place librar- ianship in the middle of this continuum, but predicts that it will not attain its goal of full professionalization. The principal attributes of a profession have been identified by Goode as: (1) a sys- tematic body of knowledge, and (2) a com- mitment to service. The authority of the profe'Ssional worker, recognized by the clientele of the professional group, is de- rived from the body of professional knowl- edge. The professional group's commitment to service is usually expressed in a code of ethics (e.g., the Hippocratic oath) that places the good of the client above the per- sonal interest of the practitioner. In the light of such express commitment and of the urgent need for the expert services, sanc- tion and approval of professional authority is granted by the broader community. In the literature of the sociology of occupations these attributes of professional- ism have been extensively discussed, espe- cially the aspects of the client-practitioner relationship. The degree to which librar- ianship possesses these attributes has also been reviewed on a number of occasions. Goode 9 suggests that librarianship is de- ficient in the knowledge base, which lacks a coherent, systematic body of theory, and in the client-librarian relationship, where the Academic Librarianship I 409 service posture of the librarian is one of compliance, not prescription. Hanks and Schmidt10 express somewhat the same crit- icism, while proposing that a different model than that of the learned professions be made the objective for librarians. Bundy and Wasserman 11 · also question librarians' fulfillment of the professional ideal in the client-librarian relationship, noting the librarian's tendency as a result to become "medium-oriented" rather than client- oriented. They mention further the failure of librarians, in the employment situation, to give first loyalty to the profession rather than to the bureaucratic structure as in- dicating a less-than-professional posture. The strivings of librarianship to attain stature as a profession should be seen in the context of a long history of professionaliza- tion in American culture. With the advance of technology and the increasing level of education in the work force in the United States there has been an increasing tenden- cy for occupations to adopt professional stat- ure as their goal. The earliest example of this tendency is civil engineering, which put forward its claim in the charter of the Institution of Surveyors in 1868. Caplow 12 has written of the .elements of this process, and Goode 13 has traced the process for librarianship. The establishment of a profes- sional organization, the assertion of a tech- nological monopoly (grounded in the profes- sional knowledge base), the promulgation of a code of ethics, and prolonged political agitation for the support of public authority in maintenance of the occupational barriers between practitioners and laypeople-these four aspects of professionalization have their expressions in the history of American librarianship. How well American librar- ianship has accomplished these tasks of professionalization is a subject of consider- able controversy. Librarianship' s generic re- lationship to the world of learning greatly strengthens its claims as a learned profes- sion, although the . continued weakness of the knowledge base (a lack of systematic theory) weakens it. In the larger universe of American occupations, there are several ·others, such as social work, accounting, nursing, and en- gineering, that have achieved considerable progress toward recognition as a profession. 410 I College & Research Libraries • September 1980 The great growth of an educated labor force in the United States and the shift to white- collar , service occupations has brought about a strong steady growth of occupations that make this clai~. The tendency of a technological society to fractionalize into specialities has also contributed to that growth. EMPLOYMENT OF PROFESSIONALS Concurrent with the drive to professional- ize certain occupations, there has been a growing tendency for professionals to aban- don the self-employed situation of the prac- titioner and to become employees in an organization. The ancient ideal of the inde- pendent practitioner whose emoluments come from the unique client-professional re- lationship seems to be becoming outmoded in modern American society except in cer- tain contexts (law, medicine, and engineer- ing) where social or economic demand for expertise makes private practice attractive. More often than not, today' s professional is found within a clinic, a research institute, or even a commercial organization . Of course , not all professions actually ever achieved the archetypical ideal of the inde- pendent, practicing physician or lawyer; so- cial workers and accountants have usually worked in an organizational setting. The growth toward such an employment situa- tion as the norm, however, is certain. Gol- denberg has commented on this process in Canadian society, with special attention to the situation of professional engineers. 14 En- gineering is , in fact , a profession that, at an early date , saw most of its professionals in employee situations . One can hardly con- ceive of an aeronautical engineer in private practice , although there are still a great many civil engineers in business for them- selves. Employed professionals represent, in a certain sense , a contradiction in terms. Within an organization (a business firm , a hospital , a university , or a government agency) the professional has divided loyal- ties. A physician's first responsibility is to the client and to the profession, not to the hospital administrator. The same is true of the engineer who affirms with his or her professional reputation the accuracy and safety of a design, or withholds that affirma- tion despite an employer's protests (or threats). The dividing line between loyalties becomes very hazy , however , in many situations where professionals are employed: witness the legal profession's anguish over Watergate. In the last analysis , there must always be a certain tension within an orga- nization that employs professionals, a ten- sion between the goals and the ethical de- mands of the practitioner and his profession on the one hand and the goals and objec- tives of the organization on the other. UNIVERSITIES AS ORGANIZATIONS Universities are organizations where this internal tension is found to an extreme de- gree. University teaching was mentioned above in passing as one of the full-fledged, "ancient" professions . In his special field, the university professor possesses the au- thority of expert knowledge and only the professor or other colleagues in that field have the power to certify a student's mas- tery of it. Taken together, the whole faculty of the university, each in his or her own discipline , constitute the body of profession- al expertise and the source of certifying au- thority. The university administration is powerless in this matter; it is the faculty's authority that prevails. Yet the university administration does have power. It has the power of legal char- ter and economic power in the control of the organization's resources which that legal authority implies. Unlike other economic organizations, however, the university administration 's power does not extend to the body of workers who create the service that is the university's product: education. In reality , for all its economic power, the university administration is the ancilla of the faculty in the central function of the organization: teaching. The tension created by the two centers of authority in a uni- versity, the professional authority of the faculty and the hierarchical or bureaucratic authority of the administration, is responsi- ble for much of the friction that we witness in modern American universities . While this situation of the two authorities has always existed in universities , it has been exacerbated in our times. Before World War II , American universities de- voted only modest resources to administra- tion. The exterided, highly articulated cen- tral bureaucracies that can be observed in present-day universities are the product of the postwar boom in higher education, the G.l. Bill, sudden population growth, and the generous participation of the federal government in hundreds of educational and research programs. This sudden growth of higher education in the postwar period and the fiscal responsibility attendant on federal largesse have encouraged the development of bureaucratic management within Amer- ican universities, organizational structures that have borrowed more from the adminis- trative techniques of business than the elec- tronic computer. Academic libraries have been part of the postwar growth pattern in American univer- sities and colleges. J'he influx of federal monies to the campus has manifested itself in a sometimes spectacular growth of the university's library. With that growth has come an increase in and ramification of the administrative structures of the library. Tra- ditionally those structures have been hier- archical, and their elaboration in the bureaucratic model has found an empathetic echo in the university administration's own growth. Academic librarians have, indeed, often identified with the university adminis- tration in the functional aspects of their situation. Smith has remarked on this iden- tification and has suggested some unhappy consequences. 15 For if the trend in the academy in postwar America has been toward a progressive polarization of the uni- versity between faculty and institutional au- thority, between faculty and institutional goals, then the developing interest of academic librarians in faculty status is at odds with their previous (continuing?) iden- tification with the administrative hierarchy. It is to that professional dilemma that academic librarians need to tum their atten- tion. FACULTY STATUS In September 1972, the Association of College and Research Libraries together with the American Association of University Professors and the Association of American Colleges published a joint statement recom- mending faculty status for college and uni- Academic Librarianship I 411 versity librarians. 16 The action was the cul- mination of a long effort of the Committee on Academic Status of the University Li- braries Section of ACRL and had been pre- ceded by extensive discussion in the litera- ture. The topic became one of active profes- sional concern in the period after the Second World War (coinciding with the rapid growth of higher education in that period), although it had been discussed even as early as the first decade of this centuryY There was a first concern for the acceptance of university librarians by the teaching faculty as colleagues i~ the educa- tional enterprise. Lundy stated: The general principle underlying faculty-library cooperation is the simple one that the library can function effectively only as an integral part of the whole instructional organization . 111 Others expressed the same conviction. 19,zo Faculty status was seen as a means "of enabling . . . librarians to play a more effec- tive role in the academic community, for they can then communicate and collaborate with the teaching faculty as peers. "21 The most faithful exponent of this view was Downs, who explor.ed the history of uni- versity librarians' place in the academic community22 and surveyed the profession to establish the facts of librarians' situations in the academic workplace23• 24 His more direct contribution to the work of the ACRL Com- mittee on Academic Status was largely re- sponsible for the development of the joint statement. One justification often put forward for the claim of faculty status for librarians is an in- terpretation of the librarian's work as educa- tive. The ideal of librarian-as-teacher has been pursued in its more naive guise in the form of criteria for appointment and promotions of library faculty that insist on "success in teaching" as a measure of pro- fessional growth. 25 Beyond the obvious tasks of library instruction, a certain amount of strained ingenuity is evidenced in interpret- ing the activities of librarians as teaching to fulfill this ideal. The Model Statement of the ACRL retains this expression of the ideal. 26 A far more subtle analysis of the librar- ian's teaching role in higher education has been developed in a reorganization study 412 I College & Research Libraries • September 1980 conducted by Swarthmore College that evolved a concept of the "teaching library, " with direct responsibility for the biblio- graphical literacy of all graduates.27 William- son has written of Swarthmore's teaching- library initiatives and made important observations about the relations between teachers and librarians in the college context. 28 An application of the concept of the teaching library is in the process of realization at Sangamon State College in Springfield , Illinois. A report of these efforts at Sarigamon to restructure the work of librarianship as a true teaching profession has been published by Dillon. 29 Others who have written of the educative role of li- brarians include DePriest, 3° Knapp, 31 and Moriarty. 32 If acceptability to the faculty is a goal of faculty status for academic librarians, then the faculty's understanding of librarians' teaching role is essential, and mere inter- pretive restatement of traditional library activities will probably not provide that understanding. There must be (among other things) a real change in the academic librar- ian's commitment to scholarship and to the life of the mind . Reichmann, for example, deplores the librarian's loss of contact with books. j 3 Knapp repeats the injunction that librarians must be, in addition to teachers and administrators, bookmen, working closely with scholars in their research function. 34 At the end of his historical re- view of librarianship, Winger notes the im- portance to the librarian of an awareness of the intellectual problems of the times as necessary to the performance of bibliothecal functions. 35 That academic librarians often fail to im- press their teaching colleagues by their scholarly ability has been attributed to the failures of library education. Thompson has stated: Perhaps the most serious indictment of the schools has been the charge that the vocational content of ... [the] curricula overshadowed the intellectual. . . . 36 Others have frequently repeated the charge. Volkersz asserts that the miseduca- tion of librarians and the technocratic rather than humanistic attitude fostered in the tra- ditional working relationships has made it impossible for librarians to adopt collegial- ity.37 Smith also notes: By concentrating their efforts on the more routine aspects of library operation, by emphasiz- ing institutional goals and adopting bureaucratic organizational patterns, college and university librarians have effectively aligned themselves with the non-academic segments of their communities. 38 He goes on to recommend a broadening and deepening of the educational base of the profession so that librarians can "assume important functions within the academic community-functions the importance of which will be recognized. "39 The ideal of the librarian-as-scholar is one that is, indeed, an important component of the struggle for status for academic librar- ians, but it is also one about which there are still grave doubts. 40 The responsibility of the library schools in this matter (that is, the strengthening of the program of profes- sional education for librarianship) is widely recognized. There seems to be some real uncertainty, however, whether this should be done in the direction of "information sci- ence" or by extension of the humanistic base of library school programs . In the long run, the needed improvements may require both. ACCEPTANCE OF FACULTY STATUS FOR LIBRARIANS The actual situation of university librar- ians with respect to faculty status has been surveyed by Hintz, 41 who distinguishes four types of academic recognition reported by his respondents: 1. Faculty rank and title (assistant profes- sor, etc.) 2. Equivalent rank (assistant librarian, etc.) 3 . Assimilated rank (librarian with the rank of assistant professor) 4. Miscellaneous other status situations In the fourth category (twenty-four respon- dents) are included such devices of aca- demic recognition as " special professional faculty," etc. One can conclude from such a survey that there is much variation in actual practice in American colleges and universi- ties , or at least a certain failure of consensus both on the part of university administrators and of librarians. In part, this uncertainty about the role of the librarian in American academic institutions may be attributed to the wide variation of views about librarians in the accreditation standards of regional and professional associations. Veit42 has studied the record of such standards as re- ported in ACRL Monograph 20 and distin- guishes six categories of academic recognition for librarians, ranging from standards that require full faculty status for librarians to those that make no comment on the subject at all. It is interesting to note, here, that the Southern Association of Colleges and Secondary Schools insists on full faculty sta- tus for librarians, perhaps expressing a re- gional appreciation of the importance of the profession. This uncertainty about the role of librar- ians in the academy has been documented by Downs, 43 who identified three attitudes among librarians themselves toward faculty s.tatus: Those who advocate faculty rank for all members of the profession who work in· colleges and uni- versities, because any other method abandons the values and possibilities inherent in the collegial relationship with faculty . Those who advocate faculty status for librarians who work in colleges and universities , but only for those who merit it by their professional maturity, scholarship, etc. Those who would accept faculty status, but only under the conditions where librarians and librar- ianship are accepted on their own merits, in a "separate but equal'' relationship to the facult y, judged by their own norms and recognized for their unique contribution. In reality, both the first and second attitude spring from a desire to identify with the teaching faculty on terms of comparable or analogous contribution to the educational process. The second is perhaps the more realistic, given the present level of academic preparation of the existing corps of practitioners in the library profession and the difficulty the professoriate have in rec- ognizing the contribution of librarians as anything more than auxiliary service. That there is, or may be, substance to the claim of librarians as educators and scholars is a question that hangs undecided in the cir- cumam bience of the American academy. The teaching-library proposals of Swarth- more College would push the decision in Academic Librarianship I 413 · the direction of a carefully defined and coordinated educational role for the library, a role many of the professoriate (and the librarians!) may · not yet be ready to accept. The "separate but equal" posture toward faculty status has the laudable purpose of affirming the goals and objectives of librar- ianship as an independent profession. Such affirmation stands in contrast to the other two, which would make the goals and objec- tives of the teaching profession the librar- ian's. The difficulty, of course, is that the goals and objectives of the library profession are so little understood or are proposed with so little consensus in the library com- munity that it is difficult to defend to the teaching faculty an educative role for librar- ian~ (separate but equal) that merits the status of "professional." Librarians are thrown back again on the question of their own identity as a learned profession and society's (and the professoriate 's) acceptance of that identity. These are formidable questions that con- front the academic librarian ; but, in spite of their serious nature, the ACRL Committee· on Academic Status has suggested to the profession, through an article by McAnally, 44 a certain set of guidelines for the professional conduct of the library facul- t·y. These seventeen recommendations sug- gest to academic librarians what needs to be done to develop within the library faculty the techniques of governance and the colle- gial culture that will make them acceptable to the teaching faculty as colleagues. Unfor- tunately , .they leave unanswered the basic questions of the professionalism of libra- rianship and seem, therefore , to have a less than effective impact. TENURE Among the seventeen recommendations in McAnally's article is the suggestion that library faculty in a university should receive tenure on the same basis as teaching facul- ty. The question of tenure has been ad- dressed in the recent literature. Branscomb stated that tenure "implied freedom to carry on the work of the library , conduct research and engage in extramural activities . . .. "45 Weber discusses the concept of tenure and distinguishes both the need to protect the academic freedom of librarians and the need 414 I College & Research Libraries • September 1980 to encourage the career commitment of able men and women to the profession. 46 He does, however, see the process as a mod- ification of the traditional concept of tenure for teaching faculty. Both Branscomb and Weber give lists of elements of intellectual freedom for librarians . 'Weber suggests four reasons for tenure for librarians: (1) book selection responsibilities; (2) dissemination of information on all subjects; (3) prepara- tion of bibliographies or exhibits; and (4) advising students in reading. Branscomb lists twelve activities of librarians requiring the protection of the tenure umbrella. A number of writers have discussed tenure as part of a program of collegial gov- ernance for library faculty and an element in the process of promotion of faculty. 47 , 48 Blake presents the case for giving tenure to academic librarians49 and quotes the formal statement on tenure published by the AAUP in 1940 as follows : Tenure is a means to certain ends, specifically, (1) freedom of teaching and research , and of ex- tramural activities; and (2) a sufficient degree of economic security to make the profession attrac- tive to men and women of ability. Among all these arguments, it is difficult to discern any cogent reasons for the practice as suggested for librarians, however. There may indeed be situations in the life of an academic librarian when he or she is in jeopardy in the performance of professional duties , but these are difficult to imagine . Perhaps the process of book selection or the elaboration of public exhibits might be the target of undue pressure, but unlike the scholar-teacher the librarian is seldom in the position of questioning accepted knowl- edge and values. Emerson put the matter succinctly: The university is generally conceived as perform- ing two main functions in a democratic society. One is the transmission of existing knowledge and values to the on-coming generation. The other is the critical re-examination of such knowledge and values , with a view to facilitating orderly change in society . 50 The protection of tenure is extended to the scholar especially in the second function of the university . But in the very nature of his work the librarian is seldom engaged in such a reexamination. When it comes down to it, tenure is the protection extended to a university teacher when his professional goals and responsibilities are in conflict with institutional goals. It "is regarded as the major guarantee of freedom because it puts the instructor beyond the easy reach of administrative tyranny or the quixotism of governing boards. " 51 On~ can question whether the professional goals and responsi- bilities of academic librarians would ever be in conflict with institutional goals, so iden- tified have they been in the past with bu- reaucratic structures of Academia. COLLEGIALITY Faculty status for academic librarians has greater meaning than merely bestowing faculty rank or titles on librarians or making available to them faculty perquisites . These are but the outward symbols of a corporate existence that is the natural domain of the university teacher, and indeed of the mem- bers of any profession. That corporate exis- tence is described by the term collegium . The advent of faculty status for university librarians implies , therefore , that the corps of professional librarians in the university is organized as a college. There follow from such an organization a number of important consequences . The members of the collegium bibliothe- cariorum first of all share responsibility , as a body of professional workers , for the qual- ity of library service in the university. It is presumed also that , understanding through their professional training the goals of the profession, they will participate in the for- mulation of the programs in this university to achieve those goals. Again , it is assumed that all the librarians accept responsibility for the quality of the library faculty and, to fulfill that responsibility , they will organize themselves in such a way as to promote the quality of the faculty in recruitment of new members of the collegium and the profes- sional growth of its present me mbers. Final- ly, the members of the library faculty are expected to join with the members of o'ther faculties in the work of governance within the larger domain of the universitas. Writers in the professional literature have treated all these aspects of collegiality . Vol- kersz notes that, in breaking out of the hierarchical structures of the past, librarians will, together with the teaching faculty, par- ticipate in making the crucial decisions shaping their contributions to teaching, re- search, collection development, and com- munity involvement. 52 McAnally has given an extensive formulation to the privileges and obligations of library faculty, with spe- cial attention to the questions of criteria for appointment and promotion for librarians. 53 Hintz has conducted a survey of academic librarians on the topic and has ass em bled recommendations for criteria for · promotion on the basis of this sampling of opinion. 54 The obligations of faculty status that bear directly on the individual librarian arise from the policy statement on criteria for appointment and promotion: the obligation to perform research, publish, and serve on university bodies. Kellam has reviewed the activities and opportunities of university librarians to such avenues of professional growth as reported from a survey of ARL directors. 55 Jesse also has treated this topic. 56 Collegiality for librarians in the university has, however, some inconvenient problems. Bailey noted some effects of faculty status on the supervision of the library and pointed out that librarians with faculty sta- tus have three overlapping aspects of ser- vice: personal expertise, administrative posi- tion, and professional status. 57 She discusses in her paper the confusion arising from the introduction of collegial relationships into an organization (the library) that is essentially hierarchical. There appears to be a con- siderable amount of negative feeling on the part of professional staff (especially middle management) toward collegiality. The trou- ble centers around the fact that, in forms of collegial governance, the locus of decision making is not clear; that collegial decisions may conflict with administrative intent; and that advancement avenues are not clear, since two tracks for advancement are in view: faculty and administrative hierarchy. Tallau raises the same problems of over- lapping and conflicting commitments of librarians who find themselves, through his- torical change, confronted with the con- sequences of faculty status. 58 She points out quite effectively that faculty status usually has been seen by librarians as equality with and acceptability to the teaching faculty, Academic Librarianship I 415 rather than affecting relations within the library. This is emphatically not so. Col- legiality has great implications for the academic librarian's relations with: (1) the faculty; (2) students; (3) the administration; and (4) his or her colleague librarians. Tallau goes on to show that the current movement toward participative management in busi- ness organizations, and in the academy, has raised some of the same problems in its im- pact on bureaucratic management struc- tures. Perhaps the most telling criticism of the concept of collegial governance for universi- ty librarians comes from Beckman. 59 After remarking on the published standards for faculty status and the encouragement of ACRL to establish collegial governance, Beckman points out that "this view is con- tentious for two reasons." The first of these is that directors of libraries have a different accountability than deans of faculties. The second is that the bureaucratic administra- tion of libraries can be mitigated by other means than collegial governance , chiefly through participative management tech- niques. It is true that the accountability of academic department chairpersons and deans is thought of as different from that of the library director. The professoriate has one primary function: teaching. "Within the teaching activity, each faculty member is in- dependent as to methodology, timing, and even to a certain extent scheduling. The dean may be to a certain extent accountable for such coordination of teaching programs as is necessary, but he is not accountable for the performance of the teacher in the classroom. "60 On the contrary, that is the responsibility of the professor in his client- professional relationship. The director of libraries, on the other hand, is seen to be directly responsible to the university administration for all library service because of his or her position as a member of the university hierarchy; the performance of all the librarians is laid at the feet of the director. Collegiality, howev- er, imposes new dimensions of responsibil- ity on the entire library faculty, since it assumes that each librarian, like the profes- sor, acts on the authority of expert knowl- edge in the client-professional relationship. 416 I College & Research Libraries • September 1980 Collegiality also introduces a second role for the chief librarian, that of dean of the li- brary faculty , a role that may be partly un- necessary (in view of the mitigation of bureaucratic rigor by participative manage- ment) and is certainly confusing in the con- text of a hierarchical organization. Underneath this contretemps there lies again the fundamental conflict endemic in all hierarchical organizations that employ staffs of professional workers: the conflict between the autonomy of the professional speaking with the authority of expert knowl- edge and the authority of administrative power. Participative management is a topic that overlaps the concerns of collegial gov- ernance ; both are systems of organization that are in conflict with hierarchical struc- tures, the very structures that were for many years the hallmark of academic librar- ies. This suggests , perhaps , that collegial governance and participative management techniques may not be antithetical but com- plementary . Both Dillon and Williamson6 1 have pointed out in their discussion of the teaching-library concept at Swarthmore and at Sangamon State that as the educative function grows to occupy the full attention of the library faculty , the business functions (acquisitions, cataloging, circulation, etc.) are turned over to highly trained parapro- fessionals whose commitment to the or- ganization and valuable contributions are elicited through a program of participative management. Librarians are thus freed to accomplish their professional work. COLLECTIVE BARGAINING The fabric of collegial governance , which so distinguishes the faculty from the ad- ministrative hierarchy of the university , has of late been broadened in some institutions by the adoption of the structures of collec- tive bargaining, a borrowing from the world of labor relations . Collective bargaining is a system of countervailing power. That is, it is a sociological technique for confronting the economic power of the employer with equal power in the hands of employees so that negotiations on matters of common in- terest to employers and employees can pro- ceed justly, without threat or intimidation. Collective bargaining is supported by Amer- ican society through federal laws that re- quire both labor and management to bar- gain in good faith. The objectives of collec- tive bargaining are wages and working con- ditions of the employees . The history of collective bargaining is closely connected to the trade-union move- ment both here and abroad. A technique of labor-management relations, it was de- veloped as a product of trade unionism. The use of collective bargaining by occupational groups outside of trade unions is a growing phenomenon of our time, however. This is especially true in the "white collar" occupa- tions. For a long time use of collective bar- gaining by white-collar workers was resisted by, reason of its association with a class ideology. Modem white-collar workers have simply adopted the technique and fit it to their own middle-class ideology. Adoption of collective bargaining by em- ployed professionals is part of this general trend to extend collective bargaining to other occupational . groups. Goldenberg has suggested a number of pressures in organi- zations employing professionals that may account for the move to collective bargain- ing. They include: (1) the impersonal work relations in the modern economy ; (2) blocked channels of communication be- tween professionals and the employer/client; (3) the decline of personal mobility and its loss as a bargaining weapon; and (4) profes- sional autonomy. 62 The move to collective bargaining in uni- versities and colleges has been part of . the spread of the technique among white-collar workers. The trend began in the two-year state institutions and has been extended through state-supported higher education in New York City , New York State , Mas- sachusetts , New Jersey , California, and many other states. A phenomenon closely associated with this trend is the develop- ment of the professional association as a bar- gaining agent. The American Federation of Teachers has taken an aggressive lead in this process , followed by the National Education Association, and lately by the American Association of University Profes- sors. Among colleges and universities there are now almost 500 employing collective bargaining. Collective bargaining is a system of coun- tervailing power. The university, however, is an organization structured on the hard realities of shared power. The power of the university professor rests on the authority of expert knowledge; the power of the admin- istration rests on economic and legal con- trol. Adoption of collective bargaining by colleges and universities introduces an in- strument of countervailing power into an employee-management situation where power itself is already an issue. ("Shared power" is a term often used to describe the relationship between faculty and administration in a collective bargaining context. Shared power is an ambig.uous term, however, and many writers . have failed to distinguish its two meanings. In the university there is more precisely "con- federated power," a coexistence of the au- thority of expert knowledge resting in the faculty and the bureaucratic power of the administration. In this case the source of faculty authority is independent of the administration . In programs of participative management there is talk of shared power, but this power sharing is by delegation from hierarchical authority. In this second case the source of shared authority is dependent on the administration.) Librarians who are seeking faculty status have an obligation to themselves to be aware of the complex situation into which they may be moved in the event that collec- tive bargaining comes to the campus. That librarians are aware in part of these aspects of academic collective bargaining can be seen in Guyton's comments that the "activi- ties of library unions suggest two areas where [bargaining issues] have occurred (1) economic renumeration; and (2) partici- pation in library administration. " 63 This second issue is an echo of the tension in the university between faculty and administra- tive authority. Weatherford has explored the interactions of the librarians' search for faculty status in a perceptive work. 64 He also has given an excellent historical summary of the forma- tion of bargaining units in colleges and uni- versities. (The special histories of the ad- vent of collective bargaining at Wayne State has been told by Spang, 65 and at West Chester State College by Burns and Carter. 66 ) In discussing issues to be bar- Academic Librarianship I 417 gained, Weatherford points out that, aside from wages, salaries, benefits, ·and condi- tions of work, which are exact analogies from industry, academic collective bargain- ing can also address itself to the participa- tion in governance as a bargainable issue. 67 He also quotes Alfred Sumberg of the AA UP as saying that "faculties should re- gard collective bargaining as a means of put- ting into effect the goals of the past fifty years." Collective bargaining is a means for the faculty to counteract the accumulated power of the "managerial middle class" that has grown up in universities. The twentieth Allerton Park Institute, held in 1974, was devoted to the topic of collective bargaining in libraries. 68 In the discussions of this meeting the suggestion was made that academic collective bargain- ing would very quickly move from Maslow's Level I goals to Level II goals. The follow- ing Level II goals were suggested as appropriate as bargaining goals: autonomy, occupational integrity and identification, in- dividual career satisfaction, and economic security and enhancement. How realistic these goals are in defining exact issues for the bargaining table remains to be seen. The institute did, however, raise a se- rious problem, one that may prove to be ex- tremely difficult for librarians. Within any campus group the university librarians are a minority. Striving for faculty status in the university means, for academic librarians, striving for minority status as well. Where union organization of faculty does not exist, minority status may be little or no disadvan- tage. With collective bargaining, however, the picture is drastically changed. Unless library faculty are a tightly organized, co- herent, and assertive group within the faculty, there may be grave danger that their in- terests will be compromised at the bargain- ing table by the larger group. In the words of the institute proceedings: " ... in the bargaining process the interests of the li- brarians are going to be diluted by the in- terests of the matrix group, unless librarians articulate their professional goals. . .. " 69 Collective bargaining brings to the cam- pus a sharply defined adversary relationship between faculty and administration. The definition of this relationship imposes dis- tinctions of union-management throughout 418 I College & Research Libraries • September 1980 the campus. The university library will not be spared such trauma and the subsequent polarization of staff. Much progress is. be~ng made in these times toward democratization of library administration through techniques of participative management. These ad- vances may be lost in the polarization of re- lations between members of the bargaining unit and librarians excluded from it by reason of their administrative position. CONCLUSIONS Much has been written about faculty status for academic librarians in American univer- sities and colleges and a fair sample of that literature has been mentioned in the fore- going discussion. Yet much of w.hat has been written lacks the breadth of v1ew that can integrate and explain. Beneath the de- mands of academic librarians for recognition in the academy lie some fundamental issues that cannot be ignored. ·Chief of these is the question of professionalism, and a second, hardly less important, is the characteristic of the university as an organization of con- federated power employing professionals within a bureaucratic matrix. Whether librarianship is a profession, is becoming a profession, or is a semiprofes- sion is a question that has been given some attention by sociologists interested in hu- man occupations, and their analyses have been very helpful. On the basis of their analyses, one can identify two key questions for librarianship: the sufficiency (or insuf- ficiency) of the knowledge base in theory; and the importance accorded library service by society, especially in the client-practi- .tioner relationship. Even without reference to the works of sociological analysis, many of those who have written about faculty sta- tus for librarians seem to be aware of the deficiency in the body of theory supporting the profession. Volkersz, Thompson, and Smith have laid the insufficiency at the feet of the library schools, and Knapp has quoted Dr. Shera to the effect that the knowledge base "lacks underpinning." Many also, as Lancour, have spoken of the need for community sanction of our profes- sional role. That sanction itself rests on the quality of the knowledge base, for as Lan-· cour remarks: Specifically the profession seeks to. prove that the performance of the occupational skill requir~s specialized education: that those that possess ~s education in contrast to those who do not dehver a superior service ; and that the human need being served is of sufficient social importance to justify the superior performance . 70 Society's need for information and librar- ians' possession of the keys to the informa- tion source lie, then, at the root of the question. Smith points out that the social need for information is growing and, in the age of electronic data processing, the com- plexity of the keys is increasing; he s~g­ gests, therefore, that this body of expertise and the underlying information theory quickly be made part of the profession's knowledge base. 71 Yet many in society still feel that they can do for themselves what librarians claim to be able to do better, and nowhere is this attitude on the part of the client group more prominent than among college and university professors. Claims for faculty status in the university situs of the profession are thus seriously affected by the perception of the profession by that part of the client group, the profes- soriate, who are the most influential and whom librarians seem most anxious to emu- late. University professors may be wrong in their perception of librarianship ; William- son who has been in both roles of professor and' librarian (in that order) and can speak with authority, states that "faculty members are but dimly aware" of the intellectual complexity of bibliographical control and do not see the knowledge of it as "a worthy discipline in itself. "72 Nevertheless, it is the faculty's perception of librarianship that the profession must deal with . One might add that this clientele can only be convinced of the adequacy of librarianship' s knowledge base by intellectually satisfying arguments. Such theoretical statement has yet to be made. In the meantime professors continue to see their librarian colleagues as voca- tionally trained "assistants," a view that is not mitigated by the sometimes strong voca- tional orientation and behavior of many members of academic library staffs. The librarians' apparent lack of percep- tion of what it means to be a professional is also at the root of many of their practical difficulties in seeking recognition in the academy. There seems to be little recogni- tion among .librarians of the tension in the power relationships within the university, and, consequent upon those tensions, the often compromising positions the university's librarians find themselves in between facul- ty and administration. A sense of their own professional identity, of the professional identity of their teaching colleagues, and what that means in the matrix of confeder- ated power in the university would make librarians' efforts to achieve academic status more effective because they would be bet- ter directed and more realistic. Those efforts are directed principally (in our day) to the recognition of the librarian- as-educator, with some (not enough) atten- tion given to the ideal of librarian-as- scholar. But are such efforts, in the main, realistic? Without a strong knowledge base and an adequate body of supporting theory to transmit to the oncoming generation can the teaching of librarians be anything but imperfect? It is not that there is no corpus of knowledge in scholarship to transmit, as some shallow-thinking members of the pro- fe~soriate would claim. The experiments at Swarthmore and Sangamon State belie that assertion. It is, · rather, that our contribution to the educational program of the institution we serve is often offered on a base of insuf- ficient preparation (our own) to a clientele whose perception of the value of that offer to their students precludes their acceptance of it as a serious part of the educational program. The apparent unawareness of academic librarians of the social dynamic of the uni- versity and the role of professionalism (of the faculty) in that drama puts them at a great disadvantage when they attempt, at the urging of their professional society, to assume the roles of collegial governance. Caught between the faculty and the admin- istration, between professional authority (the faculty's) and bureaucratic authority, their bid for status must sail the stormy wa- ter.s between Scylla and Charybdis. But this unhappy situation has even more difficult manifestations within the university itself, because of the bureaucratic nature of many library administrations. Collegial relations between professional members of a library staff in such a situation will produce great internal strain. Fortunately, progress in the art of administration in the direction of par- ticipative management is helping to ease Academic Librarianship I 419 the transition from authoritarian to collegial forms. Through the process of participative man- agement, the 'library faculty may, indeed, be able to achieve a meaningful form of col- legial governance and a (future) recognition of their role in the academy. Other aspects of library administration, chiefly the house- keeping functions, will undoubtedly remain administrative structures, reporting to the hierarchy of the university but mitigated by the processes of participatory management. Into this complex and often misunder- stood set of relationships in the sociology of the university and the university library there is now introduced the problem of col- lective bargaining. The power relationship between the professoriate and the adminis- tration has, in many institutions, created through increasing tension the movement toward collective action by the faculty. The earlier reservations faculty may have had about the class-ideology base of collective bargaining have been swept away. This new development in the power struggle within the academy cannot help but affect the library faculty. Their strivings for faculty status may be brought to an abrupt halt in a hearing before the NLRB on the composition of the bargaining unit; or, even if they succeed in maintaining their faculty status within the bargaining unit, their interests may be compromised at the bargaining table by a failure of repre- sentation in the union offices and commit- tees. The advent of collective bargaining is simply the ultimate test, for librarians, of their cohesiveness as a professional group, their commitment to the profession, their understanding of the power relationships· within the academic situation where they work, and their ability to convince the prin- cipals in this struggle of the validity of their claims. REFERENCES 1. For an excellent bibliography of this litera- ture see Nancy Ruling, "Faculty Status-A Comprehensive Bibliography," College & Re- search Libraries 34:440--62 (Nov. 1973). L. J. Pourciau in his doctoral dissertation, The Sta- tus of American Academic Librarians (Indi- ana University, 1975), also includes a valu- able bibliography. 2. Robert B. Downs, "The Status of University 420 I College & Research Libraries • September 1980 Librarians in Retrospect , " College & Re- search Libraries 29:253-58 Quly 1968). See also Howard W . Winger, "Aspects of Librar- ianship : A Trace Work of History," Library Quarterly 31:321-35 (Oct. 1961). 3. Patricia B. Knapp , "The College Librarian : Sociology of a Professional Specialization ," College & Research Libraries 16:66-72 (Jan . 1955); W . Porter Kellam , " Activities and Opportunities of University Librarians for Full Participation in the Educational Enter- prise ," College & Research Libraries 29:195- 99 (May 1968); Raj Madan and others, "The Status of Librarians in Four-Year State Col- leges and Universities ," College & Research Libraries 29:381-86 (Sept. 1968). 4. Amitai Etzione , Modern Organizations (En- glewood Cliffs , N.J.: Prentice-Hall , 1964), p . 76ff.; William J. Goode, "The Theoretical Limits of Professionalization ," in Amitai Etzione, ed., The Semiprofessions and Their Organization (New York ; Free Pr. , 1969); William J. McGlothlin , "The Accommodation of Specialization," Library Quarterly 31:35&- . 68 (Oct. 1961). 5. Ernest Greenwood, "Attributes of a Profes- sion," Social Work 2, no.3 :45-55 Ouly 1957). 6 . Howard W. Vollmer and Donald L. Mills , eds., Professionalization (Englewood Cliffs , N.J.: Prentice-Hall, 1966). 7. Etzione, Modern Organizations . 8. William J. Goode , "The Librarian: From Occupation to Profession?" Library Quarter- ly 31:306-20 (Oct. 1961). 9. Goode , "The Theoretical Limits of Profes- sionalization." 10. Gardner Hanks and C. James Schmidt, "An Alternative Model of a Profession for Librar- ians ," College & Research Libraries 36:175- 87 (May 1975). 11. Mary Lee Bundy and Paul Wasserman, "Pro- fessionalism Reconsidered ," College & Re- search Libraries 29:5-26 Qan . 1968). 12. Theodore Caplow , The Sociology of Work (Minneapolis : Univ. of Minnesota Pr. , 1954), p.139-40. 13. Goode, "The Librarian : From Occupation to Profession?" 14. Shirley B. Goldenberg, Professional Workers and Collective Bargaining (Canada, Privy Council , Task Force on Labour Relations , study no.2 [Ottawa: The Queen 's Printer , 1968]). 15. Eldred Smith , "Academic Status for College and University Librarians: Problems and Prospects ," College & Research Libraries 31 :7-13 Qan. 1970). 16. American Library Association , Association of College and Research Libraries , "Joint State- ment on Faculty Status of College and U ni- versity Librarians , " College & Research Libraries News 33:200-10 (Sept. 1972). 17. A few of the representative early writings on the subject are listed here : W. N . Chattin Carlton , " College Libraries and College Librarians: Views and Comments ," Library journal 31:751- 57 (Nov . 1906); Edith M. Coulter , " The Uni versit y Librarian ; His Preparation, Position and Relation to the Academic Department of the University, " American Librar y Association Bulletin 16:271-75 (March 1922); William Warner Bishop, "The Library in the American Col- lege ," College and Reference Library Year- book 1:1- 12 (1929); B. Harvie Branscomb , Teaching with Books; A Study of College Li- braries (Chicago : American Library Assn. , 1940). 18. Frank A. Lundy, " Faculty Rank of Profes- sional Librarians ," College & Research Li- braries 12:ll3 (April 1951). 19 . Lawrence S. Thompson , " Preparation and Status of Library Personnel ," Library Trends 1:95-104 Quly 1952). 20 . Felix Reichmann , " Hercules and Antaeus ," College & Research Libraries 14 :22-25 Qan . 1953). 21. Robert H . Mulle r , "Faculty Rank for Library Staff Members in Medium-sized Universities and Colleges," American Association of Uni- versity Professors Bulletin 39:421- 31 (Sept. 1953). 22. Downs, "The Statu s of University Librarians in Retrospect. " 23 . Robert B. Downs , "The Current Status of University Librar y Staffs, " College & Re- search Libraries 18:375-85 (Sept. 1957). 24 . Robert B. Downs , " Status of Universit y Librarians , 1964 ," College & R esearch Libraries 25:253-58 Quly 1964). 25. Carl Hintz, "Criter~a for Appointment to and Promotion in Academic Rank ," College & Re- search Libraries 29:341-46 (Sept. 1968). 26. American Library Association, Association of College and Research Libraries , " Model Statement of Criteria and Procedures for Appointment, Promotion in Academic Rank, and Tenure for College and University Li- brarians ," College & Research Libraries News 34 :192- 95 (Sept. 1973); 34 :243-47 (Oct . 1973). 27. Critique of a College , Reports of the Com- mission on Educational Policy , the Special Committee on Library Policy [and] the Spe- cial Committee on Student Life (Swarthmore , Pa. : The College, 1967). 28 . John G. Williamson, "Swarthmore College's 'Teaching Library' Proposals," Drexel Library Quarterly 7:203-15 Quly-Oct. 1971). 29. Howard W. Dillon , " Organizing the Academic Library for Instruction ," journal of Academic Librarianship 1:~7 (Sept. 1975). 30. Raleigh DePriest, "That Inordinate Passion for Status," College & Research Libraries 34:150--58 (March 1973). 31. Knapp, "The College Librarian." 32. John H. Moriarty, "Academic in Deed," Col- lege & Research Libraries 31:14-17 (Jan. 1970). 33. Reichmann, "Hercules and Antaeus." 34. Knapp, "The College Librarian." 35. Winger, "Aspects of Librarianship." 36. Thompson, "Preparation and Status of Library Personnel." 37. Evert Volkersz, "Library Organization in Academia: Changes from Hierarchical to Col- legial Relationships," in E. J. Josey, New Dimensions for Academic Library Service (Metuchen, N.J.: Scarecrow, 1975), p.77-85. 38. Smith, "Academic Status for College and University Librarians." 39. Ibid. 40. Cf. Thompson, "Preparation and Status of Library Personnel," who quotes L. C. Powell: "On every academic staff I have any aquaintance with, I can count on a few fingers the number of persons who can estab- lish intellectual camaraderie with the faculty. Until this can be done by the majority of the staff, talk of equal rank with the faculty is a waste of breath." 41. Hintz, "Criteri·a for Appointment to and Promotion in Academic Rank." 42. Fritz Veit, "The Status of the Librarian according to Accrediting Standards of Re- gional and Professional Associations," College & Research Libraries 21:127-35 (March 1960). . 43. Downs, "The Current Status of University Library Staffs." 44. Arthur M. McAnally, "Privileges and Obliga- tions of Academic Status," College & Re- search Libraries 24:102-8 (March 1963). 45. Lewis C. Bra~scomb, "Tenure for Profession- al Librarians on Appointment at Colleges and Universities," College & Research Libraries 26:297-98, 341 (July 1965). 46. David C. Weber, "'Tenure' for Librarians in Academic Institutions," College & Research Libraries 27:99-102 (March 1966). 47. Hintz, "Criteria for Appointment to and Promotion in AcademiC Rank." 48. William H. Jesse and Ann Mitchell, "Profes- sional Staff Opportunites for Study and Re- search," College & Research Libraries 29:87- 100 (March 1968). 49. Fay M. Blake, "Tenure for the Academic Librarian," College & Research Libraries 29:502-4 (Nov. 1968). 50. Thomas I. Emerson and David Haber, "Academic Freedom of the Faculty Member as Citizen," Law and Contemporary Prob- lems. 28:547 (1963). Academic Librarianship I 421 51. Henry M. Wriston, "Academic Tenure," The American Scholar 9:339-49. 52. Volkersz, "Library Organization in Academia." 53. McAnally, "Privileges and Obligations of Academic Status." 54. Hintz, "Criteria for Appointment tQ and Promotion in Academic Rank." 55. Kellam, "Activities and Opportunities of Uni- versity Librarians." 56. Jesse and Mitchell, "Professional Staff Oppor- tunities for Study and Research." 57. Martha J. Bailey, "Some Effects of Faculty Status on Supervision in Academic Librar- ies," College & Research Libraries 37:48-52 (Jan. 1976). 58. Adeline Tallau, "Faculty Status and Library Governance," Library journal 99:1521-23 (June 1, 1974). 59. Margaret Beckman, "Implications for Academic Libraries," in University of Illi- nois, Urbana, Graduate School of Library Science, Collective Bargaining in Libraries (Urbana, Ill., 1975; Allerton Park Institute, 20th, 1974), p.122-45. 60. Ibid. 61. Dillon, "Organizing the Academic Library for Instruction"; Williamson, "Swarthmore Col- lege's 'Teaching Library' Proposals." 62. Goldenberg, Professional Workers and Col- lective Bargaining. ·63. Theodore L. Guyton, Unionization, the View- point of Librarians (Chicago, Ill.: American Library Assn., 1975). 64. John W. Weatherford, Collective Bargaining and the Academic Librarian (Metuchen, N.J.: Scarecrow, 1976). 65. Lothar Spang, "Collective Bargaining and University Librarians: Wayne State Universi- ty," College & Research Libraries 36:106-14 (March 1975). 66. Mary Anne Burns and Jeanette Carter, "Col- lective Bargaining and Faculty Status for Librarians: West Chester State College," College & Research Libraries 36:115-20 (March 1975). 67. Weatherford, Collective Bargaining and the Academic Librarian. 68. University of Illinois, Urbana, Graduate School of Li.brary Science, Collective Bar- gaining in Libraries (Urbana, Ill., 1975; Allerton Park Institute, 20th, 1974). 69. Ibid. 70. Harold Lancour, "The Librarian's Search for Status," Library Quarterly 31:369-81 (Oct. 1961). 71. Smith, "Academic Status for College and University Librarians." 72. Williamson, "Swarthmore College's 'Teaching Library' Proposals," p.210-ll.