LSE Library: a history of the collections

2016

LSE’s Library, the British Library of Political and Economic Science, opened in November 1896. In the first of a series of posts celebrating LSE Library’s 120th anniversary in 2016, Graham Camfield explores the founding of the Library and its changing face through the years.

2021

This monograph traces the emergence and evolution of the LSE Government Department from 1895 to 2020, focusing on the personalities that guided the development of the Department, the social and political contexts the Department existed within, its research agenda and course structure, and the location of the Department in British politics. It also charts the evolution of the discipline of political science in Britain itself. The volume is divided chronologically into four chapters, each covering roughly similar time periods in the Departments’ history and focused on the events that shaped it: personalities, events, and location. Key themes are the development of political science in Britain, the impact of location on the LSE Government Department, the professionalisation of academia in Britain, and the microcosm the Department presents of British political life during each time period. The conflicts between progressive and conservative forces is a recurring theme which helps to link...

Blackwell, 1996

Hotbed of socialism, spiritual hoe for a particular brand of right-wing economists, platform for divers philosphers from Laski to Oakeshott (and beyond), breeding ground for all sociologists, stepping-off place for collectivist lawyers, 'the School' had everything. Dahrendorf does it proud, thoroughly, entertainingly and perceptively.

Liber Quarterly: The Journal of European Research Libraries, 2002

2007

The pillage and burning of Iraq's National Library and its National Museum in the spring of 2003 sent cultural shock waves around the world. "Stuff happens," Donald Rumsfeld, the U.S. Secretary for Defense, declared offhandedly, dismissing these events. 1 But such events, and the variety of responses that they evoke, raise a number of urgent historical questions to which the articles in this volume represent tentative answers. The collections and services of libraries and related agencies, such as museums and archives, are important components of social and institutional memory. They are both physical places of intellectual work and highly symbolic places. They represent national and cultural identity and aspirations. They are venues for individualized access to educational and cultural resources. They are also part of an infrastructural continuum for disseminating information, forming opinion, and providing literate recreation. At one end of the infrastructural continuum lie telecommunications, mass media, and more recently the Internet and the World Wide Web. Libraries have traditionally been situated at the other end of this continuum as places of access to the historical diversity of opinion represented in cumulating collections of printed materials, though in the digital era they are clearly moving to a more central position on this continuum.

London School of Economics and Political Science, 2021

You can visit the Ubiquity Press website to purchase Political Science at the LSE or download a free, open access copy. Dr Gordon Bannerman has also provided an introduction to the book on LSE History blog. Q&A on Political Science at the LSE: A History of the Department of Government, from the Webbs to COVID. Ubiquity Press. 2021. Q: Why is 2021 such an apt time to reflect on the history of LSE Department of Government? Cheryl Schonhardt-Bailey: In an ideal world, this history of the Department would have come out in 2020 to align with LSE's 125th anniversary. While other departments had told their histories, we had not yet done so. Hence, the motivation was quite simple in having the chance to 'tell our story' and be part of the celebratory atmosphere which the 125th anniversary promised the School.

Social Science Libraries, 2010

What do we lose when we lose a library, A conference about the future challenges of libraries. 9 - 10 - 11 September, 2015

On August 25, 1914, the German army deliberately burned the university's library of Leuven along with 300,000 medieval books and manuscripts. On January 28, 2013, Islamist rebels set the library of Timbuktu with thousands ancient manuscripts on fire. Many books of this library were about Islam. On January 9, 2015, the attack on Charlie Hebdo in Paris shocked the world. It was seen as an assault on free speech. Thousands of people marched in Paris to defend democracy and freedom of expression. Meanwhile the Flemish Government discharges the municipalities of the obligation to organize libraries. In all the discussions during the last weeks, nearly no one established clearly the relation between the democratic right of free expression and the importance of libraries, both the large and the small, as sources of knowledge and opinions. One of the characteristics of totalitarian ideologies and regimes is the destruction of problematic information and limiting free speech through control of the written culture. In our changing world, we are convinced that we have full access to all information thanks to the Internet. But we often forget that this information is particularly superficial and at the same time easy to manipulate. Within this context, the meaning of a library, especially a national heritage library such as the Royal Library of Belgium, as a repository for intellectual and cultural heritage remains of exceptional importance. The aim of my contribution is to develop this idea by means of the rich collection of newspapers preserved in the Royal Library of Belgium. These newspapers are not meant to be kept and their future is threatened by acidification. To preserve them, they are systematically digitized. The importance of newspapers lies in the richness of information: political, ideological, economic, social, cultural, and so on. Newspapers not only provide information, but also offer a contemporaneous interpretation and comment upon events. And because of this they also outline the history of (or the absence of) freedom of speech. So, our archive of newspaper helps critical citizens to inform themselves about the contemporary history, just like literature, philosophical or historical books, and so on. What do we lose when we lose our libraries? We lose an instrument of democracy! A democracy needs cultural and intellectual education. Cultural education is focused on personal and social development, on raising awareness, on acquiring the competence and willingness to participate in social life. From a social point of view the importance of cultural education cannot be underestimated. Cultural education shapes our identity and makes us democratic beings. This being said, we must define libraries, as well as archives, as repositories of heritage and knowledge, as institutions which form the basis for a healthy democracy. So, I am convinced that in addition to scientific research one of the most important tasks for the educational activities of the KBR is in particular the enhancement of cultural competence that everyone needs to be able to participate as a critical citizen in public life.

Library Trends, 2007

The pillage and burning of Iraq's National Library and its National Museum in the spring of 2003 sent cultural shock waves around the world. “Stuff happens,” Donald Rumsfeld, the US Secretary for Defense, declared offhandedly, dismissing these events.1 But such events, and the ...