Social Science Libraries in Greater Rio de Janeiro

Extract

In Brazil, as in Spanish America, poor public libraries and rich private libraries are mutually reinforcing phenomena. The researcher who must rely on public institutions usually spends much of his or her available time scurrying from one library to another in (often fruitless) search of materials. To the extent that one needs theoretical works and foreign publications, rather than works about, and published in, Brazil, the chore becomes more onerous.