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Studying Law in the Netherlands: the Role of the Library

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  08 September 2010

Ben Beljaars  and
René Winter
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Abstract

Ben Beljaars and René Winter contribute a thoroughly well-researched article on the profile of current users of academic libraries in Holland. They discuss their information requirements and usage; the relationship between the library and the law faculty; the use of digital resources in legal education and developments in legal information literacy.

Keywords

academic law librariesNetherlandslegal education
Type
Current Topics
Information
Legal Information Management , Volume 10 , Issue 3 , September 2010 , pp. 241 - 248
Copyright
Copyright © The British and Irish Association of Law Librarians 2010

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References

Footnotes

1 Carr, Helen, Carter, Sarah, Horsey, Kirsty, Skills for Law Students, Oxford University Press 2009, p. 143Google Scholar.

2 See <http://www.portill.nl/php/index.php>

3 Also see the discussion on open access with regard to academic literature. Warna Oosterbaan, ‘Kennis achter de tolmuur’, NRC Handelsblad 1 August 2009, in the NRC Weekblad & Wetenschap supplement 1–7 August 2009, p, 18–21. Oosterbaan refers to the Berlin Declaration (2003) : <http://www.zim.mpg.de/openaccess-berlin/berlin_declaration.pdf> For recent developments, see ‘Berlin Conference of 2009: ‘Berlin 7 – Reaching Diverse Communities’, that was held on 2–4 December 2009 at Université de la Sorbonne, Paris, France. The universities try to offer a solution with their repositories, but not all academic publications are included through this medium, which is partly dependent upon permission from the publishers.

4 Gibbons, Susan, ‘The Academic Library and the Net Gen Student. Making the Connections’, American Library Association, Chicago 2007Google Scholar.

5 Gibbons 2007, p. 5.

6 The theme of the future of the library is anything but new. Libraries are constantly focused on innovations. An appropriate example is: ‘The Future of Law Libraries. Selected articles from the impact of technology on law libraries and law classrooms of the future’, March 2005, Amelia Island, Florida: Thomson West, Florida Coastal School of Law, The InfiLaw System, 2006.

7 Darnton, Robert, ‘The Library in the New Age’, The New York Review of Books, Vol. 55, number 10, June 12, 2008Google Scholar. Darnton sketches the history of written communication and finds that successive changes are increasing proportionally. ‘When strung out in this manner, the pace of change seems breathtaking: from writing to the codex, 4300 years; from codex to movable type, 1,150 years; from movable type to the Internet, 524 years; from the Internet to search engines, nineteen years; from search engines to Google's algorithmic relevance ranking, seven years; and who knows what is just around the corner or coming out the pipeline? Each change in the technology has transformed the information landscape, and the speed-up has continued at such a rate as to seem both unstoppable and incomprehensible.’

8 Crispin Dale and John M. Pymm refer to the opportunities that popular technology can offer educational concepts. They advocate the use of Ipod technology in education. They conclude: ‘The iPod can develop a more creative learning environment that gives a sense of self-empowerment and autonomy to the individual. Ultimately, this can lead to a more responsive and independent learner who has a greater degree of control over their learning experience.’ p. 93. See Dale, Crispin and Pymm, John M., ‘Podagogy. The Ipod as a learning technology’, in: Active Learning in Higher Education, 10 (1), 2009, p. 84–96CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

9 See the website of the Erasmus University Rotterdam Library: <http://www.eur.nl/ub/english/search/online_resources/e_journals/>

10 <http://aallcssis.pbworks.com/Law-Library-Blogs>; <http://lawprofessors.typepad.com/law_librarian_blog/>; <http://blog.librarylaw.com/>.

11 <http://leiterreports.typepad.com/> <http://biblioblawg.blogspot.com/> <http://lcweb2.loc.gov/diglib/lcwa/html/lawlb/lawlb-overview.html> <http://www.loc.gov/law/find/web-archive/legal-blawgs.php>

12 The website of the Law Library of Congress USA states: ‘The Law Library of Congress began harvesting legal blogs in 2007. The collection has grown to more than one hundred items covering a broad cross section of legal topics. Blogs can also be retrieved by keywords or browsed by subject, name, or title.’ When it was consulted on 2-2-2010, there were 129 blogs available. This number reflects just the beginning of this development.

13 <http://webcast.berkeley.edu/>

14 <http://www.uvt.nl/diensten/lis/herinrichting/2009/> <http://www.uvt.nl/diensten/lis/herinrichting/fotos/>

15 A wonderful example of this are the 11 Youtube-videos on the Library 2.0 symposium at Yale Law School, 4 April 2009. <http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=08C1B3123A2AE6DB&search_query=Library+2.0+Yale&rclk=pti>

16 Robert Darnton is a historian and a professor emeritus of the Shelby Cullom Davis 30 Professor of European History, Princeton University. In 2007 he was appointed as a Carl H. Pforzheimer University Professor and Director of the Harvard University Library. In addition to his academic work, he is a regular contributor to The New York Review of Books.

17 Researchers require different information than education providers in search of information, but digital information is also gaining more ground here. Researchers or educationalists on one hand and librarians on the other are influencing each other. The work of librarians is changing constantly. Paragraph 7 ‘New Ways of Working’ from ‘Reseachers’ Use of Academic Libraries and their Services’, a report commissioned by the Research Information Network and the Consortium of Research Libraries. April 2007, p. 38-42, discusses a number of trends that are still topical. Policy and management tasks are elucidated under the headings ‘The use of digital resources’, ‘Large-Scale Collaborative Research and its Impact’, ‘The Rise of interdisciplinary research’, ‘E-Research and libraries’. These trends will continue throughout the next five years. The Harvard ‘Report of the Task Force on University Libraries’ of November 2009 complements this. (see note 24).

18 Pengelley, Nicholas, ‘The Virtual Law School Library’, 29 (3) International Journal of Legal Information, (2001), p. 615–642Google Scholar.

19 Terry, Nicolas, ‘Bricks plus bytes: How ‘Click and Brick’ will define legal education space,’ 46 Villanova Law Review, 95 (2001)Google Scholar.

20 Germain, Claire M., ‘Legal Information Management in a Global and Digital Age: Revolution and Tradition’, Cornell Law School research paper No. 07-005, Cornell Law School, Myron Taylor Hall, Ithaca, New York, 2007, p.24Google Scholar.

21 Report of the Task Force on University Libraries, Harvard University, November 2009, p. 23–24.

22 See the contribution from Ann Wolpert, Director of Libraries MIT, Library 2.0 Panel 1, Part 2: The Future of the Library <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9JloZK8wTqQ>

23 Veen, Wim and Vrakking, Ben, Homo zappiens: growing up in a digital age, London: Network Continuum Education, 2006Google Scholar.

24 Parlando is the databank containing Acts and other Parliamentary Papers from the Upper and Lower House from 1995 until today.

25 Lambert, Craig, ‘Professor Video. Visual, audio, and interactive media are transforming the college classroom.’ Harvard Magazine, November – December 2009, p. 34–39Google Scholar.

26 TU Delft is the First Dutch university with its own mobile application: de iTU. The iTU application gives access to the university library, the latest news and the timetable. Students can also see missed lectures on iTunes and access educational tools and study materials. Renowned universities such as Stanford, Harvard and Oxford are the pioneers in this territory. De Volkskrant 5 February 2010.

27 In Rotterdam: <http://www.eur.nl/ub/nederlands/zoeken/per_vakgebied/frg/> In Nijmegen : <http://www.ru.nl/ub/op_bezoek/rechtsgeleerdheid/> In Leiden : <http://www.law.leidenuniv.nl/bibliotheek/> In Utrecht: <http://www.uu.nl/NL/Bibliotheek/contact/juridische/Pages/default.aspx> In Groningen: <http://www.rug.nl/bibliotheek/locaties/bibrechten/index> In Maastricht: <http://www.maastrichtuniversity.nl/web/Bibliotheek/home.htm> In Amsterdam (UvA): <http://www.uba.uva.nl/jb/home.cfm> In Amsterdam (VU): <http://www.rechten.vu.nl/nl/studenten/studiefaciliteiten/bibliotheek/index.asp> In Tilburg: <http://www.uvt.nl/faculteiten/frw/bibliotheek/>

28 Also see A Librarian's 2.0 Manifesto: <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZblrRs3fkSU&feature=related>

29 <http://www.law.yale.edu/news/9059.htm>

30 <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pcktP5jz7mc>

31 See Laura DeNardis – Executive Director Yale Information Society Project (IPS) – for the Closing Remarks of the Library 2.0 Symposium, Yale Law School 4 April 2009: <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zj8gsmWD54k>

32 Darnton, Robert, ‘The Library in the New Age’, The New York Review of Books, Vol. 55, number 10, June 12, 2008, paragraph 2Google Scholar.

33 Leary, Margaret A., ‘Creating ‘One Library’ at the University of Michigan Law Library’, Trends in Law Library Management and Technology, 2008, Vol. 18, p. 7–14Google Scholar.

34 Report of the Task Force on University Libraries, Harvard University, November 2009. <http://www.provost.harvard.edu/reports/?Library_Task_Force_Report.pdf>

35 Report of the Task Force on University Libraries, Harvard University, November 2009, p. 7.

36 See: Association of American Universities, Association of Research Libraries, Coalition for Networked Information, National Association of State Universities and Land Grant Colleges. “The University's Role in the Dissemination of Research and Scholarship—A Call to Action.” Research Library Issues: A Bimonthly Report from ARL, CNI, and SPARC, no. 262 (February 2009): 1–6. <http://www.arl.org/resources/pubs/rli/>.

37 Mersky, Roy M., ‘Legal Research versus Legal Writing within the Law School Curriculum’ in: Law Library Journal, Vol. 99, Spring 2007, Number 2, p. 395-401Google Scholar. Symposium Legal Information and the Development of American Law: Further Thinking about the Thoughts of Robbert C. Berring. Op p. 399 he quotes two legal professionals from real-life: Mersky writes: ‘Complaints and comments from practitioners testify to the inadequacy of the legal research skills of young lawyers. Here is a representative comment from an experienced practitioner: ‘Our attorneys are smart and can spot issues in any assignment with little difficulty. However, when it comes to researching these issues they are really quite lost. They have no idea how to design a research strategy and usually just jump into a variety of sources without any direction. The inefficiency and waste of the clients’ money is incredible.’ A law firm librarian similarly recognised the problem and pointed to a possible solution: ‘Legal research training programs at United States law schools are grossly inadequate. These programs should be an integral part of the curriculum throughout law school rather than just a few weeks each semester. Legal research is often crammed into a one week or one semester course. It ought to be spread over three years. Give the first year students the basics and, for example, don't cover administrative materials until they have had administrative law.’’

38 A.I.M. van Mierlo and R.W. Polak, ‘De Brauwerij: de eerste stap naar een volwaardig professioneel bestaan’, AA 2006, p. 145–147.