Promises Made: An Interpretative Analysis of Canada's Public Library Legislation / Promesses faites : une analyse interprétative de la législation canadienne sur les bibliothèques publiques

Abstract

This article is an interpretive textual analysis of current Canadian provincial and territorial public library statutes and regulations framed through the dual lenses of boundary objects and legal statutory interpretation. Six provincial legislative debates preceding passage of their public library statutes were also analysed. Definitions, purpose statements, and provisions related to library services were compared; and public library principles, values, and services were identified. Within the framework of statutory interpretation, texts are more varied than similar. Most are silent on service and digital features of contemporary public libraries promoted as "more than just books." Saskatchewan's statute is exceptionally detailed and future oriented.

Résumé

Cet article est une analyse textuelle et interprétative des lois et règlements en vigueur dans les bibliothèques publiques, provinciales et territoriales du Canada, dans la double optique des « objets frontières » et de l'interprétation des lois. Six débats législatifs provinciaux antérieurs à l'adoption de leurs lois respectives sur les bibliothèques publiques ont également été analysés. Les définitions, les énoncés d'objets et les dispositions relatives aux services des bibliothèques publiques ont été identifiés. Dans le cadre de l'interprétation statutaire les textes sont plus différents que similaires. La plupart d'entre eux sont muets sur les services et les caractéris-tiques numériques des bibliothèques publiques contemporaines publicises comme étant, « plus que des livres. » La loi de la Saskatchewan est exceptionnellement détaillée et tournée vers l'avenir.

Introduction

Search "Canada" "public libraries" and your first page of hits turns up links, keywords, and headlines covering the vast landscape of online interaction that merely hints at the complex business of the modern public library. From lending seasonal affective disorder lamps, musical instruments, carpenter tools, or wireless hotspots, to opening millennial, hip, architecturally award-winning, community living rooms in cities, towns, and villages in rural, northern, and urban Canada, to debunking fake news, or hosting live music concerts, or being embroiled in fiercely contested public debates around why someone can or cannot use the library's meeting room or the library's public Internet access, public libraries are deeply embedded, beyond just connecting books to readers, in their local communities' day-to-day lives and simultaneously connected provincially and nationally through resource-sharing agreements and advocacy campaigns.

Public libraries remain unique, open, accessible, and highly trusted institutions, enabling individual learning and literacy, entrepreneurship, access to physical and digital culture, and social hubs for belonging and participation. It is easy to take local public libraries for granted because some regions of Canada have had access to some form of public library service since the late nineteenth century. In total, there are approximately 3,415 public libraries in Canada (Schrader and Brundin 2012). Many people have immediate, personal experiences informing what they think a public library is or ought to be. Moreover, when a crisis seriously threatens a library's viability and future, whether through natural disaster or political process, the community appears to instantly know what is at stake, organizing a collective response and taking action to protect and preserve its very own educational and cultural lighthouse (e.g., Ensing 2016; Peet 2016). With the notable exception of LIS political economy researchers (e.g., Stevenson 2011), what is often overlooked among a majority of LIS researchers is the fact that virtually all public libraries are, first and foremost, government-created entities, and, in this sense, their foundations are attributed first to these often invisible government statutes.

Newfoundland and Labrador and Saskatchewan recently introduced library budgets in 2015 and 2017 that, if implemented, would have gutted much of the rural public library service in these jurisdictions (O'Connor 2017; Roberts and Ensing 2016). Community response in each case was swift and widespread and resulted in cuts being rescinded, buying time for more thorough, consultative reviews to take place. In both instances, larger questions about how public libraries are rationalized and resourced, including legislative responsibilities, were brought into these public debates. This article was prompted by these two provincial debates, specifically by the Saskatchewan experience. As the first work in a larger case study of that province's public library "crisis" in the spring of 2017, it introduces an analysis of contemporary public library legislation in Canada that compliments the few related references that an extensive literature search revealed (Helling 2012; Wilson 2008). Whereas earlier work takes a descriptive approach to understanding the governance foundations and critical elements constituting public libraries in Canada, this article takes an explicitly and thoroughly interpretive turn, premised by several central questions. What does public library legislation promise, and then continuously negotiate with, its citizen members in terms of library values, principles, and services? How should we interpret these documents in answering this question? More narrowly for LIS researchers, this article responds to these research questions: (1) how does legislation fit into the larger landscape of public library research and (2) how can we approach, methodologically and theoretically, a study of public library legislation?

Literature review and framework

Public library legislation has received relatively little attention or in-depth study in LIS research except as its passage is accounted or referenced in provincial or regional public library histories (e.g., Brice 2010; Maher 1967). Wilson's (2008) overview of Canadian public library legislation is broad and descriptive, comparing and contrasting structure, governance, and funding across provincial and territorial statutes. Helling's (2012) study focuses on various countries' national policies only, updating Gardner's (1971) selective international coverage. The former includes a chapter on Canada's libraries and makes brief reference to the provincial and territorial statutes while also noting the "difficulty in describing the management of Canada's public libraries" (Helling 2012, 31). The latter briefly acknowledges the differing public library legislative foundations in Ontario and Quebec.

Public libraries and their role in public policy and the political process, including libraries as government agencies, have been studied in various ways. Stevenson (2011, 2016) has critically examined Canadian public libraries as government agencies and, more specifically, the labour provided by public librarians in these libraries using a post-Fordist lens. Related, but still tangential, to this article's focus is the research on Canadian library leadership, advocacy, and the political decision-making processes (e.g., Stenstrom and Haycock 2014). Cavanagh (2015) examined public library membership as collective organizational and political action. In the United States, leading research on public libraries as government agencies has been provided by Jaeger et al. (2014) and Jaeger, Bertot, and Gorham (2013). Buschman (2003, 2018) has produced several significant texts situating public libraries in their political and democratic contexts, again drawing largely on data from the United States. Library advocacy studies tend to ignore legislation, focusing instead on demonstrations of library value (e.g., Huysmans and Oomes 2013). This study is the first to closely and comprehensively study Canadian public library legislation.

Figure 1 represents the theoretical framework for this analysis. This study draws on legal statutory interpretation and on an information sciences' perspective on boundary objects (Huvila et al. 2017; Star 2010), referencing key concepts from Sullivan's (2007) statutory interpretation and from a close reading of key documentary sources. These library statutes and associated regulations are important, yet often overlooked, objects or "relational props" (Huizing and Cavanagh 2011) in public library practice because of their unique political properties of instantiation, ongoing translation, and enactment.

Library statutes as boundary objects

Boundary objects are valuable theoretical constructs (Star and Griesemer 1989), as they "negotiate meaning and help to understand and articulate connects and disconnects between communities, cultures, and information infrastructures" (Huvila et al. 2017, 1807), a scholarly rendering that also sounds uncannily like a contemporary public library. They can take many forms in a multitude of contexts. The library statutes analysed for this study are both physical documents and conceptual representations of the public policy behind contemporary public library practice in Canada. A boundary object is "something people act toward and with. Its materiality derives from action, not from a sense of prefabricated stuff or 'thing'-ness … [it is] at once temporal, based in action, subject to reflection and local tailoring, and distributed throughout all of these dimensions" (Star 2010, 603). These public library statutes have been studied as living documents, including their legal, political and social contexts; they act and enable the practice of public libraries, across and in their local geo-political spaces. As boundary objects, they are actors in the broadest social theoretical practice or actor network called the public library. Library statutes connect the abstract idea with the ongoing happenings of the public library. If we were to move away from the traditional view of the noun, public library, less as "prefabricated stuff" or "thing-ness" and, instead, interpret it as a verb, as "public librarying," how might we theorize public library action and translations differently? As boundary objects, these public library statutes bring their library communities, their political and administrative actors, and their protocols, rules, and structures as legislated public services into being and action.

Figure 1.

Theoretical framework for Canadian pubic library statutory interpretation

The research problem addressed by this study is not strictly legal, nor is the researcher a qualified legal expert. However, the research questions posed are addressing problems of interpretive meaning about the foundational legal texts constituting Canadian public libraries. Therefore, to study public libraries in their broader and narrower geo-political, legal, and library contexts, this combined legal, interpretive approach to statutes must be incorporated into the theoretical framework and textual analytic approach.

Legal statutory interpretation

Canadian public libraries are created through systems of government. They come into being only by first being recognized by their provincial or territorial governments as legal entities according to the terms of each jurisdiction's relevant statute. In Canada, provincial and territorial governments are responsible for drafting, passing, and then administering public library legislation in their geographic regions. Legislation is also a form of codification or systematic ordering. Library statutes are drafted by legal experts in close collaboration with designated administrators and subject authorities according to standardized and rule-based documentary style and structure (Sullivan 2007). Draft bills are tabled in Parliament followed by a formal process that may include political debate and that is concluded after several readings by a vote. After a public library bill is passed and becomes law, it is the responsibility of the politicians' delegated authority to implement the statute's provisions.

In the field of Canadian legal research, statutory interpretation is a technical and highly structured sub-discipline that is "at once the most practical and the most theoretical of subjects" (Sullivan 2007, 4). Formal statutory interpretation can be applied to other types of legal documents and has several overarching goals "to indicate how the rules are used in analysis of legislative texts." Rules are an important concept in statutory interpretation, but unlike rules applied to library classification or cataloguing, statutory rules are provided to "supply … a vocabulary for describing interpretation problems" (30). They give courts structure and guidance in coming to decisions on meaning-based problems depicted often through multiple, subjective, and conflicting perspectives. Importantly, the leading rule that informs all others is referred to as Elmer Driedger's modern principle (Driedger, in Sullivan 2007). It obliges courts to go beyond considering the text alone and to consider the "entire context," which includes additionally the "scheme of the Act, the object of the Act, and the intention of Parliament" (41).

Methodology

Sullivan (2007) provides a practical approach and series of analytic perspectives that align methodologically with social sciences' qualitative methods (Glaser and Strauss 1967) with LIS practice-based scholarship (Huvila et al. 2017; Savolainen 2008). The unit of analysis is the most current provincial or territorial statute, including amendments and, where they exist, associated regulations, which together constitute the statute as a legislative instrument. Statutes, above all, have an instrumental purpose that is to carry out the political intentions of their governments. Related government documents, including legislative debates, web pages, and library policies, were reviewed as contextual data sources but only as they made reference to provincial or territorial statutes.¹ As material objects—indeed, classic boundary objects of public library practice—these statutes literally enact public libraries; as governance documents, they have cardinal status. And, yet, they have been rarely studied or referenced, directly or tangentially, in public library scholarship.

The researcher assumed the role of textual critic of Canadian public library legislative structures and practices, aided by her prior experience as a public library practitioner in several of these provincial jurisdictions and in the wide Canadian field. Using convenience sampling and triangulating the textual data, three in-depth interviews were conducted with former provincial public library leaders (Interviewees 1, 2, and 3) on the legal and policy processes for enacting or revising public library legislation. In addition to their library expertise, one of these interview participants also had expert knowledge of, and experience in, drafting and interpreting provincial, territorial, and federal statutes. This participant (Interviewee 2) was involved in drafting Saskatchewan's 1996 public library legislation and, therefore, provided a unique perspective on this subject, combining expert knowledge on both public library and statutory interpretation.

In sequence, the first round of analysis focused on each provincial and territorial statute and associated regulations, including amendments. Each statute was reviewed and coded descriptively and then interpretively, using the following categories for data selection and analysis: date of original statute and associated regulations; total number of clauses in the statute; inclusion of purpose statement or preamble; core definitions; references to resources; references to resource sharing; references to specific library services; references to technology; and major amendments since initial statute. Numerous iterative readings were conducted of each provincial and territorial statute and regulation. Initial sensitizing concepts beyond explicitly stated definitions included library services, technology, information, vision, purpose, principles, and cooperation (Bowen 2006). Explicit references to these terms were noted alongside any implicit references suggesting aspects of these sensitizing concepts. Notable inclusions and omissions as well as common and exceptional elements were also noted. Data were compiled into spreadsheets to enable comparison across all provinces and territories.

The second phase of data collection and analysis entailed identifying and retrieving legislative debate transcriptions on which the current statutes were tabled, then passed into law, in their respective legislatures. These texts (approximately 66,400 words) were analysed using iterative, inductive coding techniques as employed in qualitative research methods (Glaser and Strauss 1967). The texts were reviewed, key segments highlighted, conceptually and thematically coded, reviewed, and recoded several times. The codes and concepts emerged from those elements identified in earlier statute and regulation analysis. The findings are presented first as an analysis of the statute texts themselves, reported according to four themes, followed by a separate analysis of the debates and the primary emerging concepts. The article concludes with a brief discussion of these findings, study limitations, and implications for future research.

Findings

Overview of statutory textual analysis

Each jurisdiction's social, economic, political, and cultural histories and current life have undoubtedly influenced their respective public library histories, traditions, governance models, values, and services. These elements form the broad contextual backdrop to the statute. Moreover, it is to be expected that even within the norms and rules for writing statutes, every jurisdiction also has its own drafting style and practices, referred to by one interview participant (Interviewee 1) as the "personality of the jurisdiction." This review makes no claim of constructing a single, dominant, or correct assessment or interpretation. Instead, the findings and discussion form but one commentary and interpretive perspective (Age 2011) and compliment previous work (Wilson 2008).

Table 1 provides an overview of several data elements describing these provincial and territorial statutes. These data offer a slightly broader perspective drawing on Driedger's modern principle for considering statutory context.

The date range for all statutes covers a period of 22 years from 1987 to 2011. Three statutes date from the 1980s; the majority (six) date from the 1990s, and four statutes date from the 2000s with the most recent being New Brunswick. The debates from legislative assemblies during which sittings these bills were passed into law, and on which the present statutes were based, span a wider period of 26 years between 1984 and 2010. Eight statutes have associated regulations. Three statutes include purpose statements. In terms of length, Saskatchewan's Library Act is much longer than all of the other statutes, with 83 clauses; it is also significantly longer than the next longest statute from British Columbia with 62 clauses. The shortest statutes with fewer than 10 clauses are from the three territorial legislatures. There is no apparent relationship between date of publication and the length of the statute, which is indicated by the number of clauses. Six provincial legislatures debated their library bills before royal assent and passage into law: Alberta, British Columbia, Manitoba, Nova Scotia, Ontario, and Saskatchewan; the remaining provinces and territories passed their respective library bills without formal debate. Analysis of these debates follows later in the article.

Purpose statements

Although Sullivan (2007) is clear that all units and provisions of a statute together constitute the "Act as a whole" and are to be considered in any purposive analysis, definitions and purpose provisions are the foundational interpretive provisions of any statute. As she further explains, "purpose statements are relied upon to establish the meaning of the text, … as a standard against which proposed interpretations are tested." Purpose statements are viewed with greatest authority in any interpretive analysis. They draw attention to the "principles and policies that should inform the exercise of discretion conferred by the Act … they are to be relied upon in every interpretive exercise" (141). Purpose statements are intended to be interpreted within the "legislative scheme of which it is a part" or, in other words, in their "relationship to other provisions in the Act and related legislation" (200). Only three statutes reviewed for this analysis contained purpose statements: British Columbia, Nova Scotia, and Saskatchewan. Because of their relative importance as provisions in interpreting library statutes, the full texts of these sections are excerpted in table 2, which outlines the purpose provisions of public library statutes.

Table 1.

Overview of public library legislation In Canada, 2017

Notes:

^a Unless otherwise noted, all statutes examined for this study were sourced in the CanLii database and then validated on each provincial or territorial government department's web page.

Table 2.

Public library statute purpose provisions

A few observations can be made regarding length, structure, language, and mechanisms. Purpose statements are not mandatory, although Sullivan (2007) indicates they are increasingly commonplace. Slightly surprising in this dataset is that the later statutes do not have purpose provisions; the three acts with this type of provision date from 1990 and 1996. It is possible to have multiple purpose statements in a purpose provision, and there is no rank order of importance among the individual statements. In cases where subclauses may potentially conflict with one another, this structure can pose interpretation challenges. In each of these statements, there are no obvious conflicts among the various subclauses.

Both British Columbia and Saskatchewan reference multiple purposes, whereas Nova Scotia references one purpose with three associated subclauses. In the case of Saskatchewan, there are two distinct purpose provisions that immediately follow each other in that act's scheme. This structuring decision, and, indeed, the texts themselves, indicate that the overall act has a purpose with elements for establishing a provincial public library system; the subsequent section 2 purpose provision specifically lists the purposes of that provincial public library system. This ordering scheme textually, logically, and interpretively binds these two provisions together. Although it would be possible to understand the act with only the first purpose provision, section 2 specifically and unambiguously assigns authority and responsibility for equitable access to basic library services, the union catalogue, inter-library loans, reciprocal borrowing, and autonomous library boards, not to a provincial library authority but, rather, to a provincial public library system defined as all local, regional, northern libraries and library systems in the province, notably excluding the Saskatchewan Provincial Library. Thus, while the provincial library is excluded in provisions regarding service delivery, it "shall" function as "the central library for Saskatchewan" and play a critical supporting role to "co-ordinate, facilitate, and develop the activities of the provincial public library system" (section 7(2)).

In examining the language used, and the specific content included within each of these purpose provisions, distinct differences can be noted. British Columbia's purpose has aspirational phrases while also taking an operational approach to the act's overall purpose. The act aspires to "encourage" the growth or "extension" of public library service and to also "support improvements." How this growth and improvement should occur as stated in section 2(b), however, is not aspirational; it involves establishing and/or continuing operation of various types of libraries and groups of libraries.

Nova Scotia's purpose statement reads in part like a traditional, no-fail recipe for public library service: just the basics, not particularly aspirational or ambitious, but technically complete nevertheless. It suggests a status quo, traditional regional configuration. Two key actors are identified; the provincial library is named to coordinate not services but, rather, library-based "activities" via regional public libraries. The implication is that the vision and responsibility for service rests solely with individual regional libraries. Unlike British Columbia's provision, Nova Scotia is silent on who is involved or how "support services to libraries" are to be provided, on what these might consist of, and on what principle or goal (e.g., "improvement") they could or should enact.

Saskatchewan's two purpose statements combined, have the tone and relatively detailed language of a primer on public library fundamentals to create a highly structured, complex, distributed, yet interdependent, resource-sharing network, with no central hub. As noted, the basic premise of Saskatchewan's purpose statements is to create a "provincial public library system," and, in this way, section 3 suggests a vision of library service that is first and foremost provincial in scope. The act's overall purpose is to "ensure equitable access to basic library services," and the mechanism specified for achieving that vision is a "provincial public library system." The purpose statement of section 3(2), which directs the establishment of the provincial public library system, repeats this overarching principle of "equitable access to basic library services." Where the act's first purpose statement sets the goal to "ensure" this access, the second purpose statement's goal is to "facilitate" this access. This language makes a nuanced connection between a higher-level goal and a more operational objective for achieving that goal. Specifying the four ways this provincial system will be created and operationalized in both purpose statements limits potential ambiguity regarding how equitable access is to be achieved. This level of specificity is exceptional when compared with British Columbia's and New Brunswick's purpose statements.

These statutory purpose statements suggest dimensions of a vision for public libraries individually in their respective jurisdictions and when read together. Several library service values and guiding principles can be gleaned from these statements—the majority from Saskatchewan's statement: libraries can always be improved, regardless of size or location; together, libraries offer equity in access and service; a province's public libraries operate as a collective, while individual libraries also retain local autonomy; reciprocity in lending is valued; and interinstitutional cooperation occurs in creating a union catalogue. These interpretations will be further examined by looking at how each statute directly or indirectly makes reference to library services intended for their public.

Legal definition of library

Many Canadian federal and provincial statutes and regulations begin with a section or subsection setting out definitions of terms. As Sullivan (2007) notes, these definitions are meant to "clarify rather than qualify" the ordinary meanings, "to create precise meanings and sharp distinctions, to resolve doubt." Sullivan explains a distinction between exhaustive and non-exhaustive definitions that is helpful in comparing definitions of key terms (69). The former is usually introduced by the word "means," which comprises the "sole meaning the word may bear throughout the statute," whereas the latter is introduced by the word "includes," which "adds or subtracts from the ordinary meaning of the defined term" (68–69). Four purposes pertain to inclusion of statutory definitions: (1) to create a short form of reference for lengthy expressions; (2) to narrow the usual scope of a word or expression; (3) to enlarge the usual scope of a word or expression; and (4) to resolve possible doubt or ambiguity.

The "ordinary meaning" or dictionary definition of "library" begins as "a place set apart to contain books for reading, study, or reference," with other references to collections of "objects of a person's study." A public library is defined by the online version of the Oxford English Dictionary as "a library maintained for the use of the public, usually out of public funds." These understandings are construed as the layperson's "ordinary" meanings. In this context and analysis, we also consider the legal meaning of the entity called "library" or the characteristics that, taken together, legally constitute a library. It seems obvious that any legislation governing public libraries would begin with some kind of scoping of the concept of either library or public library precisely in response to these questions and for the purposes that Sullivan (2007) notes. Of the 13 statutes, however, no definitions of any terms are provided by Nova Scotia, Quebec, or the Yukon. Of the remaining jurisdictions, one province (Ontario) provides definitions but does not define either of these specific terms. Alberta and British Columbia define public library through reference to categories of libraries or library-organizing entities—for example, municipal, community, or regional associations or systems—as those included in the act. Newfoundland and Labrador, Nunavut, and the Northwest Territories define public libraries referentially as those entities established by their respective acts. Manitoba, New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island, and Saskatchewan each define library by listing multiple criteria that mean library. This last cluster of definitions warrants closer examination.

Manitoba defines a library by itemizing a list of elements of its "collection" (e.g., "books, periodicals, … and any relational medium") and, within the same definition, by specifying the purposes of that collection: "For the preservation and diffusion of knowledge, or … intended for circulation or reference." Prince Edward Island also defines a library as a "collection" for the purposes of "circulation or reference," with the additional scoping of the term by reference to buildings or spaces; library means "the physical premises in which such materials are kept" such as "branch libraries, mobile units and reading rooms." New Brunswick and Saskatchewan offer the most detailed and far-reaching definitions. New Brunswick's definition of library references "physical facilities" and "collections" with two types of associated purposes: "lending or consultation" and collections having "literary or artistic merit and having educational, recreational or informational value." Echoes of historically traditional public library missions statements can be found in the subclause referring to "merit" and "value" of a library's collections. In addition to including collections in the subclauses of the definition of library, New Brunswick's and Saskatchewan's statutes, exceptionally, also include reference to the staff, their expertise, and the services they provide within the scope of their definitions of library.

Saskatchewan's definition of library is the most robust in terms of capturing the contemporary public library purposes and services. Its definition begins with a general statement that a "'library' means an information centre." It continues to define library by specifying these elements: containing a collection with the purpose of "bibliographic and intellectual access to knowledge"; having a trained staff "to provide services and programs related to the information needs of its clientele"; and as defined by types of service points or facilities including "branch libraries, bookmobiles, and book deposits established or used in connection with a library."

Other inclusions and exclusions among the definition of the concept of library or public library among these statutes were also observed. The public aspect of public libraries was suggested only by New Brunswick's definition of a public library, distinct from a library, as "a library where services are available without charge to residents of the Province." To be clear, the idea of public library service being freely available is referenced variously in many of these statutes, though not by way of a specific definition, as in New Brunswick. Several jurisdictions define various types of organizational units of public libraries such as "regional resource library" (Newfoundland and Labrador), "central library" (Manitoba), "community library" or "district library" (Prince Edward Island), "integrated public library system" (British Columbia), or "public library system" (New Brunswick and Saskatchewan).

This brief analysis reveals there is no commonly held legal definition of library or public library in use across Canada's provincial and territorial library jurisdictions. However, it may be understood from at least a handful of the jurisdictions that, broadly speaking, the constituent elements of a public library include some or all of these aspects: collections, facilities, staff, and related services. Where the term "library" is defined by referencing the acts themselves, it is possible to imply these and additional constituent elements in the various subsequent provisions, clauses, and subclauses.

Library services for the public

The first section examined for references to library services was the definition provision. Two provinces (Alberta and Saskatchewan) define "basic library services," and one province (Prince Edward Island) defines "service" by delegating responsibilities to the Provincial Library Service; all of these definitions appear in their respective regulations. Saskatchewan's definition is again exceptional by comparison as it sets out a detailed, comprehensive basic library service framework that many practitioners would recognize in contemporary public library service. The main clauses of this definition are: (1) "provision of a level of service determined locally at the community level" with seven detailed specifications in subclauses; (2) "the development of library collections according to the needs and interests of communities," including three subclauses itemizing collection processes; and (3) "the development of programs that meet local needs for cultural, economic, education and recreational information organized around the themes of … with four sub-clauses specifying distinct program objectives such as "increasing information competencies" and "advocating library values." Numerous aspects of this definition of basic library services have no corresponding language, inferred or explicit, in any of the other statutes or regulations.

There are two main areas in the statutes and associated regulations where we find suggestions of what library services might look like for their respective citizenries. In many of these jurisdictions, more detail and elaboration is provided on their respective government websites, and later discussion will return to this observation. In several jurisdictions, an organizational strategy uses the same wording across various sections organized by type of library system (e.g., municipal libraries, inter-municipal boards, regional libraries) and uses subheadings referencing "board duties"; in other cases, references to library services are clearly specified in provisions discussing free and fee-based library services.

Both Alberta and Ontario use the same phrase referencing library services. In Alberta, a library board shall "organize, promote and maintain comprehensive and efficient library services" (sections 7, 12.5, 17) and, in Ontario, "shall seek to provide … a comprehensive and efficient public library service" (section 20). The Alberta regulations further detail these services under the "community boards" provision where section 10, in its entirety, refers to collections, knowledgeable staff, information services, program events and exhibits, and equipped facilities. Manitoba does not specify services but refers only to the responsibility of a regional or municipal board to "operate" the library. Among the territorial statutes, the Northwest Territories is most detailed, and Nunavut's language is similar, as it was derived from the Northwest Territories statute at its establishment in 2009. For the Northwest Territories, the minister enters into an agreement with a "library authority" agreeing to "provide staff and books, periodicals, films, records, materials and other objects or articles of educational or cultural value" and agrees to "provide and maintain adequate premises for use as a public library" (section 4 (a); see Nunavut Library Act, section 5(a)). The Yukon refers only to the "business of the library" in the broadest terms (section 5(2)). The Atlantic provinces reference services under provincial responsibilities (New Brunswick and Newfoundland and Labrador); under regional library responsibilities (Nova Scotia); or under both provincial and community library provisions (Prince Edward Island). Like Saskatchewan, Prince Edward Island and New Brunswick specifically reference centralized cataloguing services and a union catalogue; New Brunswick also mentions inter-library loans among central services (section 8(e)). Under section 18 of the Quebec statute, the minister is authorized to establish services including collections, resource sharing, programs, and information services. "Programs" described as a type of library service are mentioned in a few jurisdictions only (Alberta, New Brunswick, Quebec, and Saskatchewan).

Several, although not all, of these statutes and regulations also have provisions specifying what constitutes free or "basic" library services. In British Columbia's statute, this is the only provision where library services are specified at all; free services include access to a library building, using materials on premises, borrowing materials, and using reference and information services (section 46(1–2)). Alberta, Ontario, and Prince Edward Island specify the same types of services under similar provisions (Alberta Libraries Act, section 36(3); Ontario Public Libraries Act, section 23(1); Prince Edward Island Public Libraries Act, section 4). Uniquely, Prince Edward Island's statute also contains a provision entitled "Rights of Library Users" that restates what constitutes free services, but notably in the language of rights (section 5).

From this analysis, it is difficult to imagine a rich picture of what public library service in Canada might look like. Minimally, local public library service consists of a community's free access to collections via physical spaces. Formats of possible materials in these collections are generally itemized, often restrictively, occasionally non-restrictively. Maximally, Saskatchewan's definition of a basic service sets out the most robust vision of local library service within a provincially coordinated context. It is also possible to interpret various types of roles for organizing and coordinating library services among provincial and territorial, regional, and local authorities depending on where in the statute the language appears and what force the particular phrases and word choice suggest.

Sullivan (2007, 74, 78) draws attention to an important drafting convention that distinguishes between the words shall and may; whereas "shall is always imperative in the sense that it always imposes binding duties or requirements," "powers conferred by may are taken to be discretionary." For example, section 20 of Ontario's statute, "Powers and duties of the board," specifies that a board "shall seek to provide … comprehensive and efficient public library service" and, later in the same provision, "may operate special services in connection with a library as it considers necessary" (section 20(a)–(d)). Prince Edward Island's provision on provincial library service leads with the imperative: "the Provincial Library Service which shall, … enhance and support public library services, by" subclauses (a) to (g), specifying obligations such as the provision of a "centralized cataloguing service" and "interlibrary cooperation with the National Library of Canada" (section 20(f)). Saskatchewan's section 5, "Duty to provide public library services," also importantly highlights this "shall/may" distinction. Subsection 5(1) states: "Each public library board shall … (a) participate in the public library system" and "(b) provide public library services to the residents of Saskatchewan within the area it serves," whereas section 5(2) notes that, "for the purposes of carrying out its duties to subsection (1), a public library board may," followed by clauses (a) to (f), which outline the ways in which this service could be provided. This convention is important to highlight as it also surfaces in the later discussion of the legislative debates of public library bills.

When a statute or regulation such as Saskatchewan's explicitly details basic library services and then further delegates authority for delivering these services or when a statute or regulation references service delivery mechanisms such as inter-library loan or a union catalogue, the effect is textually and interpretively more forceful and emphatic. In all acts, however, there appears to be minimally sufficient language that leaves open the possibility of library services changing in minor ways over time. Were library services to change or evolve substantively in a jurisdiction, this analysis suggests that purpose statements and/or definitions would also have to be amended accordingly.

Finally, as might be anticipated given the years many of these statutes were passed, few references are made to services supported through information and communications technologies (ICTs). Moreover, the evolving nature of ICTs and their changing platforms, relevance, and application within the broad range of library services may also account for the lack of detail in this area. Of the references that do appear, several provinces refer to "electronic databases" (Alberta, Manitoba, and New Brunswick), "computer software" (Ontario), and "information in … electronic, magnetic or other format" (Alberta). Only Saskatchewan makes reference to "publicly accessible computers" under the definition of basic library services. Most other statutes and regulations have language related to the provision of information and reference resources where it is possible to read in a requirement to provide online access to information, as is the norm in most contemporary Canadian public libraries. The mechanisms by which such access is to be provided are unspecified.

Legislative debates

To gain another perspective on these primary documents, legislative debates of the proposed public library bills resulting in their eventual enactment into law were also retrieved and coded using a qualitative text analysis approach (Bowen 2006). It is important to note that these debates are the direct voices of provincial politicians, whose words may or may not have been influenced or scripted by the bureaucrats of the day. Distinct rhetorical style in this public, politically positioned discourse can also be observed in individual jurisdictions. Six primary emergent concepts were identified: the bill's purpose, the future, library principles, library services, library organization, and autonomy. The concept of autonomy is also a library principle, but because it was such a widespread topic, it is also discussed separately. Related aspects that are both analytic and sensitizing concepts were also derived and are indicated under each key concept. These aspects are analytic in the sense that they are "sufficiently generalized" to indicate common concrete entities of public libraries. With a few exceptions, most of these aspects are also sensitizing concepts in that they "yield a meaningful picture, … that enable one to grasp the reference in terms of one's own experience" (Glaser and Strauss 1967, 38–39). Not all aspects appear in all debates. The words under each primary concept represent an interpretive and inductive identification, collection, and clustering of all concepts, including prevalent, infrequent, and exceptional aspects (see table 3).

Table 3.

Primary emergent concepts and related aspects in legislative debates

In the preambles to the various legislative debates, all speakers referenced the bill's purpose and put the proposed bill into their respective political and jurisdictional contexts. These statements suggested politicians were looking both backwards and forwards in time, attempting to remedy weaknesses or recognize changing social, cultural, and educational contexts and improve their library services. Their comments indicated they were often responding to comments from public review processes and anticipating future needs. Whereas all debates noted that the proposed bills aimed to achieve consistency across all types of municipalities, the Alberta and Ontario proposals also sought "a flexible framework" (Ontario) and greater local flexibility and decision making for municipalities in how these boards govern locally. The Nova Scotia bill's purpose was described as "basically housekeeping in nature." Several debates referenced the future, suggesting that their bills would "modernize" their legislation (British Columbia and Saskatchewan) and "protect" existing free public library service (Alberta and British Columbia). Other debates were explicit in proposing bills that would prevent municipalities from being able to withdraw from library services (Nova Scotia and Saskatchewan), thereby protecting existing service levels and maintaining consistency across their jurisdictions. The Saskatchewan debate took the idea of consistency further, noting that the proposed bill had an explicit purpose of responding to "the need for a whole-province or one-province library system."

The future as a concept was suggested explicitly and implicitly in the logic of several of the provincial debates. The Alberta, BC, Ontario, and Saskatchewan debates used a variety of discursive phrases to reference their aspirations for future library service. For Alberta, "the future" would be technologically linked via "the electronic highway," understood as one of the "information systems of the future." Both Saskatchewan and Alberta imagined future library service, using a technology lens, as the "new age, the information age, the 21^st century." Saskatchewan's future library service looked like a network, whereas BC legislators noted that "libraries will be much more than they are now. In fact, the electronic highway, as it is termed, will have everything to do with access to information." The concept of the future, which translated in this instance into anticipated "changes in technology," was also embedded in a debate on the scope of the term "public library," including what definition should be set out in the act. The same BC legislator noted: "A public library could be construed as anything … many libraries are branching out to audiovisual, to certain parts of technology and to computer technology. Will there be some sort of future provision to define what a library is, so we know what falls under this act?" BC legislators also looked for, and received, assurances from their political opponents that their future library service would never be a "for-charge service." In Nova Scotia, concern for libraries of the future arose in considering changing material formats in the collection, many involving interactive materials (e.g., computer disks and "digital store of information and text readers with networks from library to library"). One politician further connected changing collection formats with changing requirements in library facilities: "We must provide the people of Nova Scotia with the leading-edge library facilities. Let us not just keep house with libraries. … let us move towards the future and not regulate for the past."

Several library principles are embedded in the rhetoric of these political voices and are referenced more specifically in concerns raised about the wording of a particular proposed statute or in understanding how a statute might be interpreted and applied. These principles could also begin to frame the theoretical and structural foundations of the public library. The most common principle addressed was a concern to preserve existing "free" public library service, followed by a concern for urban-rural equity in terms of access to library service (British Columbia, Manitoba, Ontario, and Saskatchewan). It became a recurring point of British Columbia's debate as several politicians commented that the word "free" was nowhere to be found in the proposed bill.

Noted in several debates, including British Columbia's, Manitoba's, and Nova Scotia's, were references to the supporting role public libraries play as educational institutions and in the education sector broadly. Setting aside numerous references to ministries of education being responsible for administering public library service, the belief in the role of public libraries in learning, and in education, both in the abstract sense and as partner organizations in the formal Kindergarten to Grade 12 elementary education system, was distinct in several provinces. A Manitoba politician asked "whether there is any dovetailing, whether there is any coordination or complimentary action" with libraries in the "educational system," particularly in rural areas. Notable by its infrequent reference in the same contexts, however, was the word "literacy." Instead, the word "learning" was more common to refer to the educational mandate of public libraries. An Ontario legislator elaborated: "But for many people to learn a new language, to learn English or French, to learn about a great many things, the library is an important place." The recognition that "libraries are central to the educational and social infrastructure" (British Columbia) was suggested in several, though not all, debates.

Two other aspects of library principles were identified as significant, though they were referenced only in their respective individual provincial debates. Confidentiality or the right to privacy of personal information was referenced in one provincial debate (Ontario). The practice of protecting patron circulation records was raised by several Ontario municipal libraries whose submissions were read into that debate record. Legislators noted the new potential for this action, "especially with the move to computerized technological bases." While sharing resources was widely acknowledged as a common library service, only in Saskatchewan was the idea of cooperation introduced as a fundamental library principle. At the same time as a revised public library statute was being proposed and debated in Saskatchewan, a brand new bill, the Libraries Co-operation Act (1996), a complimentary statute enacting a multi-type library lending network and organizational infrastructure, was also being proposed for passage into law. The minister responsible for both bills argued: "No other agency has a mandate to encourage greater cooperation and resource-sharing among libraries." While this statute is beyond the scope of the current study, it is important to note its immediate relationship to the province's revised Public Libraries Act (1996) from the same period.

Predictably, the broad analytical concepts of library services and library organization were prevalent across all debates. These concepts refer to the discrete and often practical concerns of administering various types of public libraries (e.g., municipal, regional, local, branch, association, and so on) or of delivering some aspect of what would be considered typical public library services (e.g., collecting and lending materials, buildings, access to electronic information, and so on). As previously noted, free library service was referenced in several debates (Alberta, British Columbia, Ontario, and Saskatchewan). Equitable or "equal and fair access" (British Columbia) was a concern in several jurisdictions, as was the related aspect of equal, or at least equitable, library services across rural and urban municipalities (Alberta, British Columbia, Manitoba, Ontario, and Saskatchewan). Historically, all provinces and territories have had varying proportions of rural to urban residents, and, along this census distribution, equity of access as it is realized through the level of library service has remained a recurring point of political debate. In each debate analysed, this tension had a slightly different entry point and focus for concern. These concerns took various forms of expression such as the issue of "connecting [technologies] to isolated communities" (Alberta), the pervasive spectre of small town library closures due to decreasing provincial grants or the need for greater "centralized" regions to leverage services to smaller libraries and their communities (Ontario), the large disparities in service levels between larger urban and smaller rural communities (Manitoba), or, finally, the need to not "discriminate against rural areas" and their library services because of more expensive telecommunications (Saskatchewan).

Although all aspects noted in table 3 can be observed across these debates, the concepts of definition, leadership, and First Nations, Inuit, and Métis peoples may be less obvious and therefore warrant more detail. Questions raised in Alberta, British Columbia, and Saskatchewan regarding indigenous peoples related to ensuring processes for library systems to enter into agreements with bands for the provision of library services. In the case of British Columbia, the question also arose regarding how non-indigenous people who lived on reserve lands could access library services. Alberta legislators differentiated Métis peoples from First Nations peoples, though similar questions about how each group was recognized, with appropriate provisions for service agreements, were to be struck if desired. Questions about ensuring provincial and other library leaders were "qualified" librarians arose in all but one provincial debate (Manitoba). Legislators were concerned that "at least a base accreditation" be explicitly defined (British Columbia). In trying to avoid a further amendment, a Nova Scotia politician speculated: "Perhaps it goes with the term Provincial Librarian, that carries with it the clear implication that the holder of the office is a librarian."

Not only did the BC legislators call for a clear definition of librarian to satisfy their requirement for having that accredited provincial leader, but the same speaker initiated an extensive debate about the necessity of the statute clearly defining the term "library":

We're living in an age of information; it has almost become trite to say that. Libraries are the repositories and disseminators of information in so many of the communities of British Columbia, small or large. Public libraries are crucial resources, and increasingly so, as we head into an age dominated by technology and the dissemination of information through technological means—through computers, computer networks, etc. In this statute we have no definition of a library—which is interesting. I'm not sure if that's an oversight or if it's deliberate. But the concept of a library is being redefined in terms of a community resource, not just by young people but by library users of all ages.

Not all legislators, however, shared that view: "To define it may reduce the flexibility that allows it to react to the needs of a community. I would suggest that a definition may be a negative rather than a positive. … If we define it, do we limit those opportunities?" Another BC politician saw the virtue of having a public library clearly defined in the act to eliminate any potential public confusion or misperceptions whereby taxpayers think they are funding entities that behave more like "public video stores" than public libraries. In the final text of the BC statute, as it was passed, "public libraries" were formally defined as "libraries established under this Act." This example and the discussion of the definition illustrate the importance and relevance these structured statutory elements may have as interpretive mechanisms within public library statutory interpretation.

Finally, autonomy as a distinct fundamental principle was a topic in several debates (British Columbia, Manitoba, Nova Scotia, and Ontario). Legislators argued for local control and authority from one of two governance perspectives: either from the perspective of the local library board or from the perspective of the local municipality. The lengthiest debate arose in Ontario: "The first principle of the bill is authority versus autonomy. Are the library boards going to be autonomous bodies, as they have been in the past 100 years in this province, or are they going to be merely advisory bodies to municipal councils?" Several speakers commented on the importance of ensuring that library boards, not their municipal councils, retained full financial authority and decision-making over all aspects of their local library services. For example, "the municipal council, while it has a legitimate interest in certain financial questions, is not a substitute for a library board and the existence of a library board as a separate body responsible for determining services, and particularly determining materials." A BC legislator noted: "The important thing here is that municipal library boards need a legal status that is consistent with their role as autonomous bodies." Without explicitly making reference to "autonomy," Nova Scotia legislators argued against the "elimination of the withdrawal clause," which would give municipalities the right to withdraw from their agreements with their local or regional library boards.

Several Ontario legislators also expressed their concerns about protecting local library board autonomy when they debated the usage of "shall" versus "may" in certain provisions. The provision entitled "payments to boards," respecting whether the minister shall or may "make a grant to every board for library purposes," was the subject of repeated debate. The member sponsoring the proposed bill acknowledged this overwhelming criticism of the proposed draft and, within the debate, indicated her willingness to revise the language and adopted the language of the imperative "shall." Although beyond the scope of this analysis, the theme of library autonomy returned to the Ontario legislature, in sustained debate and public outcry, during 1996–97 when the province introduced Bill 109, Local Control of Public Libraries Act, proposing the elimination of provincial funding and giving authority for library service entirely to local municipalities. The bill was eventually withdrawn.

Discussion

This analysis is by no means conclusive; by design, it invites multiple interpretations. It can, however, serve as an LIS researcher's punctuation mark. In time, it will also become a historical interpretation as jurisdictions continue to review and revise their library statutes. This discussion examines how themes raised in this study constitute the foundation of the legally constituted public library in Canada and further the work of library practitioners and researchers in the practice of public library. For a variety of reasons, library statutes often remain invisible. They are taken for granted in ways that unduly constrain their role and their capacity for action. This analysis technically and interpretively unpacks the textual, discursive "infrastructure" of Canadian public library statutes, making them visible in several new ways.

In everyday library work, which includes library advocacy where communities, politicians, and practitioners circulate, statutes are often treated as background documents, passive objects of the status quo, referenced and perhaps briefly explained on a provincial or territorial web page. Technically, statutes answer what and how questions: what is a public library and how do libraries organize themselves and operate within their jurisdictions—in this case, in Canadian provinces and territories (Catlin 1994)? Importantly, however, as illustrated by this study, statutes can also explicitly and implicitly answer a foundational why question: why do public libraries exist?

In times of crisis and political challenge, such as recently occurred in Saskatchewan and Newfoundland and Labrador, all of these questions and their responses often come under renewed scrutiny and debate. One illustration of how library statutes can wield power to influence public library services has been made visible in the Saskatchewan crisis specifically. As a condition for restoring the funding for one year, Saskatchewan's minister of education called for a "systemwide [legislative] review," explaining: "The legislation hasn't been reviewed—I don't know when the legislation has been looked at, so we've indicated we're willing to listen to the concerns they have and do some consultation with them" (Langenegger 2017). In their follow-up brief to the minister, the Saskatchewan Library Trustees' Association acknowledged the government's plan to review the Public Libraries Act and asked, as critical stakeholders, to take an "active role in the review process" (Saskatchewan Library Trustees' Association 2017). In this library "crisis," then, the exemplary Saskatchewan public library statute continues to be a critical boundary object mediating public library services in that jurisdiction. The act was both a focus of attention at the initial public protest and, significantly, a more central outcome of the same crisis.

As conventional and rule based as the practice of statutory drafting and interpretation is, Driedger's modern principle and the socio-constructivist, practice-based approach taken in this study equally support a requirement to, however broadly, recognize that these geo-political contexts are vastly different and can be compared only in limited ways. Sullivan (2007) acknowledges, and two of the interview participants confirmed, that local political and bureaucratic norms, practices, and cultures also influence the inclusions, exclusions, level of detail, language employed, particular provisions, and so on that appear in these final texts. Moreover, the six legislative debates also point to the importance and relevance of local political and jurisdictional contexts. A well-established bureaucrat's point of view, which was confirmed by one of the participants interviewed for this study, argues that legislation can sometimes be "strengthened by its omissions" (Catlin 1994, 52).

To understand why each statute appears as it does would require, among other data, multiple in-depth interviews with the various past and present-day actors and in-depth knowledge of the political, social, and economic contexts of each jurisdiction. In the case of Saskatchewan, the researcher was able to interview a primary author of the Saskatchewan text, who was then, and remains, an expert in legal statutes and library governance. This participant explained the process:

The things you want to put into the legislation are only the fundamental things that will protect the issues that are most important. You don't want this to be easy to change. It's only when you use the legislation that you discover its deficiencies. If the bureaucrats are sitting in their offices, but are not actually engaged in the issues, they're not going to see the problems and will have no motivation to propose revisions that improve the existing statute.

(Interviewee 2)

This analysis exposes many of the unique dimensions of public libraries as institutional entities, with corresponding principles and values that together, minimally at least, distinguish a public library from, for example, a real or virtual bookstore or other media enterprise, a social networking website, a delivery service, or even a Google search box. However simply a library may be defined by statute and regulation, references to services, purpose statements, and other provisions that have been highlighted also suggest the breadth and scope of contemporary public library service that exceed a single borrower, or a single politician's, average experience and knowledge. Public libraries are increasingly complex networks of action informed by common values and principles and underwritten by technical, cultural, and informational infrastructures and networks, as detailed and summarized in table 3. The legislative debates of these political actors can add important nuance and technical context to an understanding of the meaning and ongoing public library action realized in their statutes.

Further questions are invited related to how public library statutes negotiate meaning and action as critical boundary objects, particularly as public libraries evolve in this fast-paced, contemporary knowledge and information society. While many of these jurisdictions post policies on service-related issues—for example, meeting room rentals, data privacy, transborder data, or Internet use (e.g., New Brunswick), the statutes and regulations themselves are, in some cases, silent altogether or, in others, making the briefest mention. As public library services and their roles in their communities evolve and expand, and as calls for accountability and value increase, should statutes have more explicit language reflecting their core values, principles, and related services—in particular, digital and online services? In hypothetical challenges to public library funding, where priorities or decisions made need to be clearly communicated, how might current or revised statutes and regulations enable or constrain these public and political conversations?

As presented, the Saskatchewan statute and regulations are clearly exceptional. Saskatchewan's is the only statute that defines and details a comprehensive provincial public library system, including its essential constituent services, the majority of which are services requiring inter-library cooperation and not services that stand-alone public libraries can provide, such as inter-library loans, reciprocal borrowing, and union catalogue. Although many provincial and territorial library jurisdictions provide similar services, they are not written into their legislation and, therefore, will never have the same force; for Saskatchewan residents, these services cannot be as readily dismantled as could happen in other jurisdictions. This evidence points to a policy dilemma for future provincial and territorial library administrators and legal consultants.

In today's political and public spheres, library leaders regularly have to explain or justify why and how their public libraries are "more than just books" (Donachie 2014; Kielburger and Kielburger 2016). This phrase, so often invoked by media and library advocates, has become the de facto definition of the public library idea. As an everyday definition of such a complex modern institution, however, it is surely insufficient. Moreover, the library statutes underwriting these libraries and library systems, as a whole, also do not obviously and explicitly recognize that complexity and diversity. Nor do these statutes clearly outline the public policy spaces, evidenced, for example, in the role of the library's public Internet access, or the creative and entrepreneurial opportunities made available by the maker spaces that they increasingly inhabit. Substantially revising public library statutes to more forcefully enshrine public library principles and core services can be a lengthy and politically volatile process and one that may not meet an acceptable risk analysis threshold among many library administrators and their governments. As the Saskatchewan and Newfoundland and Labrador stories suggest, library legislation can become a powerful boundary object, actively influencing public debates, and critical to negotiating the shared library principles, values, and services that connect the library's past, present, and future identities with its citizens and communities.