College and Research Libraries


376 I College & Research Libraries • September 1974 

carefully. It is not recommended either as 
an initial or as a comprehensive review of 
these topics. To end on a positive note: 
the University of Chicago in publishing the 
report as a monograph has aided in making 
it easier for a user to gain bibliographic 
and physical access to the document.-
M orell D. Boone, University Librarian, U ni-
versity of Bridgeport, Bridgeport, Connec-
ticut. 

Hug, William E. Strategies for Change in 
Information Programs. New York: Bow-
ker, 1974. 373p. $13.95. 

It may seem a discourtesy to the author 
to write a review of a book that one has not 
read thoroughly, but that, unfortunately, 
is the situation in which I find myself. I 
have examined this anthology, but I cannot 
say that I have read it, nor do I intend to 
read it, despite the fact that change in li-
braries is not only a subject which I recog-
nize as being of some importance but also 
one in which I have an immediate and 
practical interest. 

Mr. Hug's anthology consists of twenty-
four articles, mainly dating from 1969 on, 
arranged in two equal parts. The first part 
is entitled "The Subtle and Ubiquitous Na-
ture of Change" and the second "Alterna-
tive Strategies Or Ways to Aim at a Moving 
Target." There is also a three-page preface 
which describes generally the intent of the 
anthology and a five-page introduction to 
each part which comments briefly on each 
of the articles. 

There are only four articles by librarians: 
Wasserman on "Professional Adaptation," 
McAnally and Downs on "The Changing 
Role of Directors of University Libraries," 
Atherton on "Putting Knowledge to Work 
in Today's Library Schools," and, of course, 
Shera on "Documentation into Information 
Science." The remaining articles are by 
people in a number of other disciplines. 
Many of the contributions by librarians on 
a topic such as this may not be significant, 
but a scanning of those articles that are in-
cluded here leads me to believe that they 
are not very significant either. One of the 
articles that I did read, for example, was 
a two-page one called "Ex-Innovators as 
Barriers to Change," by Bob F. Steere. 
Apart from his creation of the incredibly 

horrible jargon word "complacentor," one 
need cite only his concluding remarks: 
"Look around you, Mr. Ex-Innovator! Are 
you today' s traditionalist? Are you the pres-
ent barrier to change?" Mr. Hug's descrip-
tion of this article as "thought-provoking"-
I would better describe it as "thought-re-
volting"-gave me no confidence in his 
ability to identify the most significant arti-
cles on this subject. In addition I can readi-
ly cite a number of other more substantial 
and useful articles on this topic such as 
Victor Thompson's "Bureaucracy and Inno-
vation" (Administrative Science Quarterly 
10: 1-20 [ 1965] ) , and my knowledge is 
somewhat limited. 

I am increasingly dismayed by antholo-
gies, generally designed to serve some poor-
ly defined purpose, in which all of the ma-
terial is readily available in any decent li-
brary and for which, therefore, a solid bib-
liographical article might well suffice and 
might, indeed, be even more useful since 
it could cover a wider range of material. 
Such anthologies only contribute to what 
can best be described as information pollu-
tion. They might have some value as a sup-
plementary textbook in a course, but they 
have relatively little other value. Surely 
there are less expensive and less polluting 
ways to make readings readily available to 
students. Such anthologies would be more 
bearable if they managed to include reason-
ably lengthy, understandable, and useful 
introductory remarks that put the material 
into perspective, analyzed it, and used it 
to arrive at some kind of useful and mean-
ingful conclusions. 

In this case Mr. Hug's preface is so brief 
and so jargon filled that it is of limited val-
ue, and he appears to reach no real conclu-
sions. The material is simply presented for 
the reader to make of it what she/he will. 
I came away from a scanning of this book 
with the feeling that to read it carefully 
would leave me no better informed about 
the nature and meaning of change and 
how to effectively accomplish meaningful 
change in a library setting. I cannot recom-
mend it to others.-N orman D. Stevens, 
University of Connecticut Library, Storrs, 
Connecticut. 

Ford, Stephen. The Acquisition of Library