College and Research Libraries book. Instead of listing 1,300 libraries, it would have been more helpful to devote two or three pages to a description of the Superintendent of Documents Classification System (SuDocs). Even a brief outline of SuDocs and the arrangement of the various relevant publications would have given the researcher a major advantage. Coehlert mentions SuDocs, but he does not outline the system or its role in libraries or the re- search process. Furthermore, though Goehlert discusses the Serial Set, no one unfamiliar with it could possibly discern its relationship to ma- terials and the tracing of legislation. In fact, the index to the Serial Set, the Numerical Lists and Schedule, is not even mentioned. A serious drawback is that citational interre- lationships are not clearly explained, such as, for a report, its place in the Serial Set and how to locate it. There is useful information in this book, but it is not pulled together in a way that most laypersons (and librarians) could easily understand. If one is already familiar with legislative research, the text is helpful; un- fortunately, for the beginner it is confusing. If additional space were devoted to some of the problems enumerated and extraneous materials omitted, Congress and Law- making would be a more useful book. -Alan Edward Schorr, University of Alaska, juneau. C herns, ] . ]. Official Publishing: An Over- view. An International Survey and Re- view of the Role, Organisation and Prin- ciples of Official Publishing. Guides to Official Publications, V.3. Oxford, New York: Pergamon, 1979. 527p. $40. LC 78-41157. ISBN 0-08-023340-6. This ambitious survey of publishing activi- ties and information transfer processes in nineteen countries with representative or parliamentary forms of government, nine major international organizations, including the UN family, and three private publishers is both a historical account of the develop- ment of publishing and a current assessment of the "forms of organization, the policies, and the objectives associated with official in- formation and publishing." This is not a bibliographic work nor one that librarians would keep handy to assist in Recent Publications I 255 bibliographic searching or answering refer- ence questions. Instead, it should be read to increase understanding of the field by all librarians dealing with foreign and interna- tional documentation. Students of the print- ing and publishing efforts of the United States and Canadian governments will also find it of value for the comparisons offered. Even though the United States is proba- bly the best-developed country in dissemi- nation of publications, much can be learned from the trials and errors, successes and failures, and shortcomings and achievements of other governments. For the practicing librarian, information is presented on historical quantity and quality of government publishing and its availability through bibliography as well as sources of supply. Occasionally, actual publications are listed in the text or as an appendix for pur- poses of illustration (e.g., Hong Kong Fact Sheets, page 169). Organization charts showing the structure of each government's information and pub- lishing or printing apparatus and working definitions currently in use increase the value of the work for purposes of compari- son and idea generation. Differing attitudes toward copyright versus public domain also offer a basis for further exploration of this complicated and controversial area of public policy. Important differences in theory of in- formation dissemination other than through publication are explored and conclusions drawn regarding their relative success or lack of it. The volume is organized into three parts, including the scope and importance of of- ficial publishing, the survey itself, and the general review and conclusions from the study. While the format is a reproduction of the authors' original typescript for economy and timeliness, neither the type style nor the few typos encountered distract from the topic at hand. The coverage from country to country is somewhat uneven, but necessarily so given the diverse nature of government publish- ing. Each country does include many of the following topics: population, constitution and form of government, information or- ganization, publishing organization, range of government publishing, history of develop- ment, policy, parliamentary publishing, ref- 256 I College and Research Libraries • May 1980 Newspapers On Microfilm Exclusively from Research Publications, Inc. The 'Washington Post The London Times Le Monde THE DAILY AND SUNDAY TELEGRAPH (London) THE SCOTSMAN (Edinburgh) EVENING STANDARD (London) AL AKHBAR (Cairo) THE AGE (Melbourne) LLOYD'S LIST JOURNAL DE GENEVE THE STRAITS TIMES and SUNDAY TIMES OF SINGAPORE THE BANGKOK POST For complete information on our newspapers on microfilm write: reseamlicatio;;s, inc. 12 Lunar Drive Woodbridge, CT 06525 erences, and relevant appendixes . One ap- pendix (page 400) does make an attempt to compare information and publishing activi- ties in eaeh country in chart form. The work does not include discussion of scientific and technical information dissemination. Presenting the text thus in a broad and flexible format , Cherns has , for the most part, avoided making generalizations unsub- stantiated in the text. Use of footnotes , however , is somewhat uneven. A reference to the United States , "public and congres- sional printing, because of its position on the fringe of the political area , was the sub- ject of speculation , jobbery and scandal," appears undocumented , while the source of "an examination . .. [that] disclosed serious logistical and control deficienci e s in th e handling of orders" is duly noted. Many of Cherns' conclusions found throughout the text and especially in part III should be furth e r explored by librarians and government policy makers. "The right to know needs to be matched by the desire to inform" and " Useful information may be passive simpl y in the sense that nobod y knows it is there or that there is a deliber- ate decision not to publish it" are among the many thoughtful observations that should give rise to additional study in each country surveyed. This work is recommended for library schools and libraries dealing with foreign _and international documentation and to stu- d e nts of public policy in the field of infor- mation generation and dissemination .-Joan G. Kerschner , Nevada State Library , Car- son City. Hu , Shu Chao. The Development of the Chinese Collection in the library of Con- gress. Westview Replica Edition . Boul- der , Colo.: Westview Pr. , 1979. 259p. $20. LC 79-1741. ISBN 0-89158-552-4. While the amount of literature on Ameri- can library history has been mushrooming in recent years , a monographic study c}.e- voted to the historical development of the largest Chinese-language collection in the West , that at the Library of Congress , did not appear until the completion of this dis- sertation. The history of the Library of Congress' Chinese collection began in 1869 with some