Blog Post | Looking to the Future – Mapping the Environment for Research Libraries

The current RLUK strategy, Transforming the Library, runs until the end of 2025. This year, we have been looking to draft a new strategy that will take us to 2030.

Predicting the environment in which research libraries might operate over any five-year span is a thankless task – history is full of future-gazing that reality has failed to validate.  However, as we look to this strategic review, the future feels particularly difficult to pin down.  There is such a wide range of plausible possibilities – from the most utopian to the depressingly dystopian.

At a recent strategy workshop the RLUK Board used the Future Cone methodology to identify possible futures over the next five years. First developed in the 1990s, the Future Cone methodology allows for a range of potential futures to be modelled – from those that are considered plausible to the ‘preposterous’. By expanding out beyond what might be considered preferable or even plausible, the Cone allows for a wide ranging consideration of possible futures. Having expanded the range of possible futures, it is possible to then focus back to where we think research libraries are going, and so frame the new RLUK strategy.

In going through the exercise as part of the Board’s strategic workshop, it became clear that the range of possible futures was expanding with some quite divergent possibilities as a number of key potential disruptors could move us along very different paths. Reviewing the outputs, we noted that many of these disruptors could be clustered under three related themes:

• Technological uncertainty
• Geo-political uncertainty
• Financial uncertainty

Technological uncertainty

Over the past quarter-century there have been at least two significant technological innovations that have affected how we access and share information. The first was the widespread public adoption of the world wide web around the turn of the century, while the second was the launch of the smart-phone 18 years ago. It feels that we are a couple of years into a third transition, where the consequences are hard to predict – the wide-spread adoption of generative AI.

• The use of AI in the research process is increasing – from writing grant proposals, through data analysis, to the writing, reviewing, and reading of research outputs.  What this means for the scholarly record is unclear.
• Copyright is currently a battle-field between tech companies, not all of whom respect the concept of copyright, and content rights holders. Worldwide, governments are struggling to catch up and determine where they wish to draw the line between enabling un-fettered AI development and protecting rights holders. It can feel that there is little consideration of the unique nature of scholarly outputs and the needs of research libraries are being squeezed out of these discussions.
• Issues around copyright are just part of a deeper set of unresolved questions around the ethics of AI.
• Libraries traditionally have played a role in supporting literacy and critical thinking.  How should this role adapt in a world of increasing disinformation and deep-fakes?
• Another area of ethical consideration is around the environmental sustainability of Al. How does the increasing energy costs of AI fit with the net-zero aspirations of our members? Wider sustainability issues are raised by our digital and physical estates, especially as library buildings age.
• But AI could also bring benefits in terms of library workflows, potentially improving cataloguing, description, and discovery.  We will also see AI deeply embedded in all of the online tools that we use.

Geo-political uncertainty

Generally, the consensus of the model for academic endeavour built since at least WWII has been that research is best served by the free and open exchange of ideas and international collaboration. There has also been an acceptance that research – especially powered by universities – leads to economic growth, and improved life-outcomes for citizens.  Can we take this consensus for granted?  If not, what are the implications for research libraries?

• There are signs of increased isolationism amongst some countries. This threatens the model of publishing in international outlets if there is a perception that a country’s research investment should only benefit that country.
• This isolationism together with concerns over the ‘appropriation’ of content by AI companies may see a backlash against open access.  The notion that some countries are ‘giving away’ their research without reciprocation from others, placing them at a disadvantage, could become more prevalent.
• The role of governments as research funders may decline. We are already seeing this in the US where major funders such as the National Institutes of Health (NIH) are having their research budgets cut and individual universities are facing financial sanctions if they displease the current administration. But financial pressures world-wide could see either a real-term decrease in funding or a shift from some subject areas to others.
• The behaviour of international students is hard to predict. Increased isolationism may make some countries less attractive to international students compared to those that welcome them. But as local universities in countries that have previously sent significant students abroad for their education climb the international rankings there may be less demand from those students to travel abroad.

Financial uncertainty

There have not been many points since the financial crash of 2008 and the austerity programme that started in 2010 where the UK Higher Education Sector has felt in robust financial health. However, for a number of institutions the current situation is particularly acute. It is possible that the sector will not have the same shape in five years that it does today. 

• As universities cut courses and departments their requirements for research and student support will change. This could have many implications, from the range of journals and books that are purchased, through to collecting policies for special collections. 
• It is possible that some universities might close and/or merge – again with implications for collections.
• While UK demographic changes (where the number of 18 year olds is set to decline after 2030) will not affect the current strategic planning period, the declining participation rate may, so adding financial pressures.  
• As mentioned above the movement of International Students is hard to predict.  The UK heavily relies on these students, but it is currently sending mixed messages – overt welcomes are undermined by stricter visa requirements and anti-immigration rhetoric
• We are seeing an increased focus on shared services. Drivers towards shared services will increase – especially if some of the barriers currently in place are removed. 
• As budgets become tighter, those vendors that have greatest economies of scale will be best placed to continue to thrive. We will probably continue to see consolidation in the sector – especially as companies attempt to provide services across the wider range of university activity. This may lead to ‘super-deals’ as vendors seek to negotiate at a level above the library.
• If cuts deepen, many libraries may have to operate with reduced staff numbers.  This has implications both for the range and depth of services that can be offered, but also for the capacity to engage with external activity (such as membership of RLUK networks and working groups or with other professional bodies).
• At the same time, we are seeing Library Directors being encouraged to take on wider, ‘non-library’ responsibilities within the university. Again this raises capacity issues. At this stage it is unclear what impact this might have on the status of the library within the institution. 

Facing the Future

Uncertainty can be unsettling, especially with some of the pressures and direction of travel, we are currently seeing. Of course, as the result of a single exercise the above does not represent an exhaustive list of possible changes that we might see over the next five years and I am sure that for each of the uncertainties described above we could add others.  However, we know that the changing landscape will also bring new opportunities and that many of the key activities of research libraries will continue. The emphasis may shift, but the fundamentals will remain.

The conclusion of the Board was that a new strategy should retain sufficient flexibility that RLUK can react to changes in the environment over the next five years and to position itself in a way that it is of value to its members and the wider, international community. To help us ensure that any new strategy is grounded in what makes research libraries important, RLUK has been working with our members to develop a clear statement of our values as an organisation. These will be published with the new strategy later in the year and will underpin how we face whichever one of the Cone’s futures arises.