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Unit 1: Information Analysis, Repackaging and Consolidation

1.8.1 Objectives of the Study Notes

This study examines repackaging of information in libraries. The study will acquaint information
professionals with the need to be dynamic and explore new ways of providing service.

1.8.2 The Problem

Libraries have to justify their existence and make a case for why their functions should not be
outsourced. This has led to budget cuts, which have effect on services to users of the library. Worse
still, libraries are made to recover some or all of their costs, and administrators pay little or no attention
to the library. The growth of free library services reveals that users place relatively low value on the
receipt of information, hence users resist any fee or charge placed on library and information services.
Most librarians are not equipped to provide the full range of information repackaging services.
Considering the nonchalant attitude that users exhibit towards the library and alternative information
sources that are available, how can libraries survive?
Guiding principles for arrangement and presentation of idea in a helpful sequence are given below

1.9 Principles of Arrangement

1.9.1 Basic Principle of Arrangement

The basic principle of arrangement is that of respect des fonds, sometimes spoken of as the principle
of provenance. The meaning of this principle has been explained by Dr. Waldo G. Leland in the
Report of the [Illinois] State Education Building Commission to the Forty-Eighth General Assembly
(1913).
Each public office is an administrative unit, and its records form a homogeneous group reflecting
its activities. This large group naturally falls into subgroups, and the subgroups into series following
the organization and functions of the office. The principle that must be borne in mind then, is that
the archives must be so classified that the organization and functions that have produced them
shall be clearly reflected by them. This is the substance of the famous principle of the respect des
fonds.

The principle of respect des fonds is clearly the one which has defined the archivist’s
role and distinguishes the archival profession from other information management
professions.

The principle of respect des fonds, on the development of which additional information can be
found in Staff Information Circular No. 5, was formulated by French archivists in the period following
the French Revolution. It provided a rational basis for archival arrangement, substituting a system
of preserving records by organic units or fonds for the old practice of arranging records by subject
groups that were artificially established by the archivist. The system implicit in the principle is that
every document will be traced to its origin and will be maintained as part of a group having the
same origin. This guiding principle, which was refined and modified to suit the needs of various
European archival agencies, was given a theoretical justification by the Dutch archivists S. Muller,
J. A. Feith, and R. Fruin in their Manual for the Arrangement and Description of Archives .
The first postulate of the principle of respect des fonds is that records will be maintained in the
organic units or fonds in which they were originally accumulated or, conversely, that they will not
be regrouped by subjects or in accordance with any other scheme that may be devised. In France a
fonds was regarded as all records of a particular institution, such as an administrative authority, a
corporation, or a family. In England the term “archive group” was used instead of “fonds,” and this

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