FLAG: collaborative collection management of foreign legal materials

Aims

• To create a web directory to research collections in foreign, comparative and international law in UK universities

• To serve as a guide for researchers to enhance access regionally and nationally. The web directory contains an inventory of collections by jurisdiction, form of legal literature, and subject where relevant, with an indication of the strength of collections

• To facilitate collaborative collection management of the collections identified.

Achievements to date

• Development of a methodology for the collection of information about groups of publications which may be applicable to subject areas other than law

• Development of a thesaurus for foreign and international law publication types

• Publication of the results of a questionnaire survey of over 100 potential users of the database, conducted to ascertain user requirements

• Appraisal of the foreign law collections in over 50 major academic or national libraries in the UK

• Creation of a MS Access database of over 10,000 entries

• Conversion of the MS Access database into web format using Inmagic’s DB/Textworks and Web Publisher software.

Deliverables

A searchable web database to assist:

• lawyers, librarians and information officers quickly locate collections which will assist enquiry work, the referral of users in person and more accurately direct inter-library loan requests

• library collection managers develop national and regional collection development policies which ensure users of foreign, comparative and international law collections are best served in terms of the type and location of collections within the UK.

Methodology

• One person is collecting all the data - this helps to ensure consistency in the way the data is collected and the findings described.

• Each library taking part in the project is visited by the project researcher. Title by title details are taken of all foreign, comparative and international law publications held which contain statements of the law itself (commentary in journals and textbooks is excluded). Information is collected manually using a standard form and is taken mainly from an inspection of the publications themselves. Existing catalogue records are used very little.

• By appraising the publications themselves information frequently omitted from catalogues, yet which is particularly helpful to law users, is added to the database. Examples include: whether the publication is an official source of law or not; the language/s of the collection; the particular type of law material represented, for example: statutes or delegated legislation; digests or indexes or citators.

• The individual title records found are amalgamated, where necessary, to create a single database entry describing the holdings for each publication type for each country or international organisation held by each library. The number of records created for each of the 50 or more libraries appraised so far ranges from 13 to 1779. The database comprises a total of over 10,000 entries currently.

• Each database entry describing a collection has a common record structure to aid comparison of holdings.

• At intervals, a copy of the MS Access database is converted to web format and displayed at the project website.

• In June 2001 a postal questionnaire survey was sent to over 100 academic law libraries in the UK, to identify in general terms the foreign, comparative and international law material each possesses. Visits were made to a large proportion of those libraries responding, ensuring that all major foreign, comparative and international law collections throughout the UK have been included within the database.

• Libraries appraised and featured in the database include The British Library, the Advocates’ Library (National Library of Scotland), National Library of Wales, the project partner institutions listed below, British Library of Political and Economic Science, the universities of Edinburgh, Cardiff, Sheffield & Manchester and University College, London.

• A range of publicity material has been designed and printed: letter heads: business cards; leaflets; posters. The database has been promoted through conference presentations in the UK and US. User feedback has been positive and encouraging.

Partners

• Institute of Advanced Legal Studies Library, University of London.

Associate partner institutions are:

• Bodleian Law Library, University of Oxford

• British Library

• School of Oriental and African Studies Library, University of London

• Squire Law Library, University of Cambridge.

Contacts

Project Manager:

Project website

http://ials.sas.ac.uk/flag.htm

Content: Gill Davenport
Last updated 2 July 2002