The soft power of the information sciences: Western influences on the development of Japan's library and archival systems

Abstract

The history of information practices in Japan runs parallel to its larger cultural influences — namely its long history of adaptation of the cultures of China and Korea, with a more recent turn towards the West. The soft power, the use of culture to extend influence over a foreign country, exerted by the US on Japanese libraries and archives can be felt in official policies and professional practices. In order to understand the variation and complicated nature of hegemonic influences the West has had on Japan's information culture, this paper will examine the history of librarianship and archival practices via the lens of practices imported to and/or avoided by the nation.

Understanding soft power discourse in the National Library of Australia

“…Rarely does the existing literature explicitly describe libraries as being engaged in soft power behaviour. LIS research that broaches soft power or cultural diplomacy, implicitly or explicitly, are primarily historical case studies (Black, 2016; Harris and Thaler, 2020; Maack, 1986, 2001; Prieto-Gutierrez, 2015; Prieto-Gutierrez and Segado-Boj, 2016; Witt, 2014; Yi and Thompson, 2015). With most literature focused on non-library cultural institutions, there are substantive research gaps from an LIS perspective.…”

“…Indeed, the intangible values, institutions, and policies promoted through soft power are considered attractive to adopt because they are recognised or represented as having political legitimacy or moral authority (Nye, 2004, p. 6). Increasingly, libraries' contributions to international relations and soft power are recognised, though literature explicitly addressing this phenomenon is limited (Australian Library and Information Association (ALIA), 2018; Harris & Thaler, 2020;Mariano & Vårheim, 2021).…”

The library as soft-power actor: A review

“…‘Cultural hegemony’ was also included, after finding that Harris and Thaler (2020) highlight its significance and conflation with soft-power behaviour. While theories of cultural hegemony and soft power are related, as evidenced by Harris and Thaler (2020), searching with this new phrase did not uncover a significant body of research and did not fill the existing content gap on libraries and soft power. Including ‘cultural hegemony’ as a search term primarily aided in refining and understanding the theoretical and operational definitions of ‘soft power’ and ‘cultural diplomacy’.…”

“…As anticipated, most of the relevant articles were an analysis of historical trends in the development of libraries and the Library and Information Science profession and organisations (Harris and Thaler, 2020; Ignatow, 2011; Yu, 2008). These historical case studies support the existence of a research gap with regard to libraries and contemporary soft-power influence.…”

“…Libraries are increasingly recognised as global actors, contributing to international relations and exercising soft power, in both scholarly and grey literature (Australian Library and Information Association, 2018; Harris and Thaler, 2020). Few studies, however, have examined the role of libraries as soft-power actors.…”