CONCLUSION
 

This examination of how academic libraries are launched or relaunched reveals how well the established system of collection development works. It is easily applied to all of these cases. The fundamental approach to collections is to respond to user needs as revealed by the undergraduate curriculum and faculty research interests. This is as true for the librarian developing an electronic collection (as at Royal Roads University) and for the librarian starting a collection from scratch (Patricia Appavoo and UNBC and Lorin Ritchie in the UAE and Catherine Collins in Niigata).

This hybrid of collecting monographs and electronic access might usefully be called "content managment" and operate as the traditional collection management with a focus on content rather than medium. Once again, the "content management" librarian is simply responding to user needs only with the additional possiblity of including electronic resources.  The result is the same, only the delivery system has a new addition.

The attempts to restore the National and University Library of Bosnia and Herzegovina at first appear to be different from the other examples, with the attempt to acquire what had been lost.  But still the approach is to respond to user needs. As a national and academic library the assistance offered by the world community had two focuses: to restore archival documents and specialized texts of national importance, and to re-establish an academic library appropriate for undergraduate and research work.

Any library collection is a living thing, constantly renewing itself with the annual addition of new monographs, print journals, and with access to regularly updated databases. "Relaunching" collections happens all the time in slow motion. The examples on this website are merely dramatic examples of how academic libraries behave all the time.

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