In the library everyone can be a library user, and take part in public life. As noted by geographer Kurt Iveson, libraries allow “a diversity of users, and a diversity of uses” within one space. As a place that is expressly designed to serve its wider community, the library offers services to library users regardless of their financial situation, citizenship or place of residence. The library’s position as a rare non-commercial site in the city gives people equitable access to resources, but also helps with basic needs like using a bathroom, or having a place to shelter from the elements. Libraries have been widely described as “the last truly public space” in contemporary cities. The response to this proposal – after the library’s privatisation was voted down by the same council in July last year – has been one of widespread outrage and passionate defence of the public ownership of the central library.
Although the mayor denied this would be privatising a public asset, a number of city councillors were quick to note that is precisely what it would be.
The proposition to sell off a portion of space in the existing library building was framed by mayor Andy Foster as a necessary cost-cutting measure that would allow the central library to reopen more quickly.
#The last bastion netflix review full#
After the Wellington council vote on February 18, instead of arguing full stop for the existence of a library building, the debate shifted to focus on how the “publicness” of the public library is central to its value. This changing landscape of debate has altered the frontiers of defence for supporters of public library systems. Around the world, when a library is threatened, highly visible localised campaigns spring up: see the Save Our Libraries movement that pushed back hard in 2018 when the University of Auckland moved to close some of its specialist libraries. Yet the vehement defence of libraries appears to be as loud as – or louder than – the dissent. However, public attitudes towards libraries are still polarised, with significant numbers of people in New Zealand still adamant that libraries are obsolete spaces and services that are a drain on public funds. Tūranga, 2018 (Photo: Kai Schwoerer via Getty Images) The range of services taking place in library branches – including IT lessons for the elderly, toddler rhyme time sessions, book clubs for unhoused individuals – are now more widely known and supported.
That has not come to pass – instead we see a resurgence in attention towards the social elements of physical libraries. In the 1990s we feared that a widespread digitisation of resources would lead to the demise of the library building. The way we talk about public libraries in New Zealand has shifted over the last few years, with a growing focus on the large number of services libraries offer, and the wide-reaching social benefits of these spaces. Why was the debate over a small part of this single library building – whether the current structure or an imagined future building – so polarising and emotive? In response to loud and wide condemnation, several councillors had a change of heart and the library was given a reprieve. Wellington Central Library has been at the centre of an increasingly bitter dispute in recent weeks, after the city council voted to sell off part of the library building as office space. The shitfight that ensued over a proposal to sell office space in Wellington’s Central Library saw anxieties over public space and social infrastructure converge, writes Salene Schloffel-Armstrong, an urban geographer who researches the place of public libraries in cities.