Sage Journals: Discover world-class research

Abstract

Since its foundation in 1896 the British Library of Political and Economic Science has attempted a double function, to be the library of the London School of Economics and also to act as a quasinational library for the social sciences. These roles have proved to be complementary. The LSE has been better served because of its ambitions for its library. The library has grown to become one of the most substantial collections of social science materials in the world. Its subject catalogue, begun in 1925, became The London Bibliography of the Social Sciences, which has a worldwide coverage of monographic material whether published or ‘grey literature’. Unlike other countries, where such significance has been given legal recognition, this has not occurred for the BLPES and equivalent libraries in the United Kingdom. Funding and other pressures on the British Library may change these arrangements in the future.

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

Quoted in full in Caine

The history of the foundation of the London School of Economics and Political Science. London: Bell, 1963.

Clarke

D.A.

‘A new laboratory of sociological research': the British Library of Political and Economic Science’. Journal of Documentation, 40(2), June 1984, pp. 152–157.

Mackenzie

Norman

, ed. The letters of Sidney and Beatrice Webb. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1978, pp. 40–41.

Webb

Sidney

. ‘The library service of London: its coordination, development and education.’ Library Association Record, 4(5), March 1902, pp. 143–203.

Waples

Douglas

& Lasswell

H.D.

National libraries and foreign scholarship. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1936, p. 9.

See Line

M.B.

& Roberts

‘The size, growth and composition of social science literature’. International Social Science Journal, 28(1), 1976, pp. 122–159.