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The purpose of the paper is to explore the impact of strategic planning, marketing and external relations, and shared services on library development.

The paper uses the National Library of Scotland as a case study.

The introduction and development of strategic planning has provided a clear basis though which NLS has defined and achieved a new role within and beyond Scotland. Longer term planning is being informed by Thriving and Surviving – a future library project which has identified the transition to digital, the need for an outward focus and the development of an agile library as fundamental to a successful future for NLS. Strategic planning also supported the successful development of new legislation for NLS which was passed by the Scottish Parliament in 2012. Marketing and external relations have been vital in promoting the library's role, and widening the use made of its collections and services. The development of “shared services” is changing the way back office services are provided, achieving some savings and adding operational resilience.

The paper will be of interest and relevance to library managers seeking to address the issues facing libraries in the 21st century who are seeking management tools and techniques that will help them with the challenges they face.

The Equal Pay Act 1970 (which came into operation on 29 December 1975) provides for an “equality clause” to be written into all contracts of employment. S.1(2) (a) of the 1970 Act (which has been amended by the Sex Discrimination Act 1975) provides:

MR RONALD BENGE, distinguished penseur, tutor in philosophy both classical and homespun, self‐confessed ‘lapsed librarian’ and ‘detached insider’ has written a book about himself—a point which it is desirable to state because not all autobiographies are in truth about their subjects—and since more or less everyone within his peripatetic physical and spiritual ambits has heard rumours for some years that this oeuvre was in progress, there will be general relief that it has now appeared in published form (Confessions of a lapsed librarian, Scarecrow Press 1984, $16; UK, Bailey Bros), so that we can all look up our own names in the index and, perhaps, elsewhere. (I may say at once that the index itself is a predictable short masterpiece of oblique priorities. I have an entry all to myself, as does Rudyard Kipling, but luminaries such as Edward Dudley, Frank Hogg and Philip Sewell appear only under the entry ‘Colleagues’, while others like Sergeant Bruce Copp aren't indexed at all, which is frightfully irritating because one would love to try to learn more about Ronald's near half‐century friendship with that delightful man other than by wading—in vain—through every word of the text with such an end in view.)

Neuroscience, with its promise to peer into the brain and explain the sources of human behavior and human consciousness, has captured the scientific, clinical, and public imaginations. Among those in the thrall of neuroscience are a group of ethicists who are carving out a new subspecialty within the field of bioethics: neuroethics. Neuroethics has taken as its task the policing of neuroscience. By virtue of its very existence, neuroethics presents a threat to its parent field bioethics. In its struggle to maintain authority as the guardian of neuroscience, neuroethics must respond to criticisms from bioethicists who see no need for the subspecialty. We describe the social history of neuroethics and use that history to consider several issues of concern to social scientists, including the social contexts that generate ethical questions and shape the way those questions are framed and answered; strategies used by neuroethicists to secure a place in an occupational structure that includes life scientists and other ethics experts; and the impact of the field of neuroethics on both the work of neuroscience and public perceptions of the value and danger of the science of the brain.

IT IS EASY to make glib generalisations about the student situation in this country, and its associated problems, but a recondite analysis of student mores is much more difficult. Commentators tend to be extreme, varying from those who declaim ‘All for youth and the world well lost’ to those crying ‘Stop their grants, make them do a day's work’, and more in similar vein. An understanding of student attitudes to work and society is one thing, the cause and effect of their attitudes is quite another. What is certain is that there has been a radical change, and the full effects of this change are yet to be felt. Behind each new generation rise those ever ready to decry the follies of youth, but today there is a widespread and differing view held that youth is king, and can do no wrong. Both of these points of view are extreme, and both, in totality, are unjustified.

Stresses the importance of the effective management of the release of information to the media and the development of media relations. Considers reasons for good and bad press. Advises on the presentation of press releases, the elements of their content and their structure. Looks at how additional information should be supplied, and how photographs can be used to illustrate a story. Considers the need to know the media, and how press releases should be tailored to meet media requirements.

The purpose of the present investigation was to determine to what extent authors of scientific articles cite their previous publications and what are the principal distinguishing features of this particular type of citation. We have analysed the bibliographies of a group of articles from the areas of plant physiology and neurobiology, and have examined the relationship of the self‐citations to some characteristics of the articles in which they occurred. We found self‐citations to be more recent and to be cited more frequently in the text of the citing articles than citations of other authors. The extent of self‐citing did not appear to be related to the number of co‐authors and to the bibliography size of the citing articles, or to their authors' productivity.

As the neurosciences endeavor to explain increasingly complex aspects of human biology and behavior, domains of human life that can only be assessed in social interaction become ever more important, if formally unacknowledged, dimensions of scientific research. Drawing on semi-structured interviews with 14 researchers who study epilepsy genetics, this chapter examines how neuroscientists encounter ‘the social.’ We find that at the beginning of their careers, researchers are intrigued by epilepsy as a disease of the brain and a means of exploring “the last frontier in medicine.” However, as they begin their investigations, the importance of building social relationships, gleaning the subtleties of seizure experience available only in patient narratives, and engaging with families in the field quickly emerge as important parts of epilepsy genetics research. Some researchers hope for and work toward a day when new techniques or models will allow them to forgo the time consuming, painstaking, and often invisible work of gathering detailed histories, combing through patient narratives, and traveling to field sites to meet with families. However, these accounts make clear that, at the current moment, much of “the molecular work” of epilepsy genetics research is built upon social interactions, relationships, and experiences.