Abstract:
Aims to examine the rôles of libraries and their development. Their part in fostering
and supporting intellectuals in contemporary societies is discussed with particular
emphasis on free access to information and freedom of expression. From the
nineteenth century, libraries became recognised as necessary to society. In recent
years. Libraries have increasingly been seen an instrument for the development and
maintenance of a democratic society which offers the individual access to a wide and
varied range or knowledge, ideas and opinions. The ubiquity of the Internet and other
media and their promise of universal access to information ‘regardless of frontiers’
have reinforced the democracy paradigm. In fulfilling a function of sustaining the
discourse of concerned intellectuals libraries demonstrate their importance to
humanity.
