The Changeover from SAB to Dewey in Research Library Sweden : An Organizational Change from the Viewpoint of the Employees

In November 2008 the National Library of Sweden decidedto switch classification system from SAB to Dewey decimalclassification. SAB had then been the main classificationsystem in the whole of the Swedish library field for 87 years.Included into the decision was not just the nationalbibliography but also the research libraries of Sweden. Thisdecision was in alignment with a West European tendency tochange in favor of the internationally well-spreadclassification system Dewey in order to co-operate more inthe cataloguing process. The purpose of this study takenplace in the autumn and winter of 2013 is to examine howlibrarians involved in the transition feel about what differentways the implementation has affected the research libraryorganizations. We also aim to study the librarians’ view onthe involvement of the research libraries into the decision ofthe changeover. In order to do so we apply a theory onorganizational change by Nadler and Tushman (1990, p. 80)that deals with two different dichotomies appropriate to ourstudy; strategic versus incremental change and reactive inopposition to anticipatory change. When these dimensionscome together into a typology we can describe change astuning, adaption, re-orientation or re-creation. The methodwe are using is semi qualitative interviews with fourinformants respectively from two Swedish research libraries.Our findings are that the transition to Dewey merely meantchange as tuning; an incremental and anticipatory transition.No larger organizational change took place according to ourinformants.Program: Bibliotekari