Management and economic issues of library and information services: a review of the German literature

Abstract. The paper presents a critical and constructive review of German language literature. Mostly the publications focus on business econonucs aspects: library and information services as busmess units, management issues, procurement, produc-tion, services. financing and charges, marketing. On the macro-economic level, questions like the government’s respon-sibility for the information market and consequences of the establishment of a unified European market are addressed. Only few studies go beyond the level of general business economics theory and develop the specifics of information services. Emprncal research and empirical tests of hypotheses are largely missing. Foreign hterature is being ignored in many publications. A re-orientation of research, as can be observed in some recent studies, towards the user and the functions that information services perform for him is recommended as well as studies on information management issues. 1