Provision of the European Union information in an acceding country: A survey of the role of public libraries in Croatia

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to present an exploratory study whose aim was to investigate the role of public libraries in the provision of European Union (EU) information in an EU acceding country (Croatia). Design/methodology/approach – Study was conducted via online questionnaire in public libraries across country. Findings – The findings revealed that majority of respondents (83.7 percent) think it is an important task of public libraries to provide citizens with materials about the EU, and that almost all responding libraries (98 percent) have EUmaterials. In general, respondents think that provision of EUmaterials in their library does not compromise its role of politically neutral institution. The results also indicate that libraries quite rarely (10 percent) maintain links to relevant EU online sources on their websites. EU collections in responding libraries are promoted actively most frequently in the library itself and on its website, and very rarely in the local media. Practical implications – Findings are expected to be of interest to European administration in charge of the development of effective communication policies, national authorities in EU candidate and acceding countries, and information professionals in general. Originality/value – This is the first study to investigate the role of public libraries in EU information provision in an EU acceding country.