news online accompanied by growing personal attacks using social media. For example, during the summer of 2020 Black Lives Matter protests were held right across the United Kingdom. As part of these, the toppling in Bristol of the statue of Edward Colston, a trader in enslaved African people, made national headlines. The UK Government, who many would argue had been increas- ingly adopting the tone and language of the “war on woke” or a “culture war” responded by developing proposals to enforce the adoption of a policy of “retain and explain” by cultural and her- itage organisations – a direct challenge to curatorial and intellectual freedom. In February 2021, following a meeting with “leading heritage organisations” – including the British Library – the then Culture Secretary Oliver Dowden announced a working group would be set up and guidelines published to put “retain and explain” into practice despite claiming that the Government “absolutely support the independence of museums and the heritage sector”. 3 Since then, the Museums Association has reported concerns that the Gov- ernment was looking to deny funding to projects it considered “political” and that they were encouraging a “culture war” over contested heritage. The Museums Association also reported that the appointment of some trustees to public bodies was being blocked because they held different views from the Government.4


Whilst museums have been the main targets of this particular approach (which only applies to England) the “war on woke” is a consistent theme that can impact on all culture, heritage and knowledge organisations. There are signs that the Government is becoming increasingly intolerant of dissenting views across their agenda. The Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill is aimed at restricting forms of public protest and the more recent Online Safety legislation allows for increasing government control over and interference in communications and content.


There is also evidence that censorship and efforts to restrict access to materials and content are on the rise in our socie- ties. This is not just the case in autocratic countries where control is a way of life. The American Library Association (ALA) Office of Intellectual Freedom regularly reports on the banning of books from school and public libraries, and Indiana and Iowa state legislatures are consider- ing legislation that could leave librari- ans and information professionals open to criminal prosecution for providing access to certain titles.


April-May 2022


More recently, we have seen this issue spill across into public libraries in the US, which accounted for more than 37 per cent of book challenges in the past year (accord- ing to figures published by the ALA). In the UK and Europe, censorship tends to be less political and visible, but anecdotally is not uncommon especially in schools where librarians and infor- mation professionals can just be asked to remove certain titles. A British school librarian, for example, was recently asked not to share on social media images of a book display featuring titles addressing LGBTQ+ identities. Similarly, they can be instructed to remove displays and cancel author visits concerning “inappropriate” topics or themes. Despite the best efforts of dedicated staff, this overall atmosphere can have a chilling effect, with self-censorship becoming a real issue – if difficult to quantify.


The near universal access to online media – especially social media – is pre- senting challenges to intellectual freedom that were unimaginable in 2005. The sheer volume of un- (or lightly) mediated content, misinformation, and fake news provides major challenges; however, the apparently unstoppable flow of intimida- tion, threat, pile-on and other forms of challenging intellectual freedom is also having a major impact.


This increasingly difficult environment for intellectual freedom has prompted CILIP to launch a new consultation with our community and the wider sector in order to develop a new Policy on Intellec- tual Freedom and accompanying guidance. CILIP’s own web page on Freedom of Information defines this as “the right to access and share information, to intellectual activity and creativity, to expression and debate. A fair and prosperous democratic


INFORMATION PROFESSIONAL 45


Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24  |  Page 25  |  Page 26  |  Page 27  |  Page 28  |  Page 29  |  Page 30  |  Page 31  |  Page 32  |  Page 33  |  Page 34  |  Page 35  |  Page 36  |  Page 37  |  Page 38  |  Page 39  |  Page 40  |  Page 41  |  Page 42  |  Page 43  |  Page 44  |  Page 45  |  Page 46  |  Page 47  |  Page 48  |  Page 49  |  Page 50  |  Page 51  |  Page 52  |  Page 53  |  Page 54  |  Page 55  |  Page 56  |  Page 57  |  Page 58  |  Page 59  |  Page 60