ABSTRACT
This chapter contains profiles of law librarianship each written by experienced law librarians from various countries around the world: India, Moldova, Nigeria, the Philippines, Turkey and Vietnam.1
Each country profile addresses topics which describe and explain the overall environment in which law librarians operate in their country. The profiles give the number of practising law librarians in the profession, if that number can be quantified and if indeed there is an identifiable cadre of professionals who can be termed law librarians. The education and training of law librarians is explained, including the general qualifications needed to practise as a librarian, any particular qualifications which are available to law librarians, and the usual qualifications held by law librarians including the prevalence of law degrees. Reference is made to any association or organisation for law libraries or law librarians which engages in some or all of the following activities: networking, continuing professional development, oversight of professional qualifications, collaboration in services, and lobbying about policy issues affecting librarianship in general and law librarianship in particular. The libraries in various sectors which hold major law collections, including separate law libraries and libraries with a more general role but with substantial holdings of law, are identified and described. Legal publishing in the country is briefly described, noting major legal publications in print and electronic form, and freely available and reliable sources of legal information are mentioned. Authors were also requested to identify major policy issues affecting law librarianship in their country. It is hoped that the assessments from these and further country profiles of law librarianship, which will be collected by the International Association of Law Libraries, will over time provide evidence and direction for the formation of international legal information policy. Reference is made throughout to other materials for further study.
