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The International Information & Library Review (2007) 39, 64–71

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Library and information science education indeveloping countries

Catherine A. Johnson

School of Information Studies, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, USA

Summary This paper introduces the special issue on education for library andinformation science in developing countries. It reviews past articles that appeared inThe International Information and Library Review on the same topic and commentson the articles appearing in this issue. Previous articles reveal that this topic hasbeen of interest to readers and contributors to the journal since its beginning. Someissues have remained constant throughout the history of the journal, for instance,the relevance of LIS curriculum to developing countries, dependence on Westerneducation models, lack of respect for the profession and need to upgrade the skills oflibrarians and other information professionals to address the challenges of theinformation society. The articles contained in this issue address some of the sameconcerns with an additional focus on the need for LIS education to prepare graduatesto become more involved in the economic and social development of their countries.& 2007 Published by Elsevier Ltd.

Introduction

The motivation for this special issue had its originsin my own experience of working with librarians inMongolia as a United Nations Volunteer in 1998, andsubsequently as a researcher for a study I con-ducted for my Ph.D. dissertation in 2002 (Johnson,2007). Although the librarians I met in Mongoliawere highly motivated and keen to improve theirskills, there were few opportunities for them to doso, given the resources of this very poor country.The government of Mongolia provided barelyenough funds to keep open the network of librariesestablished during the Soviet period. Neither was it

ee front matter & 2007 Published by Elsevier Ltd.ilr.2007.02.011

ess: caj3@uwm.edu.

inclined to invest scarce educational resources totrain people for a profession that seemed to lackrelevance in the face of the enormous economicand social upheaval following the collapse of theSoviet Union. A few librarians have been able toparticipate in two-or-three-week study visitsabroad or to attend short courses offered by theCentral European University in Budapest. Interna-tional organizations sponsor workshops in Mongoliaor fund visits by professional librarians who attemptto impart knowledge about more current theoriesand practices of the profession. But there has beenno attempt to reevaluate the entire system oflibraries and library education to make it morerelevant to the information needs of the country. Iwondered whether this was a problem common to

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Library and information science education in developing countries 65

other developing countries. Consequently, I orga-nized a panel for the 2006 meeting in San Antonioof the Association of Library and InformationScience Educators (ALISE) consisting of peoplewho were actively involved either in delivering LIScourses in developing countries or had considerableexperience in evaluating LIS curricula. It wasobvious from this panel discussion that othercountries face similar problems and that therewere no easy solutions available to resolve them. Ahopeful sign is that there are many talented peopleworking towards finding a solution. The paperscontributed to this issue continue the discussionsbegun in San Antonio and reveal that many of theproblems I encountered in Mongolia, such asrelevancy of the curriculum and lack of supportby the government, are indeed common to manydeveloping countries.

Concerns about LIS education in developing andemerging nations have been voiced in this journalfrom its earliest days. The first section of thisreview article summarizes the issues raised andtracks how they have evolved over the decades.The second part of this article introduces thecurrent contributions to the discussion.

0 2 4 6 8 10

General

Middle East

Asia

Africa

Soviet Union

South America

Pacific2000-2006

1990s

1980s

1970s

Number of articles

Figure 1 Number of articles discussing LIS education byfocus and decade.

Review of previous articles

In the inaugural issue of the International LibraryReview (ILR) in 1969, editor George Chandler paidlittle attention to developing countries. Althoughthere is no clear statement outlining the scope andemphasis of the journal at that time, it appearsfrom the first editorial that the main interest was inproviding an outlet for publications from interna-tional and national library organizations. Reportswere submitted from international organizationssuch as UNESCO, the International Federation ofLibrary Associations and the International Associa-tion of Technological University Libraries, as well asfrom various national library associations. Theemphasis was clearly on international librarianshipwith reports describing library activities in variouscountries, including Canada, New Zealand, India,South Africa and Japan. Only a brief mention wasmade of the situation in developing countries.

Nevertheless, articles discussing the state oflibrary education within developing countries sur-faced early in the journal’s publication history.Professor Mohammed Aman’s review article onInternational Librarianship for 1969 (Aman, 1970),has a section devoted to education for librarian-ship. In this section, he describes a new LIS programestablished in Nigeria that offered both a two-yeardiploma and a three-year B.L.S. degree. He also

summarized papers that described programs estab-lished in Pakistan, India, West Germany and Spain.

Since the appearance of the International Li-brary Review (which changed its name to TheInternational Information and Library Review in1992) until 2006, 66 articles were published thatdiscussed the state of LIS education in developingcountries. The chart below illustrates how thenumber of articles was distributed across thedecades between 1969 and 2006 (Fig. 1).

The most articles on education in developingcountries were published in the first decade of thejournal’s existence with a steadily declining num-ber in each subsequent decade. The first decade ofthe 2000s shows a particularly steep decline in thenumber of articles published. Most articles in thefirst decade focused on either general issuesrelated to LIS education or a description ofprograms offered in various countries. Few of thesearticles provided a critical evaluation of theseprograms. Most of the articles dealing with libraryeducation in specific countries described theirorigins, which often came about either throughshort courses offered by UNESCO or through theefforts of librarians from the United Kingdom or theUnited States who had spent some time in thecountry.

Out of 26 articles published during the 1970s, fivefocused on LIS education in Africa (three onNigeria), five on the Middle East (three on Iranand two on Jordan), two on Soviet republics, twoon India, and one each on South America in general,and one on Southeast Asia, specifically Thailand,with the remaining 10 discussing education issues ingeneral. In the 1980s only two articles focused onAfrica, while in the 1990s, seven articles focused onthis continent. A near equal number of articlesdealt with LIS education in Asia during the 1980sand 1990s, although three of these focused on theIndian subcontinent and one on China in the 1980sand three on China and one on the Indiansubcontinent in the 1990s. An interest in LIS

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education in Middle Eastern countries continuedthroughout the 1980s and 1990s, with eight articlesin total focusing on these countries, including twoon Iran and three on Jordan. Sometimes thesearticles were authored by the same person andwere mainly descriptions of the progress made inthe development of LIS education. For instance,Younis (1982, 1992, 2002) contributed three arti-cles on LIS education in Jordan. Ahmad (1981)contributed an article discussing the need forprofessionally trained librarians in Bangladesh andanother about the need for instruction in informa-tion technology in Bangladesh in 1992. Aina con-tributed three articles focusing on Nigeria,discussing factors affecting the development oflibrarianship in 1979, training for middle levellibrary staff in 1991 and the need to providecontinuing education programs to train library staffin the use of information technology in 1996.

The most common themes addressed by theauthors, at least until the 1990s, were the influenceof expatriates in the development of LIS programs,the relevance of the curricula, which were oftenbased on Western programs, and the low status ofthe profession and libraries which resulted in lowpay for librarians and inadequate financial supportof libraries by the government. Many LIS educationprograms had begun in the 1950s and 1960smotivated by the need to raise the education levelof these countries’ populations, particularly toeradicate illiteracy. India was one of the earliestof the developing countries to offer courses inlibrarianship, and in fact, was not far behind theUnited States with the establishment of the firstcourse in librarianship in 1911 by an Americanformer student of Melvil Dewey (Rao & Babu, 1990).Ranganathan, who received his library education atUniversity College London, established librarycourses in Madras in the 1920s and 1930s. Inrelating the history of librarianship in Bangladesh,which received its independence in 1971, theauthors complained that no programs were devel-oped under the British rule: ‘‘In other words in theearly fifties Bangladesh experienced an unwhole-some and suffocating situation when she had theinstitutions of libraries but not the philosophy andtechnique of librarianship’’ (Rao & Babu, 1990,p. 105).

Concern with developing libraries and LIS educa-tion often went along with the achievement ofindependence. When Nigeria gained independencein 1960, it also established the first library school atthe University of Ibadan (Aina, 1979, p. 63). Prior tothis date most librarians working in Nigeria wereBritish expatriates. According to Aina, the expatri-ate librarians were opposed to the new school,

which was established to train leaders in the libraryfield. Evelyn Evans, the director of the Gold CoastLibrary Board (present-day Ghana), questionedwhether a library school should be established atall. She felt that better education could beattained in the United Kingdom, where studentswould have the opportunity to visit ‘‘model’’libraries. Short courses would be sufficient untilmore libraries were built (Akinyotu, 1976). How-ever, although the Nigerian librarians appealed tothe Carnegie Corporation to provide funds for fourscholarships per year to send students to the UnitedKingdom and the United States for their libraryeducation, the corporation decided to providefunds to establish the library school at Ibadan.The Carnegie Corporation felt that not only wouldproviding funds to a few students to attain theireducation overseas be ineffective financially, butthe education the students received would alsohave limited relevance to the local situation (Aina,1979, p. 60).

A recurring theme of many of the articlescentered around the relevance of the library schoolcurricula in developing countries. In an articlediscussing the work of UNESCO in supporting thedevelopment of library schools, Keresztesi (1982)was especially concerned with the prevalence ofWestern influence on the LIS curriculum. Althoughpraising UNESCO for providing the funds andsupport for such schools, the author stressed theneed for the new schools ‘‘to develop validphilosophies and testable methodologies of libraryand information services in preliterate and tech-nologically unsophisticated societies’’ (p. 354).Without applying the theory and practice of LIS tolocal conditions, the library schools would risk‘‘becoming pale reflections of their Western mod-els.’’ An article by Ballard (1980), a professor atNorth Carolina Central University School of LibraryScience, expressed a similar point of view. He feltthat the conferences sponsored by UNESCO onlibrary education did not have a significant effecton libraries in developing nations and that the levelof education for librarianship in these countries wasinadequate to cope with the exponential growth ininformation that was occurring globally. A corecurriculum for library science should be developedand adopted by developing countries which wouldinclude courses that respond to the particularconditions of these low-income countries and notbe carbon copies of curricula of developed coun-tries.

In an article discussing LIS education in theASEAN countries, Harvard-Williams and Atan (1987)also expressed concern about the wholesale trans-fer of LIS curricula from the West. A reason for the

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lack of indigenous elements in LIS programs, statedthe authors, was the fact that there had been verylittle research and publishing done that focused onthe local situation. The dearth of research on localissues was mentioned several times as a reason forthe lack of local content in the courses.

Given the role played by Western librarians in thedevelopment of librarianship and LIS education indeveloping countries, it is not surprising that theywould have a strong influence on the content of thecurriculum. For four years after the establishmentof the Ibadan Library School in Nigeria in 1960,students were required to pass the British LibraryAssociation exam before achieving professionalstatus. Students in Jordan were also unhappy withthe requirement that they pass an English languagecomprehension exam before being admitted into apost-graduate program that was taught largely byBritish faculty. As a result of student protest againstthis requirement, the British faculty eventually leftin 1982. Nevertheless, it was difficult to findqualified faculty to replace them.

The dearth of qualified teaching staff hasconsistently plagued LIS education in developingcountries. Harvard-Williams and Atan (1987) dis-cussed the lack of qualified teaching staff in theASEAN countries who were often trained abroadand had no practical experience in local libraries.The same sentiment was echoed by Kargbo (1999)who complained that teaching staff in Sierre Leonedid not have practical experience in the field, werenot aware of jobs available for librarians and didnot survey employers to determine what skills theywere looking for, and relied on teaching traditionalcourses that did not respond to changes in theinformation environment. Younis (2002) also dis-cussed the lack of qualified staff in privateuniversities in Jordan. He felt that if there were asystem of accreditation the quality of LIS educationwould improve.

Library associations are important in the devel-opment of LIS education since they were oftenresponsible for setting up short courses for peoplealready working in libraries who had no formallibrary training. An article comparing libraryeducation in Tunisia and Jordan (Bouazza & Nimer,1986) pointed out that colonial influences affectedthe establishment of library associations. TheBritish model of professional associations resultedin Jordan’s establishing a library association quiteearly, while the lack of such a model under theFrench resulted in the absence of a libraryassociation in Tunisia. This absence in Tunisiaaffected the development of the profession.Harvard-Williams and Atan (1987) felt that a stronglibrary association could positively influence

government policy towards libraries and libraryeducation.

Although attaining the means to educate librar-ians at home was an important step in developingthe profession of librarianship, there was still aconsiderable distance to go to achieve professionalstatus. For instance in Nigeria, as the result of areport issued in 1956, librarians were accordednon-professional status and in 1974, universitylibrarians had their status reduced by one levelbelow teachers. As a direct result of this demotion,enrolment in the library school was nearly halved,where previously it had been increasing steadilysince the early 1970s. The low status of librarian-ship is a constant theme running throughout thearticles in the IILR. The low pay that accompaniedthe diminished status of the profession resulted insmall numbers enrolling in LIS programs as well asinsufficient funds provided by the state to developlibraries. Ochai (1987) claimed that it was difficultfor the government to support public institutionsduring poor economic times, which are a constantstate of affairs in most developing countries. Withpriorities focused on improving the local economyor eradicating diseases, it is understandable thatlibraries, which were not highly respected, wouldreceive little public support.

By the end of the 1980s, the articles took on adifferent tone. The spread of new information andcommunication technologies (ICTs), globalization,and the rise of the Information Society, gave LISeducation an important new mission—to traininformation professionals to help their countriesenter the Information Age. An article by Mohamed(1982) discussing LIS education in Malaysia, placedthe discussion in the context of Daniel Bell’s thesisabout post-industrial society. The new informationsociety, claimed Mohamed, would give the informa-tion professions a ‘‘predominant position in socie-ty—replacing the managerial elite with theknowledge elite.’’ LIS education, he stressed,should concentrate on developing a managerialculture so that graduates would be able to establishthe information centers that would connect peopleto the information needed in the new informationsociety. Many of the articles called for LIS programsto include courses on computer applications (Ah-mad, 1992; Aina, 1996; Boye, 1991; Gupta, 1993;Rao & Babu, 1990; Younis, 1992). Most complainedthat LIS programs had not grasped the impact ofinformation technologies on their profession. How-ever, they also pointed out that few schools couldafford computer equipment to use in the class-rooms and lacked teachers qualified to teachcomputer applications. Chaudhry (1988, p. 202),writing about curricula in Asia, emphasized the

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need for computer training: ‘‘The recent enhance-ment and development of microcomputers andtheir falling prices, have made them an attractiveoption for Asian countries. This has to be reflectedin the library school curricula.’’

Although there were several articles discussingthe state of LIS education in Asia, mainly the Indiansub-continent, there were few articles that focusedon the Chinese situation until the 1990s. As inAfrica and India, the first library school in China wasestablished by an American, Elizabeth Wood, whoopened the Boone Library School in 1929 in Wuhan(Weiming, 1989). By 1989, there were 45 post-secondary institutions offering tertiary level edu-cation for LIS personnel in China. Nevertheless,only 2–5% of staff working in libraries and informa-tion centers had completed professional degrees.Free market reforms that resulted in the growthand globalization of the Chinese economy alsoaffected the LIS profession. By the mid-1990s,Xiaoying (1997) stated that the need in China wasno longer for professional staff to work in libraries,but rather for information professionals to work inthe new economy. New graduates were mainlyinterested in working in the better paying emergingprivate companies and industries. Informationscience courses, such as information management,information technology applications, informationprocessing and access, communication and tele-communication, were more pertinent to the neweconomy than the traditional library coursesfocusing on print resources. In response to thischanged focus, the name of the Department ofLibrary and Information Science at Peking Univer-sity was changed to the Department of InformationManagement. Jin (1999) noted that while over 90%of graduates of LIS programs in the United Statessought jobs in the library field, Chinese graduatespreferred jobs in the information marketplace,with more than half of LIS graduates employedoutside of libraries.

Summary of articles in this issue

Although many of the concerns expressed inprevious volumes are present in this special issue,the emphases have changed. Although designing acurriculum that is relevant to local conditions isstill a major concern, the focus has shifted toproducing graduates who can manage the informa-tion resources and services that contribute to theeconomic and social development of the commu-nity. With globalization and the benefits broughtabout by ICTs, the access to and use of informationis more important than ever. The authors of the

articles in this issue make the point over and overagain that librarians and other information profes-sionals need to take a leadership role in ensuringthat their communities can make the best possibleuse of these resources and thus contribute to thesocial and economic advancement of their people.Because of the persistent economic, social, andhealth challenges facing the Sub-Saharan region,most of the articles in this issue focus on LISeducation in Africa. Two articles look at the Africansituation in general, and five others discuss thespecific situation of LIS education in South Africa,Nigeria, Kenya, Ethiopia and the West Africancountries of Benin and Senegal. In addition, articleson the Dominican Republic, Vietnam and Ukrainepoint out that although the specifics may change,the concerns of the profession in the developingremain consistently similar.

The article by Nassembeni and Underwoodstresses that LIS policies should support the devel-opment goals of South Africa. The authors explainthat the development of LIS education in SouthAfrica is part of the transformation of highereducation following the democratic elections of1994, which was intended to correct the inequal-ities of the apartheid system. Since the achieve-ment of an information society is a prominenttheme in the government’s strategy for the socialand economic development of the country, itprovides an opportunity to prove the relevance ofthe LIS profession. Although public libraries underthe old regime were seen as an enclave of middleclass whites, the current government, according tothe authors, views libraries as a cost-effectivemeans to accomplish the transformation of societyin both social and economic terms. The problem,however, remains with librarians who have not yettaken a leadership role in advocating for the libraryas a key resource in community development and inthe democratization of the country. LIS education islargely to blame because it has not provided thenecessary skills to give librarians the confidence totake on this leadership role.

Despite the recognition by many of the authorsthat LIS professionals can be a dynamic force in thedevelopment of African society, there needs to be aconcerted effort to provide the necessary tools tomake this possible. Gathegi and Mwathi’s analysisof undergraduate and graduate LIS programs inKenya found that they still reflected the needs ofthe 1980s and that the focus now needed to be onproviding information services to assist in theeconomic development of the country with anemphasis on developing ICT services. In addition,they claim, students should be prepared foremployment in the private sector rather than in

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educational institutions. A problem in designing LIScurricula is that there is no list of competencies forLIS graduates that would assist in the design ofthese programs.

The article by Diso and Njoku emphasizes theneed for locally relevant research and curricula. Itcompares four university-based LIS programs inNigeria, pointing out their shortcomings and makingrecommendations for the improvement of thecurriculum. The concentration of LIS programs onthe management of print media, state the authors,essentially excludes most of Nigerian society whichis predominantly oral in nature. The use ofinformation for development in rural, non-literatecommunities requires producing information in aformat that can be used effectively. Despite thegrowing globalization of the economy, the authorsfeel that programs aimed specifically at improvingaccess to information in rural communities shouldtake precedence over the internationalization ofinformation services.

Mammo’s article describes a study that analyzedLIS programs in Ethiopia and the satisfaction withthe programs of both graduates and the people whoemploy them. The author contends that while LISprofessionals can play a pivotal role in developingan information society in Ethiopia, they lack theskills in the use of information technology in orderto do so. The termination of some LIS programs andtheir replacement with programs that focus en-tirely on technology has not solved the problembecause, although graduates may have gained theIT skills, they still lack the foundational knowledge,such as information organization and collectiondevelopment, that enable them to work effectivelyin libraries. The study found that both employersand employees are dissatisfied with the level oftraining for LIS professionals. A recently inaugu-rated Bachelor of Library and Information Sciencedegree at Jimma University promises to addressmany of the concerns raised by participants in thestudy, however.

A gap in our understanding of LIS education inFrench-speaking Africa has been rectified with theinclusion of the article by Menigbeto who discussesthe situation in Benin and Senegal. The problems inthese countries are typical of most African coun-tries and, in fact, appear to be considerably morepressing than the larger economies of Nigeria,Kenya and South Africa. The author points out thatLIS education in these countries is severely lackingthe courses that will make graduates competent towork with information technology and take advan-tage of new products such as database manage-ment software and bibliographical software tomanage information. Computer labs as well as

instructors are not adequate to keep up withadvances in information technology.

The article by Albright and Kawooya examinesthe whole of Sub-Saharan Africa and summarizesmany of the deficiencies in LIS education that havebeen discussed elsewhere, including the lack ofculturally relevant information resources and ser-vices and lack of research into the specificinformation needs and environment of Africancountries. The authors evaluate LIS educationwithin the context of the Millennium DevelopmentGoals (MDGs) established by the United Nations. LISeducation, they state, should be directed atachieving these goals, which include the eradica-tion of poverty, reduction in child mortality andimprovement in maternal health. Limited access toinformation serves as a barrier to improvedhealthcare in developing countries. The absenceof information professionals’ involvement in theAIDS crisis, particularly the HIV/AIDS campaign inUganda, is presented as a case in point. The authorsconclude that by aligning information services tothe MDGs and taking a leadership role in thedissemination of HIV/AIDS information, the profes-sion as a whole will acquire the relevance andconsequently the respect that has so far beenlacking.

A common response to poor educational facilitiesfor LIS, as well as other professionals, in Africa hasbeen for students to seek their education abroad.This has resulted in a serious brain drain ofeducated Africans who opt to find employmentabroad rather than return to low paying jobs intheir homelands. Britz, Lor, and Botma propose asolution that will turn this brain drain into a ‘‘braingain’’. They propose a collaboration betweenuniversities in South Africa and the United Stateswhere students chosen from among all Africancountries will participate in courses delivered byseveral universities both via the Web and onsite.Students will have the opportunity to visit Amer-ican campuses for a few weeks during the program,but the program itself will be anchored at theUniversity of Pretoria. Through this method, stu-dents will be able to take courses not yet availablein Africa, while at the same time ensuring that theirlearning is done in the context of the Africanenvironment and relevant to African conditions.

A similar solution, although for different reasons,is proposed for the development of LIS profes-sionals in the Dominican Republic. Mendez andMontero investigate LIS education in the DominicanRepublic not only to find out what is being taught,but also whether the programs described on paperactually exist. The authors, as others have done inthis issue, emphasize the important role libraries

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and other information services should play insupporting the development of an informationsociety, poverty reduction and the promotion ofsustainable development. Since there have beenmany attempts to establish LIS programs in thecountry with little success, the authors concludethat a hybrid (partially onsite and partially online)program currently offered through the University ofPuerto Rico is the best option for the small country.

Although the development of LIS education isimportant in the long-term for promoting andimproving the information profession in developingnations, short-term training programs continue tobe a popular method to increase skill levels forspecific purposes. Welch and Murray describe atraining program that was developed in Australiaand delivered in Vietnam to train staff at a newlyopened Learning Resource Center in Can ThoUniversity. The article details the challenges andlessons learned in delivering the course which, itwas hoped, would facilitate the move from theolder style print-based library culture to onefocused on service, customers and electronicresources. The main challenge revealed duringthe course of the training program was related toapplying a Western model of LIS curriculum in adeveloping country context. Such training programscannot be a simple transfer of knowledge, concludethe authors, but concepts as well as vocabularymust be translated and interpreted within thespecific cultural context of the receiving society.

In something of a departure from the otherarticles in this issue, Haigh discusses the role oflibraries in promoting national cultural goals,rather than economic development goals, in thecontext of overcoming the legacy of Russia’sdomination of cultural institutions, particularlylibraries, in Ukraine. During its heyday, explainsHaigh, the Soviet Union had one of the most highlydeveloped library systems in the world with librarynetworks established in all its republics andsatellite countries. These systems were structuredsimilarly, whether they were located in Ukraine orMongolia. With the collapse of the Soviet Union inthe early 1990s; however, libraries often languishedafter the withdrawal of financial support and thegrowing irrelevance of their mission. This waspartly a result of the struggle of the newlyindependent countries to cope with new economicand political structures and to throw off the socialand cultural yoke of their former oppressor/benefactor. Haigh points out that in an independentUkraine a major challenge for libraries is topromote the Ukrainian language and culture. Yet,as with the situation in other developing andemerging nations, the library profession suffers

from low pay, lack of respect and therefore lack ofinterest by young people in attaining an LIS degree.New fledgling LIS programs, however, are adding ITcomponents to their curriculum, and libraries arebeginning to see themselves as part of the knowl-edge society and a vital link between the produc-tion of knowledge and access to it by the public.Haigh concludes with the hope that students will beattracted to a profession that is anchored in theUkrainian people’s zeal to promote and developtheir own cultural and informational institutions.

Conclusion

The articles in this special issue demonstrate thatLIS professionals and educators in developingcountries have a keen awareness of the problemsbesetting the profession.

Because of the increased importance of informa-tion in a globalized society, people who have beentrained to manage and provide access to informa-tion should be in demand to help create theknowledge economy to which so many developingcountries aspire. Nevertheless, LIS programs con-tinue to suffer from lack of financial support bygovernments and, consequently, a lack of interestin them by ambitious, motivated students who canhelp to change the image and direction of theprofession. It is a chicken and egg situation that hasno immediate solution. But with LIS educators andpractitioners in developing countries taking aleading role in identifying the problems anddeciding which activities at home and what supportfrom abroad would help resolve them there is agood chance that the profession will gain therelevance and respect it has continually sought.Educators and practitioners in the West should doall they can to help them achieve their aims.

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