Page 60 - JOURNAL OF LIBRARY SCIENCE IN CHINA 2015 Vol. 41

An CHANG / The unity of freedom and equality in library rights system 059

2.3 The footstone of freedom and equality in the library rights system

2.3.1 The inherent tension of freedom and equality in the library rights system
Freedom and equality constitute the core values of the library rights system. Firstly, a library
should guarantee the users have their freedom to get information without any restraint. Under
the major premise of protecting the users’ intellectual freedom, a library should also guarantee
that it opens to everyone equally. The relationship between freedom and equality is a unity of
the opposite. Without intellectual freedom, the equality in the library rights system is not a real
equality, and the intellectual freedom will become worthless without the equality. Human’s natural
attribute determines the coexistence and uniformity of the freedom and equality, which are the
basic human rights, but human’s social attribute determines the inherent tension and the importance
of ensuring the stability of freedom and equality. There are three main reasons why the library
rights system can regard freedom and equality as its own core values naturally and validly.
First of all, as the basic rights of people, freedom and equality relate to the individual’s
personality and human dignity, and have the natural attributes of the moral right. Moral right is the
established foundation of other rights including library rights. So the building of the library system
inevitably reflecs the pursuit and expression of freedom and equality.
Second, the library right is a kind of educational right, and as an essential part of the second
generation of human rights, the educational right is a basic right of people. As the general
requirements of human rights, freedom and equality can inevitably affect the construction of the
library rights system fundamentally. Therefore, it is valid and natural to use freedom and equality
to express the ideal values of libraries.
Third, as an arrangement of the system of justice, libraries have features of publicity and
commonweal itself. This makes it inevitable to offer the same opportunity to free access for
everyone with consideration of social fairness and justice. The essence of the library’s own
existence and its mission fundamentally determine that it should highlight the arrangement and
implementation of freedom and equality in the construction of theory and system.
The library rights system puts freedom and equality both as its own value pursuit. The right to
freedom of libraries is the precondition for the equality right of libraries, and the users’ freedom to
get information without any restraint is the precondition of equality. Only under the major premise
of protecting the users’ intellectual freedom, can library equality have its substantial meaning.
Intellectual freedom is always an essential precondition of the library rights system, and library
equality is difficult to implement without it. The equality right of libraries is the equilibrium
condition for the right to freedom of libraries. The intellectual freedom removed barriers for users
in obtaining information without any constraints, but this is only an essential premise. Under the
premise of freedom it also has to be guaranteed that library resources can be used equally at the
greatest extent, which could give knowledge more realistic significance. However, the harmonious
coexistence idea of the freedom and equality has an inherent tension and conflict in practice,