Shanghai Library as a human capital developer for a knowledge-driven socio-economic environment

Abstract

As an integral part of society, public libraries have been functioning as community centres that help enhance personal and professional skills development as part of an individual’s lifelong learning process. To that end, public libraries are sometimes regarded as the ‘people’s university’. Using a Shanghainese context, this study seeks to understand the effects of Shanghai Library in creating human capital for the local community. Through a quantitative questionnaire survey, this study focused on examining the perceptions and usage patterns of three different financially independent user groups – white-collar workers, executives/professionals and educators/cultural administrators – and, in particular, how Shanghai Library contributed to the lifelong learning of these three user groups. A total of 429 responses were collected for the study. The findings reveal that a majority of the respondents from all three user groups used Shanghai Library mainly for learning and studying, as well as enhancing job-related skills. In fact, the majority of the respondents regarded Shanghai Library as an ‘indispensable place’ for lifelong learning. This study offers a glimpse of how public libraries in China might build human capital for their local communities.