Research On Legislation Of National Reading Promotion Specialization:Library And Information Science

As the development of the practice of national reading promotion in China, reading promotion law becomes a hot topic. In fact, the centre government and local government in China have already begun the national reading legislation. For example, in 2013, the China General Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television announced that the legislation of national reading promotion was took into the national legislative plan of 2013.However, the theoretical research is not sufficient. Based on this background, this study attempts to discuss three questions, through three research methods which includes literature survey, comparison, and qualitative methodology. Firstly, what about the reading promotion laws in other countries? Secondly, why do we make the national reading promotion law? Thirdly, what does the national reading promotion law in China shall involve? With the foundation of comprehensive research on the present situation of national reading promotion legislation of different countries in the world, this study tries to provide reliable reference for the related legislation of China.At first, this study summarizes the experience and legislative history of reading process of the reading laws of the USA, Russia, Japan, Korea, and some other countries such as Sweden, Spain, Mexico and so on. USA is the first country which especially made law for reading promotion. The experience of the legislation in USA indicates that the civil reading right shall be established. And paying attention to youngsters, using guiding ways not forcing, is also the USA’s experience. As for Russia, it is a large country bordering on China. The two countries have many commons in politics, history and geographical environment. The reading law of Russia puts forward that national reading promotion shall be divided to stages, shall be under a powerful committee’s supervision, and shall make duties of relevant institutions clear. The legal system of Japan is instilled by the idea which protects different groups’ reading rights, such as children, youngsters, prisoners and so on. Korea is the forth country discussed by the study. Korea created a long-term mechanism assuring people’s reading right by its national reading promotion law. in addition, Korea stresses the responsibility of state and a good atmosphere of reading.Then, this study discusses the necessity and feasibility of legislation. The author holds that reading right is one of the civil rights, coming from education right, information right and leisure enjoying right. As a kind of abstract right, the reading right actually is easy to be ignored by people. Some other basic civil rights will be harmed further on, such as information right, labor right, voting right and so on. So the legal significance of reading right determines the legislation of reading promotion law. Secondly, facing with seriously descent of people’s reading rate, the imbalance of regional development and the difficult coordination among the reading promotion agencies, the national reading legislation has become inevitable. Only the national reading promotion law can solve these problems. Meanwhile, the foundation of policy, economy, theories, society and laws provides the feasibility to legislation of national reading promotion. Subsequently, this study compares the local legislations of Jiangsu Province, Hubei Province, Shenzhen City and Liaoning Province. The author also summarizes the flaws and common views among the local legislations. Actually, the four local governments built a long-term mechanism, established a authority, institutionalized the reading promoters, improved the reading education of schools, stressed the library’s position, set up book day and guided the publishing market in common. Meanwhile, the legislation of national reading promotion shall pay attention to the flaws of the four local governments, which includes that neglecting civil reading right, lacking execution, and ignoring the market factors.Finally, this study puts forward conception of national legislation, which shall comprise government, enterprises and public organizations, successful forms of reading promotion and the right of vulnerable groups in reading. The successful forms shall contain reading and book day, recommendatory booklist and reading promoters. The vulnerable groups in reading shall include children, youngsters, illiterates, half- illiterates, the blind, the poor, farmers, and the immobile such as prisoners, patients, lonely elders and so on. In addition, this study discusses digital reading, intellectual property and reader privacy, which may lead to some problems in the future.In the conclusion, this study proposes the basic framework for the National Reading Promotion Law. Then, author gives the prospects of this topic, making the library as an example. At the same time, the article summarizes the limitations of the research, and it considers that the research in the future shall concern the legislation technology, and more, further study of the legislation of different countries in the world shall be studied.