CONFLICT IN THE LARGE ACADEMIC-LIBRARY - FRIEND OR FOE

Conflicts of various kinds have always existed in academic libraries. They are a normal concomitant of the bureaucratic nature of the organizational structure of libraries and universities. This article looks at the views of some of the seminal contributors to the development of conflict theory and then describes the broad range of library conflicts, the value and danger of these conflicts, and some of the techniques available for lowering or raising the level of conflict.