THE UNIVERSE OF INFORMATION.pdf - ideals

work of international organisation of co-operation in documentation
was a beginning that ended in the realisation that
they must be separated. Phrased as the resolutions were, they
could only suggest approbation of and concern for the future
of two essential activities of the Institute. But they were in
a sense the first of a slow series of revolutionary realisations
which led to transformation as various misfortunes befell the
OIB in Brussels.
The emergence of a strong Dutch interest in the Decimal
Classification also had far-reaching consequences not at once
evident. The delegation went back to Holland with a different
understanding from that which Otlet had hoped the Conference
might encourage. «The idea of creating a world center
for documentation looked impossible under the circumstance
of the time» and Donker Duyvis «thought another road should
be taken: that of creating in each country a national center for
documentation, forging close co-operation between them and
then only, contemplating the making of a world unified
center». This idea was similar to but ultimately quite different
in its emphasis and in its consequences from Otlet's idea
of national councils and a World Federation or Union. Donker
Duyvis, to begin carrying it out, set about organising the
Nederlandsch Instituut voor Documentatie en Registratuur
(Nider) in 1921. It proved to be successful and became «an
imposing factor in providing scientific and technical literature
to services and industrial concerns*. It was, indeed, given
the ineffectiveness of the Bureau Bibliographique de Paris,
the existence of which few later students seem to have been
aware, «the first among the group of national bureaux of this
kind». 20
The Congress of the Union of International Associations
also followed the pattern of previous congresses. It had three
general aims: first, «to determine the role of the International
Associations in the new order created by the League of Nations»;
second, «to define and enlarge the role of the Union
of International Associations*; and third, to assist in «the
mobilisation of energy which will lead to the systematic organisation
of all the material, moral and intellectual forces of
the world». 21 The main result of the congress was a resolution
directed at the League of Nations:
228
That the League of Nations be responsible for the creation of an international
organisation for intellectual work analagous to those
already created for manual work, for hygiene and for economic matters;
That this organisation, inspired by the particular necessities of intellectual
work, should enjoy considerable autonomy of the kind assured
to the International Bureau of Work. Its aim will be to aid the rapid
development of the sciences and of education by co-ordinating the
activity of three groups of organisations: the great national intellectual
institutions of the various countries; the great international associa-