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Introduction
Organisations do not exist in a vacuum but rather they exist, co-exist, compete and cooperate in a multi-dimensional and interrelated environment characterised by ambiguity and complexity. Understanding this environment is fundamental to formulating strategy, decision making and strategic planning. As a result, there is a proliferation of strategic planning tools to enable managers to formulate competitive strategies in line with the requirements of their business environments. These include strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats (SWOT) analysis, which may well be used more than any other management technique in the process of decision making
(Panagiotou, 2003, p. 8).Similarly, libraries do not exist in a vacuum. The State of America's Libraries 2017 report underscores this observation, noting: "in the 21st century, libraries of all types are responding to the changing social, economic, and political impacts of living in a digital society" (Rosa, 2017). Dempsey (2015a, p. 11) concurs, stating: "academic libraries are a part of the changing education enterprise, and the character of that enterprise is what will most influence an individual library's future position." Libraries are therefore not isolated: they must exist, co-exist, compete and cooperate in an environment characterized by growing alternative information providers, technology, dwindling budgets, changes in higher education and student behavior and demands to articulate value. Understanding this internal and external library environment is therefore fundamental to academic libraries formulating strategy, decision making and strategic planning. "SWOT analysis is concerned with the analysis of an organisation's internal and external environment with the aim of identifying internal strengths in order to take advantage of its external opportunities and avoid external (and possible internal) threats, while addressing its weaknesses" (Panagiotou, 2003, p. 8). SWOT analysis having this focus at its core is therefore particularly suitable to the current situation of academic libraries. A SWOT analysis of Jamaican academic libraries in higher education can yield such strategic insights for academic librarianship on the local and international scenes, thus providing direction, determining levels of growth and competitive advantage, influencing the future and ultimately impacting praxis.
Accordingly, this paper seeks to document the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats of the five local academic libraries in higher education at university level (also referred to in this paper as Jamaican university libraries and as Jamaican academic libraries), through...