Collection Development

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Collection Development

Subject Policy Statement - LAW

 

A. Purpose and Program Description

The Libraries seek to support research and teaching in law by the Faculty of Law, as well as the Law Division of the University's School of Professional and Continuing Education (SPACE), and cross-disciplinary studies in double degree programmes offered by the Faculty in conjunction with the Faculty of Business and Economics, Department of Politics and Public Administration, and Department of Civil Engineering.

The Collection supports the needs of undergraduate, graduate (JD, LLM, MCL, PDip, PCLL), research students (SJD, PhD, MPhil), the teaching faculty, researchers and staff members.

Areas of established specialization are: Hong Kong law, common law areas, comparative law, human rights, constitutional and administrative law, public international law, international trade law, corporate and financial law, commercial law, professional practice, Chinese law, information technology and intellectual property law.

 

B. General Selection Guidelines (See Classed Analysis)

Overall, the Libraries' existing collection and acquisitions commitment, based upon available resources, and its collection goal for Law are at the research level.

 

C. Specific Delimitations

  1. Formats collected: We collect primary legal materials (statutes, cases, law reports) and secondary materials including monographs, reference tools and scholarly series extensively; periodicals, annuals, CD-ROMs and other electronic tools, audio-visual materials including videocassettes and videodiscs, microforms selectively; textbooks and dissertations (other than HKU dissertations). Publications which cater only to help students prepare for and to answer examination questions ("nutshell" or "Q & A" series) are generally purchased with prudence, as are texts for laymen.
  2. Imprint Dates Collected: We collect current publications extensively, and earlier materials, selectively.
  3. Chronological Focus: We collect materials focusing on current topics extensively and all others, selectively.
  4. Languages Collected: We collect English language materials extensively and non-English language materials selectively, except for Chinese law, for which materials in the Chinese language are also acquired.
  5. Place of Publication: We collect materials published in Hong Kong, PRC, North America, United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand, and Western Europe (if available in English) extensively; Taiwan, Macau, South Africa, and Asia Pacific (if available in English) selectively.