The Neutrality Lodestar: Reclaiming the Library from Ideological Capture

Libraries were built on the foundational idea that access to knowledge belongs to everyone. That idea is worth defending, and so are our libraries.

In recent years, some of America’s largest library organizations have begun explicitly rejecting neutrality as a professional ideal. In 2021, the American Library Association (ALA), the profession’s dominant institutional body, adopted a resolution condemning “neutrality rhetoric” as complicit in white supremacy and fascism. The ALA later amended its Code of Ethics to commit librarians to advancing social justice activism. These changes marked a significant shift in the profession: from a model centered on intellectual freedom and viewpoint neutrality toward one increasingly comfortable with political and ideological advocacy.

For many librarians, that shift raised an uncomfortable question: if libraries are no longer neutral institutions, what are they becoming?

The Association of Library Professionals (ALP), founded in 2023, emerged in response to that question. ALP is a nonprofit focused on championing neutrality, intellectual freedom, open inquiry, and freedom of thought and speech. ALP welcomes librarians, library staff members, library board members, and concerned community members who want to work with us to ensure that libraries as institutions, and their staff, avoid ideological capture and partisan political activism, instead keeping neutrality and intellectual freedom as the lodestar of our profession.

Since the 1960s, librarianship has gradually shifted from a profession grounded in neutrality and intellectual freedom to one increasingly defined by political and ideological activism, and organizations like ALP have emerged in response to that transformation.

Although local libraries are beloved public institutions in America, most people probably don’t spend much time thinking about how the library works or what librarians do. Library associations shape the profession far beyond conferences and networking. They create ethical standards, influence hiring and training practices, guide continuing education, and lobby on political and legislative questions affecting libraries. In practice, they help define what it means to be a librarian.

Library associations also serve social, professional, and political advocacy functions. Professional associations provide a mechanism for librarians to network with one another to advance their careers. Academic librarians often need to show that they’re providing service to the profession outside of their college or university, and committee service within a library association is a great way to demonstrate this. Finally, many library associations will officially lobby for or against state and federal budget and legislative questions that affect libraries, often sponsoring annual legislative days when librarians meet directly with politicians.

America has dozens of library associations, many of which are divisions or affiliates of the ALA.

So why are a group of librarians forming yet another association?

At ALA’s 2021 Midwinter Conference, the organization formally adopted the Resolution to Condemn White Supremacy and Fascism as Antithetical to Library Work. Notably, this resolution attacks and condemns the traditional professional ethic of neutrality, declaring “…that the American Library Association…acknowledges the role of neutrality rhetoric in emboldening and encouraging white supremacy and fascism” and “charges the Working Group on Intellectual Freedom and Social Justice, with a representative from the Committee on Diversity, to review neutrality rhetoric and identify alternatives…”

By pledging unquestioning support for social justice pedagogy, and by attacking neutrality as both inimical to these goals and a prop of white supremacy and fascism, ALA made an unmistakably political statement that alienated many within the profession.

Later in 2021, ALA amended its Code of Ethics, adding a ninth item which states, “We affirm the inherent dignity and rights of every person. We work to recognize and dismantle systemic and individual biases; to confront inequity and oppression; to enhance diversity and inclusion; and to advance racial and social justice in our libraries, communities, profession, and associations through awareness, advocacy, education, collaboration, services, and allocation of resources and spaces (emphasis added).” This language represents notable overreach by ALA, clearly committing librarians not only to the ideology of critical social justice, but also to activist pursuits in service of the same.

Librarians should be free to choose their own ideologies, and to work towards justice, truth, beauty, and goodness in their “libraries, communities, profession, and associations” in ways that align with their own personal philosophy, without dictates from the ALA. Yet the reality is that librarianship has become permeated by social justice ideology, critical theory, and political activism in service of the same. While these changes often happen behind the scenes, their impact is revealed in the professional literature and the specific training sessions offered to library staff. Below are several representative examples of this new activist direction.

In 2011, Char Booth published Reflective Teaching, Effective Learning, a practical guide for academic librarians teaching undergraduates skills for finding and evaluating information. Booth’s work borrows heavily from Marxist philosopher Paulo Freire’s pedagogical theory, itself grounded in critical theory. In 2016, the Association of College and Research Libraries formally adopted the Framework for Information Literacy in Higher Education, replacing the Information Literacy Competency Standards for Higher Education which had been in place since 2000. Drabinski’s and Tewell’s entry on Critical Information Literacy (CIL) in The International Encyclopedia of Media Literacy acknowledges that the Framework was shaped and informed by CIL, and candidly recognizes CIL’s aspirations towards activism, declaring that “libraries are not and cannot be neutral actors, and embraces the potential of libraries as catalysts for social change” and that CIL “ultimately seeks to identify and take action upon forms of oppression, and proposes to undertake the work by engaging with local communities.” These are far from fringe positions in professional librarianship, and it’s telling that Emily Drabinski later served as president of ALA from 2023-2024.

Recent professional development offerings illustrate how pervasive these ideas have become within the profession.

In April 2026, ALA’s Association of School Librarians provided an online presentation, Subversive Librarianship: Embedding Social Justice and DEI in Our Schools which encouraged librarians to “subtly and strategically embed social justice principles” into their work despite “external pressures.”

Library Journal and School Library Journal offered a multi-day, 15 credit hour class, Antiracism 201: Digging Deeper in Antiracist Library Cultures, in 2024. Stated learning objectives included “Understand tenets of antiracist theories and how they apply to libraries…Recruit, hire, retain, and promote staff in an equity-centered way…Identify and start to resist white supremacist values or qualities in your library’s internal work culture.”

Another multi-day Library Journal training in 2023, focused on “How to Build LGBTQIA+ Inclusive Libraries.” Learning outcomes for this program included: “Make yourself visible as an LGBTQIA+ advocate and ally… Create trans and gender nonconforming programs, spaces, and services … [and] Advocate for LGBTQIA+ representation in materials and services.”

Many librarians are recognizing that our profession has become heavily invested in one creedal idea: that social justice activism is the only way to be a librarian. Our professional associations issue resolutions inveighing against neutrality and calling on librarians to commit themselves to political and cultural activism in the service of social justice.

A steady stream of charged rhetoric (“book banning!”), and politically oriented professional development opportunities make it clear that librarians who disagree with the illiberal progressive political agenda (or who simply believe that libraries and librarians ought to be neutral instead of political), are either expected to either adopt these activist roles or remain silent. More and more librarians who are alarmed by these developments are making their way to organizations like ALP, which seek to return the profession to its first principles.

The ALA’s turn toward ideological activism didn’t happen overnight, and reclaiming the profession may take just as long. But the work has begun. My favorite bumper sticker says, “The world is run by those who show up.” It’s a simple but powerful reminder that ordinary people can make a lasting difference simply by deciding to participate.

Libraries were built on the foundational idea that access to knowledge belongs to everyone. That idea is worth defending, and so are our libraries. Let’s show up for them.

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