Last week, we attended the LIBER annual conference in Trondheim, Norway. Our reasons for attending were twofold: (1) to present results from Ithaka S+R’s recent 2025 US Library Survey as part of the parallel session titled, “Research Libraries in Challenging Landscapes,” and (2) to learn from European colleagues about areas of convergence or difference between the activities and areas of focus of research libraries within the US and Europe.

LIBER’s current strategic vision document outlines three areas for library development: to become engaged and trusted hubs of their user communities; to provide state-of-the-art services for collections, publishing, and curation of information and (meta-)data; and to develop and manage infrastructures and practices to advance open science. These goals are underpinned by the fundamental tenets of upholding the rights and values of the library community and upskilling the library workforce to be prepared to undertake new challenges.

Parallel themes of the importance of upholding core library values strongly emerged within our 2025 Library Survey; 97 percent of US directors agreed that they are committed to upholding their library’s core values, even when those values are challenged, while 92 percent agreed that the library’s mission remains consistent even as the broader sociopolitical environment changes.

Issues around trust in information and the library’s role in redressing the influence of misinformation and disinformation were significant conference themes. A recent large-scale survey of students by CIVICA, an alliance that brings together ten leading European universities, provides valuable student perspective on this topic. Just 24 percent of student respondents indicated they feel very comfortable evaluating information reliability and identifying fact from fiction, and 71 percent are concerned about the risk of being misled by inaccurate information. Libraries clearly recognize these challenges; various LIBER sessions addressed this topic, including the opening keynote by Kenneth Ruud of the Norwegian Defence Research Establishment on how mis- and disinformation actively undermine society’s ability to make evidence-based decisions. The US Library Survey results demonstrates that American libraries are similarly focused on this problem, with 86 percent of US library directors rating the library’s role in countering the influence of dis/misinformation as highly important.

Organizational change management was another recurring topic of discussion. In the session “Leadership for the Future,” three presentations described how libraries are updating their strategies in response to both local conditions and broader sector-wide pressures. The speakers offered varied models for structuring and reshaping library strategy: using a user survey to inform recommendations and an action plan; undertaking a data-driven organizational restructuring based on a four-helix analysis that integrated process data, job categories, performance indicators, and trends in the literature on university libraries; and adopting a staff-focused restructuring that replaced a traditional hierarchical leadership structure with a role-based circle model for decision-making. The session concluded with a virtual audience poll on topics of organizational restructuring. In response to the question, “What helps staff feel safe and stable during times of change?” The most commonly selected responses among the approximately 100 respondents were “transparency about what is changing and why” (64 percent) and “clear and timely communication” (63 percent). These findings resonate with the US Library Survey, in which we have historically asked library deans and directors to identify the knowledge, skills, abilities, and competencies most valuable in their roles. Across survey cycles, the ability to manage change has consistently ranked among the most important competencies, including in the most recent 2025 cycle.

One area of divergence between US and European libraries at present, however, is the prioritization of open science activities that promote access and reuse of information. Many conference presentations focused on ways in which European libraries support open science initiatives, particularly with emphasis on building capacity for the Diamond open access model including through collective initiatives such as the European Diamond Capacity Hub. Several presentations also highlighted library efforts to support citizen science initiatives as a way to strengthen an open knowledge society, supported by a LIBER Citizen Science working group. In contrast, results from the 2025 US Library Survey demonstrate investments in open access initiatives have declined within US libraries since the survey was last administered in 2022. Our presentation of this data elicited questions from European colleagues about possible drivers behind this change and how changes in federal funding may be impacting open science more broadly within US research contexts.

We are grateful to European colleagues for their warm reception in Trondheim and for engagement with our research. We look forward to further exploring the evolving roles of research libraries in broader international contexts.