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The recent PTRC meeting at Warwick on “Retailing and Local Planning” was notable for the practicality of its approach and its determination to avoid suffocation by excessive concentration on gravity models. Useful contributions were made by a number of people concerned with various aspects of the development of retailing facilities. The conference is discussed here by Patrick McAnally, (Research Department, John Lewis Partnership) who acted as Chairman of the Programme Committee for the meeting.

How have department stores fared over the last five years? Patrick McAnally suggests that there has been something of a renaissance, that a newer generation of store has developed alongside the old one. Some of the new ones include Fenwicks and John Lewis at Brent Cross, Debenhams in Stirling and Bentalls in Bracknell — stores which by any standards are as much part of the 1970s as the latest hypermarket.

Time was when the lot of the department store was not a happy one. Its glorious past contrasted unhappily with its demise, and until recently, it seemed that the department store had only one fate: to comply with the laws of gravity. However, the results of an URPI workshop, “Planning for Department Stores” seemed to note the beginning of a recovery. The response to this apparently unprecedented move — a workshop about department stores and their particular planning needs — was very well attended and the results were optimistic. The main points of the conference concerned the problems of attracting a department store into town centres, something of importance to local authorities who are facing pressure for these stores from public attitude surveys. Of course, the department stores themselves are equally concerned with finding suitable sites. A report on the findings and papers held at the workshop have been published by the Unit for Retail Planning Information (URPI UIO), Victoria House, 26 Queen Victoria Street, Reading RG1 1TG, Price £6.40 to members and £10.90 to non‐members.

Communications regarding this column should be addressed to Mrs. Cheney, Peabody Library School, Nashville, Tenn. 37203. Mrs. Cheney does not sell the books listed here. They are available through normal trade sources. Mrs. Cheney, being a member of the editorial board of Pierian Press, will not review Pierian Press reference books in this column. Descriptions of Pierian Press reference books will be included elsewhere in this publication.

Differentiation is an important dimension of organizational structure, as it is the building block of organizational structure upon which organizations are based. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the nature of differentiation in central libraries of leading universities in Pakistan.

Multiple quantitative methods were used to carry out this research. Structured questionnaire, perusal of organizational documents and observation of library section were used to collect data for this study.

Majority of libraries have divided the entire library operations into five to eight departments, and acquisition, circulation and periodical sections are created in almost all the libraries included in the sample. Unity of command principle is applied at only the section level, but dual chain of command is prevalent for personnel working under the two hierarchical levels, i.e. section head and library head, as they have to report to both of them. In majority of libraries, average span of control ranges from five to ten personnel for the library head and from six to seven personnel for the section head.

No such study is conducted in Pakistan. This study has identified the levels of differentiation and will guide academic library executives in creating a balance in the levels of differentiation to accomplish the objectives of the organization.