Fostering community empowerment through library social responsibility: a social capital approach in Malaysian academic libraries

This study examines the understanding and implementation of social responsibility (SR) practices in Malaysian public academic libraries. Focusing on how these initiatives contribute to community development and empowerment through a social capital perspective, the inquiry was guided by two research questions: (i) How do academic librarians engage in social responsibility activities? (ii) How do academic library social responsibility practices foster community empowerment through the development of community social capital? Qualitative data were collected from 19 library administrator interviews and 19 focus group discussions with professional and non-professional library staff. The findings reveal that community empowerment does not result from isolated programmes but emerges through the interplay of structural networks, shared cognitive understanding, relational trust, and dimensions of social capital that operate synergistically. The study demonstrates that Library Social Responsibility (LSR) functions as a social capital-building process rather than a set of discrete charitable activities. Empirically, it specifies how partnership brokering, participatory needs alignment, and accumulative trust translate LSR into sustainable community capacity. Theoretically, it offers a moderated contribution: an empirically grounded elaboration of existing social capital theory applied to LSR contexts, rather than a new paradigm. Practically, the findings provide actionable insights for library managers and policymakers to design sustained, community-responsive LSR initiatives that position academic libraries as strategic agents of social inclusion and collaborative community development.

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