And now let's face facts

Abstract

The article analyses the Survey of Italian public libraries' preliminary report (July 2013). The survey was promoted by the Italian Centre for Book and Reading (Centro per il libro e la lettura) and by the Italian Library Association, and was carried out together with the Italian National Institute of Statistics (Istat) and the National Association of Italian Municipalities (ANCI). The author takes into consideration the methodological choices as well as the report's results, in order to bring out a realistic portrait of Italian public libraries and to reflect on their future perspectives – given the current international economic situation and the public policies' traditional rigidity.