Transformative choices towards a sustainable academic publishing system

Kayal, Mohsen; Ballard, Jane; Kayal, Ehsan

doi:10.24908/iee.2021.14.3.f

Cited by 3 publications

(5 citation statements)

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“…To address the identified ethical shortcomings of academic publishing, Kayal et al (2021) propose several "individual scientist level solutions". Among them, we can quote auto-publication, and the choice for more responsible journals-the latter sounds similar to consumer-based incentives.…”

Section: Enabling Individual-level Solutionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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The article by Kayal et al (2021) constitutes an important reminder to the scientific community of some ethical shortcomings of today's academic publishing system for which several solutions are proposed. In this short response, I discuss Latour's portrayal of scientists as "savage capitalists" to relocate a part of these issues in the practices held by researchers themselves.

…”

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confidence: 99%

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Investing in publication: Researchers as "savage capitalists"

Brun¹

2022

IEE

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The article by Kayal et al. (2021) constitutes an important reminder to the scientific community of some ethical shortcomings of today’s academic publishing system for which several solutions are proposed. In this short response, I discuss Latour’s portrayal of scientists as “savage capitalists” to relocate a part of these issues in the practices held by researchers themselves. By depicting scientists as capitalist agents publishing articles as investors awaiting returns in capital, I question the compatibility between the stated goal to transform today’s publishing system and a potential collective inertia rooted in personal and career goals. So-called “individual solutions” with deep collective and institutional roots are therefore calling for social momentum to effectively be activated; this vision could be translated into more specific goals for future research and actions.

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Section: Enabling Individual-level Solutionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…

…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Investing in publication: Researchers as "savage capitalists"

Brun¹

2022

IEE

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“…Researchers hence navigate a system in which their career aspirations are embedded-a system they know to be broken (Kayal, Ballard, and Kayal 2022). This leads to paradoxical behaviors; for example, they may publish articles in costly journals for the sake of career advancement, while also praising initiatives like Sci-Hub that illegally grant free access to those same articles (Resnick 2016).…”

Section: Where Are We Now?mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…We suggest considering the journal's business model, and more generally, the journal's publication ethics, to be an important criterion. Indeed, our submission choices can have a strong impact on the structure of the publishing system (Logan 2017;Kayal, Ballard, and Kayal 2022). Whenever we have a choice between more or less equivalent options, we can favor diamond, nonprofit and/or society journals over purely commercial journals.…”

Section: Support Healthy Journalsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Convincing scholarly societies or research institutions to give up their association with large commercial conglomerates would be a way to end this pointless "bleed-out" of academic funds (Haspelmath 2015;Wilson 2018;Kayal, Ballard, and Kayal 2022). Such organizations could  OPEN ACCESS -PTPBIO.ORG begin by making profit-sharing arrangements explicitly, which could in turn prompt their members to support a switch to ethical or nonprofit publishers, or even organize the publication of their journals themselves in a fair open access model (www.fairopenaccess.org).…”

Section: Discuss Switching To Ethical Publishing With Existing Journa...mentioning

confidence: 99%

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Ethical Publishing: How Do We Get There?

Racimo

Galtier

Herde

et al. 2022

Philosophy, Theory, and Practice in Biology

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The academic journal publishing model is deeply unethical: today, a few major, for-profit conglomerates control more than 50% of all articles in the natural sciences and social sciences, driving subscription and open-access publishing fees above levels that can be sustainably maintained by publicly funded universities, libraries, and research institutions worldwide. About a third of the costs paid for publishing papers is profit for these dominant publishers' shareholders, and about half of them covers costs to keep the system running, including lobbying, marketing fees, and paywalls. The paywalls in turn restrict access of scientific outputs, preventing them from being freely shared with the public and other researchers. Thus, money that the public is told goes into science is actually being funneled away from it, or used to limit access to it. Alternatives to this model exist and have increased in popularity in recent years, including diamond open-access journals and community-driven recommendation models. These are free of charge for authors and minimize costs for institutions and agencies, while making peer-reviewed scientific results publicly accessible. However, for-profit publishing agents have made change difficult, by co-opting open-access schemes and creating journal-driven incentives that prevent an effective collective transition away from profiteering. Here, we give a brief overview of the current state of the academic publishing system, including its most important systemic problems. We then describe alternative systems. We explain the reasons why the move toward them can be perceived as costly to individual researchers, and we demystify common roadblocks to change. Finally, in view of the above, we provide a set of guidelines and recommendations that academics at all levels can implement, in order to enable a more rapid and effective transition toward ethical publishing.

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