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Research Funders and the Transition to Open Access Books
By Niels Stern (Managing Director, OAPEN Foundation; Phone: +45 31384208) <stern@oapen.org> https://oapen.org https://doabooks.org
Why is the transition to open access (OA) for academic books happening at a much slower rate than for journal articles? We know that OA policies are key drivers to change, so how can we help those making OA policies include books as well?
What is a Book?
A book is a book is a book … In conversations with colleagues about OA and books, we have often had to pause and reflect on how we define the book. Even though we focus on academic books, agreeing on a definition that captures the varied typology of the academic book shaped by disciplinary traditions, culture, language, digital technology, etc., is difficult — if not impossible. However, in the PALOMERA 1 project, which I will tell more about below, we have agreed on a generic yet operational definition of the academic book: “monographs, book chapters, edited collections, critical editions, and other long-form scholarly peer-reviewed works.”
With an educational background in both the Social Sciences and Humanities (SSH), books have always played an important role in my life. But it was not until I joined a small Danish university press more than 20 years ago2 that I really began to understand the role of the book in the many — sometimes very niche — disciplines of SSH. Writing a book — especially a monograph — is very different to writing an article. We published around 60 books annually; some were 150 pages, others 1,500 pages. We also published around ten humanities journals. It goes without saying that the mere length of the book differentiates it from the article. But, moreover, as some SSH researchers put it, the writing of a book is part of the research process itself. Furthermore, the peer review process is often more extensive for books than for articles and the publisher is typically very involved in the editorial development of the book manuscript. Additionally, there is production, marketing, and distribution. Book publishing is special and exciting. I have had many, many meetings with authors about their book manuscripts and research projects, and the overwhelming engagement and excitement that mostly filled the air during such meetings was both inspirational and educational.
Bibliodiversity and OA Book Publishing
Although academic books mainly play a pivotal role in the SSH, they are also an integrated part of many STEM disciplines. As an example, in the OAPEN Library,3 which hosts more than 30,000 OA books, around 20-25% of the titles are STEM titles or STEM related, e.g., interdisciplinary. Over the years, studies have continuously highlighted the relevance of the book in scholarly communication.4
Following the Budapest Open Access Initiative (BOAI),5 many OA policies were developed and adopted by research funders and institutions. However, books were rarely included in these policies and strategies — despite their importance to the many disciplines within SSH. What were the reasons for this? What are the bottlenecks and challenges that prevent research funders and institutions from including books in their policies and strategies? Good guesses could include the abovementioned typology variation, the profound editorial engagement in book publishing, challenges related to publishing in non-English languages, potential royalties gained by authors, the symbolic capital of the book, the nature of the book industry and so on. All of this makes up a rich and diverse book landscape often referred to as bibliodiversity This is what makes books and book publishing complex to deal with from an institutional and funding perspective but at the same time essential to the nurturing of many researchers and research disciplines across the SSH domains. Moreover, the high institutional expenses relating to journal acquisitions and licenses, APCs, and Transformative Agreements have maintained the focus on open access to journal articles rather than on books.
Some research funder policies for OA books do exist in Europe (e.g., in the UK, Austria, Switzerland, and the Netherlands). The European Commission also has a clear OA mandate for books. But considering Europe as a whole, let alone the rest of the world, OA book policies are still few and not really aligned. Why is this so?
Searching for Answers — the PALOMERA Project
In the Horizon Europe work program 2021-2022, 6 an investigation into this question was called for. A group of 16 organizations led by OPERAS 7 and OAPEN 8 successfully answered to the call with a project named PALOMERA — Policy Alignment of Open Access Monographs in the European R esearch A rea — a two-year project that was kicked-off in January 2023.
Halfway into the project, over 600 documents relevant to the analysis of the OA book policy landscape in Europe have been collected. These documents have been included in an open Knowledge Base 9 attached to the OAPEN OA Books Toolkit. 10 The Knowledge Base is fully searchable and contains links to the documents that have been collected, including abstracts in English often attached with extracted snippets translated into English when required. The Knowledge Base will continue being developed through the second and final project year and sustained beyond the project by OAPEN. 11 In January 2024, invited stakeholders assisted in validating the data collection to minimize the risk of missing important documents and to ensure that the views and voices of all relevant stakeholders are represented as best as possible, promoting diversity, equity, and inclusion.
Furthermore, PALOMERA has also issued a survey which saw 454 responses and performed 39 in-depth interviews, and three group interviews. The data have been collected in European countries, but the methodology could equally be applied to other regions. It would indeed be a very valuable extension of the Knowledge Base to collect data from other regions in the world.
The collected data is currently being studied and analyzed using the PESTLE analysis framework which provides a methodology to investigate complex environments (like the OA books landscape) using an analytical lens around Political, E conomic, S ocial, Technological, L egal, and E nvironmental factors.12 This analytical framework will help us understand the importance and the nuances of each PESTLE factor for each major stakeholder group — both locally and internationally.
What Else to Expect from PALOMERA?
Based on the analysis that will be conducted, PALOMERA will provide actionable recommendations and concrete resources to support and coordinate aligned funder and institutional policies for OA books, with the overall objective of speeding up the transition to open access for books to further promote open science. The recommendations will address all relevant
stakeholders (research funders and institutions, researchers, publishers, infrastructure providers, libraries, and national policymakers).
One important resource that PALOMERA has already created and will further develop is the Funder Forum. It is a forum that convenes research funders and policymakers to discuss and exchange experiences on OA book policy development and implementation. The first Funder Forum meeting took place on 23 May 2023 and the second meeting on 20 November 2023. Both meetings saw participation from over 40 research funders and policymakers representing more than 20 countries. The engagement of the participants in the meetings was significant and showed a clear need for funders to come together to discuss policymaking for OA books amongst peers. From these first meetings, it has already been quite clear that some funders are advanced and experienced in their policymaking efforts in this field while others have not even considered developing policies. However, they all seem interested in learning and exchanging knowledge and experiences.
See You at Charleston?
During the final year of the project, the Knowledge Base will be technically improved, and more content will be added (for instance anonymized interviews). We will also see new content about funding and funder policies written for the OAPEN OA Books Toolkit that will draw on the findings of the project. The Funder Forum will continue to bring together funders and policymakers to increase the understanding of their needs and explore with them which resources are needed to align their efforts in developing and implementing OA book policies. We will also provide actionable and evidence-based recommendations for all stakeholders in the OA books landscape.
The project has an international dimension and seeks to interact with stakeholders beyond Europe. We have been very pleased to include North American participants in our Funder Forum meetings and our hope is to attract more international funders and policymakers and also to share our work with the library community. One concrete idea is to propose a North American funder panel at the Charleston Library Conference in November 2024. Fingers crossed. If all goes well, I will see you there!
We look forward to sharing all our results and recommendations with you. Stay tuned via our news service https://forms. gle/6DptBc8qSvhkP3AaA
Endnotes
1. https://cordis.europa.eu/project/id/101094270 and https://operas-eu.org/projects/palomera
2. Stern, Niels. (2021). A brief saga about open access books. https://doi.org/10.7557/11.5751
4. For example: Crossick, Geoffrey. (2015). Monographs and Open Access. http://www.hefce.ac.uk/pubs/rereports/Year/2015/ monographs/, Ferwerda, Eelco et al. (2017). A Landscape Study on Open Access and Monographs. https://doi.org/10.5281/ zenodo.815931, Oxford University Press and Cambridge University Press. (2019). Researchers’ perspectives on the purpose and value of the monograph. https://global.oup.com/ academic/pdf/perspectives-on-the-value-and-purposeof-the-monograph, Shaw, Philip et al. (2021). Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences Monographs: A Report on Publishing trends. https://www.oxfordpublish.org/news/item/monograph_ publishing_-_oicp_report_now_published/
5. https://www.budapestopenaccessinitiative.org/read/
6. https://cordis.europa.eu/programme/id/HORIZON_ HORIZON-WIDERA-2022-ERA-01-42/en
9. https://knowledgebase.oabooks-toolkit.org/
10. https://oabooks-toolkit.org/
12. Aguilar, Francis. (1967). Scanning the business environment. https://www.worldcat.org/title/scanningthe-business-environment/oclc/166317
