Shaping the Future of Open Access Books: Recommendations for Open Access Book Policies

Abstract

Books continue to play an important role in scientific communication, especially in the humanities and social sciences. Unfortunately, open access in academic communication in the journal sector has progressed much further than in the area of books. The PALOMERA project investigates the reasons for this asymmetrical development and develops open access book policy recommendations for shaping the transformation towards an open access book system and bringing a strong and stable foundation and commitment to this important sector. 

This presentation will show which information sources were evaluated in the PALOMERA project, which methods were used to analyse over 500 policy documents from more than 30 countries, and, in particular, which recommendations for the design of open access book policies were finally deduced from our data. The centrepiece of the presentation are the policy recommendations for the development for open access books. They were developed from the data collected in the project (already existent policies, interviews, surveys and contextual documents) and address the relevant stakeholders in the field: research funding organisations, research performing organisations, infrastructure providers and libraries, policy makers and publishers. The last part of the presentation is dedicated to a critical assessment of future developments in the book market and ends with questions on the implementation of measures for more open access books.