Open Access – Change Is Inevitable | Russian History Blog

"The tragic suicide of Aaron Swartz has brought a new round of discussion around the issues of open access academic publishing. Even the field of Russian history has gotten involved in the discussion, driven by Sean Guillory’s thoughtful blog post. The post has drawn comments from editors of Kritika, Russian Review, and Slavic Review, who have chimed in with their take on the economic difficulties of open access for the peer-review journal. My co-blogger Joshua Sanborn has already written about the issue at some length here at Russian History Blog. I heartily agree with the impetus for Sean’s original post and consider myself a supporter of the ideals of open access. Russian History Blog itself was created in part with hopes of tilting the field ever so slightly in that direction–something I have written about on a few previous occasions. I thought it worthwhile to add a few things to the conversation Sean has provoked. I consider myself far from expert on these subjects, but one simply cannot spend the better part of a decade in the Department of History and Art History at George Mason University without imbibing something of the thinking about these subjects that drive the work of the Roy Rosenzweig Center for History and New Media (RRCHNM). While I am happy to see this discussion within the framework of the field of Russian history, it is important that we recognize that this is a long and ongoing conversation within the digital humanities, and many of the arguments we see here are merely a rehash of those taking place within other forums. First, a primarily moral argument is made in support of open access ... Then, the complications, primarily economic, are raised ... By no means do I doubt either the good will of those in the conversation and or the veracity of the various costs/constraints that they describe... I would certainly like to know more, though, about the economics behind the more than 8,000 open access journals that already exist... However, I would suggest that we also at least look at the very foundation of this conversation–something that has been happening in the digital humanities. That is, the question has been posed in terms of the impact of open access on journals as they are currently published. Sanborn urges us 'to make sure that we don’t destroy the funding models of our journals before we have a secure path towards ensuring their viability over the long run...'  I do think we should recognize that our journals as they are currently published do impose certain costs on the academic and intellectual enterprise. These costs are most readily apparent in the limitation of readership, the primary concern of Guillory’s initial post,  but as Michael O’Malley (among others) has argued in a pair of blog posts, peer review itself imposes significant costs on the scholarly enterprise.  However, even if we leave aside the question of whether maintaining the status quo is desirable, doing so may prove impossible. Surely the major changes in the publishing world wrought by the digital revolution and the reduction of public funding for higher education and scholarship will impact our academic journals as well..."