Continuing our University Press Week series of articles, Thea Cook, Senior Journals Marketing Executive, reveals how Bristol University Press speaks up through our involvement in initiatives and efforts that promote equity and accessibility.
At Bristol University Press, we believe that the challenges our society faces can be better explored together rather than separately. This is why, as a press, we seek, celebrate and champion partnerships and initiatives that break down barriers and silos:
Championing transformative research partnerships
Bristol University Press was the first publisher to sign the Africa Charter for Transformative Research Collaborations. Co-created by Africa’s key higher education and science constituencies, the Charter aims to ensure that African scholars, institutions and knowledge take their rightful place in the worldwide scientific effort. It sets out key principles and aspirations for fostering transformative research collaborations for all parts of the scholarly ecosystem, including publishing. As signatories of the Charter, we have made a number of commitments, including commissioning more work led by African scholars.
Creating a forum for research that breaks academic silos
To address global social challenges, we need to break down the disciplinary barriers that divide academics from one another and from the practitioners working on the ground. Bristol University Press publishes several journals which span disciplinary boundaries. The open access Global Social Challenges Journal has trans- and interdisciplinarity at its heart. Its six Editors-in-Chief, from a range of disciplines and geographic regions, are supported by a diverse team of associate editors and editorial board members, some of whom are working outside academia.
Supporting alternative publication formats
The GSCJ also supports non-academic stakeholders and communities of practice. These authors can face a learning curve when conforming to an academic writing style. To make the journal more accessible, we offer shorter, alternative formats to ensure non-academics can contribute confidently, without compromising on our high editorial standards.
Many of our journals offer alternative publication formats, which are as rich and varied as their readership. Policy and Practice sections share policy ideas, practical developments and insights which may be useful to policy makers. Other journals offer a space for lively, evidence-based exchanges around specific topics or debates. Some of our journals also share the experiences of practitioners and service users. All of these sections are reviewed to ensure quality, and many are free to access by default.
Implementing equitable citation policies
We recognise that references cited in journals sometimes replicate and reinforce inequities by underrepresenting minority scholars. This why we encourage our authors to critically examine their references to include citations of equally rigorous and relevant scholarship by underrepresented authors. To support this effort, the reference lists in these journals are no longer included in the word count.
Making our publishing accessible to the world
We have partnered with Research4Life to provide free or low-cost online access to our journals in lower-income countries. We also work with OpenUp to convert a number of our books to Gold open access each year.
Striving towards equitable open access
One of the biggest criticisms of open access is that it gives an unfair advantage to wealthier authors and institutions, especially in the Global North. To publish an article Gold open access, authors have to pay an Article Processing Charge (APC). In exchange, the author’s work becomes freely available to everyone, increasing the work’s audience and impact. However, this can compound the disadvantage of authors from lower-income countries, where open access funding is much more difficult to come by.
To address this disparity, we offer full APC waivers to authors based in countries in the UN HDI’s Low Human Development category. We also offer a substantial discount to authors based in countries in the medium and high development categories.
Authors from wealthier countries can also struggle to pay APCs. This is especially true for authors working in underrepresented fields which don’t attract much funding. This is why our Global Social Challenges Journal operates a ‘pay what you can’ model.
For scholarly publishing to make a difference in supporting social change and social justice, it must be inclusive and have as wide a reach as possible. We firmly believe that the strength of our scholarly community lies in our ability to come together to overcome obstacles to create a more equitable world, where every voice is valued. We hope that our initiatives can remove obstacles to the sharing of knowledge and support our authors to make a real-world impact.
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