Community-Governed and Community-Paid Publishing: Resilient Support for Independent Open Access Journals

Abstract

Community-driven open access journals foster the idea of a biblio-diverse publishing ecosystem and challenge the prevalent commercialization of academic publishing. But despite their importance, their existence is threatened. With little to no budget they operate mostly on "gifted labor" (Adema/Moore, 2018, 8) by their editorial teams and free support by public infrastructures. The first part of this article describes the model, key functions, and governance principles of community-driven open access journals within the business of global academic publishing. In promoting fair, resilient, and gratis open access, they contribute to the evolution of an inclusive and biblio-diverse publishing ecosystem. In the second part I will detail ways to support community-driven open access journals, e.g., through substantial funding, coaching, and networking. Following-up on this, I will end with introducing a network developed by the Alexander von Humboldt Institute for Internet and Society that provides information materials and increases visibility for these journals.