Open Access: Balancing Mission and Business Models

Robert K. Merton identified four key principles—what became known as the Mertonian norms of modern science: communism, universalism, disinterestedness, and organized skepticism—in The Sociology of Science (1942). These principles, summarized by the acronym CUDOS, formed the cornerstone of the Mertonian paradigm, setting the normative structure of scientific inquiry and its unique reward system. They also align with Karl Popper’s concept of an Open Society, where no ideology, belief system, or institution is exempt from scrutiny. Merton’s principle of Communism (or Communalism) emphasizes that scientific knowledge is a collective product and should be freely shared within the scientific community and beyond. Scientific discoveries, as products of social collaboration, should not be treated as private property but as public goods accessible to all.

In the early 1960s, philosopher Michael Polanyi expanded these ideas by introducing the concept of the ‘Republic of Science’, which positioned scientific inquiry as a self-regulating community, operating like a republic. The core of this concept lies in the balance between individual autonomy, collaborative effort, and a collective commitment to truth. These foundational principles, bolstered by technological advancements, eventually fueled the rise of the Open Access (OA) and Open Science movements in the 1990s and 2020s.

Models of Open Access Publishing

1. Gold OA: Articles are made fully open access, indexed in directories like DOAJ, and authors typically pay an article processing charge (APC).

2. Green OA: Authors can self-archive their manuscripts in open access repositories, but readers may need to pay on the publisher’s site. An embargo period often applies, but no APC is required.

3. Hybrid OA: Authors have the flexibility to choose between the Gold or Green models, depending on their preference for immediate or delayed open access.

4. Bronze OA: A less common model where articles are available in subscription-based journals with limited open access and unclear licensing terms.

These models offer various pathways for researchers to disseminate their work, balancing the trade-offs between openness, costs, and sustainability.

One of the central critiques of the gold model is its reliance on APCs, which can disenfranchise researchers lacking institutional support. Additionally, the rise of APCs has inadvertently contributed to the proliferation of predatory journals, which charge fees without proper peer review or academic standards. Moreover, the double dipping practice, in which publishers charge both APCs and subscription fees for hybrid journals, exacerbates financial burdens on libraries and institutions, fueling calls for reform.

Diamond Open Access Model

A promising alternative is the Diamond Open Access model, where neither authors nor readers pay for publishing or accessing content. Supported by institutional or governmental funding, Diamond OA eliminates APCs, making it more equitable for authors from underfunded regions. Recently, initiatives like Plan S and the Gates Foundation have announced plans to end funding for APCs, which might lead to a potential shift toward broader adoption of the Diamond model.

Convergence into Open Science

In parallel, several movements—including Open Access, Open Source, and Open Data—are converging into the broader framework of Open Science, which seeks to make scientific knowledge more accessible, reusable, and inclusive. Open Science is an inclusive construct that promotes collaboration and involves societal actors beyond the traditional academic community.

According to UNESCO (2021), open science integrates various movements such as Open Access and Open Source to create a more transparent, collaborative, and accessible scientific environment. The rationale behind Open Science is both socio-economic: scientific research is considered a public good, and its creation stems from social collaboration, with ownership belonging to the global community. The COVID-19 pandemic accelerated the momentum of Open Science, redefining the roles of authors, researchers, and publishers in this new global research ecosystem.

The journey of open access exemplifies the continuous balancing act between making knowledge accessible and developing sustainable business models in academic publishing. As the landscape evolves, the mission of promoting wider dissemination of knowledge while addressing the financial and infrastructural challenges remains a core priority for the academic community.

Responding to my question on the overarching mission of OA, Guédon emphasized that the movement has been overly focused on economic models like Article Processing Charges (APCs), instead of prioritizing the broader goal of making knowledge universally accessible. He pointed out that shifting financial burdens from readers to authors—especially through APCs—creates new barriers, particularly for underfunded researchers. Guédon also highlighted how OA has been constrained by traditional publishing practices, failing to fully embrace the opportunities of the digital revolution. Ultimately, he stressed that OA’s mission should focus on removing barriers to knowledge, making its free dissemination the priority, while business models should remain secondary.

In Oldenburg’s Long Shadow and Looking into the Future through a Rearview Mirror

In May 2001, Dr. Jean-Claude Guédon delivered a presentation titled “In Oldenburg’s Long Shadow: Librarians, Research Scientists, Publishers, and the Control of Scientific Publishing” at the Association of Research Libraries (ARL) meeting. This presentation was later expanded into a monograph published by ARL to provoke further dialogue about the control and future of scientific publishing. Guédon critically examines the historical roots of publishing, tracing the power dynamics that continue to shape the dissemination of scientific knowledge. His central thesis is that the scientific community must reclaim control over the distribution of research by embracing Open Access (OA) and breaking free from traditional publishing models.

Guédon advocates for dismantling the long-standing influence of Oldenburg’s journal-based system and reimagining scientific communication to align with the opportunities presented by the digital age. He calls for practical steps to promote OA, ensuring that knowledge remains a public good, not a commodity controlled by commercial interests.

Reflecting on his journey in the OA movement, Guédon acknowledges a key regret: the adoption of the Article Processing Charges (APC) model. While OA was originally conceived as a mission to remove barriers to access, it became entangled in debates over business models, particularly APCs. He recalls a pivotal moment when PLOS, BioMed Central, and other early players legitimized APCs as a funding model. Guédon now regrets not opposing this direction, as it opened the door for commercial publishers like Springer to capitalize on the model, turning OA into another market-driven system.

Looking forward, Guédon stresses that OA needs to break free from the legacy structures of the print era. He emphasizes that scientific communication should be reshaped to fully harness the potential of the digital age, enabling more equitable and open participation in the global “great conversation” of science. To truly succeed, OA must not merely adapt old methods but fundamentally transform the ways in which knowledge is shared and discussed in the digital era.

From Scholarly Exchange to Commercial Monopoly: The Evolution of Academic Publishing and the Path to Diamond Open Access

Traditionally, journals have served three main purposes: granting intellectual credit to authors, archiving knowledge, and facilitating dissemination. In response to my question on whether the functions of journals have evolved, Guédon had this to say:

Indeed, these roles have shifted. Studies have shown that while we still use the term ‘journal,’ its meaning has subtly but significantly changed. The journals of the 17th and early 18th centuries, whether academic or small commercial publications, were quite different from today’s journals. For instance, commercial journals used to blend popular science with scientific news for professionals, a practice that has since become more specialized.

In the 19th century, many journals were established by scientists who wanted to defend minority positions in their fields. These journals, often created to advocate for specific scientific theories or approaches, sometimes faded away but also contributed to significant scientific debates. Over time, journals have evolved, but they’re still called ‘journals.’

A major shift occurred after World War II when commercial entities began to dominate the journal industry, sidelining learned societies. This change turned journals into commodities, where market share and reputation became entangled. The impact factor, introduced around the 1970s and 1980s, further complicated this dynamic by linking a journal’s market success to its perceived reputation, which then extended to the authors published within these journals.

This transformation has led to a troubling scenario where journals, once tools for scholarly communication and debate, have become market-driven commodities. As companies sought to control their markets, they began focusing on consumers and brand exclusivity, often marginalizing smaller journals.

Two conflicting goals emerged: market share and academic reputation. These objectives were reconciled by using tools like the impact factor, which linked a journal’s influence to its market success. High impact factors became a marker of prestige for both journals and authors, solidifying this market-driven approach.

As publishing became commercialized, companies sought to control their market by excluding others, as seen in the limited scope of databases like the Web of Science. This exclusion reinforced an oligopoly dominated by major publishers like Elsevier and Springer, further entrenching the “rich get richer” principle, or the Matthew Effect, where established players gained more prominence. The introduction of open access (OA) models—gold, green, diamond, etc.—aimed to counteract this trend. While the APC (Article Processing Charge) model initially promised a solution, it ultimately reinforced commercial interests, leading to unsustainable costs

Guedon says: I believe the future of OA isn’t determined by technology but by the choices we make. We must actively shape the future we want, and that future lies in the diamond model—no fees for authors or readers. Some might question the sustainability of this model, but I have ideas on how it can work. Open science is crucial because it encompasses the entire knowledge production cycle, beyond just publishing.

In this context, the reproducibility of research, often neglected in open access, is essential. Open science, of which open access is a part, should be supported by diamond journals. I’ve been deeply involved in promoting this model through initiatives like the European OPERAS project. The diamond model, in conjunction with green open access, can create a coherent and sustainable system for the future of scientific publishing.

To sum up, while green and diamond models might seem distinct, they can complement each other. Guédon envisions a network of open repositories maintained by libraries, where scholarly output is freely available, with evaluation and certification managed by the academic community rather than profit-driven journals. This approach would transform scientific communication into a more open, transparent, and collaborative process.

Challenging Academic Bias: Reshaping Research Recognition and Scholarly Reputation Systems

In the context of Guédon’s vision of a global, multi-layered knowledge-sharing system beginning with local institutional repositories, I raised concerns about the unconscious bias against publications from less prestigious institutions when compared to elite ones, which limits the recognition of valuable research. How can we address this imbalance, especially considering the exclusionary practices of systems like Scopus and the Web of Science?

Guédon responded by noting that these systems prioritize journals deemed reputable, often reflecting the interests of economically dominant regions like the North Atlantic. For instance, important research from underrepresented regions, such as cholera studies in India, is often overlooked because it lacks relevance to those regions. This issue perpetuates bias not only in terms of reputation but also through metrics like citation counts and impact factors, which distort the evaluation of research.

Additionally, researchers tend to focus on well-known topics or submit to highly regarded journals within larger academic communities to increase their citation count, further marginalizing lesser-known areas of research. This leads to a skewed knowledge production system, ignoring critical issues in many parts of the world.

Universities are often forced into ranking competitions based on impact factors and citation counts, which reinforces an inferiority complex, particularly among smaller institutions. This dynamic pressures universities to publish in prestigious journals like Nature or Science instead of prioritizing locally relevant research.

What is needed is a shift toward recognizing the intellectual and societal value of research emerging from these institutions. By creating a system where work from underrepresented regions is widely accessible, we can challenge the North Atlantic’s dominance in intellectual influence and address global needs more effectively. Open access has improved accessibility but has not sufficiently reshaped how reputation is built or how researchers are evaluated. Unfortunately, it has often adopted traditional metrics like impact factors, which diminishes its potential to revolutionize scholarly reputation systems.

To truly succeed, reputation systems need to be based on the quality and relevance of the work, not on traditional evaluation tools like impact factors that primarily serve the publishing industry.

Rethinking Intellectual Property in Open Access: From Ownership to Collective Knowledge

“Retain rights” has been a crucial component of the OA movement, advocating for authors to keep control over their work rather than transferring copyright to publishers as it empowers authors, promotes more widespread dissemination of knowledge, and is a key factor in realizing the original goals of the OA movement—ensuring that scholarly research is freely accessible and reusable without undue restrictions.  There are growing calls for copyright law reforms to support OA, though questions remain about how best to achieve this. In a recent article Esteve (2024) examines the right to benefit from science principle and points to competition law as another mechanism that could play a role in promoting open access.

The four theoretical frameworks behind copyrights: the labor-desert theory, the personality theory, the utilitarian theory, and the social planning theory have shaped the economic foundations of the copyright laws.  In this episode, I brought up the issue of copyrights to discuss the tension between traditional intellectual property rights (IPR) models and emerging alternative approaches in the context of Open Access (OA). While traditional IPR models, like labor-desert or utilitarian theories, continue to dominate, new voices advocate for a “cultural turn” in the treatment of knowledge, emphasizing collective ownership and open dissemination.

Guedon notes that solutions like Creative Commons (CC) licenses, while not perfect, address many of the challenges surrounding copyright in scholarly communication. He suggests that CC licenses offer practical tools for managing rights, although problems like predatory publishing remain a concern. Guedon also reflects on the broader issue of scholars being treated as authors, which conflates their role with creators of intellectual property, a mindset that emerged in the 19th century.

In his view, knowledge should not be owned, but rather seen as humanity’s collective asset. Scholars create provisional, evolving knowledge, not permanent works of art like novels. The current system, he argues, confuses these roles, complicating discussions around copyright.

He advocates for a shift towards recognition of scholarly contributions as part of a global community’s intellectual efforts, rather than reinforcing outdated norms of ownership and control.

Navigating Complexities: Guédon’s Vision for the Future of Open Access and Its Shift Beyond Market-Driven Ideologies

In response to my final question on the “future of OA,” Guédon outlined his views on the future of the Open Access (OA) movement and its evolving trajectory:

1. Complexity and Diverging Objectives: Guédon notes that within the OA movement itself, not everyone shares the same objectives. The future of OA is seen as involving complex interactions and confrontations between different stakeholders, such as publishers, researchers, and funding bodies.

2. Role of the Public Sector: A key argument is that the public sector is gradually realizing that knowledge production cannot be left solely to market forces. While market forces still play a role, Guédon believes that the neoliberal focus on market-based allocation is starting to lose influence, which could benefit the OA movement.

3. Impact of Neoliberal Policies on Scientific Publishing: Reflecting on the 1970s to 1990s as a period where neoliberal ideologies converged with commercial interests in scientific publishing, leading to the issues currently faced in the publishing world, Guédon noted how the rise of commercial publishers and the focus on profit maximization have negatively affected access to scientific knowledge.

4. Shifting Dynamics in Global Publishing: With research funding agencies, ministries of science, and higher education taking more active roles, especially in non-Western regions such as Latin America, Africa, and Southeast Asia, the landscape of scientific publishing is expected to shift.

Guédon also hints at the influence of China’s growing nationalistic stance, which could reshape the dynamics of global scientific publishing, forcing commercial publishers to contend with state interests.

5. The Impact of the Science Citation Index and Impact Factor: Guédon laments the creation of the Science Citation Index and the overemphasis on impact factors, which contributed to the convergence of intellectual and commercial goals, leading to the current challenges in academic publishing.

Overall, Guédon is cautiously optimistic that OA will benefit from shifts away from market-driven ideologies, and that continued advocacy is needed to bring about more equitable and sustainable open access to scientific knowledge.

Science, as a critical national resource, plays a pivotal role in driving innovation, enhancing productivity, ensuring national security, improving healthcare, and fostering economic growth. Recognizing this, national governments, along with intergovernmental and supranational bodies such as UNESCO, the European Union (EU), and the Group of Twenty (G20), acknowledge that the responsibility for scientific research rests with the state. This growing recognition may serve as a catalyst for advancing Open Access, helping to ensure broader dissemination of scientific knowledge.