Montréal (Québec), July 8, 2015 – At a time when scholarly dissemination is facing major challenges, Érudit is carrying out an important study on Canadian scholarly journals in collaboration with several organizations involved in academic publishing.
The Canadian scholarly journal community, made up of 350 or so journals, is going through a period of unprecedented change since the advent of Open Access. The most fundamental transformation at stake, relates, no doubt, to the issue of open access to scholarly publications, as it calls into question the traditional subscription-based model. In order for scholarly journals to evolve and thrive, new business models must, thus, be considered. However, before setting up such models, it is essential to determine the profile of scholarly journals in Canada, including the financial impact of digital dissemination and Open Access.
Érudit, in collaboration with the Canadian Association of Learned Journals, the Federation for the Humanities and Social Sciences, Canadian Science Publishing, and a financial support from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council, have hired a team of independent consultants to undertake a study of the financial situation of scholarly journals in both official languages in Canada.
As a first step, managers of Canadian scholarly journals are invited to participate, until July 31, 2015, in the online survey (available at http://svy.mk/1CWzoRN); then, during the summer, forty in-depth interviews will be conducted with journals managers.
The report of the study will be made available in autumn 2015. The results will provide an accurate and up-to-date economic assessment for all Canadian research stakeholders, in order to endorse the search for new economic models which promote a transition to open access to scholarly journals.
Study Partners
Canadian Science Publishing is an independent, not-for-profit scholarly publisher dedicated to serving the needs of researchers and their communities.
The mission of the Canadian Association of Learned Journals is to represent, develop and support the academic community of Canadian learned journals in disseminating original research and scholarly information, and to promote intellectual culture in Canada and internationally.
Érudit, is the largest electronic disseminator of French-language and bilingual Canadian research results with more than 150 journals disseminated and 200’000 documents available on its platform.
The Federation for the Humanities and Social Sciences is the national voice and public policy advocate for Canada’s scholars, students and practitioners in the humanities and social sciences.
This study was financially supported by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council.
