[GOAL] Re: Open Access in Latin America: A paragon for the rest of the world

[bianca at ibict.br]

I would like to sign, how can I do it?

Bianca Amaro, Instituto Brasileiro de Informação em Ciência e Tecnologia,
Brasil



De:	Juan Pablo Alperin <juan at alperin.ca>
Para:	"Global Open Access List (Successor of AmSci)"
            <goal at eprints.org>, LibLicense-L Discussion Forum
            <LIBLICENSE-L at listserv.crl.edu>
Data:	17/08/2015 14:45
Assunto:	[GOAL] Re: Open Access in Latin America: A paragon for the rest
            of	the world
Enviado por:	goal-bounces at eprints.org



For those interested in sharing the message that Kathleen Shearer shared
with this list earlier this morning ("Open Access in Latin America: A
paragon for the rest of the world"), you can find the statement published
on The Winnower at the following URL:
http://dx.doi.org/10.15200/winn.143982.27959

Thanks.

juan

On Mon, Aug 17, 2015 at 12:19 AM, Kathleen Shearer <
m.kathleen.shearer at gmail.com> wrote:
      Open Access in Latin America: A paragon for the rest of the world

      August 17, 2015

      Latin America is one of the world’s most progressive regions in terms
      of open access and adoption of sustainable, cooperative models for
      disseminating research; models that ensure that researchers and
      citizens have access to the results of research conducted in their
      region.

      SciELO is a remarkable decentralized publishing platform harboring
      over 1,200 peer-reviewed journals from fifteen countries located in
      four continents - South America. Central-North America, Europe and
      Africa. Redalyc, based in Mexico, is another extraordinary system
      hosting almost 1,000 journals from fourteen Latin American countries
      plus Spain and Portugal. Governments around the world spend billions
      of dollars on infrastructure to support research excellence;
      platforms such as SciELO and Redalyc are extensions of this much
      larger investments in research. They reflect an enlightened
      understanding in Latin America that the wide dissemination of and
      access to research results is as important as the research itself.
      The rest of the world would do well to take note.

      In a recent blog post, these two initiatives were discredited by
      Jeffrey Beall. In the post, Beall compared the two publishing
      platforms to favelas, resulting in a mean-spirited insult to both
      favela dwellers on the one hand, and SciELO and Redalyc on the other.
      Rather than maligning these initiatives, they should be held up as
      examples of best practice for the rest of the world.

      Furthermore, just because some in North America do not know about
      SciELO and Redalyc does not render them irrelevant. This is an
      extremely elitist and narrow view of the world. Although these
      platforms may not be well known in some places, SciELO and Redalyc do
      raise the visibility and accessibility of the journals they host,
      particularly with their local communities. If these journals were
      published by the big commercial publishers, the vast majority of
      researchers in Latin America would simply not have access to the
      articles in those journals. What value is visibility, if people
      cannot access the articles?

      One of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, which were
      finalized on August 1, 2015, is to “Build resilient infrastructure,
      promote inclusive and sustainable industrialization and foster
      innovation”. Both Scielo and Redalyc are excellent exemplars of this
      type of infrastructure. These types of networked meta-publishers
      allow for central governance of policies, procedures and controls,
      but are intentionally decentralized to support the development of
      local capacity and infrastructure ensuring greater sustainability and
      alignment with local policies and priorities. What Beall advocates
      for, namely to let powerful foreign players come in and take over
      local capacity building, is exactly the opposite of what sustainable
      development is about.

      For these reasons, we believe that SciELO and Redalyc are very nice
      neighbourhoods indeed!

      Signed by,

      Juan Pablo Alperin, Public Knowledge Project and Simon Fraser
      University, Canada
      Dominique Babini, CLACSO, Argentina
      Leslie Chan, University of Toronto Scarborough, Canada
      Eve Gray, University of Cape Town, South Africa
      Jean-Claude Guédon, University of Montréal, Canada
      Heather Joseph, SPARC, United States
      Eloy Rodrigues, University of Minho, Portugal
      Kathleen Shearer, COAR, Canada/Germany
      Hebe Vessuri, Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico and Instituto
      Patagónico de Ciencias Sociales y Humanas, Argentina


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