New Commentary by Rick Anderson: “The Varieties of OA Resistance: a Response to Gareth J Johnson”

The following commentary was published today by Insights (a UKSG publication).
Title
The Varieties of OA Resistance: a Response to Gareth J Johnson
Author
Rick Anderson
University of Utah
Source
Insights, 31, 32
doi: 10.1629/uksg.434

Abstract

In a recent Insights article, Gareth J Johnson reports on research designed to determine the reasons that so many authors still fail to embrace open access (OA) publishing, despite many years of advocacy on the part of a dedicated community of OA practitioners. To answer this question, Johnson interviewed OA practitioners at 81 UK universities, seeking their insights into the attitudes of academic authors. In response to Johnson’s findings, this paper proposes three categories of authorial resistance, questions the effectiveness of asking third parties to interpret the thinking of authors (particularly when those third parties have a vested interest in the authors’ adoption of OA) and critiques some of the assumptions underlying the informants’ reports (most importantly, the assumption that resistance arises necessarily from misunderstanding or misinformation).

Direct to Full Text Article
See Also: “Cultural, Ideological and Practical Barriers to Open Access Adoption Within the UK Academy: an Ethnographically Framed Examination” by Gareth Johnson (June 11, 2018)

Filed under: Journal Articles, News, Open Access, Publishing, Reports