General FAQ

Why is Berghahn opting for a subscribe-to-open model?

As a scholar-led publisher whose mission is to advance scholarship and disseminate knowledge, we are supportive of open access aims and respectful of open access policies. However, given the lack of funding particularly in the social sciences and humanities and the inequities in how those sparse funds are allocated, we advocate for funding models that do not place the financial burden on the author, as APCs do. In addition, we maintain that librarian selection plays an important role in the curation of content for researchers and so we support approaches that preserve their role in the process in addition to those intermediaries, such as subscription agents, who reduce the related (and considerable) administrative burdens. Subscribe-to-open is a compelling model because it seeks to take what is good and working well in the current system and applies it to achieving a sustainable and more universal model of open access across publications and publishers of all sizes.

Why is Libraria opting for a subscribe-to-open model?

As a community of global researchers, Libraria’s goal is to create a model that preserves the rich and diverse scholarly communications landscape that includes libraries, journals, societies, publishers, and intermediaries of all sizes. The S2O model provides a simple and straightforward means of achieving open access, based on best practices that are rooted in existing resources, journals, and processes.

What is subscribe-to-open?

Subscribe-to-open is a model of sustainable open access for scholarly journals in which institutions continue to “subscribe” to the journals that their communities value at similar prices and with the same quality as when those same journals were accessed under a conventional subscription. Subscribe-to-open is a form of subscription that allows libraries to direct funds through the same subscription channels routinely used to provide journal access to their own researcher community, while also supporting the journals’ readership across a wider community as an open access publication. In addition, if an institution has also established open access funds to support transitional initiatives or author open access publication, then these funds may also be used for this model through a simpler, journal-level process.

What license is supported by the Berghahn subscribe-to-open model?

Authors retain the copyright in their works and may select one of three Creative Commons licenses for the publication of their works.

Learn More about License Options

How can researchers support Berghahn Open Anthro?

Researchers can support the BOA-S2O initiative by contacting their libraries directly or filling out a recommendation form.

Any questions?

We welcome your feedback and any additional questions you might have. Please feel free to email us: info@berghahnjournals.com