NOTICE> Policy on Calls for Papers for Possibly Predatory Journals

Dear editors, dear colleagues

while I sympathise with the general tenor of this announcement and I am of course totally in favour of "denouncing" predatory journals or otherwise unethical behaviours, I feel that there are some misunderstandings and possibly misleading statements in this post. In the spirit of open and constructive debate on important issues such as publishing, which concerns our entire scholarly community, I hope that members of this community, such as myself, could share their experiences (be they negative or positive) and opinions about this matter.

First of all, if a journal “demanding an article processing charge (APC) for publication, sometimes in excess of a thousand US dollars” is regarded by definition as “predatory”, then the list of non-predatory journals would probably shrink to a dozen entries. Natively Open-Access journals are usually backed (financially and academically)  by strong institutions and learned societies, which pay for the publication costs. Most journals follow a hybrid system, as they charge either readers (or academic institutions and libraries, funded by taxpayers' money or private entities) or authors (more often than not funded by taxpayers' or private money, too, via their institutions’ funding or external grants). It is important to point out that the OA processing charges of the most reputable journals, published by top academic presses and often attached to a learned society, charge 2 or 3 times the amount that Religions currently charges, while many other charge about the same. The bottom line is, there are simply too few OA journals that apply a "0 charge" policy for OA, which are unable to meet the increasing demand.

If the problem is that Religions applies a (paid) OA-only policy, then my bet is that within a few years, many "traditional" journals will shift to the same model—the trend is clearly there. I'm not sure about what the solution to fix this problem could be. Somebody has to pay for the costs—no journal can publish for free in OA unless it is a not-for-profit entity. Who is going to pay for the IT and administrative infrastructure, editors, copyediting and proofreading, marketing, dissemination, printing, etc.? As much as I would like to have a universal OA publishing system for authors and readers, the money must come from somewhere. Even this very list encourages donations and charges for publishing job ads in order to ensure its smooth operations and survival. To accuse Religions of "misleading" readers by calling itself Gold Open Access is certainly a misleading accusation itself, which could equally be applied to several dozens "respectable"/non-predatory journals.

As for the minimal standards of peer review allegedly applied by Religions, as somebody who has been regularly bombarded with peer review requests from the same journal (for articles that were clearly of abysmal quality and not even fit for peer-review) over the past couple of years, and as the co-editor of a special issue that is currently being published, my own experience has been quite different. While I am at times annoyed by the many peer review requests and the apparent lack of filter, in the end, I am happy to be given the opportunity, as a scholar, to advise whether an article should be published or not. This strikes me as an application of the basic standards of academic evaluation and peer review. In support of the standards applied by the journal, I can say that me and the co-editor were entirely locked out of the peer review process of a paper until its final publication since the author was from the same institution as the co-editor, in order to avoid a perceived conflict of interest. For this and other papers, the whole process was conducted in a way that was no less professional and impartial than in other journals I have worked with as guest editor (in fact, I can say that the process is handled "by the book" with multiple steps taken to ensure that the reviewers' feedback is applied and, in case of disagreement with the guest editors, weighed by the general editors). 

I am aware that other colleagues may have had different experiences, and I am myself aware of some of the problems inherent with the model applied by Religions, on multiple levels. However, I reiterate the point that this problem is a complex one that cannot be reduced to a "good" vs. "evil" dichotomy by preventing colleagues from posting call for papers (ironically, our guest-edited special issue, almost entirely funded by my institution, has enabled at least three young PhD candidates/early career scholars to publish an OA article for free and in a quick manner).

Regards,

Andrea Acri

EPHE, PSL University, Paris

Dear H-Buddhism and colleagues, 

I wanted to first publicly state my support for this new policy. It seems well-reasoned and well-intentioned, and knowing the editors are themselves reasonable folks, I feel confident that any concerns will be resolved fairly and openly. 

In other words, no where in your original post do I detect that you have reduced the world to "good" versus "evil," relegating the journal Religions to the latter.

Having also served as a guest editor for Religions. I stand by the quality of the articles published in that special volume, but I will also admit that my experience with the journal was... weird. It is not one I would repeat or recommend to others. And, after the fact, having witnessed a long list of bad behavior and hearing horror stories from others, I would not recommend the journal as an acceptable place to publish one's work, which is disappointing.

Of course, I share Dr. Acri's concerns about reducing the world to simple binaries. And, yes, it takes money to run a journal. Inevitably someone is paying for even the best and most open of "open access" of journals. And no journal is perfect. The world is a confusing, imperfect, and inconsistent place. (If only there were a philosophical system that sought to explain the imperfections of this world?) But at some point, the criticisms and bad experiences add up to, if nothing else, a bad reputation. Religions has published some good stuff. They've also done some shady things. It may not be fair or "objective," but they've got a bad reputation now, and it doesn't seem unwarranted for the H-Buddhism editors to make this editorial policy, for Religions or any other journal.  

And, it's not like there aren't plenty of alternative, peer-reviewed, open-access journals out there being operated by not-for-profit entities and funded entirely via the generosity of donors. I'll resit the urge to do the obligatory institutional self-promotion. But do feel free to reach out to my colleague Dr. Natalie Quli and ask her about opportunities to serve as a special-issue guest editor for the Pacific World Journal.

Thank you,

Scott Mitchell

Institute of Buddhist Studies