Abstract

There are many Africans who hold the view that the philanthropic underpinnings of the openness movement have been hijacked by commercial publishers, violating the altruistic principles of open access to advance a business model that guarantees exorbitant profits. To address these challenges, the University of Cape Town (UCT) developed a diamond open access publishing alternative via the continental publishing platform whose core goals are to advance inclusivity, equity and diversity. The platform uses the tenant infrastructure model as it offers participating institutions the prospect of enhancing their prestige through showcasing their academically sound scholarship.

This paper spotlights the success of one of its publications to showcase the impact of library publishing from two perspectives, firstly, the advancement of OA movement and secondly, the contribution of the publication to student success. Both perspectives demonstrate how libraries can reclaim the philanthropic underpinnings of OA and accelerate inclusivity, equity and diversity. The platform demonstrates its potential to disrupt the current alienating publishing ecosystem and resurect the founding philanthropic principles of OA.

Introduction

There are many Africans who hold the view that the philanthropic underpinnings of the openness movement have been hijacked by commercial publishers, dismantling the altruistic principles of open access to advance a business model that guarantees exorbitant profits. Unfortunately, this business model exacerbates the marginalisation and exclusion of the African research voice. To address these challenges and to ‘denorthernise’ the current publishing ecosystem, the University of Cape Town (UCT) exploited the diamond open access option as a publishing modality to advance social justice; to advance inclusivity, equity and diversity. The development of the continental publishing platform1 (based on principles of Ubuntu (we are all part of the same village, there is a universal bond of sharing) was intended to open avenues for the dissemination of African scholarship.

Definition of social justice

At the epicentre of this presentation is the concept of social justice. For the purposes of this article, a simple definition of social justice is presented. Social justice is viewed as the act of being fair and equitable and breaking down barriers to unfair practices and inequalities. It is associated with the notion of equity of opportunity. Drawing from Rawls (Follesdal, 2014) posit, it is advanced that while the principle of inclusivity is central to social justice, so too is the principle of dismantling structures that perpetuate inequality. The theory of social justice is centred on the notion that a society cannot be just until there is equity and that will include equitable access to scholarly literature.

As an academic library, it is strongly asserted that there is an obligation to ensure inclusive and equitable access and dissemination of research. Unfortunately, global north ‘architectured’ models such as transformative agreements and APCs do not uphold the principles of equity and inclusivity: in fact, it has the opposite effective of expanding the gulf between the Global North and Global South. The proposed continental platform attempts to deconstruct the inequalities that are so embedded in the current publishing ecosystem and to reconstruct a forum that nurtures and grows the open dissemination of African scholarship.

Core principles

In alignment with this quest for a social justice driven publishing modality, the following core values and goals are associated with the platform:

• Academic rigour is not compromised

• Commitment to adoption of Diamond Open Access model

• Advancement of diversity, equity and inclusion

• Commitment to adhering to social justice principles

• Commitment to nurturing the next generation of African researchers

• Commitment to growing African research output

• Promotion of unhindered participation in the dissemination of African scholarship

• Improvement in the visibility and discoverability of African scholarship

• Enhancing institutional reputation through showcasing of their research output

• Enhancing institutional prestige through showcasing of their research output.

Tenant model

The platform uses the tenant infrastructure model as it offers participating institutions the potential of enhancing their prestige through showcasing their academically sound scholarship. In this multi-tenant architectural model, there is a single software instance that serves multiple tenants (or institutions).

According to Raju, Claassen and De Lillie (2023), the model facilitates the building of communities of practice with like-minded participants coming together to advance the sharing of African scholarship. A typical example would be developing a community in support of the publication process, e.g. developing a template for layout editing. Some of the other challenges that the platform addresses are that of capacity, here reference is made to the ability to manipulate the software for the delivery of a service. Infrastructural challenges have always been a thorn and so too are issues of affordability, sustainability and future proofing – these issues are addressed via the platform.

One of the foundational pillars of this model is to offer  each participating institution the opportunity to retain their identity. If effect, the participating institution will make use of the common base of the platform and, the look and feel of its journals and books will be reflective of the institution. The aspiration is for participating institutions to take ownership of their segment within the platform while showcasing its research productivity. The prestige of the participating institution needs to be upheld which, it is believed, t the platform delivers.

A platform for inclusivity and equity

The fundamental pillar of the platform is the commitment to adopting the Diamond Open Access route. However, there is acknowledgement that there must be some element of flexibility without too much of a compromise. The concept of making a profit is totally forbidden. The creation of the platform is driven by the need to provide researchers with vastly improved opportunities to openly share their scholarship and, in the process, address the myriad challenges that beset the Continent.

Impact of Library Publishing

This platform was developed by the University of Cape Town to disrupt the current commercial model. The scope was expanded to include all academic or research institutions on the Continent. Although the Continental Platform is still in its fledging stage, UCT Libraries hold the view that the platform has and will continue to have an impact on publishing on the Continent. The better part of the rest of this presentation will focus on the impact on student success. What will be shared is the publication of a book to demonstrate the impact of publishing open access.

Before sharing the UCT examplar to demonstrate student impact, it is worth noting the impact of the platform in influencing government policy. After many training sessions with institutions in Namibia, all of the major public universities in Namibia have embraced open access publishing and are now are using the platform to publish journals. The Namibian government ackonwledges the significance of publishing open access and is in the midst of passing legislation making it mandatory to publish open for all reseach funded by the government.

To ensure successful adoption of the Contnental Platform (APOS), a number of training session were held with interested persons/institutions. The Hewlett Foundation has funded a training workshop to increase the number of countries that are publishing on the platform. In Zimbabwe, three insitutions are using the platform and a fourth is in preparation. An insitution in Cameroon is publishing in French. Post the Hewlett Foundation training, institutions in Ghana, Nigeria, Gambia, Kenya and Rwanda are being capacitated to publish on the platform. It is anticipated that institutions from these countries will have titles on the platform within the next 12 months.

UCT publishing programme

UCT Libraries publishes 6 journals and has published 25 books. There will be a spotlight on the success of one of its publications to showcase the impact of library publishing from two perspectives, firstly, the advancement of OA movement and secondly, the contribution of the publication to student success. Both perspectives demonstrate how libraries can reclaim the philanthropic underpinnings of OA and accelerate inclusivity, equity and diversity.

Constitutional law for students

The Constitutional Law for Students textbook is a diamond open access publication that addresses the issue of equity, inclusion, development, and empowerment. This book is written for students by students in support of a complex subject in the Law Degree in South Africa. The book had a soft launch in 2019 at the SPARC Africa Open Access Symposium. The hard launch was in March 2020 and the book has, until May 2023 solicited 150,780 downloads. Of the 150,780 downloads, 101,470 (67.3%) is from within the South Africa and the other 49,310 (32.7%) is from the rest of the world including Global North countries.

As can be seen from the Graph 1, there is a steep rise in the downloads just before the examination period. One can safely infer that students are using the book in preparation for the examinations.

Graph 2 highlights that there is a relatively high number of downloads from across the world which demonstrates that this book is compliant with the philanthropic elements of the open access processes, that is, free to the reader and with an open license.

As can be seen, there is a relatively high number of downloads from across the world which demonstrates that this book is compliant with the philanthropic elements of the open access processes, that is, free to the reader and with an open license.

Besides the number of downloads, what has been the impact of Constitutional Law for students at UCT? The authors did a deep dive into the possible impact of the book on student pass rates at UCT. The data for analysis was obtained from the University’s student administration system (PeopleSoft) and extracted by the relevant authorities. It is acknowledged that there are numerous variables that contribute to student success.

Given that there was a soft launch of the book in 2019, this year was used as the separation between the pre- and post- periods. As can be seen in Table 1, the average percentage pass of Black students for the period 2016-2018 was 65% and the average for the period 2020-2022 was 74%. This is a significant increase post the launch of the textbook. In the years 2021 and 2022, the percentage pass was 80% for each of year.

Table 1: Black student pass rates

One of the assertions made by the authors was that student pass rate was influenced by access to critical information resources. Hence, they drilled down further to test this assertion. It must be noted that a substantial number of Black students are funded by the National Student Financial Aid Scheme (NSFAS). The limited NSFAS funding allocation has forced students to make choices between the purchase of textbooks and other essentials, such as food and accommodation. Given this dilemma, the authors analyzed data relating to the success rate of NSFAS students. For the period 2016-2018, the average pass rate was 14.4% (see table below) and the pass rate post publication was 32%. This is an indication of more than 120% increase in pass rate of the Black students on government funding.

Table 2: Pass rate of Black NSFAS students

The relatively high number of downloads and the inferred contribution to student success is viewed as improved impact of the publication. The philanthropic principles of open access are evidenced in the example of this book.

Summation

The development of the Continental Platform is intended to disrupt the current alienating publishing ecosystem and resurect the founding philanthropic principles of OA. This alternate publishing model brings equity and inclusion to the current publishing ecosystem and provides unhindered dissemination opportunities for African scholarship. It embodies the principles of social justice providing a publishing modality for Africans to share their research and contribute to the world’s knowledge production but more importantly, contributing to addressing the challenges that beset the Continent.