Academic Publisher Tries to Silence Debate on Academic Publishing


An article in Times Higher Education reports that the editorial board of the journal of Prometheus: Critical Studies in Innovation, has threatened to resign. Why? The journal’s publisher, Taylor & Francis, delayed the publication of a special issue of Prometheus on the topic of academic publishing and profits and made changes to the issue’s articles, including removing the names of academic publishers. The publisher also inserted a disclaimer alongside the main article, saying that “the accuracy of the content should not be relied upon”. (via Sam Liao)

Taylor & Francis publish many philosophy journals. Any editors care to weigh in on this?

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Peter Gratton
Peter Gratton
9 years ago

Reblogged this on PHILOSOPHY IN A TIME OF ERROR and commented:
This is obviously troubling. And no doubt this shows Taylor and Francis–at least those who were behind this–don’t get academics or even media 101: far more people have now noticed this than would have otherwise and it demonstrates some of the very problems the issue set out to highlight.

Derek Bowman
Derek Bowman
9 years ago

Yes, but it remains to be seen how much such noticing will matter. How upset will T&F be if this scandal nets them some bad publicity, at the end of which some middle managers get reprimanded, people wring their hands, and their academic publishing business goes on uninterrupted? In that case, the lesson for publishers will be ‘Well, it doesn’t hurt to try…’

Joanne Gaudet
9 years ago

Based on my research into peer review, these dynamics are not surprising. The editor holds a relation of accountability to journal publishers/owners… Following are a few preprints from my research on journal peer review. Given your anchoring in philosophy, you should especially enjoy the second preprint on journal peer review as scientific object of study… philosophical and historical roots are fundamental to understanding peer review. I am working on a more extensive paper for the historical shaping of peer review…

http://hdl.handle.net/10393/31238 – Gaudet, J. 2014. All that glitters is not gold: The shaping of contemporary journal peer review at scientific and medical journals. uO Research. Pp. 1-23.

http://hdl.handle.net/10393/31161 – : Gaudet, J. 2014. Investigating journal peer review as scientific object of study. uO Research. Pp. 1-11.

http://hdl.handle.net/10393/31198 – Gaudet, J. 2014. How pre-publication journal peer review (re)produces ignorance at scientific and medical journals: a case study. uO Research.