Policy and Advocacy

The Policy & Advocacy Committee (PAC) works in partnership across the research ecosystem to advocate for policies which support researchers and the quality, integrity and sustainability of scholarly communication. In dialogue with governments, funders, institutions, researchers, and others, we aim to enable and drive change, particularly in support of emerging Open Science practices, including Open Access.

While representing the publishing community in all its diversity, we speak with one voice to governments, funders and university leaders, responding to their missions while advocating for policies which accommodate both change and sustainability.  We provide evidence on the value publishers add to research and its communication, and the wider contributions the industry makes to societies and economies.

Shaping the Future of Peer Review

ALLEA, the Global Young Academy (GYA), and STM today published the summary of a series of cross-sectoral workshops on the future of peer review in an open, digital world.

Experts from across the world, representing different cultural and disciplinary traditions of peer review, convened virtually in November 2020 to discuss the future of peer review in an Open Science environment. Participants explored which models can best serve and reward the research community in both an enhanced and sustainable way.

Peer review is an essential element of scholarly communication and documentation processes and contributes to ensuring the quality and trustworthiness of modern research. The traditional models of peer review are, however, challenged by new digital modes of publication, and the wider range of research outputs envisaged as part of the move towards Open Science.

The workshops comprised a broad array of experts and actors including researchers, research funders, universities, publishers, libraries, the Open Science community and trade bodies. Main themes and areas for further consideration that emerged during the discussions included:

  1. Clarifying peer review and the roles of different actors in the system
  2. Building capacity for peer review: training, mentoring, inclusion and diversity
  3. Leveraging technology to deliver enhanced peer review
  4. Changes should be motivated by a strong evidence-base, collected through research, pilots and experimentation

Read the full summary here