Do the editors know the owners of the journals they edit?!
Some commercial publishers exploit the goodwill of editors for the private benefit of the company owners. Few publishers are big enough to provide their own in house editors.
It is not clear that the civil war is between authors and editors. The editors are often authors too.
Perhaps what has happened is a breakdown of the civil (academic) society, where journals were owned and produced by the academic workers themselves.
The globalization and corporatization of academic production seems to follow the same pattern as the global food industry. To reclaim food sovereignty, we need to get back to work on our own farms, and grow our own food.
To reclaim academic sovereignty, we have to get back to work with our own small publishers, and grow our own journals. They can all be indexed and made accessible using open access software systems.
It is not that global systems are all bad, but losing all local production is definitely bad. The job of the modern world is to find a balance that is sustainable and spreads benefits to as many people as possible.
--
Peter J. Matthews, Chief Admin.,
The Research Cooperative,
Auckland & Kyoto.
Contact: researchcooperative [at] gmail [dot] com
