Obstacles to Open Access publishing for researchers with weak institutional ties - epistemic injustice in academic publishing

In October 2024, the TIB - Leibniz Information Centre for Science and Technology launched the IDAHO project, a groundbreaking effort to identify and describe barriers to open access publishing faced by researchers with weak institutional ties. In the frame of the IDAHO project, the term “weakly affiliated” encompasses a diverse group of researchers that may not have strong ties to academia but still engages in research and produces publications. The project adopts a comprehensive, multi-part exploratory methodology, combining both qualitative and quantitative methods to gain deeper insights into the research problem and focuses specifically on: independent researchers, citizens science, retired researchers, refugee scientists, researchers working for civil societies, industry enterprises, hospitals, non-profit and governmental organizations. In our presentation, we will share synthesized findings from ten qualitative interviews with targeted researchers, complemented by a global quantitative survey, uncovering the unique challenges researchers with weak institutional ties face in disseminating their research OA. We will also present the findings from qualitative interviews with journal editors, highlighting their awareness of identified obstacles, as well as the initiatives and strategies they employ to promote equality, inclusion, and the diversification of authors within their venues.