Investigating international academic librarian attitudes on copyright reform in support of open access

This paper reports on the results of a survey of academic librarians from 19 countries on their attitudes toward copyright reform in relation to open access to research. In addition to querying general attitudes toward the advancement of sustainable open access, the survey asks respondents about their level of agreement for three current copyright reform proposals in support of open access. The results of this research demonstrate endorsement from the academic librarian community for professional associations, in particular, to continue to advocate for the advancement of open access and to consider whether there are copyright reforms that are likely to encourage and support this objective. Survey responses also identify the need for any reform to address respondents’ distrust of publishers’ “exploitative” open access models.