One of the four dimensions of quality in the SEP relates to Open Science. In their evaluations, research units are expected to provide insight into their policy and practice on Open Science – including Open Access - and its applications in research. In the case of evaluations in the humanities, a number of special circumstances come into play that influence the development of Open Science.
Aspects of Open Science
There are many aspects to the pursuit of Open Science.
- In essence, this comes down to the pursuit of greater openness and transparency-oriented practices in the organisation and conduct of research;
- publishing the results of this research in a way that is more accessible to a wider audience than classical publishing methods (i.e., usually in journals that can only be accessed through university libraries, based on a subscription model).
- striving for transparent forms of quality assessment of scientific communication, that is, open peer review.
- another key aspect of Open Science is the principle of open data, whereby the data collected in the research are also made accessible to third parties.
These objectives can take all kinds of forms. Some of the less familiar elements of Open Science include working with pre-prints, which allows scientific knowledge to be shared much more quickly with both academic peers and interested outsiders, by publishing manuscripts in institutional or disciplinary repositories. Another Open Science practice is the so-called pre-registration model, in which the researchers record, even before the research process has started, what the hypotheses are, how they think they can fulfil them, the research design, the data and cases needed to conduct the research, etc., so the achievement of certain outcomes becomes more transparent throughout the process, and to eradicate the dubious research practice known as HARKing (Hypothesizing After Results are Known).
Open Science in the humanities
To what extent do these issues play out in the humanities? The results of a lot of research in the humanities have always been (and continue to be) communicated to both the academic community and the interested general public, often through general books or journals that are accessible thanks to the use of national languages and relatively low (subscription) prices. Precisely because the humanities have always had and continue to have such an open relationship with their environment, research in the humanities is already quite ‘open’ by nature.
When it comes to open data, too, we encounter different situations in different areas of the humanities, but also in comparison to other scholarly fields. Within domains such as the digital humanities, archival science or empirical philosophy, for example, the principle of open data is widespread. In other domains, making research results open and transparent is less relevant, and general guidelines may feel like a straitjacket.
The fact that large domains of the humanities relate to (several of) the tenets of Open Science in a different, complex way means that research units should explicitly explain how they approach these principles in their self-evaluation, and not just in a defensive way. This requires careful argumentation, and the points outlined below may be of help when reflecting on the choices made.
Open Access
Although Open Access publishing has been the norm in the Netherlands and the EU for several years now, with a target of 100% of publications being made freely accessible, the situation for the humanities is more complicated. First of all, books and edited volumes were excluded from the ‘100% Open Access by 2020’ obligation by the minister in 2014; there has been no follow-up to this decision, either in terms of a new target date or in the form of additional policy to facilitate making books and edited volumes available via Open Access. In 2020, however, the NWO launched a project to facilitate Open Access for books and edited volumes (Open Access books | NWO).
A second complication lies in the different publication culture in various domains of the humanities (see profiles), where a key role is played by general journals, books and other hybrid means of communication (catalogues, articles, documentaries), and where adequate means are lacking to cover the costs of making these accessible via Open Access, not least because no agreements on this have been made with publishers (among others) at the national level.
In short, current Open Access policy is largely determined by the journal culture in the natural/biomedical and social sciences, meaning that the issues above tend to be overlooked. As a result, the discussion around Open Access output in the evaluation of humanities research is a complex one. On the one hand, there is the broadly supported, laudable aspiration of achieving 100% Open Access to publicly-funded research, a requirement that in many cases is imposed from above; and on the other hand, there is the risk of potentially curtailing high-quality publishing opportunities – and thus accessibility – due to the lack of adequate facilities in relation to publishing cultures in the humanities. It is wise to address these issues in the self-evaluation, and to show which position has been taken on them and with what result.
Open Data
The same applies to the data that are collected and created by researchers in the humanities. Much of this material is available in publicly accessible facilities, such as libraries, archives, museums, etc., and is thus already of an open nature. In that light, it is essential first to determine exactly which data need to be made open and which do not, perhaps because they are already in the public domain. This is an important task for data management. This process should be guided by the FAIR principles (‘Findability, Accessibility, Interoperability, Reusability’) and the GDPR. It should be added that digitally storing research data in line with the FAIR principles does not automatically imply that the data will be shared, i.e., made public. These issues are being tackled across the entire Dutch knowledge system, resulting in a number of different practices. There is no single, clear standard, either in the humanities or in other fields. It is important to remember that the nature of the material, in which aspects of privacy and data ownership play a role, can form a major obstacle to opening up the data. Attention could also be paid to the role of the data steward and ethical review committees in this process.