CARL Releases New Brief on the Unsustainability of International Journal Costs

February 15, 2018. – The Canadian Association of Research Libraries (CARL) has released a new brief entitled Responding to Unsustainable Journal Costs, which addresses the increasingly alarming situation of escalating subscription costs for international journals.

Authored by CARL Research Associate Kathleen Shearer, with input from the Canadian Research Knowledge Network (CRKN), the brief provides an overview of the current situation and discusses the systemic issues contributing to the problem. While this issue is not new for libraries – they have been dealing with it for decades – it is now getting to a point of crisis. The aim of the brief is to raise awareness with the broader community and define an appropriate national response.

Although the library community has been actively working to mitigate the increasing unsustainable situation through redistribution of library budgets, journal cancelations, and consortial purchasing, more must be done. A coordinated approach is needed, and the brief provides recommendations for how the Canadian university community can work together to tackle this important issue.

> EN: Responding to Unsustainable Journal Costs: A CARL Brief (PDF)
> FR: Contrer les coûts insoutenables des revues savantes : Un mémoire de l’ABRC (PDF)

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CARL members include Canada’s twenty-nine largest university libraries as well as two national libraries. Enhancing research and higher education are at the heart of its mission. CARL develops the capacity to support this mission, promotes effective and sustainable scholarly communication, and public policy that enables broad access to scholarly information.

For more information:
Lise Brin, Program Officer

902.318.4485