Category: Open Access

Featured Post

Call for Editors – Journal of Deliberative Democracy

The Journal of Deliberative Democracy is pleased to invite expressions of interest for the editorship of the journal. The new editorial team is expected to serve from April 2023 to April 2026. Multi-institutional and multi-country bids are encouraged but not required.

Established in 2005 (originally as the Journal of Public Deliberation) the journal is a forum for the latest thinking, emerging debates, alternative perspectives and critical views on deliberation. It publishes on all theoretical and methodological traditions and aims to broker knowledge between scholars and practitioners of citizen engagement.  Supported by the NewDemocracy Foundation, the International Association for Public Participation and the University of Westminster, the journal is fully open access, with no fees for authors or readers.  Articles are made available as soon as they are ready to publish in order to prevent delays in making content publicly available, and the journal also publishes themed Collections. 

The journal also publishes The Deliberative Democracy Digest blog.

Published by the University of Westminster Press, the journal is listed in the Directory of Open Access Journals, EBSCO and the Norwegian Register for Scientific Journals, and is included in Science Open.  It has a global audience across 190 countries and achieves average usage figures of over 16,000 per month.  This is an opportunity to oversee the next stage of development of this established and respected journal on a topic of increasing importance internationally.

General responsibilities of the Editor include:

  • Assisting in the peer review of scholarly submissions via the Janeway manuscript submission system
  • Overseeing new Collections
  • Being the focus of editorial activity in their speciality, working to enhance the journal’s visibility and reputation in the field
  • Actively recruiting authors to contribute to the journal
  • Assisting in the framing of journal editorial policy and development of the journal
  • Assisting in the appointment of other editorial team members, ensuring members reflect the diversity of the field and the range of perspectives within the community
  • Attending Editorial Board Meetings
  • Representing the journal and promoting it wherever possible

EOIs should not be more than 500 words and should cover the following topics:

  • Names and institutional affiliations of the proposed editorial team
  • Reasons for editing JDD
  • Priorities for the JDD in the next three years
  • Plans for the Deliberative Democracy Digest
  • Institutional resources available to support the journal (JDD is funded by the newDemocracy Foundation, IAP2 and the University of Westminster Press but identify possible support from your institution/s like teaching relief, financial and other in-kind resources).

The journal invites EOIs to be submitted on/by 30 October 2022. 

Shortlisted candidates will be interviewed in November.  

All enquiries and EOIs should be directed via email in the first instance to:

Philippa Grand

Press Manager

p.grand@westminster.ac.uk

Momentum at a New University Press: Revisiting the UWP Story
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Momentum at a New University Press: Revisiting the UWP Story

Reflecting on the merits of consistent publishing activity and its multiplier effects – some reflections on UWP’s growth on the Ubiquity Press blog from the University of Westminster Press: ‘Thanks a Million: Momentum at a New University Press‘

Interesting to compare with the view in September 2015 ‘Setting up a University Press in the Digital Age’ and again as recently as May 2019, ‘Setting up a University Press in the Digital Age Revisited‘ when a fuller UWP timeline was presented.

Still unconfirmed but possible we will be able to announce in July 1.25 million views and downloads to end June but we have to wait for the data which may or may not confirm that!

Andrew Lockett, Press Manager

A Cool Million: UWP Reach Readership Landmark
Featured Post

A Cool Million: UWP Reach Readership Landmark

Over 1 million views and downloads have now been achieved by the University of Westminster Press since publishing its first journal issue in September 2015. (Figures end April 2021). The graphic presenting the following (and more) can be downloaded from our website.

Total Readership: 1,089,280

Books: 560,573

Journal Articles: 528,707

Readership by Nationality (estimate, where recorded) from 197 countries and territories.

1. UK 2. USA 3. Canada 4. Germany 5. Brazil 6. China 7. Australia 8. India 9. Italy 10. Spain 

Authors of New Publications: 276 unique authors from 38 countries, recorded by institution or current domicile.

Publications total:

35 books and 7 policy briefs

192 new journal articles from 2 new titles launched and 3 existing journals new to UWP

719 archive journal articles and 5 books distributed

Most Popular Book Titles: (1) Critical Theory and Authoritarian Populism (ed. J. Morelock) 68,260 views/downloads (2) The Propaganda Model Today (ed. J. Pedro-Carañana et al.) 63,353 (3) Critical Theory of Communication (C. Fuchs) 37,350.

Top Journal Titles: Westminster Papers in Communication and Culture (290,505 since 15/9/2015), Entertainment and Sports Law Journal (165,847 since 26/06/2016) and Journal of Deliberative Democracy 55,787 (since 28/08/2020).

UWP Series: ‘Critical Digital and Social Media Studies‘, 20 titles: 353,317; ‘CAMRI Policy Briefs‘, 7 titles, 44,413; ‘Law and the Senses‘ 24,102 (3 titles).

Context: UWP was established by a University steering group in 2014, hired its first part-time employee in February 2015 and published its journal issue in September 2015 and first book in October 2016. Its website went fully live on 12 May 2015. UWP has worked with platform providers Ubiquity Press and more recently for journals since 5 January 2021 Michigan Publishing/Janeway. It has functioned as a mixed model diamond open access publisher supported by income from book sales, central university and departmental contributions, one-off external university and grant-holder donations and library membership collective funding notably Knowledge Unlatched’s ‘Select’ programmes for individual titles. Many of its publications are in the area of media and communications but it has published book titles in history, philosophy, geography, education and politics. Its activities are overseen by a single UWP Editorial Board and it works within Research and Scholarly Communications, of the Research and Knowledge Exchange Office, Student and Academic Services, University of Westminster.

UWP is considered to be a ‘New University Press‘, digital-first with open access as a key principle. Its logo is a ‘W’ consisting of an open laptop and an open book.

Thanks to our editors, authors, peer reviewers, UWP editorial board members past and present, series board members and our partners Ubiquity Press (books and website) and Michigan Publishing Services and Janeway (journals) and all our colleagues at the University of Westminster for helping UWP reach this landmark.

Featured Post

New Jisc University Press Toolkit: Introduction – Webinar Event

We are advised by Jisc that there are still a few places remaining for this webinar event on new university presses at which UWP will be represented by their Press Manager. See here for the Toolkit.

When? Tuesday 8 June 2021, 14:00-15:30 (BST).

What follows is information from Jisc verbatim.

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In March 2021, Jisc launched a toolkit to support new and existing university
and library open access publishing ventures. The toolkit was developed with the
input from an international editorial advisory board consisting of University
Presses and other experts in the field.

This webinar will discuss the aims and objectives of the toolkit,
including a short walkthrough, followed by a panel session featuring members of
the Editorial Advisory Board.

Andrew Lockett, Press Manager, University of Westminster Press, Kate Petherbridge,
White Rose Libraries Executive Manager, White Rose University Press Lara
Speicher, Head of Publishing, UCL Press Graham Stone, Subject matter expert (OA
monographs), Jisc Alison Welsby, Editorial Director & Senior Commissioning
Editor, Liverpool University Press Sofie Wennstrom, Managing Editor, Stockholm
University Press.

The session will be Chaired by Eelco Ferwerda, Consultant, formerly of
OAPEN/DOAB.

This event will be of interest to university press staff in existing
presses, as well as library, academic and senior university staff who are
considering setting up their own press. We also hope that the toolkit is
transferable to the wider community, e.g., those wishing to set up academic-led
publishing and presses that are considering the transition to a fully open
access model.

Please visit the URL below to book for this free online event.

University of Westminster Press to partner with Michigan Publishing Services and Janeway Systems for Open Access Journals
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University of Westminster Press to partner with Michigan Publishing Services and Janeway Systems for Open Access Journals

London, UK and Ann Arbor, MI, USA – 10 December 2020

The University of Westminster Press and Michigan Publishing Services working with Janeway Systems digital journals publishing platform have reached an agreement whereby they will partner to publish UWP’s six scholarly journals from January 2021.

Andrew Lockett, Press Manager (University of Westminster Press) warmly welcomed the new arrangement: ‘Michigan are at the forefront globally of the innovation and development of academic library publishing services and together with Janeway represent an exciting opportunity for UWP’s activities to be part of the development of sustainable public open source scholarly communication infrastructure. We are excited at the prospect at learning from and working with two innovative teams that share our values and to further enhancing the impact, reach and quality of our new and established journals’.

Jason Colman, Director of Publishing Services (Michigan Publishing) said: “We’re delighted to form this new partnership with the University of Westminster Press and Janeway, who share our commitment to an open and community-owned future for scholarly publishing. We look forward to seeing UWP journals made available to readers on Janeway very soon.”

“We’re very excited to be working with the University of Westminster Press” added Andy Byers, Senior Publishing Technology Developer at Birkbeck, University of London, “and look forward to expanding our existing relationship with Michigan Publishing.”

Additional Information
As one of the UK’s first fully open access university presses, the University of Westminster Press has been publishing open access journals since 2015 and open access books since 2016 achieving 850,000 views and downloads thus far for its publications in the process across its books and journals. It has published 170 new journal articles with an archive of 719 articles publishing 33 new books and 6 policy briefs launching the new journals Silk Road – A Journal of Eurasian Development, Anthropocenes – Human, Inhuman, Posthuman and (forthcoming in 2021), Active Travel Studies. Its 2020 catalogue recently released was its third and its book publishing and general website continues in its current form with Ubiquity Press.

Michigan Publishing Services is a team of librarians and publishing professionals offering a suite of publishing services to the University of Michigan community and several other partners in the UK, US and worldwide. Its Fulcrum platform offers infrastructure and services that enables the full richness of author’s research output to be published in discoverable, durable, accessible and flexible form. From 2021 Michigan Publishing Services will migrate its own, more than 40 mostly open access journals, to the Janeway Digital Platform.

Janeway is a digital platform designed for publishing scholarly research material. Launched in 2017, the platform provides a workflow for the submission, processing and presentation of scholarly materials. It was developed by Professor Martin Eve, Mauro Sanchez and Andy Byers at the Centre for Technology and Publishing, Birkbeck, University of London, and the Open Library of Humanities, UK. Janeway is currently used by many publishers and libraries including Michigan Publishing Services, UCL Press, the Open Library of Humanities, Huddersfield University Press, Iowa State Digital Press, the University of Essex, the University of West London and California Digital Library to host its recently launched Preprint service Eartharxiv.

UWP, #openaccessweek2020: a raincheck

UWP, #openaccessweek2020: a raincheck

At the end of #openaccessweek2020 honoured to reflect that since September 2015 open access imprint @UniWestPress has published 254 unique editor/authors in our journals and books from 34 countries. That’s 32 books (incl. edited), 6 policy briefs and 5 distributed titles; 131 new journal articles also making available 719 archive journal articles.  

Today we have just had certain confirmation that we have hit over 750,000 views and downloads for our publications already, close to a 50% increase in less than a full year. Over 20% of UWP’s unique authors are University of Westminster authors with on the other hand 58% of contributions originating from outside the UK. Many authors (75) have worked with us more than once. One of our journals Silk Road is based at Westminster International University in Tashkent.

It’s not all about quantities. Our books have been translated into Spanish, Chinese and (shortly) Turkish; one has won a Latin American prize. We’re proud of our diverse range of authors from the global south, Europe, from all corners of the English-speaking world, feminist writers and early career research authors, the academic stars of the future as well as – Jurgen Habermas, Antonio Negri and Jean-Luc Nancy contributors to our list.   

It would not have been possible without support of our authors and editors @UniWestminster @UniWestLib @ubiquitypress the Research Environment and Knowledge Exchange Team at Westminster and the UWP editorial board.