Long-form open access can’t rely on unfunded mandates

The desirability of making monographs open access (OA) is not especially controversial. Publicly funded research should be available to the public, and widening access to that research has the potential to change who reads, uses and benefits from it.

However, as the recent Research Excellence Framework (REF) consultation showed, there remains considerable disagreement about how this might be best supported in practice.

Much of the progress around OA has been influenced by journal publishing. However, this model does not translate easily to SHAPE disciplines, in which long-form outputs remain central and raise different issues. This is exactly why the decision not to require these materials to be OA for REF 2029 availability matters. It reflects a recognition that the sector does not yet have the systems needed to make such a shift work at scale, particularly given the current reliance on suboptimal green OA routes, where authors self-deposit a free-to-read manuscript in an institutional repository.

Set against this uncertainty, research commissioned by the British Academy offers a clearer picture of how long-form open access is actually functioning. It brings together interviews and surveys with repository leaders, quantitative usage analysis and the perspectives of academics across SHAPE disciplines to offer a holistic view of how these works are deposited, discovered and used through UK institutional repositories. Taken together, the findings point to not just uneven progress, but a system that isn’t yet set up for long-form scholarship.

It outlines that despite strong support for widening access in principle, green OA is often viewed by SHAPE academics as a secondary or fallback option rather than a preferred route for dissemination. For long-form research, an accepted manuscript is not a near-final version. It can differ significantly from the published version (or version of record) in structure, presentation and readability, and is not always seen as representing the work in the way it is intended to be read or cited.

At the same time, the report found that institutional repositories themselves are not well equipped for the types of engagement typical of long-form scholarship, such as extended reading, navigation and annotation. They are largely optimised for journal articles, not books, and struggle with the specific demands that long-form materials place on them, including complex formats and copyright constraints. These limitations are further compounded by more general issues, such as inconsistent metadata, meaning that even where content is deposited, it is not always easily discoverable or usable.

Few institutions have a dedicated strategy for long-form open access. That means repositories also often lack the capacity, workflows and staffing needed to handle book-length material effectively. Even basic questions, such as how many long-form works are held, in what format, or which version is available, can be difficult to answer. Ultimately, when policies designed for journals are applied to books, the result is typically a compromise that satisfies neither the aim of openness nor the needs of the work itself.

None of this reflects a lack of commitment. Instead, it highlights a system that has not yet been designed to accommodate the realities of supporting long-form scholarship. The issue is no longer whether open access should exist, but how it can function in a way that works with researchers, libraries and publishers while sustaining the valuable research “ecosystem” in the SHAPE disciplines.

Above all, the report points to the need for a more coordinated and strategic approach. That means developing a clear national strategy for long-form OA, co-designed across funders, universities, libraries, publishers and scholarly communities, as well as greater clarity around roles and expectations, more consistent repository standards, and better ways to monitor progress.

Funding and infrastructure are part of this same problem. Long-form OA cannot rely on unfunded mandates or publication fees that many institutions cannot afford. Investment, therefore, will be essential in community-led initiatives and Diamond OA models (in which works are freely accessible to both authors and readers), alongside improvements to repository systems – from rights management to accessibility and usability – if open books are to be both publishable and usable.

In addition, policy needs to engage seriously with the concerns of authors. Questions about version quality, third-party rights, career incentives and international readerships are central to how researchers make decisions about publishing. Any move towards greater openness must ensure that early-career researchers and those working with complex or image-rich material are not placed at a disadvantage.

The debate about open access has often focused on principle, but the harder task is making it work – especially for the long-form scholarship that underpins the SHAPE disciplines. What this report offers is not a simple answer, but a clearer sense of where the challenges lie. That is an important step forward because it allows the conversation to move beyond general commitments and towards the practical work of building a system that can deliver on them.

Lindsay Farmer is vice-president of publishing at the British Academy and professor of law at the University of Glasgow.