The original article published in Japanese ( https://current.ndl.go.jp/ca2064 )
Current Awareness
No.360 June 20, 2024
CA2064e
Trends in the Transformative Agreements of E-Journals in Japanese Universities
1. Introduction
Transformative Agreements (TAs) intend to shift journal-related payments to publishers from subscription fees to Open Access (OA) publication fees. As of 2024, a few years have passed since university libraries in Japan began to pay attention to transformative agreements. In fact, the number of institutions that signed agreements with publishers has been increasing rapidly.
A review article published in 2020 (see CA1977) provides a detailed overview of the background on the emergence of transformative agreements, efforts to encourage them in Europe, as well as early cases in Japan. This article reviews the status of transformative agreements in Japan through the first half of 2024. We first describe the status of negotiations between Japan Alliance of University Library Consortia for E-Resources (JUSTICE) and publishers as well as the situations of proposed transformative agreements after 2019. This is followed by an introduction of the status of transformative agreements between universities and publishers outside JUSTICE proposals. Lastly, we discuss future issues.
2. Background of the Initiation of Transformative Agreement Negotiations at JUSTICE
Since its launch in 2011, JUSTICE has operated as an opt-in consortium. We represent member libraries—over 550 university libraries and institutions (as of April 2024)—to negotiate and organize terms and conditions of purchase and use of electronic resources. Because JUSTICE itself does not have the budget or the authority to directly contract for electronic resources, member libraries make their own decisions on concluding contracts based on proposals agreed upon between JUSTICE and publishers.
In its negotiations, JUSTICE has primarily focused on subscription model products. In parallel, we began negotiating on OA publication model following the signing of the Expression of Interest (EOI) for “OA2020” in September 2016. Subsequently, JUSTICE published “Transformation from subscription model toward OA publishing model ～JUSTICE OA2020 Roadmap～”(1) in March 2019. This document laid out a roadmap to overcome the transition period until OA publishing model is realized. In August 2019, we prepared “Negotiation Policy for the Realization of the Open Access Publishing Model”(2) and began negotiations with publishers for transformative agreements.
The “Negotiation Policy” presented policies towards publishers. For example:- Both the conventional subscription agreement and transformative agreement should be proposed, and the proposals should be selectable by the member libraries.
- In principle, the proposal is that articles published by universities that sign a “transformative agreement” shall be OA.
- In principle, the upper limit for the amount of expenditure for a university that enters into the transformative agreement shall be the current amount of expenditure (subscription amount + APC expenditure).
- In addition to the Read & Publish (RAP) Agreement, we welcome proposals for a transformative agreement that promotes the OA publishing model, such as vouchers for OA publishing based on the subscription amount, discounts on the APC unit price, and discounts on the subscription amount based on the amount of OA publishing.
Subsequent negotiations on OA publication models at JUSTICE have been conducted in line with these policies.
Currently, RAP is dominant in transformative agreements around the world. Proposals agreed to by JUSTICE are also mainly RAP.
3. Proposal Agreements for Transformative Agreements at JUSTICE
JUSTICE began negotiating transformative agreements with academic publishers in 2019. The year indicated below as a heading refers to the year the contract came into effect. Negotiations and agreements took place the year before.
・2020 (CUP)
The first publisher with which JUSTICE reached agreement to the RAP model proposal was Cambridge University Press (CUP) (see E2259). The proposal period ran from 2020 to 2022, and member libraries could choose either subscription model or RAP model. Institutions that chose RAP model would pay subscription fees determined per full-time equivalent (FTE) tier and additional fees for OA publication to allow affiliated authors to publish an unlimited number of articles for eligible titles in contracted collections.
In addition, we agreed to a proposal on applying discounts on the APC unit price with the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) (until 2021).
・2021 (ASME, SPIE)
Agreement on RAP model proposal was reached with the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) and the Society of Photo-Optical Instrumentation Engineers (SPIE) from the 2021 contract. We also agreed with Elsevier(3) and Wiley on a proposal to apply discounts on the APC unit price.
In February 2021, the Subcommittee on Journal Issues of the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT) presented a report titled “Response to Issues on Scholarly Communication in Japan (Summary of deliberations)” (4). This document requested JUSTICE to clarify the research strategy including the division of roles among universities and other research institutions to be grouped together by contracting entity.
・2022 (IEEE)
Agreement on RAP model proposal was reached with IEEE for three years from 2022 to 2024. Agreement was also reached with De Gruyter and Taylor & Francis on a proposal to apply discounts on the APC unit price (2022 only for Taylor & Francis).
・2023 (OUP, Taylor & Francis, Wiley)
Within the three years from 2023 to 2025, RAP model proposals were agreed to with the following three publishers.
Oxford University Press (OUP) (5): If RAP model is selected, the library will be able to increase the percentage of articles it publishes OA in OUP journals. The library will also receive a discount on APCs for full OA journals.
Taylor & Francis (6): The library can gradually increase the percentage of subscription expenditure allocated to OA publications.
Wiley(7): Negotiation began outside the JUSTICE proposal, as an extension of transformative agreement pilot project of four domestic universities (see E2505, to be described in the next section). An agreement was reached. The library has the right to publish OA articles in all Wiley hybrid and full OA journals up to the number of articles specified in the contract.
In February of this year, JUSTICE revised the “OA2020 Roadmap” (8). At the time of its preparation in 2019, the roadmap stated that the development toward OA publication model contract will be implemented after a trial. However, in the revised version, it was changed to an image where trials will continue, with repetitive trials and developments. Furthermore, given the appearance of universities and institutions that conclude their own transformative agreements with publishers that had not proposed transformative agreements to JUSTICE, the revised document included JUSTICE’s support to groups of universities and institutions that negotiate and make contracts, with the aim of realizing contracts that the groups desire. Also included was to feedback the experiences and results gained from these efforts to the activities of JUSTICE.
・2024 (The Company of Biologists, Elsevier, CUP, SPIE)
Within the three-year period from 2024 to 2026, new agreements on RAP model proposal were reached with the following two publishers. Renewal of RAP was also agreed with CUP and SPIE.
The Company of Biologists (9): All journals published by this publisher are covered (three hybrid journals and two full OA journals). As of 2024, six institutions have signed contracts.
Elsevier (10): For the first time, JUSTICE invited member libraries that expressed willingness to participate in RAP model negotiations. A team of 57 universities was formed for a joint negotiation. In response to the agreed proposal, 140 universities, including these 57 universities, announced their interest. 51 universities signed contracts in 2024.
Promotion of open science was clearly stated in the G7 Science and Technology Ministers’ Meeting in Sendai (11) and the communiqué of the G7 Hiroshima Summit (12) in May 2023. In February 2024, the Integrated Innovation Strategy Promotion Council released the “Basic Policy on Promoting Open Access to Publicly Funded Scholarly Publications and Scientific Data” (13). The government has begun to make major moves toward OA promotion, drawing attention to their impact on transformative agreements in Japan.
In the future, JUSTICE will analyze and evaluate each publisher’s model based on the “OA2020 Roadmap.” Based on the results, requests for improvement of the models will be made to the publishers. We also intend to gradually expand the improved models to other publishers.
4. Examples of Transformative Agreements between Universities and Publishers
As described in the previous section, JUSTICE had begun negotiations on RAP model proposal since the 2020 contract. However, for certain period of time, negotiations were limited to a few publishers. Moreover, we were not able to advance negotiations with major commercial publishers with which many universities in Japan have contracts. One reason was, with JUSTICE being an opt-in consortium, it was difficult to negotiate on the assumption that a certain number of universities would surely sign contracts. A breakthrough to this situation was the signing of transformative agreements between four domestic universities and Wiley starting in April 2022 (see E2505). This started as a pilot project until December 2024 and was later developed into a proposal agreement by JUSTICE. In 2024, this expanded to contracts by 45 universities and institutions.
Springer Nature was the next to sign RAP contracts with multiple several universities. In starting the negotiation, universities aimed to do so on a larger scale and decided to use Research University Consortium (RUC) as the entity. Joint negotiations were made by more than ten RUC member institutions that showed interest. As a result, ten universities signed a three-year pilot contract starting in January 2023(14). Subsequently, JUSTICE also began the negotiation, but as of 2024, no agreement has been reached. On the other hand, the publisher created its own framework called J-SPRINTA for universities not participating in the aforementioned pilot project. Thirteen universities have signed a three-year contract starting in January 2024.
Other examples of individual universities entering contract on RAP model without involvement of JUSTICE include Association for Computing Machinery (ACM), American Chemical Society (ACS), Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC), and Rockefeller University Press.
5. Future Issues
As described above, the number of cases of transformative agreements in Japan has increased rapidly over the past few years. However, challenges are also becoming apparent.
Issues related to the overall model of transformative agreements have been summarized in the review article published in 2020 (see CA1977). First, there is an advantage for universities to keep their total expenditures down by entering a comprehensive contract of APCs which covers journal subscription fees and OA publication fees. However, there remains cases where “transformation” from subscription fees to OA publication fees have not been achieved. In addition, the situation where large fee payments continue to be made to publishers is creating a second Big Deal problem. It is still not a sustainable model.
Issues specific to Japan, including negotiations at JUSTICE and introducing processes at universities, have been summarized by JUSTICE officials in 2023 (15). In Japan, contracts are made by individual universities with consideration of their circumstances and decisions, rather than on a national or consortium-wide basis as seen in other countries. As such, there remains significant concerns about widening disparities among universities as well as overall inefficiencies.
Although the current transformative agreements face these issues, for the time being, it must be promoted as a means to expand OA of academic papers. There is a need to grow into a more mature contract model.
*Notes are not translated and remain in Japanese language.
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[Accepted: 2024-05-13]
