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This briefing paper aims to support decision makers at research organisations and research funders to develop new monitoring exercises or assess and improve existing processes to measure the Open Access status of publications.

Science Europe and cOAlition S publish an in-depth report and recommendations arising from a study of community-driven Open Access journals across the world that are free for readers and authors, usually referred to as 'OA diamond journals'.

Developed by experts from Science Europe Member Organisations, this guide aims to align research data management (RDM) requirements across research organisations. Originally released in 2019, it was updated in January 2021 to include guidance to support the evaluation of data management plans (DMPs).

The 2020 edition of the Science Europe High Level Workshop on ERA was co-hosted with the Foundation for Science and Technology and the Portuguese Ministry of Science, Technology, and Higher Education. It explored how research and innovation can contribute to crisis recovery and to societal resilience in the context of an evolving research culture.

In its response to the European Commission, Science Europe highlights that future EU legislation on AI needs to strike the right balance between safeguards for users and developers of AI systems, and a legal environment that fosters R&I.

In its response to the European Commission, Science Europe highlights that the foreseen scope of the new legislation is not clearly defined and greater clarification should be introduced to ensure that the Digital Services Act does not have unintended effects on research.

In its response to the European Commission Roadmap for an upcoming legislative proposal on the governance of common European data spaces, Science Europe reinforces the need to consider sectoral policies to ensure coherence.

The 20 and 21 November 2019 Science Europe Workshop on Digital Transformation in Scholarly Communication explored how new possibilities and technologies provided by the digital transformation can impact the future of the scholarly publication process.

Does your organisation want to develop requirements for data management plans (DMPs) or update existing ones?

Take a look at our latest publication to find out how to do so in three steps.

So far, much of the focus of the transition towards Open Access has been on scholarly and scientific articles. However, a significant number of disciplines, notably – but not only – within the Social Sciences, the Arts, and the Humanities produce and heavily use books. This briefing paper identifies the key issues at stake in implementing a policy of Open Access to academic books, and outlines recommendations for different stakeholder groups to facilitate and accelerate such a policy.

In this joint statement research and Innovation stakeholders call on the EU institutions to seek a balanced approach to data sharing in response to the European Commission’s proposal for a revision of the Directive on re-use of public sector information (PSI Directive). While the partners are supportive of the European agenda to promote Open Science and innovation, and share a common commitment to the principle of making research data ‘as open as possible and as closed as necessary’, there is a need to focus on the optimal re-use of research data and not on the (unconditional) opening of such data.

‘Big Deals’ are one of the dominant but highly-disputed business models in academic publishing. The model needs to be further analysed before it can be used as an instrument to implement and increase Open Access. This workshop was as organised to trigger further expert discussions on the current business models and consider the available alternatives.

How can citizens best be involved in the scientific process, and how ‘Open’ can we make science? How do we ensure that the highest standards in scientific research are maintained in such a system? This report provides an overview of the main discussions at the 2017 Science Europe High-level Workshop hosted in Berlin by the German Research Foundation (DFG).

Research organisations and funders increasingly ask researchers to create Data Management Plans for their work and proposals. A lack of standardisation means that these can be time-consuming to create and difficult to compare and evaluate. Science Europe presents a framework for the creation of domain-specific protocols that can be used as standardised templates, reducing the administrative burden on both researchers, research organisations, and funders.

Science Europe supports the principle that research data should be “as open as possible and as closed as necessary.” However, the particularity of research data as well as of data about research activities requires careful consideration on which aspects are better dealt with by legislative acts or by guidelines developed by the research sector.

Science Europe welcomes the efforts made towards the European Open Science Cloud (EOSC). In this open letter, the Governing Board of Science Europe reinforces its view that research data should be permanently, publicly, and freely available for re-use. The proposed EOSC aims to further this goal but a number of important questions still remain.

This open letter, signed by the European Research and Innovation community, calls on Members of the European Parliament and the Council to secure Europe’s leadership in the data economy by revising the Text and Data Mining (TDM) exception in the draft of the Directive on Copyright in the Digital Single Market. It calls for the TDM exception to apply to any person that has legal access to the content to help the European data economy grow, foster innovation, and encourage entrepreneurship.

This open letter issued by the international research community calls on Members of the European Parliament to halt the adoption of harmful provisions found in the current draft of the Directive on Copyright in the Digital Single Market, which could threaten Open Access and Open Science.

Science Europe is committed to playing a role in accomplishing the transition to Open Access in an efficient and sustainable way and encourages scientific institutions to disclose payments of Open Access publication fees by participating in the ‘Open APC Initiative.’ This paper highlights how this will help create a more transparent cost structure in the Open Access publication market and stimulate competition.

Open Access greatly improves the pace, efficiency, and efficacy of research. This report highlights the efforts made by public research organisations in Europe to develop and implement Open Access policies and addresses the challenges faced by different actors in order to facilitate and accelerate the transition towards full Open Access for all scholarly publications by 2020.

The recent legislative proposal from the European Commission to reform EU copyright law addresses some needs, but not to the full extent required. Science Europe calls for research and data mining exceptions to ensure that copyright legislation is friendly to research and innovation.

Text and data mining (TDM) is hugely important for science as it can facilitate better research and the free flow of knowledge across borders. This report urges policy-makers to update the legal framework in the context of the upcoming EU copyright reform in order to allow TDM for commercial and non-commercial means, and also to clarify the legal position surrounding it.

Decisive action is needed to transition towards more effectively and efficiently towards an Open Access publishing system. This paper presents some of the recent trends and developments in the transition to Open Access, as well as various business models currently in use which aim to facilitate this transition. It also highlights expected benefits and underlines remaining challenges.

This publication by Science Europe’s Scientific Committee for the Social Sciences addresses two audiences: scientists, especially those who have been traditionally more resistant to the OA approach, and policy makers. In it, the Scientific Committee for Social Sciences proposes a ‘Diamond Engagement’ concept with the three key principles: partnership; standardisation and interoperability; and enabling structures.