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The paper presents a literature review on research data management services in African academic and research libraries on the backdrop of the advancing open science and open research data infrastructures. It provides areas of focus for library to support open research data.

The literature analysis and future role of African libraries in research data management services were based on three areas as follows:open science, research infrastructures and open data infrastructures. Focussed literature searches were conducted across several electronic databases and discovery platforms, and a qualitative content analysis approach was used to explore the themes based on a coded list.

The review reports of an environment where open science in Africa is still at developmental stages. Research infrastructures face funding and technical challenges. Data management services are in formative stages with progress reported in a few countries where open science and research data management policies have emerged, cyber and data infrastructures are being developed and limited data librarianship courses are being taught.

The role of the academic and research libraries in Africa remains important in higher education and the national systems of research and innovation. Libraries should continue to align with institutional and national trends in response to the provision of data management services and as partners in the development of research infrastructures.

This paper aims to analyse a set of converging trends underpinning a larger phenomenon called science 2.0 and to assess what are the most important implications for scientific method and research institutions.

It is based on a triangulation of exploratory methods which include a wide-ranging literature review, Web-based mapping and in-depth interviews with stakeholders.

The main implications of science 2.0 are enhanced efficiency, transparency and reliability; raise of data-driven science; microcontributions on a macroscale; multidimensional, immediate and multiform evaluation of science; disaggregation of the value chain of service providers for scientists; influx of multiple actors and the democratisation of science.

The paper rejects the notion of science 2.0 as the mere adoption of Web 2.0 technologies in science and puts forward an original integrated definition covering three trends that have not yet been analysed together: open science, citizens science and data-intensive science. It argues that these trends are mutually reinforcing and puts forward their main implications. It concludes with the identification of three enablers of science 2.0 – policy measures, individual practice of scientists and new infrastructure and services and sees the main bottleneck in lack of incentives on the individual level.

The purpose of this paper is to explore and analyse interfaces between scholarly and science communication practices by using the production of open letters on climate change as a point of departure. Furthermore, the paper highlights an understudied form of science communication – open letters.

The material consists of nine open letters on climate change, written and signed by academics and published in 2018–2019, as well as 13 semi-structured interviews with the initiators and co-authors of the letters. The interviews were analysed by qualitative thematic analysis and grouped into thematic clusters.

The study finds that three practices used in scholarly communication – more specifically: peer review, professional community building and, to a certain extent, communication as “merit-making” – are central in the making of the open letters, illustrating an integration of scholarly communication practices in academic science communication activities.

The study suggests that the conflation of communication practices needs to be seen in relation to larger structural changes in the academic working environment, as well as in relation to the specific environment in which communication about climate change occurs.

This study contends that the proposed conflation between scholarly and science communication concerns not only texts and genres but also practices integral to contemporary science, thereby conflating the forms of communication at a practical level.

This paper aims to present empirical evidence on the opinion and behaviour of French scientists (senior management level) regarding open access (OA) to scientific and technical information.

The results are part of a nationwide survey on scientific information and documentation with 432 directors of French public research laboratories conducted by the French National Research Center (CNRS) in 2014.

The CNRS senior research managers (laboratory directors) globally share the positive opinion towards OA revealed by other studies with researchers from the UK, Germany, the USA and other countries. However, they are more supportive of open repositories (green road) than of OA journal publishing (gold). The response patterns reveal a gap between generally positive opinions about OA and less supportive behaviours, principally publishing articles with article processing charges (APCs). A small group of senior research managers does not seem to be interested in green or gold OA and reluctant to self-archiving and OA publishing. Similar to other studies, the French survey confirms disciplinary differences, i.e. a stronger support for self-archiving of records and documents in HAL by scientists from Mathematics, Physics and Informatics than from Biology, Earth Sciences and Chemistry; and more experience and positive feelings with OA publishing and payment of APCs in Biology than in Mathematics or in Social Sciences and Humanities. Disciplinary differences and specific French factors are discussed, in particular in the context of the new European policy in favour of Open Science.

For the first time, a nationwide survey was conducted with the senior research management level from all scientific disciplines. The response rate was high (>30 per cent), and the results provide good insight into the real awareness, support and uptake of OA by senior research managers who provide both models (examples for good practice) and opinion leadership.

This paper seeks to discuss the question of “openness” in e‐Science.

The study is based on 12 in‐depth interviews with principal investigators, project managers and developers involved in UK e‐Science projects, together with supporting documentary evidence from project web sites. The approach was to explore the juxtaposition of research governance at the institutional level and local research practices at the project level. Interview questions focused on research inputs, software development processes, access to resources, project documentation, dissemination of outputs and by‐products, licensing issues, and institutional contracts.

The findings suggest that, although there is a widely shared ethos of openness in everyday research practice, there are many uncertainties and yet‐to‐be resolved issues, despite strong policy imperatives towards openly shared resources.

The paper concludes by observing a stratification of openness in practice and the need for more nuanced understanding of openness at the level of policy making. This research was based on interviews within a limited number of e‐Science/Social Science projects and the intention is to address this in future work by scaling the study up to a survey that will reach the entire UK e‐Science/Social Science community.

The fundamental challenge in resolving openness in practice and policy, and thereby moving towards a sustainable infrastructure for e‐Science, is the coordination and integration of goals across e‐Science efforts, rather than one of resolving IPR (Intellectual Property Rights) issues, which has been the central focus of openness debates thus far.

The question of openness has previously been posed on the macro‐level of research policy, e.g. whether science as a whole can be characterized as open science, or in relation to the dissemination of published outputs, e.g. Open Access. Instead, a fine‐grained perspective is taken focusing on individual research projects and the various facets of openness in practice.

Citizen Science – public participation in scientific projects – is becoming a global practice engaging volunteer participants, often non-scientists, with scientific research. Citizen Science is facing major challenges, such as quality and consistency, to reap open the full potential of its outputs and outcomes, including data, software and results. In this context, the principles put forth by Data Science and Open Science domains are essential for alleviating these challenges, which have been addressed at length in these domains. The purpose of this study is to explore the extent to which Citizen Science initiatives capitalise on Data Science and Open Science principles.

The authors analysed 48 Citizen Science projects related to pollution and its effects. They compared each project against a set of Data Science and Open Science indicators, exploring how each project defines, collects, analyses and exploits data to present results and contribute to knowledge.

The results indicate several shortcomings with respect to commonly accepted Data Science principles, including lack of a clear definition of research problems and limited description of data management and analysis processes, and Open Science principles, including lack of the necessary contextual information for reusing project outcomes.

In the light of this analysis, the authors provide a set of guidelines and recommendations for better adoption of Data Science and Open Science principles in Citizen Science projects, and introduce a software tool to support this adoption, with a focus on preparation of data management plans in Citizen Science projects.

The present paper is compilation of open access resources in the subject area library and information science (LIS) and their usefulness in the LIS teaching and learning process. The paper aims to discuss these issues.

Researcher compiled list by visiting library science department web sites, library web sites, OA forums/blogs, etc.

The library science subject area is rich in various forms of open access literature which is reported in the paper.

One of the first studies to report various forms of open access literature in the library science subject area.

It's hard to envision a system more global and more integrated than research. Many stakeholders affect and are affected by changes in the research ecosystem; the ecosystem differs in significant ways across the globe and between researchers, institutions and fields of study; and there are many questions that exclusive action can't address. There are also broad ecosystem-level questions that need answering. For these reasons alone, global approaches to reform are needed.

The first step in this exploration isn't to start looking for “solutions”, but to develop a better understanding of how our needs and interests overlap. By identifying the broad contours of common ground in this conversation, we can build the guardrails and mileposts for our collaborative efforts and then allow the finer-grained details of community-developed plans more flexibility and guidance to evolve over time.

What are these overlapping interests? First, the people in this community share a common motive – idealism – to make research better able to serve the public good. We also share a common desire to unleash the power of open to improve research and accelerate discovery; we are all willing to fix issues now instead of waiting for market forces or government intervention to do this for us; and we want to ensure that everyone everywhere has equitable access to knowledge.

There is also very broad agreement in this community about which specific problems in scholarly communication need to be fixed and why, and well as many overlapping beliefs in this community. OSI participants have concluded that four such beliefs best define our common ground: (1) research and society will benefit from open done right; (2) successful solutions will require broad collaboration; (3) connected issues need to be addressed, and (4) open isn't a single outcome, but a spectrum.

OSI has been observing and debating the activity in scholarly communication since late 2014 with regard to understanding possible global approaches and solutions for improving the future of open research. While the COVID-19 pandemic has made the importance of open science abundantly clear, the struggle to achieve this goal (not just for science but for all research) has been mired in a lack of clarity and urgency for over 20 years now, mostly stalling on the tension between wanting more openness but lacking realistic solutions for making this happen on a large scale with so many different stakeholders, needs and perspectives involved.

Underlying this tension is a fundamental difference in philosophy: whether the entire scholarly communication marketplace, driven by the needs and desires of researchers, should determine what kind of open it wants and needs; or whether this marketplace should be compelled to adopt open reform measures developed primarily by the scholarly communication system's main billpayers-funders and libraries. There is no widespread difference of opinion in the community whether open is worth pursuing. The debate is mostly over what specific open solutions are best, and at what pace open reforms should occur.

OSI has proposed a plan of action for working together to rebuild the future of scholarly communication on strong, common ground foundation. This plan – which we're referring to as Plan A – calls for joint action on studies, scholarly communication infrastructure improvement, and open outreach/education. Plan A also calls for working together with UNESCO to develop a unified global roadmap for the future of open, and for striving to ensure the community's work in this space is researcher-focused, collaborative, connected (addressing connected issues like peer review), diverse and flexible (no one-size-fits-all solutions), and beneficial to research. UNESCO's goal is to finish its roadmap proposal by early 2022.

For a full discussion of OSI's common ground recommendations, please see the Plan A website at http://plan-a.world.

The purpose of this paper is to propose a personal viewpoint on the development of document supply in the context of the recent European Union (EU) decisions on open science.

The paper provides some elements to the usual questions of service development, about business, customers, added value, environment and objectives.

The EU goal for open science is 100 per cent available research results in 2020. To meet the challenge, document supply must change, include more and other content, serve different targets groups, apply innovative technology and provide knowledge. If not, document supply will become a marginalized library service.

Basically, open science is not library-friendly, and it does not offer a solution for the actual problems of document supply. But it may provide an opportunity for document supply to become a modern service able to deal with new forms of unequal access and digital divide.

The purpose of this paper is to discuss emerging practices in open evaluation, namely, the concept of co-evaluation and how research on evaluation developed within information science can contribute to enhance stakeholders and citizens’ involvement in open science.

A meta-evaluative and transdisciplinary approach – directed toward the intersection between information science, evaluation, competences management, sustainability transitions management and participatory methodologies – provided the basis for the identification and subsequent reflection on the levels of stakeholder participation embedded into ISO 16439’s (2014) methods for assessing the impact of libraries and on the domains and competences to be mobilized for (co)evaluation. The contributions of Engaged 2020 Action Catalogue, as well as several taxonomies of evaluator competences and the Council of Europe’s (2016) conceptual model of competences for a democratic culture were particularly relevant for this (re)construction process.

Two results of the line of research carried out since 2012 at the Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities of the Universidade NOVA de Lisboa (Portugal) can significantly contribute to improve stakeholders’ participation in Open Science: ISO 16439’s systematization of methods and procedures for assessing the impact of libraries and the (co-)evaluation competency framework.

This paper presents the transdisciplinary concept of co-evaluation and examines the current epistemological challenges to science by analyzing the general tendency to openness through the lens of research on evaluation and participatory methods developed within information science.