International publishing partnerships for China's English language journals and financial security

Abstract

This article considers China's English language journals (CELJs) and looks at two aspects of partnership with international publishers: the financial cost and their ability to deliver the quick success objectives of the journals. Success is defined as being indexed in international databases such as SCI (Science Citation Index) and Ei (Engineering Index) Compendex databases. Our research shows that 226 CELJs (57.8%) have an international publishing partnership with publishers such as Springer, Elsevier, and Wiley. A survey of 12 CELJs in Hubei Province, China, shows that 75% journals have financial pressures on the journal opera- tion. The Journal of Rock Mechanics and Geotechnical Engineering (JRMGE) is pro-vided as an illustration of the operation costs of CELJs and to demonstrate the associated financial pressures. We conclude that although international partnership is an on-going fashion at present in China, it has both benefits and limitations. We also propose that to reduce the financial pressure on CELJs, government funding should be differently apportioned, providing a better return on investment (ROI).

Internationalization of China's English‐language academic journals: An overview and three approaches

“…Of the remaining 168 journals, 128 (29.4%) are owned and published by Chinese universities, research institutes, or learned societies, and merely 40 (9.2%) were published by Chinese commercial publishers. Compared to the investigation conducted in 2015 byLin and Zhan (2016), the percentage of journals pub-…”

“…To attract high-quality submissions, Chinese publishers must change the publishing language to English and try to make their journals be indexed by major databases, such as the Web of Science (WoS) and SCOPUS. As stated earlier, CELAJs face plenty of opportunities and challenges Lin & Zhan, 2016;Xian, 2006;Xu & Whals, 2012). The Chinese government has made considerable effort to support CELAJs 'going global' (Lin & Zhan, 2016).…”

“…As stated earlier, CELAJs face plenty of opportunities and challenges Lin & Zhan, 2016;Xian, 2006;Xu & Whals, 2012). The Chinese government has made considerable effort to support CELAJs 'going global' (Lin & Zhan, 2016). However, the overall performance of these journals is still not as high as expected.…”

“…The internationalization of a journal is considered to include features such as use of the English language, international peer reviews, orientation to an international readership, and submissions by foreign authors (Wang, Wang, & Weldon, 2007;Zitt & Bassecoulard, 1998). Successful international journals also tend to be indexed by international authoritative databases such as Science Citation Index (SCI), Social Science Citation Index (SSCI), or Art and Humanities Index (A&HCI) (Lin & Zhan, 2016).…”

Question all assumptions: Learned Publishing at 30

“…Stanley & Shuai, ; Wang, Deng, You, Zhang, & Chen, ) and about international publishing partnerships (e.g. Lin & Zhan, ). Although regional diversity is often a challenge for publishers, it can also be an opportunity and our articles provide insights into the publishing and research environments in a wide range of countries.…”