The Democratisation Myth

Abstract

Open access (OA) in the Global North is considered to solve an accessibility problem in scholarly communication. But this accessibility is restricted to the consumption of knowledge. Epistemic injustices inhering in the scholarly communication of a global production of knowledge remain unchanged. This underscores that the commercial or big deal OA dominating Europe and North America have little revolutionary potential to democratise knowledge. Academia in the Global North, driven by politics of progressive neoliberalism, can even reinforce its hegemonic power by solidifying and legitimating contemporary hierarchies of scholarly communication through OA. In a critique of the notion of a democratisation of knowledge, I showcase manifestations of OA as either allowing consumption of existing discourse or as active participation of discourse in the making. The latter comes closer to being the basis for a democratisation of knowledge. I discuss this as I issue a threefold conceptualisation of epistemic injustices comprising of testimonial injustice, hermeneutical injustice, and epistemic objectification. As these injustices prevail, the notion of a democratisation of knowledge through OA is but another form of technological determinism that neglects the intricacies of culture and hegemony.

Diverse sources of normativity in open science and their implications for ethical governance

“…Yet the worry remains that open access, as currently practised, is still likely to further increase the inequalities within global research community. On the one hand, there is the concern that these developments may be insufficient to fully counteract the inequality perpetuated by academic publishing [ 16 ]. On the other hand, there is the more fundamental worry that regardless of the specific model of open access, data sharing is first and foremost going to be beneficial to those who have the resources to quickly capitalize on the data and publish results [ 2 ].…”