Open access in Canada

Open access is a set of principles and a range of practices through which nominally copyrightable publications are delivered to readers free of access charges or other barriers. In Canada, open access policy has developed and expanded for nearly 20 years.[1] The Institutes of Health Research effected a policy of open access in 2008, which in 2015 expanded to include the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council and Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council.[2][3] In 2025, the Tri-Agency (comprising the Canadian Institutes of Health Research, Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council, and Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council) released a draft, revised open access policy.[4]

There are also established Canadian organizations that pursue or support open access activities. The Public Knowledge Project began in 1998 at University of British Columbia.[5][2] The Canadian Research Knowledge Network was launched in 1999 (as the Canadian National Site Licensing Project),[6] and facilitates open access to research via licensing agreements with publishers and the Partnership for Open Access (with Érudit).[7] Érudit, a Canadian scholarly journal platform, has been operating since 1998.[8] Together, Érudit and the Public Knowledge Project formed Coalition Publica in 2017.[9] In 2023, the Canadian Research Knowledge Network and Canadian Association of Research Libraries released a library action plan in support of open scholarship in Canada.[10] Notable Canadian advocates for open access include Leslie Chan, Jean-Claude Guédon, Stevan Harnad, Heather Morrison, and John Willinsky.[11]

Repositories

There are some 88 collections of scholarship in Canada housed in digital open access repositories.[12]

Timeline

Key events in the development of open access in Canada include the following:

  • 1994
    • 27 June: Stevan Harnad posts a Subversive Proposal calling on authors to archive their articles for free online.  
  • 1998
  • 1998
    • French-language Érudit online publishing platform launched, as a university-based initiative with the ambition to create digital tools and offer services to scholarly journals[13]
  • 2000
  • 2002
    • PKP launched Open Journals Systems (OJS) as an open source journal publishing platform [15]
  • 2003
  • 2005
    • SFU Dean of Libraries Lynn Copeland initiates PKP partnership with Simon Fraser University Library and the Canadian Institute for Studies in Publishing, led by Rowly Lorimer.
  • 2006
  • 2009
  • 2017
    • Coalition Publica founded to support publishing in social sciences and humanities fields.[19]

Journals

  • Les Presses de l'Université de Montréal issued one of the world's first open access journals, Surfaces (ISSN 1188-2492) in 1991.[20]
  • FACETS is Canada's first multidisciplinary open access journal in Canada.
  • Anthropocene Coasts, is a multidisciplinary international open access journal jointly published by Canadian Science Publishing and East China Normal University.
  • Arctic Science is a quarterly open-access peer-reviewed journal.

In addition, Canadian universities and research institutions support and / or host the following journals:

Acadia University

Athabasca University

Brock University

Carleton University

Concordia University

Dalhousie University

Institut national de la recherche scientifique

Kwantlen Polytechnic University

Lakehead University

Laurentian University/Université Laurentienne

MacEwan University

McGill University

McMaster University

Memorial University of Newfoundland

Mount Royal University

Queen's University

Simon Fraser University

Toronto Metropolitan University

University of Alberta

See also

References

  1. ^ "Open Access in Canada". MDPI. Retrieved 11 March 2026.
  2. ^ a b "Canada". Global Open Access Portal. UNESCO. Retrieved 6 April 2018.
  3. ^ "Tri-Agency Open Access Policy on Publications". Science.gc.ca. Government of Canada. Retrieved 6 April 2018.
  4. ^ "Draft, Revised Tri-Agency Open Access Policy on Publications". ised-isde.canada.ca. Government of Canada. Retrieved 11 March 2026.
  5. ^ "History". Pkp.sfu.ca. Retrieved 6 April 2018.
  6. ^ "History of CRKN". crkn-rcdr.ca. Retrieved 11 March 2026.
  7. ^ "The POA: Supporting Equitable Open Access". apropos.erudit.org. Retrieved 11 March 2026.
  8. ^ "A Look Back at 25 Years of Development for the Érudit Platform". apropos.erudit.org. Retrieved 11 March 2026.
  9. ^ "About". coalition-publi.ca. Retrieved 11 March 2026.
  10. ^ "Towards Open Scholarship: A Canadian Research and Academic Library Action Plan to 2025" (PDF). carl-abrc.ca. Retrieved 11 March 2026.
  11. ^ "Open Access". HLWIKI International. University of British Columbia. Archived from the original on 5 June 2018. Retrieved 3 June 2018.
  12. ^ "Browse by Country: Canada". Registry of Open Access Repositories. United Kingdom: University of Southampton. Retrieved 15 April 2018.
  13. ^ "History", Érudit, Montréal, retrieved 18 June 2018
  14. ^ "PKP Timeline". Retrieved April 29, 2025.
  15. ^ "PKP Timeline". Retrieved April 29, 2025.
  16. ^ Shearer, Kathleen (2003). "Institutional Repositories: Towards the Identification of Critical Success Factors". Canadian Journal of Information and Library Science. 27 (3): 9–108. doi:10.11575/prism/29084.
  17. ^ a b Peter Suber (2012). Open Access. MIT Press. p. 192. ISBN 9780262517638.
  18. ^ a b "Browse by country: Canada". ROARMAP: Registry of Open Access Repository Mandates and Policies. UK: University of Southampton. Retrieved 28 April 2018.
  19. ^ Coalition Publi.ca, Canada, retrieved 18 June 2018
  20. ^ Nancy Pontika (ed.). "Early OA journals". Open Access Directory. US: Simmons School of Library and Information Science. OCLC 757073363. Retrieved 24 April 2018.

Further reading

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