NCMR is Becoming Open Access
Dear IACM community,
I am writing with an important announcement about our society’s journal, Negotiation and Conflict Management Research (NCMR). Beginning January 1, 2021, NCMR is moving to Open Access (OA) and will be completely free for BOTH authors and readers! NCMR will be published by IACM in partnership with Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) Libraries Publishing Service (LPS). IACM will retain full ownership of the NCMR archives. All past and future articles of NCMR will be freely available to any person in the world as of January 1, 2020.
NCMR is an interdisciplinary and international journal that focuses on negotiation and conflict management research and scholarship. Our readers include academics and practitioners alike, from all over the world, with various abilities to access resources. It is more important than ever that we provide free access to high caliber research and scholarship on negotiation and conflict management to serve our society’s mission.
As an OA publication NCMR will be able to increase the visibility and impact of negotiation and conflict management research. Because there are no paywalls, authors will be able to freely and easily disseminate their research via personal websites, social media, and other outlets to reach a wider variety of audiences. As a journal, we will be able to curate and publicize NCMR articles in response to current events to amplify the impact of our research in times when it is most needed.
With this move to OA, NCMR is also planning to encourage open science practices and revise our journal’s policies and procedures to support this change. We are currently in the process of researching and reviewing best practices for open science so that we can implement changes to coincide with our January 1, 2021 move. These may include, for example, recommendations to post study materials and de-identified datasets when feasible, or in cases when it is not feasible, to provide written justification for why certain materials or datasets cannot be shared. Our hope is that such changes will facilitate transparency, replicability, reproducibility, and generalizability of negotiation and conflict management research.
You might be wondering how we are able to make NCMR articles free to both authors and readers. We are fortunate to have free support from the Carnegie Mellon University Libraries Publishing Service, who will partner with IACM to provide an infrastructure to publish and host the scholarly content of NCMR via the open source journal management system, Janeway. The mission of CMU LPS is to maximize open and free access to scholarly publications and products in a sustainable fashion for the benefit of scholars, students, and the general public. CMU LPS’s goals are to promote learning, share research, and create greater opportunities to engage the general public—goals shared by IACM. CMU LPS is part of the emerging innovations and services CMU Libraries offers to support the growing digital scholarship and publishing needs of the CMU community. IACM’s partnership with CMU LPS offers NCMR the benefit of CMU LPS’s expertise in promoting scholarship via open access and open science practices.
With this free support from CMU LPS and our use of the free open source platform Janeway, our expenses for running and maintaining NCMR are minimal. We hope to secure sponsorships to help cover the cost of an editorial assistant. Given the healthy state of IACM’s finances, we are able to cover these costs from IACM’s operating budget if needed, though our goal is to make NCMR sustainable through financial sponsorships. We are currently exploring options and we would love to hear from you if you have ideas for sponsors who might be willing to help support NCMR so it can be sustainable as a completely free and open journal for all, imposing no costs on authors or readers.
How we got here: This past fall, after a strategic review of their publication portfolio, Wiley notified IACM that they would be releasing us from our contract with them, effective December 31, 2020. Given that IACM and NCMR leadership were already seeking to secure greater autonomy for the journal, this development was viewed with optimism and an opportunity to explore new avenues for the journal. Earlier this year, IACM President, Zoe Barsness, convened a special task force on the Future of NCMR. After conducting extensive research to explore several possible strategic paths forward for the journal, the task force recommended that IACM move to self-publish NCMR as an Open Access journal that would be free to both authors and readers. In May 2020, the IACM board unanimously endorsed the task force’s proposal to self-publish NCMR with (free) support from Carnegie Mellon University Libraries.
In closing, we would like to express how excited and optimistic we are for NCMR’s future. We encourage you—the IACM membership—to submit your high-quality work to NCMR, and to read and cite NCMR. Consider proposing or being a guest editor of a special issue. We are always eager to receive your feedback and consider proposals for innovations at the journal.
Sincerely,
Taya Cohen
President, IACM
Qi Wang
Editor-in-Chief, NCMR
Zoe Barsness
Past-President, IACM
