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  1. Home > Articles & Issues >
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  3. Inequality in Knowle ...
Conference paper

Inequality in Knowledge Production: The Integration of Academic Infrastructure by Big Publishers

Alejandro Posada (1), George Chen (1)
(1) Knowledge GAP
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Publication details
Submitted on
June 20, 2018
Accepted on
June 20, 2018
Published on
June 20, 2018
Last modified on
March 31, 2025
Proceedings 1
Connecting the Knowledge Commons: From Projects to Sustainable Infrastructure
Long Papers
DOI
10.4000/proceedings.elpub.2018.30
License
Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)
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Inequality in Knowledge Production: The Integration of Academic Infrastructure by Big Publishers

Alejandro Posada (1), George Chen (1)
(1) Knowledge GAP
Abstract
This paper attempts to illustrate the implications of a simultaneous redirection of the big publishers’ business strategy towards open access business models and the acquisition of scholarly infrastructure utilizing the conceptual framework of rent-seeking theory. To document such a transformation, we utilized financial databases to analyze the mergers and acquisitions of the top publicly traded academic publishers. We then performed a service analysis to situate the acquisitions of publishers within the knowledge and education life-cycles, illustrating what we term to be their vertical integration within their respective expansion target life-cycles. Implications of higher education institutions’ increased dependency towards the companies and increased influence by the companies on the institution and individual researcher were noted from the vertical integration of products. Said vertical integration is analyzed via a rent theory framework and described to be a form of rent-seeking complementary to the redirection of business strategies to open access. Finally, the vertical integration is noted to generate exclusionary effects upon researchers/institutions in the global south.
Keywords
  • [SHS.INFO]Humanities and Social Sciences/Library and information sciences
  • inequality
  • knowledge production
  • rent-seeking
  • scholarly infrastructure
  • concentration
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