Open and inclusive collaboration in science: A framework

Authors : Qian Dai, Eunjung Shin, Carthage Smith

Open science can be variously defined.  In some communities it is related principally to open access to scientific publications, for others it includes open access to research data and for others still it includes  opening  up  the  processes  of  academic  research  to  engage  all  interested  civil  society  stakeholders.

The  absence  of  a  common  understanding  of  what  is,  and  isn’t,  included  in  open  science  creates  confusion  in discussions  across  these  different  communities.  It  is  potentially  holding  back  efforts  to  develop  effective  policies for promoting open science at the international level.

This paper builds on the limited conceptual work that has been published to date and proposes a broad framework for open science. The framework is not  meant  to  be  prescriptive  but  should  help  different  communities  and  policy  makers  to  decide  on  their  own  priorities  within  the  open  science  space  and  to  better  visualise  how  these  priorities  link  to  different  stage of the scientific process and to different actors.

Such a framework can be useful also in considering how  best  to  incentivise  and  measure  various  aspects  of  open  science.  Digitalisation  is  fundamentally  changing  science  and  the  paper  lays  out  some  of  the  opportunities,  risks  and  major  policy  challenges  associated with these changes.

DOI : http://dx.doi.org/10.1787/2dbff737-en