BRUSSELS DECLARATION ON STM PUBLISHING
by the international scientific, technical and medical (STM) publishing community
as represented by the individual publishing houses and publishing trade associations, who haveindicated their assent below.

M

any declarations have been made about the need for particular business models in theSTM information community. STM publishers have largely remained silent on thesematters as the majority are agnostic about business models: what works, works.
However, despite very significant investment and a massive rise in access to scientificinformation, our community continues to be beset by propositions and manifestos on the practiceof scholarly publishing. Unfortunately the measures proposed have largely not been investigatedor tested in any evidence-based manner that would pass rigorous peer review. In the light of
this, and based on over ten years experience in the economics of online publishing and our longstanding collaboration with researchers and librarians, we have decided to publish a declarationof principles which we believe to be self-evident.
1.

The mission of publishers is to maximise the dissemination of knowledge througheconomically self-sustaining business models. We are committed to change andinnovation that will make science more effective. We support academic freedom: authors
should be free to choose where they publish in a healthy, undistorted free market

2.

Publishers organise, manage and financially support the peer review processes of
STM journals. The imprimatur that peer-reviewed journals give to accepted articles(registration, certification, dissemination and editorial improvement) is irreplaceable andfundamental to scholarship3.

Publishers launch, sustain, promote and develop journals for the benefit of thescholarly community

4.

Current publisher licensing models are delivering massive rises in scholarly accessto research outputs. Publishers have invested heavily to meet the challenges ofdigitisation and the annual 3% volume growth of the international scholarly literature, yetless than 1% of total R&D is spent on journals

5.

Copyright protects the investment of both authors and publishers. Respect for
copyright encourages the flow of information and rewards creators and entrepreneurs

6.

Publishers support the creation of rights-protected archives that preservescholarship in perpetuity

7.

Raw research data should be made freely available to all researchers. Publishers
encourage the public posting of the raw data outputs of research. Sets or sub-sets of datathat are submitted with a paper to a journal should wherever possible be made freely
accessible to other scholars

8.

Publishing in all media has associated costs. Electronic publishing has costs not foundin print publishing. The costs to deliver both are higher than print or electronic only.
Publishing costs are the same whether funded by supply-side or demand-side models. Ifreaders or their agents (libraries) don't fund publishing, then someone else (e.g. funding
bodies, government) must

9.

Open deposit of accepted manuscripts risks destabilising subscription revenues
and undermining peer review. Articles have economic value for a considerable time after
publication which embargo periods must reflect. At 12 months, on average, electronic
articles still have 40-50% of their lifetime downloads to come. Free availability of significant
proportions of a journal’s content may result in its cancellation and therefore destroy thepeer review system upon which researchers and society depend

10.

“One size fits all” solutions will not work. Download profiles of individual journals varysignificantly across subject areas, and from journal to journal

These principles are supported by the following publishing houses and associations:Akademie Verlag
American Chemical Society
American Institute of Physics
Blackwell Publishing
British Medical Journal Group
Carocci Editore
C. G. Edizioni Medico Scientifiche
Cambridge University Press
Carl Hanser Verlag
Clueb
De Agostini Editore
De Agostini Scuola
Editoriale Folini
Egea
Edinburgh University Press
Elsevier
Elsevier Masson
E. Schweizbart’sche Verlagsbuchhandlung (Nagele u. Obermiller) Science Publishers
Federico Motta Editore
Institute of Physics Publishing
Gebr. Bomtraeger Science Publishers
Georg Olms Verlag
Georg Thieme Verlag
Groupe De Boeck
Guerini e Associati
Institute of Pure and Applied Physics, Japan
John Wiley & Sons
Lippincott Williams & Wilkins
Macmillan Publishers
Multi-Science Publishing Co. Ltd
Nature Publishing Group
Oldenbourg Verlag
Oxford University Press
Portland Press
Provestia Publishing House
Primula Edizioni
Royal Society of Chemistry
S. Hirzel Verlag
Sage Publications
Springer Science+Business Media
Taylor & Francis Group
The McGraw Hill Companies (Milano)
The University of Chicago Press
Utet (Torino)
Weidmannsche Verlagsbuchhandlung
Zanichelli Editore
Associazione Italiana Editori (Italian Publishers Association)
Australian Publishers Association
Börsenverein des Deutschen Buchhandels
Bulgarian Book Association
Federación de Gremios de Editores de España
Federation of European Publishers (FEP)
Gruppo dell’Editoria Universitaria e Professionale dell’Associazione Italiana Editori
International Association of Scientific, Technical and Medical Publishers (STM)
International Publishers Association (IPA)
Nederlands Uitgeversverbond (Dutch Publishers Association)

Professional/Scholarly Publishing Division of the Association of American Publishers
Singapore Book Publishers Association
The Association of Learned & Professional Society Publishers (ALPSP)The Publishers Association of the UK
As of 1200 GMT on Thursday 1 November 2007.
We expect other publishers and associations will wish to support this declaration and lookforward to adding them to this list.