Chapter Three: Literature review
3.2 Theoretical framework
costs of existing products but not an analysis of electronic journals or print journals.
(Lancaster 1988 : 157)
Very few analyses of the cost-effectiveness of participation in network or consortium or resource sharing have been published. (Brin 1994 : 209) In the opinion of this author, no completely credible or definitive cost-benefit studies have been applied to university libraries.
Several surveys give a valuable analysis of the developments in scholarly communication.
(Cargille 1999; McCabe 1997; Milne 1999; Kent 1999; Keller 2001; Oppenheim 2000;
Sosteric 1996). However, none of these studies focused exclusively on scholarly journals.
The place of the e-journal in the electronic future is hotly debated. Much of this debate is not new and has little to do with the issue of print versus electronic access. The continuing rise of journal prices has perhaps become the biggest factor driving the demands for change.
Explanations for these rises in prices vary, and have been a source of much dispute. ( Mobley 1998 : 5) There are many predictions on how far-reaching e-journals can be.
hypothesis formulation. Theoretical knowledge often provides scholars with standards for weighing the validity of their research findings. (Busha & Harter 1980 : 17)
Theory plays a crucial role in research. Theory helps to make research more productive in that it organizes a number of “unassorted facts, laws, concepts, constructs and principles into a meaningful and manageable form.” (Powell 1997 : 25) Theory can explain a group of phenomena, suggest relationships between facts, structure concepts, organize facts into a meaningful pattern and provide logical explanations for facts. If certain facts or variables appear to be causally related, theory can help to explain the nature of the relationship. Sound theoretical knowledge of the problem area from which the research task originated is
necessary to conduct a meaningful inquiry. A thorough familiarity with the current literature relevant to the facets of a problem to be investigated can help research workers compile a list of important issues, theories or questions that can then be categorized and utilized according to their value in the frame of reference of a particular inquiry. (Busha & Harter 1980: 17)
It has been observed, and previous research has indicated, that certain facts are related to electronic journals. The main purchasers of scientific journals have been universities. For at least a decade, the price of scientific journals has been escalating above the levels of inflation. There appears to be no relationship between production costs and subscription prices of scholarly journals. Journals are priced according to what the market is estimated to bear, but at the same time, the market is inelastic. (Cornish 1999 : 33) As a result, prices have consistently increased annually at a rate well above the general inflation rate for the last two decades.
As Cornish (1999 : 34) points out the publishers were in an enviable position, as journals are not substitutable. Scientists need to be able to publish in what they consider to be the leading titles in their field, and to be able to read these titles at their desks. The library is a crucial element in the publishing industry as such. It is an arguable fact that publishers publish for profit; the basis for the activities of the industry is to make the creativity of authors more widely known to the public. (Halliday 2001 : 260 ) But authors on the other hand write not for profit but to disseminate their research and make their ideas more widely known. Both these groups cannot reach all potential readers of any work and need intermediaries. The library provides the interface between the publisher and the public. Publishers cannot hope to
reach every potential outlet for their products because they do not have direct contact with the necessary groups to achieve this. Publishers are also limited in what they can provide in terms of a repertoire, which will normally be limited to their own products or those of
associated companies. Libraries, however can, and do, reach a wide audience as they have direct access to a very broadly based user community. They can also offer a much wider range of products than the publisher or even other intermediaries (booksellers, publishing agents and database hosts) as they are not motivated primarily by financial incentives, although they may need to limit the range of resources because of financial constraints.
(Cornish 1999 : 35)
Odlyzko (2001 : 9) maintains that the inertia of the scholarly community is partly to blame for the journal crisis. Scholars do not see themselves in any way responsible for the situation.
They have no incentives not to publish in the high-priced prestigious journals. From their perspective, they provide research findings freely to journals and expect their libraries to enable them to read other research findings just as freely.
Naturally, libraries, as major resources of information, and valuing their unique role to reach so many users, want and need to be able to exploit new possibilities. However, budgets have not been rising at the same rate as journal prices. The result was that by the mid-1990s libraries had to make some hard decisions about journal cancellations. If they are no longer going to rely on a print-based industry, the alternative will be to use materials in electronic formats of many kinds.
Publishers are required to make very large investments in new technologies in order to remain competitive. For publishers, electronic delivery is a way of differentiating their titles from those of other publishers by providing innovative ways of searching and displaying each paper. As a result, each publisher has developed his or her own user interface. The groups of companies in the middle of this are the subscription agents who have provided a valuable service in providing a commercial interface between librarians and publishers. In the electronic world, the subscription agents have now started to provide integration services, providing libraries with a consistent interface to a wide range of different publishers. All these parties are strongly affected by changes in the area of scholarly publishing. (Keller 2001 : 388)
There are a great number of publications dealing with the future development of scholarly communication. Most of them can be described as scenarios or forecasts of individuals presenting their own ideas of the future to their peers. (Halliday 2001 : 661)