From: Richard Poynder <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Fri, 26 Jul 2013 10:22:41 +0100

The ninth Q&A in a series exploring the current state of Open Access
(OA) has been published. On this occasion the questions are answered
by Dominique Babini, Open Access Advocacy leader at the Latin American
Council on Social Sciences (CLACSO). Based in Argentina, CLACSO is an
academic network of 345 social science institutions, mainly in the
universities of 21 of the region’s countries.

 In inviting people to take part in this Q&A series I have been
conscious that much of the discussion about Open Access still tends to
be dominated by those based in the developed world; or at least
developing world voices are often drowned out by the excitable babble
of agreement, disagreement, and frequent stalemate, that characterises
the Open Access debate.

It has therefore never been entirely clear to me how stakeholders in
the developing world view OA, and whether their views differ greatly
from those that have dominated the OA conversation since it began in
around 1994. In the hope of gaining a better understanding I plan to
invite a number of people based in the developing world to take part
in this series.

To start the ball rolling I have published a Q&A with Dominique
Babini, who is based at the University of Buenos Aires. Readers will
judge for themselves how, and to what extent, Babini’s views differ
from those we hear so often from those based in, say, North America or
Europe.

The Q&A can be read here:

http://poynder.blogspot.co.uk/2013/07/dominique-babini-on-state-of-open.html

Richard Poynder