Supporting the Transition towards Open Access: Putting the Researcher at the Centre

The European Research Council (ERC) supports the principle of open access to research results as a fundamental part of its mission. It strongly endorses the policy that informs the OA 2020 initiative for the large-scale transition to open access. As an organization that is governed by scientists, the ERC considers it crucial that this transition take into account the important role of researchers in this context, be it as producers of knowledge, as actors in the review and publication process (within the established system or otherwise), or as users of other researchers’ output. The vast diversity of situations across different research communities makes this a complex and challenging task.

With this backdrop, we will first outline the ERC’s approach towards open access, highlighting some of the bottlenecks in the implementation. We will then discuss a number of initiatives that the ERC has engaged in to support the researchers it funds in opening up their results, and provide a glimpse of some ideas for the future.