A Decolonial Approach to Open-Access Repositories. How to Set Up a Subject Repository for Documents on International Cultural Relations

To meet the information needs of subject experts, so-called open-access subject repositories have been established since the early 1990s, which make relevant documents available as a collection. These repositories are still exclusively operated in the “Global North”. Can they meet the global diversity of requirements? How can these platforms be managed with cultural humility?

A planned open-access knowledge-sharing platform for the field of international cultural relations forms the grounds for this study. The production of knowledge in this field takes place globally in different types of institutions: academic, educational, political, and economic. The communities of practice produce formal publications, but also so-called “grey literature” which is often hard to discover and preserve.

This study is based on desk research, supplemented by a three-month open commenting period and a public workshop whose participants have substantial experience in the technologies and practices analysed, or are members of the communities of practice, amongst them experts who work in “Global South” contexts.

As a result, a recommendation matrix was developed which tackles the most important issues: balancing “Global North” privileges by subtraction instead of just adding diversity, working towards social justice by involving the communities of practice from the very start, setting up a polycentric governance structure based on values defined by the communities, establishing ethics of care and translation processes to mediate different roles and accommodate individual needs, supporting multilingualism, low connectivity environments, interoperability, and experiments, all with a critical stance towards standardisation and rationalisation, planning sustainably for the long term, collaborating and cooperating, doing everything transparently, at a moderate pace, learning humbly and perpetually.