Open access journals are one of the essential building blocks for the expansion of this new scientific communication model, and they currently face three major challenges: (a) increasing their number and proportion to achieve hegemony within the system; (b) overcoming debates concerning their quality (and avoiding “contamination” by so-called “predatory” journals); and (c) consolidating sources of financing to ensure their economic sustainability. These are all underpinned by the need to develop and broaden pro-open access policies, with a special emphasis on tools designed to assess compliance with said policies.
These four areas are examined in the chapter, which reveals that open access, as a movement for transforming the scientific communication model, has managed to convince the academic community and society of its many advantages. At this time, not only has it been consolidated from a quantitative point of view, but it is also forcing commercial publishers to adapt their business model to free-access publishing. In any case, this increase in the quantity and quality of open access requires strong leadership (which, for the time being, is being provided by the European Commission) and the development of new publishing models (and, therefore, financing), which are analysed in the text
