140 journals closed in Australia 2011-20 – HASS disciplines took the hardest hit

Hamid R Jamali, Simon Wakeling (both Charles Sturt U) and Alireza Abbas (UNSW) surveyed editors to establish what happened.  They find that half the journals went “to a very great extent” due to loss of funding and lack of support from the journal owner.

HASS took the hit, with 75 per cent of journals that closed publishing research in the humanities, arts and social sciences – which is a problem for scholars, and society.

As the authors explain, “issues in social sciences, humanities and arts are more likely to have local and national significance and they need local outlets for publications because international journals’ editorial policies might not favour papers on local issues.”