In the open access policy (see PDF here, German only), the University of Basel declares its intentions and goals with regard to open access. It also sets out the responsibilities and accountabilities of authors, the President's board and the University Library.

Goals

• To ensure access to the latest academic findings and the best possible dissemination of university research results.
• To ensure access to research results as a public good, especially if the research was financed by public funds.
• To not evaluate the quality of research results solely on the basis of journal-based metrics such as the journal impact factor.

Obligations for authors

Members of the University of Basel are obliged to make their academic publications freely accessible within the existing legal framework. There are two options for publishing open access:

• The publication appears under a Creative Commons license in a purely open access journal or as an open access book (Gold Open Access).
• A complete version of the publication is deposited in a suitable online repository so that it can be made openly accessible after an embargo period (Green Open Access).

In this context, the University of Basel expects authors to refrain, whenever possible, from assigning exclusive rights of use to publishers in their publication contracts. Authors should strive to reserve a simple right of use for the public distribution of their works.

Responsibilities

The strategic direction for the funding of Open Access is determined by the President's Board within the framework of the Research Committee, in consultation with the faculties and groups.

The University Library is responsible for

• The operational implementation of the policy
• The management of the institutional repository edoc
• The ongoing optimisation of services, infrastructures and processes
• Providing information and advice to researchers and support for open access publishing

In addition, the library has is a member of the Consortium of Swiss Academic Libraries, which conducts contract negotiations with the large publishing houses.