Characteristics of the publishing infrastructure of peripheral countries: A comparison of periodical publications from Latin America with periodicals from the US and the UK

Abstract

Bibliometric research can provide science policy makers with indicators of the capacity of a country's national scientific system to produce printed information. The capacity of the local publishing industry to produce scientific and technical periodical publications reflects the availability of outlets for the dissemination of scientific findings. The present research attempts to evaluate the role of the publishing industry in the level of bibliographic control, and the level of peer review of periodical publications from Latin America. A random search was performed on the 1990 Cd-Rom version ofThe Serials Directory, a commercially produced international reference source on periodical publications. A sample of 311 periodicals from Latin America was downloaded to a local database. A similar search was performed on publications from the United States and the United Kingdom for comparison purposes. A random search of 235 publications was downloaded into a local database. Publishers were classified for both samples according to three types: academic, governmental, and commercial. Publications were sorted thematically and indicators of bibliographic control, and of peer review were recorded for both samples. Publications from Latin America showed a very low level of bibliographic control, particularly in the case of the assignment of ISSN numbers, where 58% of the sample studied was published without this element of bibliographic control. This contrasted sharply with the periodicals from the US and UK, where 83% (195) journals had an ISSN number assigned. The involvement of editorial boards in the academic quality of Latin American publications amounted only to 21% of the sample studied. Periodicals from the US and UK reported an editor as responsible for the journal in 40% (93) of the cases. This amount constitutes about double the number of editors reported by Latin American publications. Latin American academic publishers are the most numerous publishers in the sample studied accounting for 37% (114) of the journals studied however, 68% (77) of those editors printed periodicals without a named editor. Governmental publishers are the second largest publisher type. They produced 29% (89) of the journals in the sample. Commercial publishers are responsible for 26% (82) of the journals studied. Publications from the US and UK show a clear predominance of commercial publishers, accounting for 47% (111) of the journals. Academic publishers only produced 29% (68) of the 235 journals in the sample. This clear dominance of the commercial publisher sector shows that publishing in at least the two countries studied is clearly practised as a business enterprise. This is in sharp comparison to the publishing patterns exhibited in Latin America where the academic sector is the most prominent one.