During the holidays weekend, all but one member of Elsevier’s editorial board Journal of Human Evolution (JHE) resigned “with deep sadness and regret.” according to Retraction Watchwho helpfully provided a Online PDF of the publishers’ full statement. It’s the 20th mass resignation of a scientific journal since 2023 on various points of contention, according to Retraction Watch, many in response to controversial changes in business models used by the scientific publishing industry.
“This has been a particularly painful decision for each of us,” the board members wrote in their statement. “The editors who have led the journal over the past 38 years have invested enormous time and energy in making JHE the leading journal in paleoanthropological research and have remained loyal and committed to the journal and our authors long after the end of their mandate. THE [associate editors] were just as loyal and committed. We all care deeply about the journal, our discipline, and our academic community; however, we find that we can no longer work with Elsevier in good conscience.
The editorial board cited several changes made over the past decade that it said run counter to the journal’s long-standing editorial principles. These included removing support for an editor and special issues editor, leaving the editorial board to carry out these duties. When the board expressed the need for an editor, Elsevier’s response, they said, was “to maintain that editors should not pay attention to language, grammar, readability, consistency or accuracy of nomenclature or appropriate formatting.
A major restructuring of the editorial board is also underway, which aims to reduce the number of associate editors by more than half, which “will result in fewer AEs handling many more articles and on topics well outside of their areas of expertise.
Additionally, there are plans to create a third-tier editorial board that would function largely as a figurehead, after Elsevier “unilaterally took full control” of the board structure in 2023 by requiring all Associate editors renew their contracts every year – which the committee estimates. undermines its editorial independence and integrity.
The worst practices
In-house production was reduced or outsourced, and in 2023 Elsevier began using AI during production without informing the board, leading to many style and formatting errors as well as inversion versions of articles already accepted and formatted by publishers. “This has been very embarrassing for the journal and the resolution took six months and was only achieved through the persistent efforts of the editors,” the editors wrote. “AI processing continues to be used and regularly reformats submitted manuscripts to change meaning and format and requires extensive author and editor oversight during the proof phase.”
Additionally, author page fees for JHE are significantly higher than those of Elsevier’s other for-profit journals, as well as broad open access journals like Scientific Reports. Few of the journal’s authors can afford these fees, “which runs counter to the journal’s (and Elsevier’s) commitment to equality and inclusiveness,” the editors wrote.
The breaking point appears to have been reached in November, when Elsevier informed co-publishers Mark Grabowski (Liverpool John Moores University) and Andrea Taylor (Touro University California College of Osteopathic Medicine) that it was ending the existing dual-editor model. since 1986. When Grabowki and Taylor protested, they were told the model could only stay if they agreed to a 50 percent reduction in their pay.
