An open and inclusive process for new guidelines for open science: policy documents in the hands of the library

Open science is no longer a new undertaking for university libraries. Its forms and conten, however, has changed since the beginning: new international and national policies have seen the light of day and some of the tasks have been standardised and have reached a maturity level which warrants a renewal of the local policies at most higher-education institutions.

At Åbo Akademi University, as is the case at many other higher education institutions, the responsibility for the coordination of open science activities is placed at the library. Therefore the library was in charge of the open science renewal process when the old policy from 2017 had been outdated. Below we share some thoughts about the participatory process we carried out at ÅAU in 2022-2023.