Unlock the Editor’s Digest for free
Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.
Academics are boycotting a leading gender studies journal owned by New York-listed publisher Wiley after its editors and policies were changed in what they characterise as an “anti-woke” drive against radical views in the pursuit of profits.
Nearly 500 advisers, reviewers, contributors and readers have written resignation letters to Wiley in protest at the “mainstreaming” of the Gender, Work and Organization journal by changing its aims, including the removal of references to queer theory on its website.
The signatories to two documents circulated this week also criticised the appointment as editors-in-chief of “business academics with expertise in marketing and entrepreneurship [who do not reflect] the breadth of gender and feminist research of the journal”.
“This is some kind of anti-woke backlash in the form of removing what would have been seen as radical aspects of the journal,” said Professor Carl Rhodes, dean of the business school at the University of Technology Sydney and a former associate editor of the journal.
The move to call out Wiley’s “marginalising practices” highlights the tensions in academic publishing, with authors under fierce pressure to publish and to peer-review others’ contributions for free.
Publishers also face growing demands to increase subscription revenues at a time of cuts to university research budgets and a shift to open-access platforms. Intensifying “culture wars” between opposing ideologies also make some journals a target for criticism.
One of the “big five” academic publishers alongside Elsevier, SAGE, Springer Nature and Taylor & Francis, Wiley’s research publishing division reported revenues of $659mn in the nine months to January 31, down 4 per cent compared with the same period a year earlier. It does not provide detailed figures on individual journals.
The group boycotting the journal, which was established in 1994, wrote: “We no longer identify with the aims, scope or undemocratic practices and processes underpinning the journal, and we have no trust that the current governance is aligned with the values of our inclusive, feminist community. It added that Wiley was “sabotaging world-class scholarship”.
The 467 signatories said the process to appoint the new editors was “not appropriate, consistent, transparent or inclusive”, while it said former associate editors had received papers “to process that do not fit” with its critical gender and feminist roots.
The latest issue contains articles on “gendered executive headhunting with Chinese characteristics”, “the underrepresentation of women in physics compared to biology” and the “foodwork of Brexit-prepping mothers”.
Professor Alison Pullen at Macquarie University, a former co-editor and signatory to the document, said the publisher’s actions signified that it “no longer needs or wants expert academics in the field because that limits their capacity to publish popular accounts that can increase their revenue”.
Disputes between academics and publishers have increased in recent years, with editors of more than 30 academic journals resigning since 2015 and eight in 2023 alone, according to the blog Retraction Watch, in spats over fees charged and editorial disagreements.
Professor Melissa Tyler, whose research at the UK’s Essex university focuses on gender and work, said: “This is absolutely an attack on academic freedom and integrity . . . Our social and cultural landscapes are so awash with fear-fuelled hate that these kinds of critical spaces are vital to academic freedom and expression.”
Wiley said: “Our job as publisher is to ensure that our journals meet the evolving needs of the community, provide insights into emerging areas of study, and include various areas of scholarship and expertise.”
“The topics covered by Gender, Work & Organization are critically important and we continue to invest resources in this impactful journal. We have not suggested any changes to the scope of this journal, nor to the quality of research that it aims to publish.”
