For Immediate Release

March 7, 2007

Contact: Barbara Meredith
Ph: 212-255-0200

U.S. Professional and Scholarly Publishers Endorse International Declaration on Scientific, Technical, and Medical Publishing

New York, NY, March 7, 2007: The Professional and Scholarly Publishing Division of the Association of American Publishers (AAP) today announced its formal endorsement of the Brussels Declaration on STM Publishing, a statement by the International Association of Scientific, Technical and Medical Publishers (STM), articulating key industry principles.

The Brussels Declaration was issued in the context of the European Commission’s Communication on Scientific Information and its Conference on Scientific Publishing in the European Research Area in Brussels on February 15-16, and has been endorsed thus far by 42 commercial and non-profit society publishers and by ten publishing associations worldwide.

Affirming that the mission of scholarly publishers is to maximize the dissemination and preservation of knowledge through economically self-sustaining business models, the Declaration expresses a unified view of the role of the global STM publishing community and the contribution of private sector publishers to science and society. While the Declaration takes no position for or against any particular business model, it does caution that the open deposit of accepted author manuscripts risks destabilizing subscription revenues and undermining the integrity of the peer- reviewed literature. The signatories support the creation of rights-protected archives that preserve scholarship in perpetuity, and welcome innovative business models that promote economic sustainability, based on a sensible and evidenced-based approach to policymaking. The full text of the Declaration can be found at: http://www.stm-assoc.org/brussels-declaration

The decision to endorse the Declaration was made by the Professional and Scholarly Publishing Division’s 18-member Executive Council. AAP’s Vice President for Professional and Scholarly Publishing Barbara Meredith said: “We applaud STM for creating a declaration that frames the key issues in the current debate about how best to advance scholarly communication in the digital age.”

The Association of American Publishers is the national trade association of the U.S. book publishing industry. AAP’s more than 300 members include most of the major commercial publishers in the United States, as well as smaller and non-profit publishers, university presses and scholarly societies. AAP members publish hardcover and paperback books in every field, educational materials for the elementary, secondary, postsecondary, and professional markets, scholarly journals, computer software, and electronic products and services. Defense of the freedom to read and the freedom to publish at home and abroad is among the Association’s highest priorities.

Members of AAP’s Professional and Scholarly Publishing Division (www.pspcentral.org) publish the vast majority of materials used in the U.S. by scholars and professionals in science, medicine, technology, business, law, reference, social science, and the humanities, and are worldwide disseminators, archivists, and shapers of scientific research via print and electronic means. The Division's more than 100 members comprising professional societies, commercial publishers, and university presses produce books, journals, computer software, databases and electronic products.

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