*CFP* "#TRANSITION. PEER PRODUCTION AND OUR CRISES", 15º NEXT ISSUE, JOURNAL OF PEER PRODUCTION

Peer producers are people who create and manage common-pool resources together. It sometimes seems as if “peer production” and “digital commons” can be used interchangeably. Digital commons such as free and open source software and Wikipedia are non-rivalrous (they can be reproduced at little or no cost) and non-excludable (no-one can prevent others from using them, through property rights for example). So, practically speaking, proprietary objects could be produced by equal “peers”. We argue that peer production has a normative dimension so that what chiefly characterizes this mode of production is  that “the  output is orientated towards the further expansion of the commons; while the commons, recursively, is the chief resource in this mode of production” (Söderberg & O'Neil, 2014, p. 2).  

The Journal of Peer Production has tracked the evolution of peer production from open knowledge to open design and manufacturing. It approaches its ten-year anniversary in the time of the global pandemic, and of the continuing environmental crisis.

The impacts of Covid-19 are profound, but will not last forever, though local infection pools may subsist in poorer countries for much longer than in the Global North. In contrast, the environmental crisis is here to stay.

Significant social change is required to stave off climate destruction, and principles such as cooperation and trust, transparency in production, collective democratic decision-making, etc., can usefully contribute to necessary processes of “relocalization” and “degrowth”. What should be done to develop the digital and physical commons? What role should the Journal of Peer Production play in this development? And what shape should it take? It is clear that in addition to maintaining its uniquely transparent curation and dissemination of academic research, the Journal of Peer Production needs to expand its work in several ways:

• Should it feature more practical advice to develop commons, such as toolkits and how-to guides?
• Should it comprise policy proposals to help grow the infrastructure which supports the commons?
• In other words, should it combine research and action?

The answer is 'yes' in all three cases. To this end we seek creative,practical and policy-oriented ideas to help invent a new type of scientific journal that both fulfills strict academic criteria, and brings research work closer to practice. Our next issue, JOPP #15 will thus be a "TRANSITION" issue featuring, in addition to peer-reviewed research, experimental formats and "meta" articles.

We seek investigations into societal transition (how can we move towards a society where contributions to the commons are valued and recognised?), into the journal's editorial transition (how should the Journal of Peer Production change to assist this societal transition), as well as idiosyncratic understandings of scientific and political transitions.

We invite submissions of peer-reviewed academic papers from multiple fields on how "things can change". What are the sociological and historical conditions for transition to occur? For example: what is the impact of manifestos? When is innovation socialised? How can allies be enrolled? etc.

Editorial guidelines for peer-reviewed articles: max 8000 words; peer-reviewed in accordance with the JOPP peer review process.

For this TRANSITION issue, academic papers must be complemented by a shorter piece in which the contents of the academic paper are transformed into a different format. The nature of this transformation is up to the authors.

We can suggest the following: policy guidelines; practical toolkits; comic-books; etc.

Other authors may be enlisted to assist in the article's transition.

Editorial guidelines for complementary pieces: max 2000 words; reviewed by the editors.

Non peer-reviewed articles

We also invite submissions of non-peer reviewed academic papers dealing with transition. These will be reviewed by the editors.

A-Follow-up papers

Papers "following-up" on previous issues of JOPP, or on specific articles by the authors or others.

What has changed since this article was published?

B-Policy and strategic papers

Papers bringing together academics and policy makers.

Strategies for connecting to actors in government and/or civil society.

C-Meta papers

Papers on the question of impactful academic publishing: how can academics pursue a career and have social impact at the same time?

Papers on the transition of research fields: how do research fields evolve to better meet their aims?

Rewriting influential papers, or a chapter of a classic book, or revisiting one's own past paper: what has changed?

Editorial guidelines for A, B, and C: max 4000 words. 


Timeline

EOI peer-reviewed articles deadline (500-words max. extended abstract + 100-words max. complementary paper abstract) 30 July 2020

EOI non peer-reviewed articles deadline (250-words max. abstract) 30 July 2020

Authors advised 30 August 2020

First submission sent out for review 30 November 2020

Reviews due 30 January 2021

Revised submissions due 30 March 2021

Signals due 30 May 2021

JOPP # 15 released 30 June 2021