Opening up the History of Science : a Perspective from Centaurus

Centaurus was founded in 1950 and has remained so far one of the major generalist journals devoted to the study of the history of science. Since 2007, it has been the official journal of the European Society for the History of Science (ESHS), which in 2022 became its co-owner. In the last decade, Centaurus' mission has increasingly been aligned with the ESHS's purpose to promote cooperation in the field of the history of science understood in the broadest sense, in and beyond Europe. As a result of these efforts, Centaurus became a ‘diamond' Open Access journal, in which authors can publish without any cost and readers can access all the content for free. Open Access will come with new benefits and new responsibilities, especially for a small humanities field such as the history of science. Transitioning to Open Access is a big challenge and a remarkable change for a journal.

The first part of this article discusses recent developments in Open Access within their social, economic and political context, taking Centaurus as a case-study. However, Open Access is only the start of a more thorough transition to Open Science practices. The second part of this text focuses on Open-Peer Review, a new process aimed at overcoming the well-known drawbacks of blind peer-review, to open up a discussion about its advantages and disadvantages for the history of science. [Publisher's text]