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From Capacity to Agency: Rethinking Editorial Development in the Global South
For many editors across the Global South, the challenge is not a lack of quality research; it is navigating systems that were never designed with their realities in mind.
A journal editor in Africa struggling with indexing requirements, a reviewer in South Asia working without formal training, or an editorial team in Latin America managing workflows without digital infrastructure, these are not isolated cases. They reflect a deeper structural imbalance in scholarly publishing, where the “center of gravity” has long remained in the Global North.
Recent analyses suggest a significant majority of research in key fields such as economic development continues to be led by Global North contributors, reinforcing long-standing disparities in whose knowledge is produced, validated, and disseminated.
Yet this imbalance is no longer uncontested.
Beyond Access: Why Capacity Alone Is Not Enough
For years, efforts to address inequity focused on access to journals, databases, and publishing tools. While important, access alone has proven insufficient.
What is increasingly clear is that editorial capacity sits at the heart of equitable participation. Without trained editors and robust editorial systems, even strong research struggles to meet the technical, ethical, and structural expectations required for global dissemination.
In many under-resourced contexts, editors operate without formal training, institutional support, or recognition. The issue is not capability; it is the absence of systems that enable that capability to thrive. As highlighted in recent capacity-building analyses, interventions that focus solely on access without strengthening editorial systems tend to produce limited and unsustained outcomes.
This is where the shift from access to agency becomes critical.
A Collective Shift in Editorial Development
A growing number of organizations, including the Asian Council of Science Editors (ACSE), European Association of Science Editors (EASE), INASP, Research4Life, Committee on Publication Ethics, Directory of Open Access Journals, and World Association of Medical Editors, are contributing to this shift through a range of editorial development and support initiatives.
While their approaches differ, the broader direction is clear: a move away from short-term, workshop-based interventions toward more sustained, system-level strengthening of editorial ecosystems.
What Actually Works and Why
Looking across these efforts, several patterns emerge.
First, integrated approaches outperform isolated interventions. Programs that combine training with mentorship and ongoing support consistently demonstrate stronger outcomes than one-off workshops, with some analyses suggesting nearly double the effectiveness in improving editorial quality.
Second, context matters. South–South collaboration, where editors engage with peers facing similar structural constraints, often leads to more practical and adaptable solutions than externally imposed models.
Third, infrastructure is inseparable from capacity. Without investment in digital platforms, metadata standards, and indexing readiness, even well-trained editorial teams remain constrained in visibility and impact. As seen in regional platforms such as African Journals Online, infrastructure plays a decisive role in whether journals are discoverable in global systems.
Together, these insights suggest that capacity-building is most effective when embedded within broader systems rather than delivered as isolated interventions.
The Barriers That Persist
Despite measurable progress, structural inequities remain deeply embedded in the scholarly publishing ecosystem.
The dominance of English continues to shape both accessibility and perceptions of quality. Editorial boards of many “global” journals still lack meaningful geographic diversity, with some studies indicating minimal to no representation from low- and middle-income regions in decision-making roles.
Financial constraints further limit the adoption of essential publishing technologies, including XML workflows, DOI registration, and long-term digital archiving. At the same time, editorial labor in many regions remains undervalued, frequently voluntary, and largely unrecognized.
More fundamentally, the very frameworks used to define “quality” and “impact” remain rooted in systems that privilege Global North priorities, raising important questions about whose knowledge is legitimized and amplified.
Moving Forward: From Inclusion to Influence
If the goal is true equity, the conversation must move beyond capacity-building toward structural reform.
This includes:
- Recognizing regional excellence by evolving indexing and evaluation systems to value locally relevant research
- Supporting sustainable publishing models, particularly Diamond Open Access, to reduce financial barriers
- Ensuring meaningful representation, where Global South editors are active participants in decision-making processes
- Advancing language inclusivity, including multilingual publishing and responsible use of emerging translation technologies
These are not incremental changes; they require a rethinking of how participation and value are defined across the global scholarly ecosystem.
A Shift Already Underway
Encouragingly, the shift from access to agency is already visible.
Editorial systems are strengthening. Regional collaborations are expanding. More importantly, the narrative is evolving, from viewing Global South editors as recipients of support to recognizing them as active contributors shaping the future of scholarly communication.
The question now is not whether capacity exists, but whether global systems are ready to recognize and integrate it.
Keywords
Global South Editorial Development Scholarly Publishing Research Inequity Capacity Building Open Access Editorial Systems
Editor’s Brew delivers fresh updates, community highlights, and editorial insights on behalf of ACSE. These posts represent the “daily blend” of news, initiatives, and collective wisdom from across the scholarly publishing community.
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The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of their affiliated institutions, the Asian Council of Science Editors (ACSE), or the Editor’s Café editorial team.
