Perspectivas da publicação de livros em formato digital pelas editoras universitárias na América Latina

Abstract

The use of information and communication technologies (ICT) as well as the open access (OA) movement stimulate the expansion of and access to informational artifacts. The use of tools to assist the editorial process generate changes in the elaboration of the book's structure, which can now be made available exclusively in the digital universe, making it possible for the book to stay in the digital universe, and go without being physically printed and distributed, which contributes to the broadening of science production and communication. In this context, the research objective is to investigate the perspective of digital book publishing and its processes in university presses in Latin America. This research’s nature is descriptive and exploratory with a quali-quantitative approach based on the prospective scenarios method. It has developed in two moments: a sample was assembled with Brazilian university presses affiliated to ABEU, then, all university presses affiliated with EULAC in Latin America were included. Data collection instruments are publishers website analysis and a two-part online questionnaire. In the data analysis phase, content analysis and analysis of variables were used, based on the principles and tools of Michel Godet's scenario methodology, including softwares MICMAC for structural analysis, MACTOR for actor strategies analysis and MORPHOL for the morphological analysis. As a result, it is found that Brazilian public university presses are publishing in digital format, even though adoption of new formats is still slow, and that 89% of Latin American presses publish in digital format. Publishers have pointed out some barriers to digital expansion such as: lack of financing or specialized staff. From the results generated by Godet's software, among the ten variables and actors analyzed, eight variables and five actors were indicated as very influential. The morphological analysis allowed to describe four prospective scenarios, all of them favorable to the development of the academic publishing market. It can be concluded that, despite the moderate profile of publishers, there is a rise in digital publishing and the availability of works in open access by university presses in Latin America.