CrimRxiv, Criminology’s Open Access Repository, Moves to The University of Manchester

ATLANTA — CrimRxiv, the open access repository for criminal justice and criminology research and publications founded by Georgia State Professor Scott Jacques, has moved to The University of Manchester (UoM) in Manchester, England.

“Manchester is a historic institution well known for its work in criminology,” Jacques said. “It’s also had important scholars who’ve made a commitment to digital scholarship and related but distinct open access. Its criminology department will own CrimRxiv, and the library will support it via its Office for Open Research.”

Judith Aldridge, professor of criminology and head of criminology at UoM, is the new CrimRxiv director and David Buil-Gil, UoM’s open criminology lead, is its managing moderator. The Governance and Management team for CrimRxiv includes Eon Kim as lead equity, diversity and inclusion officer; Scott Taylor, head of research services and the Office for Open Research; Bill Ayres, strategic lead for research data management; Lukas Hughes-Noehrer, co-chair and local network lead for open and reproducible research; and Reka Solymosi, senior lecturer in research methods. A team of UoM Ph.D. students serves as moderators to process submissions.

Jacques will help keep CrimRxiv growing by developing additional financial support as its associate director for sustainability.

Jacques founded CrimRxiv at Georgia State University to promote open access to criminological scholarship worldwide. It remains the only open access repository devoted to criminology and criminal justice, and ensures that anyone can read the publications it makes available for free. Since its launch in July 2020, CrimRxiv has freely shared more than 2,000 publications, with nearly 230,000 views by more than 112,000 readers from 209 countries.

“The Andrew Young School of Policy Studies’ Digital Landscape Initiative gave me the inspiration and resources to create AYS Open, our college’s first open access effort,” Jacques said. “From that, I saw the need to develop a more targeted repository for criminology research, so I developed CrimRxiv with a group of criminologists from around the country. When the group disbanded, CrimRxiv needed a home with both the personnel and resources to support it and help it grow. Manchester seemed the logical place.”

The University of Manchester, in a press release announcing the acquisition, said it will use CrimRxiv to make criminology a more diverse, equitable and inclusive research environment, increasing research transparency and responsibility to improve evidence-based decision-making across government, nonprofit and industry sectors. CrimRxiv is supported by the University Office for Open Research, and powered by pubpub, an infrastructure designed by Knowledge Futures.

“The results of research should be freely available to everyone, everywhere,” Aldridge said. “I aim for CrimRxiv to become the most important digital place in criminology. It is a huge honor, opportunity and responsibility for The University of Manchester to be its new home, and me its new director.”