GHI-Cambridge Book Series Moves to Gold Open Access (OA)

“The new Cambridge policy,” says Director Simone Lässig, “reaffirms the GHI’s longstanding commitment to barrier-free access to scholarship and historical sources and also marks the final step in the Institute’s transition to open access in our print publication program.” Transatlantische Historische Studien, published with Franz Steiner Verlag, transitioned to open access back in 2019, and Studies in German History, with Berghahn Books, followed suit earlier this year. The GHI Bulletin has long been published in free digital form.

From now on, each new GHI-Cambridge title will appear as a hardcover book available for purchase (with an eventual paperback option), an e-book available for purchase, and as an Open Access PDF available for free download. “We view these formats as mutually supportive—each has its own advantages, whether it be ease of reading or enhanced discoverability, and by offering all three,” Lässig explains, “the GHI will better support its existing readers while reaching new ones.”

The first book scheduled for publication under the new OA agreement, Adam Bisno’s engaging monograph Big Business and the Crisis of German Democracy: Liberalism and the Grand Hotels of Berlin, 1875–1933, will appear in print in November 2023 but is already available for download on the Cambridge University Press website. The book’s compelling central question—why did a group of Jewish hotel owners ultimately decide that Hitler would be better for business than democracy?—together with its elegant prose, rich illustrations, and multidisciplinary approach make this title uniquely well suited for the type of broad readership that open access can help attract. The next book under contract, Jan Jansen and Kirsten McKenzie’s Mobility and Coercion in an Age of Wars and Revolutions: A Global History, c. 1750–1830, is a collection of essays by twelve scholars who live and work in cities across the globe and who specialize in the entangled histories of war, empire, and forced migration in different regions—from Chile and Argentina, New Orleans and the Caribbean, to London and Sydney. The Jansen/McKenzie volume is forthcoming for 2024, as is Michelle Kahn’s prize-winning manuscript, Foreign in Two Homelands:Racism, Return Migration, and Turkish-German History, which draws on a range of lesser-known sources from German and Turkish archives.

With strong manuscripts in the pipeline and a new Gold Open Access policy, the GHI-Cambridge series is poised to make exciting contributions to the fields of German, transnational, and global history in the coming years. Here, Lässig notes, “At a time when the Institute is expanding its research network internationally, the new access policy fully aligns our goals.” Please check our publications page regularly for information about new books in our Cambridge series and for updates on forthcoming titles in the Steiner and Berghahn series.