Open Access at Duke
Duke Law's long-standing commitment to open access includes making student, faculty scholarship freely available online.
In 1998, under the leadership of Senior Associate Dean for Information, Richard Danner, Duke Law School became the first in the country to make all articles published in its law journals — including back issues — freely accessible online. In 2005, Duke Law furthered its commitment to open access by establishing an online archive of faculty scholarship, providing free access to the majority of articles published by Duke Law faculty. The contents of that archive are now the foundation of the Duke Law Scholarship Repository.
It's a huge benefit to both our students and to faculty authors.
Duke's journals also explicitly allow authors the freedom to post their articles without restriction on freely-accessible third-party web sites. By making scholarship as easily and widely accessible as possible, Duke provides a valuable service to all who publish in its journals, and reinforces Duke's commitment to open access.
In 2008, Goodson Library hosted a meeting of distinguished law library directors to discuss open access in legal academia. The meeting resulted in the Durham Statement on Open Access to Legal Scholarship, a call for law schools to move toward electronic publication of their student-edited journals and supports. Since the Durham Statement was drafted, most law schools have made their journals freely and openly accessible.