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Dear List,

I would like to draw your attention on the following issue. Having naively expressed my interest after being invited by colleagues to contribute to a collective volume on a topic sounding to me, I was surprised to discover this new (?) type of publication promoted by the controversial MDPI/Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MDPI on "Finnish downgrading" and "proliferation of special issues"). The concerned journal is "Religions", and its current or planned "Special Issues" on Indological topics, for which there are invitations to submit with a submission deadline between 1 Feb and 31 Aug 2025, are no less than 9:

Beyond the “Spice Routes”: Indic and Sinitic Religions across the Asian Maritime Realm

Buddhist Meditation in Central Asia

Hindu Sacred Texts and Rituals in Sanskrit Literature

Jainism and Narrative

Old Texts, New Insights: Exploring Buddhist Manuscripts

Thresholds of Reality: Exploring the In-Between in Indian Thought

A Sociological Approach to the Study of the Sanskrit Purānas

Religion and Performing Arts in Contemporary India

The Encounter of Colonialism and Indian Religious Traditions

The benefits of publishing in a special issue are extolled on the above pages — "All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a double-blind peer-review process" (led by the guest editors) and the published articles are in open access (for reading them).

However, what is less common in our area of studies, is the fact that "The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 1800 CHF (Swiss Francs)" (= ± € 1900  or $ 1950). Such a prohibitive cost  certainly constitutes a denial of access to publication for most of the scholars in our field, especially the young ones (unless their own institutes or research fundings are willing or able to pay as much for their publications). However, in the (guest editors/publisher combined) invitation email (which is in fact optional, since the invitation to submit a proposal of paper is in the same time made to anybody on the Special Issue page), it was added that "should you have any difficulties with the fee, please let us know; given your qualifications and reputation, the journal is able to waive the fee for your submission" ("However if you are able to obtain any funding to cover either a portion or the whole of the APC…, either from your institution or other sources, this will help to support the journal" — this APC is requested at the end of the publishing process). This difference in (financial) treatment based on criteria that are devoid of objectivity is disturbing. And more fundamentally, in the case of a journal article, why pay for being published... I am not convinced by either the model or the results of these "Special Issues" (inevitably lacking of coherence), which, if they are successful according to MDPI ("Normally, a successful Special Issue consists of 10 or more papers, in addition to an editorial (optional) written by the Guest Editor(s)" https://www.mdpi.com/special_issues_guidelines — I wonder which issue of the above list will reach this goal) would mean much more expensive volumes (paid by the authors) than the collective ones provided from reputable traditional publishers (when the open access is paid by the scientific editors themselves, through institutional research funding previously got for their collaborative project).

Maybe the guest editors (who are apparently never among the paying contributors) of these special issues could tell us a bit more about the(ir?) interest (?) of this way of publishing (or attracting contributors ) and why they have decided to use it (even if they could have been misinformed about these mercantile aspects at the time they applied, or were invited, to become Guest Editor of such Special Issues, since nothing about the APC is found on the relevant MDPI pages : https://www.mdpi.com/journalproposal/sendproposalspecialissue/religions / https://www.mdpi.com/special_issues_guidelines 

On the other hand, are the Editorial Boards of the journal "Religions", no less than 3 plethoric different ones, somewhere really involved in the editorial process? https://www.mdpi.com/journal/religions/editors — probably not, which removes all scientific credit from it). 

With best wishes,

Christophe

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Christophe Vielle
Louvain-la-Neuve

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