Why Did You Publish That? How University Presses and Library Publishers Choose their Projects

Library and university-press publishers are driven by two different but overlapping missions. Libraries publish as an extension of their traditional function of preserving and disseminating knowledge. University presses are also tasked with distributing knowledge, but through peer review, they are engaged with what Martin Eve at last year’s meeting called the “symbolic economy of prestige.” Both are constrained by financial forces and the marketplace. This panel examines how and why different publishers select projects, and how each group decides where to invest its scarce resources. It also addresses how campus hierarchies affect these choices, especially when a university’s press and library are institutionally connected. The participants will include both library and university-press publishers, representing a range of reporting relationships on their campuses. Each panelist will respond to questions from the moderator, followed by what we hope will be lively questions from the floor. The conversation should shed light on the strategic priorities that drive our publishing decisions, as well as how we can most effectively cooperate