Scopus' Scientific Engine and the Extinction of Arab Scientific Journals
By: Prof. Dr.Younes Megdadi
The scientific journals issued by Arab universities and scientific research centers witnessed decades ago a boom in publishing the scientific production of researchers from all Arab countries, which painted a bright and abundant picture of scientific production after judging according to scientific principles, which is priceless and in various scientific disciplines in line with the reality of Arab environments. Those scientific journals and those in charge showed great care to maintain the sobriety of scientific production in terms of quantity and quality, with the aim of benefiting from its results in achieving sustainable development and in various scientific fields despite the low level of financial and logistical support that stimulates scientific research compared to developed countries.
The flourishing period of publishing in Arab scientific journals stemmed from the keenness of scientific and academic leaders to establish a culture of research and scientific production in order to achieve a qualitative and purposeful change in the structure of Arab scientific research, its sobriety and its competition with global scientific research, and the expansion of researchers’ knowledge based on the noticeable change and development in all fields. The fields of knowledge for all scientific disciplines, but unfortunately we find this boom in the volume of publication of scientific production in Arab scientific journals has begun to lead to a significant decline in recent times and for many reasons, most notably directing researchers in universities and scientific research centers to publish in international journals, especially journals based on Scopus scientific engine, which is known to all for the purposes of merging with the global scientific production, and this may be a somewhat acceptable justification, but on the other hand, we find there is a great loss for our Arab scientific journals, which has become known to most researchers and academics that their commitment to the terms and standards of publication in them may exceed their counterparts, including to many of the approved Scopus engine journals which issued by several different countries, and the evidence is that there are many cases of researches were rejected by Arab magazines due to their poor scientific value after their arbitration, were subsequently published in international journals as far as Scopus engine journals with high publishing fees around the world.
Away from the origins of the Scopus engine, which is known to many researchers and academics, as they find the exorbitant publishing costs within a fictional pricing list for many of the Scopus engine journals and publishing within a short period of time, which formed the convictions of many researchers that it is a source of generating money in according to purely commercial trends because it is far from the logic of known scientific publishing and its directions, but what is important in the matter is in light of what we are witnessing that the Scopus engine journals has become invasive of the motives of scientific production of researchers in Arab countries, especially in educational institutions such as universities, as the biggest customer for scientific production by the faculty members. Scopus engine journals become openly and explicitly represented in the texts of instructions for recruitment, appointment, promotion, academic evaluation, and others in our Arab educational institutions such as universities. On the other hand, we find publication fees in Arab scientific journals mostly for free or for a small fee, not to mention the sad and obvious matter of the inequality of Arab scientific journals compared to the scientific journals approved in the Scopus engine and others, and therefore we do not know where the compass of Arab scientific production will go in light of the Scopus equation.
The decline in the demand for publication in Arab scientific journals has become attractive according to what the followers noticed, which may lead to emptying its pioneering scientific role in publishing the scientific production of researchers from various Arab countries, which prompted those interested in following up what is happening to know the motives for the remarkable interest and being drawn behind the Scopus engine and its magazines. So, its unfair impact on publishing in Arab scientific journals. Therefore, we look forward for giving Arab scientific journals sufficient support to raise their global rank by decision makers in our educational and research institutions to be equal to their global counterparts in light of the global indicators of scientific production, so that these journals remain the scientific identity of researchers from various Arab and friendly countries with their scientific production instead of the expected extinction of most of them.
