Institutional Repositories in Chinese Open Access Development: Status, Progress, and Challenges

Open Access (OA) movement in China is developing with its own track and speed. Compared to its western counterparts, it moves slowly. However, it keeps growing. More significantly, it provides open and free resources not only to Chinese scholars, but also to those of China studies around the world. The premise is whether we can find them in an easy and effective fashion. This paper will describe the status of the OA movement in China with a focus on institutional repositories (IR) in Chinese universities and research institutes. We will explore different IR service modules and discuss their coverage, strengths, limitation, and most importantly implications to the East Asian Collection in the US.