While Open Access (OA) has made significant progress in increasing access to knowledge, it is not a lasting solution to the systemic inequalities and the structural imbalance in knowledge access, production, and sharing, particularly for scholars in the Global South (GS). The digital divide still limits access to the internet and digital resources in many parts of the world, preventing true openness. Additionally, knowledge produced in the Global South often remains unknown globally. However, Diamond OA represents an important step forward, enabling more scholars from the Global South to publish and let the world access to the knowledge they produce without the barriers and obstacles they have traditionally faced including controls, predatory attitudes, and other structural obstacles.

In our case, with Dhaxaalreeb – the academic journal of the Somaliland Centre for African Studies – the key goals are to ensure community ownership of knowledge, increase the visibility of GS publications, and promote open access – all in pursuit of epistemic justice. There is a clear path forward, as the visibility of publications and knowledge in the GS is still competing with the established and unbalanced system (such as the dominance of the Global North (GN), whether it be a platform, invisible control, a structured system of access to one’s community, and mutual promotion). While collaboration with the GN is still necessary, the focus is on recognizing and elevating local knowledge systems that have historically been overshadowed by the dominant, imbalanced global academic landscape. With this, the ownership of our knowledge is now at an ideal stage, where we are pushing for recognition of local knowledge production, sharing, and global visibility, and promoting Diamond OA is part of this fundamental effort for the epistemic justice we seek to create.

In conclusion, the push for Diamond OA, which offers free and immediate access to academic publications without cost to authors, is critical in the GS. This model aims to address the structural barriers that researchers face in accessing and publishing academic literature, promoting a more equitable sharing of knowledge on a global scale.