SocArXiv


SocArXiv is an online preprint server for the social sciences founded by sociologist Philip N. Cohen in partnership with the non-profit Center for Open Science. It is an Open archive based on the ArXiv preprint server model used by physicists.
The database was launched in 2016, shortly after the purchase of the Social Science Research Network by Elsevier, to meet "a need for a new general, open-access, open-source, paper server for the social sciences, one that encourages linking and sharing data and code, that serves its research to an open metadata system, and that provides the foundation for a post-publication review system." It was built of the Open Science Framework platform, initially as a program of the University of Maryland.
In addition to providing a forum for pre-publication papers as a matter of improving transparency and efficiency, Cohen has called for a central repository for peer-reviews of papers even when the reviews lead to the paper being declined for publication. '"Why can't reviews travel with the paper, or even better, be posted on a central repository for editors and other reviewers to consult?" he said. "Writing reviews is work we do out of professional obligation and interest in the quality of scholarship," Cohen said. "But we get basically nothing for it. Being a good reviewer, in quality and quantity, is a tremendous service that goes unrecognized."'
As of October 2019, with SocArXiv hosting over 3,000 papers, it was described as "still not used widely by the sociology community."