The province of Québec – which had been granting public funding to journals of humanities and social sciences that in exchange introduced free access to their contents – cancelled its support to half of the journals in 2015. On the contrary, in the US, the main paying digital libraries of academic journals have added edited books and created open access initiatives, while many private businesses online offer tempting new services for social scientists. In France too, the situation of humanities and social sciences is different from STM (science, technology and medicine). Thus open access cannot remain a slogan and the nation has to choose between two strategies. The first one is based on French government money; it postpones the issue of translation into English, and makes journals and academic books dependent on the State. It weakens the French editing and publishing system in comparison with the main private American and European players. The second strategy aims at better public support to academic libraries and, for journals and edited books, at a mixed model combining open access, supported by public authorities, and a measure of paying access.