Acta Politologica (AcPo) seeks to uphold the highest standards of publication ethics and takes all possible measures against any publication malpractices.
AcPo is committed to objective, impartial and fair review process. All original manuscripts undergo double-blind peer-review process. However, the editors reserve the right to “desk reject” (without review, or after a quick examination by an editorial board member) articles submitted to AcPo on the basis of a low quality of the articles (such as poor language, unclear message, inconsistency, inaccuracy, unsuitability, unclear impact or novelty of the article etc.). Manuscripts that do not comply with AcPo’s citation norm are desk-rejected as well.
The journal shall not consider for publication multiple submissions, redundant publications, and manuscripts that are clearly beyond the scope of the journal.
The editors are fully responsible for deciding which of the articles submitted to the journal shall be published.
AcPo is also committed to preventing any actual or potential conflict of interests between the editorial and review personnel and the reviewed material.
The editors may be guided by the policies of the journal’s Editorial Board and constrained by such legal requirements as shall then be in force regarding libel, copyright infringement and plagiarism.
The editors at any time evaluate manuscripts for their intellectual content without regard to race, gender, sexual orientation, religious belief, ethnic origin, citizenship, or political philosophy of the authors.
The editors and staff are obliged to confidentiality. They are not allowed to disclose any information about submitted manuscripts to anyone other than the corresponding author, reviewers, potential reviewers, and other editorial advisers.
Unpublished materials disclosed in submitted manuscripts must not be used in editors‘ own research without the express written consent of the author.
Authors who send their texts to AcPo submit their works as original articles and confirm that the submitted works (or texts that resemble the original version to a great extent) are not being simultaneously sent to undergo a review process of another journal.
Submitting the same manuscript to more than one journal concurrently constitutes unethical publishing behaviour and is unacceptable.
Authors who submitted their manuscripts to AcPo confirm that their papers were not copied or plagiarized in whole or in part from other works. By submitting his/her text, the author agrees on its publishing in the journal (based on a positive review process) and declares that the text is original and it has full copyright, including the authority to dispose of it.
Authors of original research articles should present an accurate account of the work performed as well as an objective discussion of its significance. Underlying data should be represented accurately in the article. Each article submitted for review should contain sufficient detail and references to permit others to replicate the work. Fraudulent or knowingly inaccurate statements constitute unethical behaviour and are unacceptable.
Authors are required to properly indicate in the presented article references to the sources and literature they used.
Authors are asked to provide the raw data in connection with their articles for editorial review, and should be prepared to provide public access to such data, if possible, and should be prepared to preserve such data for a reasonable time after publication.
Authors are required to submit only entirely original works. If the authors have used the work and/or words of others it has to be appropriately quoted.
Authorship should be limited to those who have made a significant contribution to the conception, design, execution, or interpretation of the article. All those who have made significant contributions should be listed as co-authors. Where there are others who have participated in certain substantive aspects of the research project, they should be acknowledged or listed as contributors.
The corresponding author is obliged to ensure that all appropriate co-authors and no inappropriate co-authors are included on the paper, and that all co-authors have seen and approved the final version of the paper and have agreed to its submission for publication.
If authors discover a significant error or mistake in their published article they are required to report it immediately to Editors and cooperate with them on remedy.
Authors acknowledge that they have disclosed all and any actual or potential conflicts of interest with their work or partial benefits associated with it.
Authors are obliged to disclose all sources of financial support for the project that has helped to elaborate the article.
Authors are not paid for their contributions.
No fees or charges are required for manuscript processing charges related to submission, processing and publishing in Acta Politologica.
Peer reviewers assist the editors in making editorial decisions and through the editorial communications with the author may also assist the author in improving the paper.
Any reviewer who feels unqualified to review the manuscript or knows that its prompt review will be impossible should notify the editors and excuse himself/herself from the review process.
Any manuscript received for review must be treated as a confidential document. It must not be shown to or discussed with others except as authorized by the editors.
Reviews should be conducted objectively. Personal criticism of the author is inappropriate. Reviewers should express their views clearly with supporting arguments.
Reviewers should identify relevant published work that has not been cited by the authors. Any statement that an observation, derivation, or argument had been previously reported should be accompanied by the relevant citation. A reviewer should also call to the editors‘ attention any substantial similarity or overlap between the manuscript under consideration and any other published paper of which they have personal knowledge.
Privileged information or ideas obtained through peer review must be kept confidential and not used for personal advantage. Reviewers should not consider manuscripts in which they have conflicts of interest resulting from competitive, collaborative, or other relationships or connections with any of the authors, companies, or institutions connected to the papers.
Reviews are financially rewarded.
AcPo fully respects intellectual property and seeks to protect and promote original research of authors. All authors submitting their manuscripts to AcPo are expected to abide by AcPo’s publication ethics.
Plagiarism is a dishonest presentation of some other persons‘ works as if it were one’s own. Plagiarism takes various forms, including but not limited: 1) Full Plagiarism = An author presents a previously published text without any changes to the text as if it were his own text. An author presents basically the same text from a source as his own. 2) Partial Plagiarism = the manuscript is a mixture from multiple sources. The author extensively rephrased text. 3) Self-Plagiarism: An author uses complete or portions of his/her previously published work once again in a new manuscript.
In case those AcPo editors find an author suspect of plagiarism, AcPo shall contact the author of the manuscript and ask him/her to deliver his explanation within two weeks. If AcPo does not receive any reply from the author, AcPo shall reject the article and shall enquire into detail if the manuscript was plagiarized. If AcPo finds out that the suspicious text was plagiarized from some previously published work, it shall immediately inform the chief representative of the institution to which the author is affiliated. AcPo shall ask the representative to take a strict action against the concerned author. In addition, AcPo shall inform the author that his text was identified as a plagiarized manuscript and the author will not be allowed to submit his manuscript to AcPo again.
