Publication Ethics and Malpractice Statement

Economics and Finance journal is committed to upholding the highest standards of publication ethics and takes all possible measures against publication malpractice. Authors who submit papers attest that their work is original and unpublished, and is not under consideration for publication elsewhere. In addition, authors confirm that their paper is their own; that it has not been copied or plagiarized, in whole or in part, from other works; and that they have disclosed actual or potential conflicts of interest with their work or partial benefits associated with it.

DUTIES OF EDITORS

Decision on the Publication of Articles

The Editor-in-Chief is responsible for deciding which of the articles submitted to the journal should be published. The Editor-in-Chief may be guided by the policies of the journal editorial board and subjected to such legal requirements regarding libel, copyright infringement and plagiarism. Decision making Editor-in-Chief may confer with other editors or reviewers in making this decision.

Review of Manuscripts

Peer review methodology

Economics and Finance journal uses external experts to help evaluate articles and assist the editors to make a decision.

When articles are submitted they will be checked and any that appear out of scope of the journal, or otherwise unsuitable for consideration, will be rejected immediately.

All other original research articles will be sent out for review. Reviewers are selected based on their experience of the subject matter of the article. They may be selected from the Editorial Board of the journal as well as from elsewhere. The journal editorial office and editor will identify suitable experts and invite them to review. If authors have a good reason to request that a particular person should be excluded from review (e.g. because they are working in a competing laboratory), then they may say this when they submit the article. However, the editors‛ judgement of reviewer is final.

Invitations are sent to reviewers and the articles are only sent to them when they agree to review. Reviewers are given between 5-7 days to return their review, and reminders are sent. However the journal cannot guarantee a time to decision since reviewers may be late, or there may be problems in finding the right reviewer. In all cases the journal editorial office will endeavour to manage the process as speedily as possible.

When the editors have received at least 2 reviews they will make a decision.

Ethical peer review – guideline for reviewers

Publisher complies with the Committee on Publication Ethics Guidelines for Peer Reviewers which provides a comprehensive guide to the ethics of peer review.

Each submission is checked for suitability when received by the editorial office, and may be rejected without review if it is outside the scope of the journal, is obviously of insufficient quality, or is missing important sections.

Economics and Finance invites external experts (not only Editorial Board members) to review each article that is considered suitable for consideration. The publication decision is made by the Editor-in-Chief after receiving at least two external reviewer reports with recommendations.

Authors are encouraged to suggest suitable reviewers, but the Editor-in-Chief and the editorial office reserves the right to select different reviewers. The reason for asking authors to suggest reviewers is that they are best placed to know who is an expert in the field. In addition, the suggested reviewers may be suitable for other articles on the same topic. Therefore, obtaining these names can help the editorial office to ensure that it is approaching suitable people to review all articles.

The journals operate a single-blind method of peer review. This means that the authors‛ names are disclosed to the reviewer, but the reviewer names are not disclosed to the authors. If the authors have a specific reason why their name should be blinded from the reviewers they may request this on submission.

On receipt of at least two reviews, the Editor-in-Chief will make a decision of (1) accept, (2) minor revision, (3) major revision, or (4) reject. The reasons for the decision will be communicated to the authors.

When the decision of minor/major revision is made, and the authors do not revise their articles satisfactorily after receiving reviewer reports, then the Editor-in-Chief reserves the right to reject the article. When revised articles are received they will either be sent out for further review or the Editor-in-Chief will make a decision depending on the level of revision requested.

The time to review and make a decision is extremely variable since it is sometimes difficult to find suitable reviewers, and there may be delays in receiving reviewer reports. The Editor-in-Chief and editorial office make all efforts to minimize the time from submission to first decision.

Disclosure and conflicts of interest

A Conflict of Interest is defined as a situation where personal relationships (e.g. friend, colleague or family), business relationships (e.g. working in a competing company), or financial influences (e.g. funding) will affect the judgement of any person during the publication of the «Economics and Finance» journal.

Authors are required to declare (within the article and to the Editor-in-Chief) any Conflict of Interest (COI) that may have affected their research (e.g. funding) or decision to submit to the «Economics and Finance» journal.

Reviewers are required to declare if they have any Conflict of Interest (COI) that may affect their judgement of any article they review. The COI may not prevent them reviewing the article, but must be declared to the Editor-in-Chief as soon as it is known.

Editors are excluded from any publishing decision in which they may have a Conflict of Interest (COI). For example, if an article by a colleague of the Editor-in-Chief is submitted to the «Economics and Finance» journal, the peer review and all editorial decisions will manager by another editor.

Fair play

Manuscripts shall be evaluated solely on their intellectual merit without regard to authors’ race, gender, sexual orientation, religious belief, ethnic origin, citizenship, or political philosophy.

Confidentiality

The Editor-in-Chief / editors and any editorial staff must not disclose any information about a submitted manuscript to anyone other than the corresponding author, reviewers, potential reviewers, other editorial advisers, and the publisher.

DUTIES OF REVIEWERS

Promptness

In case, any reviewer feels that it is not possible for him/her to complete review of manuscript within stipulated time then the same must be communicated to the editor, so that the same could be sent to any other reviewer.

Confidentiality

Information regarding manuscripts submitted by authors should be kept confidential and be treated as privileged information.

Standards of objectivity

Reviews should be conducted objectively. There shall be no personal criticism of the author. Reviewers should express their views clearly with supporting arguments.

Acknowledgement of sources

Reviewers should identify relevant published work that has not been cited by the authors. Any statement that had been previously reported elsewhere should be accompanied by the relevant citation. A reviewer should also call to the Editor-in-Chief attention any substantial similarity or overlap between the manuscript under consideration and any other published paper of which they have personal knowledge.

DUTIES OF AUTHORS

Reporting standards

Authors of reports of original research 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 paper. A paper should contain sufficient detail and references to permit others to replicate the work. Fraudulent or knowingly inaccurate statements constitute unethical behavior and are unacceptable.

Data Access and Retention

Authors may be asked to provide the raw data in connection with a paper for editorial review, and should be prepared to provide public access to such, if practicable, and should in any event be prepared to retain such data for a reasonable time after publication.

Originality and plagiarism

Plagiarism is not acceptable in Economics and Finance journal. Plagiarism includes copying text, ideas, images, or data from another source, even from your own publications, without giving credit to the original source.

Authors should ensure that they have written entirely original works, and if the authors have used the work and/or words of others this must be appropriately cited or quoted.

Reuse of text that is copied from another source must be between quotation marks and the original source must be cited. If a study’s design or the manuscript’s structure or language has been inspired by previous studies, these studies must be explicitly cited.

All Economics and Finance submissions are checked for plagiarism. If plagiarism is detected during the peer review process, the article may be rejected. If plagiarism is detected after publication, an investigation will take place and retract the article.

Data presented must be original and not inappropriately selected, manipulated, enhanced, or fabricated.

Multiple Publications

An author should not in general publish manuscripts describing essentially the same research in more than one journal or primary publication. Submitting the same manuscript to more than one journal concurrently constitutes unethical publishing behavior and is unacceptable.

Citation Policy

Authors should ensure that where material is taken from other sources (including their own published writing) the source is clearly cited and that where appropriate permission is obtained.

Authors should not engage in excessive self-citation of their own work.

Authors should not copy references from other publications if they have not read the cited work.

Authors should not preferentially cite their own or their friends’, peers’, or institution’s publications.

Authors should not cite advertisements or advertorial material.

In accordance with COPE guidelines, we expect that “original wording taken directly from publications by other researchers should appear in quotation marks with the appropriate citations.” This condition also applies to an author’s own work. COPE have produced a discussion document on citation manipulation with recommendations for best practice.