I.1. Open access and copyright policies
ColNes Publishing publishes journal articles, book chapters and selected monographs (materials, from now on) in open access, making them freely available without any subscription or restriction. The license we use for content distribution is Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC 4.0). By this license, authors can copy and redistribute their publications in any medium or format, adapting, transforming, and building upon the material as long as they follow the license’s terms.
I.2. Article Processing Charges (APCs)
There is no fee or charge for the processing and publishing of materials.
I.3. Editorial process
I.3.1. Post-submission stage
After submitting every material, the respective Editor (s) check elements like content relevance, completeness of metadata, technical quality, and presentation. At this stage, the Editor(s) might reject the proposal if they consider it unsuitable for peer review.
I.3.2. Editorial assignment and review phase
When the Editor(s) moves the material to the peer review stage, a minimum of two external reviewers of considerable expertise in the field are assigned. We employ the double-blind model for all our publication titles. Reviewers perform voluntary work; nevertheless, we encourage them to consider timeliness, confidentiality, possible conflict of interests, and ethical behavior.
I.3.3. Editorial decision
When the reviewer completes the review process, the Editor(s) makes a final decision, which can be one of the following:
When materials are ‘considered with minor revisions’, ‘considered with major revisions’ or ‘rejected’, the author(s) will receive the comments resulting from the evaluation process. Authors of accepted materials may obtain more detailed comments regarding the content format adherence before the final publication process. Once performed all the necessary review rounds, the author(s) should consider all the suggestions raised by the reviewers and editors.
I.4. Editorial policies
We ensure high-quality content derived from transparent and trusted research practices. We follow all the guidelines and best publication practices defined by the Committee of Publication Ethics (COPE).
I.4.1. Authorship
ColNes Publishing demands that all authors listed in the materials have real responsibility during the research process and content generation. We encourage the corresponding authors, project leaders, or institutions to avoid adding people who did not contribute to the research output (Gift authors) or exclude those who contributed (Ghost authors). Authors should define the authorship before the project writing.
Authors should also define, before submission, who will act as ‘corresponding author’ and how will be the ‘order of authors’. The corresponding author will play an administrative role since the Editorial Office will contact them during the editorial process.
Authors must upload a Contribution Statement as a separate document. This Statement will define the role of every author in the research work based on the CRediT Taxonomy. For those who made contributions and the function does not appear in the CrediT Taxonomy portal, their names will appear in the Acknowledgements section.
In case of withdrawal or claim for inclusion requests, all authors should send a signed agreement letter to the Editorial Office.
I.4.2. Complaints
If authors detect some misconduct or questionable practices during the editorial process, they should report it to the Editorial Office immediately. We will follow the COPE’s Core Practices to decide on any ethical issue.
I.4.3. Conflict of interest
A Conflict of Interest (COI) occurs when authors have personal, academic, or financial relationships with third parties that could influence the research work submitted for publication. That is why authors, during the submission process, must submit a COI Statement to declare any potential conflict, emphasizing:
These are some examples of COI statements:
If there is no conflict of interest, the authors must declare:
I.4.4. Research data, reproducibility, and transparency
The authors are encouraged to share the data behind the research work. Our policy is to make all scientific data open since we follow the Guidelines on Open Access to Scientific Publications and Research Data defined by the European Commission. The data sharing process can occur in the following ways:
Citations to research data should appear in the reference section of the full text. Authors need to follow the Joint Declaration of Data Citation Principles to provide the correct citation and referencing of the data.
I.4.5. Statement of data consent
To make science more transparent, open, and reproducible, we encourage authors to submit a data statement (Statement of data consent) as a separate document. We will place this Statement in the final published material. These are some examples of how to elaborate the Statement:
I.4.6. Post-publication discussions, corrections, and retractions
Retractions and corrections occur after the publication process, and it happens when we detect errors, plagiarism, content falsification, data manipulation, or legal issues regarding privacy and copyright. In each case, the Editorial Office will operate with the author’s consent (s) and based on the COPE’s Guidelines.
I. 5. Preprints
Authors can use preprint servers to host their materials before submission. On the Sherpa Romeo portal, authors can also find our self-archiving policies. Before submission, materials uploaded to preprint servers do not count as multiple or redundant publications. Authors are free to use like ArXiv, SSRN, bioRxiv, psyArXiv, SocArXiv, engrXiv, e-LIS, RePEc, and many others.
II.1. Peer reviewing for us
Peer-reviewers lie at the core of the scholarly publishing process since they play a critical role in content quality control. For that reason, we encourage the reviewers to submit comprehensive, constructive, objective, and transparent reports.
There are two ways to become a reviewer: (a) by direct invitation from a publication’s editorial board or by subscribing to the title of your interest. If you wish to be part of the pool of reviewers, it is essential to provide accurate contact information, including affiliation and research interests.
Accepting a review invitation implies to:
II.2. Steps to conduct a review
II.3. Writing the review report
The reviewer should write the report as requested by the publication, following some of the subsequent recommendations:
II.4. Publication ethics
In ColNes Publishing, we follow the COPE Guidelines; that is why we invite reviewers to read the COPE Ethical Guidelines for Peer Reviewers. Before any suspicious misconduct during the review process, the reviewers should immediately inform the Editorial Office.
II.5 Acknowledgment to reviewers
Reviewers may request a contribution’s certificates to the Editorial Office, specifying the publication title they reviewed. However, when it comes to journals, we publish the reviewer’s name in a single document at the time to close a volume. In the case of edited books, conference proceedings, and monographs, we include the reviewers’ names in the full text.
III. For editors
III.1. Editors’ roles and responsibilities
The editors are responsible for:
III.2. Peer review and decision making
Peer review ensures that the published materials have the highest quality standards. For this reason, it is considered the most crucial stage in the scholarly publication process. The stages of this process are the following:
III.3. Accepting thematic issues and volumes
Organizing special issues and edited volumes is an excellent opportunity for publishing topical collections. Editors should assess the proposals’ scope and prospective editors.
III.4. Publication ethics
If an Editor detects any case of misconduct, including authorship disputes, plagiarism, a duplicate submission, conflict of interest, or content manipulation, they should report it to the Editorial Office. We will follow the COPE’s Guidelines to proceed in every single case.