Ethical Principles and Publication Policy

PUBLISHING ETHICS
IJPS adheres to the academic and ethical principles of publishing. Studies that violate the academic and legal criteria such as double submission, plagiarism, and/or violation of copyright laws are not evaluated. If and when such violations are detected during the evaluation period, the review process is immediately stopped and the study is returned to the author(s). 
COPYRIGHT POLICY
Authors transfer copyright to IJPS as part of a journal publishing agreement. Please download a Copyright Transfer Form for subscription articles

ETHICAL RULES
IJPS is a refereed journal that objects to publish qualified articles about International Relations, International Politics, and Security Studies. The articles which are sent to the IJPS evaluated by the process of bilateral blind review and published with free access electronically.
There are the ethical responsibilities, roles, and duties of the authors, journal editors, referees, and publishers as follows. The ethical principles and rules below are prepared according to the directive of the “Editorial Ethics Committee” (Committee on Publication Ethics - COPE https://publicationethics.org/). Also, information has been provided in the IJPS regarding the cases considered plagiarism and unethical behavior.


Author (s)
a. Articles that are sent to the IJPS should be original studies in the fields of International Relations, International Politics, and Security Studies.
b. All sources (authors, online pages, personal interviews, etc.) used in the articles should be cited correctly and appropriately.
c. It should be noted that the articles submitted to the journal are not sent to another journal and the Copyright Form should be filled out.
d. Individuals who do not contribute to the article intellectually should not be specified as authors.
e. Conflicts of interest regarding the submitted article should be stated and the reason should be explained.
f. Authors may be asked to transmit the raw data regarding their works to the editorial board while the referee is in the process, in that case, the authors should share their raw data with the editorial board. The authors are responsible for keeping the data for a published article for five years.
g When the authors detect a mistake in their work, they should inform the editor and the editorial board and cooperate for the correction or withdrawal process.


Referees
All articles which are sent to IJPS are evaluated by the process of bilateral blind review. Bilateral blind review means that the authors are kept confidential from the referees and the referees are kept confidential from the authors in order to ensure an impartial, objective, and independent process. Articles are sent to referees through the journal management system for evaluation. Referees should fill a form that includes the article”s contribution to fields of Political Science, International Relations, International Politics, and Security Studies, and their decisions whether the article will be published or not, and their justifications related to the decision. The ethical responsibilities and roles of the referees of IJPS are as follows:
a. Referees should referee articles related to only their speciality.
b. Referees are expected to agree to referee articles without conflicts of interest. When referees notice any conflict of interest, they should inform the editor and refuse to be referee on the related article.
c. Referees should evaluate articles impartially and objectively.
d. Referees are required to fill in the Referee Evaluation Form regarding the articles they evaluate, and they are expected not to indicate their names in the forms in order not to harm the bilateral blind review process. Referees should also state their decisions on whether the article publishable or not and their justification for their decisions.
e. The style used by the referees in their suggestions should be polite, respectful, and scientific. Referees should avoid aggressive, disrespectful, and subjective personal comments. When it is detected that referees make such unscientific comments, they can be contacted by the editor or editorial board to review and correct their comments.
f. Referees are required to complete their evaluations within the given time and are expected to comply with the ethical responsibilities stated herein.

Editor
COPE Code of Conduct and Best Practice Guidelines for Journal”, published by the Editor”s Editorial Ethics Committee (Committee on Publication Ethics - COPE (https://publicationethics.org/)) Editors (https://publicationethics.org/files/Code_of_conduct_for_journal_editors_Mar11.pdf)) and “Best Practice Guidelines for Journal Editors (COPE Best Practice Guidelines for Journal Editors (https://publicationethics.org/files/u2/ Best_Practice.pdf)) and listed below, must comply with the ethical responsibilities listed below.
The editor is responsible for all articles published in the journal. The editor”s ethical duties and responsibilities are as follows:
a. General Responsibilities
• The editor is obliged to make an effort to increase the quality of the journal and contribute to its development.
• The editor should support the authors' freedom of expression.
b. Relationships with Readers
• The editor should be sure that the sections (letter to the editor, invited articles, conference announcements, etc. ) which do not need referees evaluation in the journal are clearly stated.
• The editor must make an effort to ensure that the published articles are compatible with the knowledge and skills of journal readers.
c. Relationships with Referees
• The editor should ask the referees to evaluate the articles appropriate for their knowledge and expertise. Thus, articles should be evaluated appropriately by experts in their field.
• The editor is obliged to request that the referees indicate that there are no conflicts of interest regarding the article before evaluating an article.
• The editor must convey all the necessary information regarding the referee evaluation process and what is expected from referess.
• The editor must ensure that the peer-review process is carried out with a bilateral blind review and does not disclose referees to authors and authors to referees.
• The editor should evaluate referees based on their timing and performance.

• The editor should create a database of referees and update the database according to the performance of the referees.

• The editor should remove the referees who make rude and unqualified comments or return late.
• The editor should update and expand the list of referees according to referees' specialties.
d. Relationships with Authors
• The editor should constantly update the publishing and writing rules and the sample template on what the authors expect.
• The editor should evaluate the articles that are sent to the journal in terms of journal writing rules, the importance and originality of the study, and if he decides to reject the article during the first submission process, the author should convey the reason for it clearly and impartially. In this process, if it is decided that the article should be revised in terms of grammar, punctuation, and/or spelling rules (margins, referencing appropriately, etc.), the authors should be informed and given time to make necessary corrections.
• Articles should include submission and publication dates.
• When authors request information about the status of their articles, authors should be informed about the status of their articles, so as not to disrupt the bilateral blind review process.
e. Relationships with the Editorial Board
• The editor should convey the publishing and writing rules to the members of the new editorial board and explain what is expected of them.
• The editor should convey the most up-to-date version of the publication and writing rules to the editorial board members.
• The editor should evaluate the members of the editorial board and elect the members who will actively participate in the development of the journal to the editorial board.
• The editor should inform the editorial board members of the roles and responsibilities listed below.
- To support the development of the journal
- To write compositions related to their specialties when asked
- To review and improve publishing and writing rules
- To fulfill the necessary responsibilities in the journal’s operation


Publisher
The publisher”s ethical responsibilities are as follows:
a. The publisher acknowledges that the decision-maker and the refereeing process are the responsibility of the editor during the article publishing in IJPS.
b. The publisher provides open, electronic, and free access to the journal on the journal’s website.

Plagiarism and Unethical Behaviors
All articles submitted to IJPS are scanned by IThenticate (http://www.ithenticate.com/) or Turnitin (https://www.turnitin.com/) software programs before they are published.

Articles with a similarity rate of 20% and below are accepted for publication. Articles exceeding this rate are examined in detail and, if necessary, are sent back to authors for review or correction, and if plagiarism or unethical behavior is detected, their publication is refused.


Some unethical behaviors are listed below:
• Indicating the people who do not contribute to the study as an author.
• Not indicating the people who contribute to the study as an author.
• Not indicating if the article is produced from the author”s master's / doctoral thesis or a project.
• Making dissection, that is, publishing multiple articles from a single study.
• Not reporting conflicts of interest regarding the submitted articles.
• Deciphering the bilateral blind review process.

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Data Sharing Policy
This journal encourages authors to share the data obtained as a result of their research while remaining within the requirements of the universal and legal criteria for the protection of personal rights with scientific ethics and citation rules. In this context, IJPS adopts the Budapest Open Access Initiative Declaration (2001).