EDITORIAL BOARD OFFICE

Editor in Chief:

prof. Radosław Kaleta, Ph.D. with habilitation (Associate Professor)
ORCID: 0000-0001-6892-9332

email: actaalba[at]gmail.com

Standards and duties for Editorial Board members

• Criteria for accepting texts for publication: The Editor in Chief decides which texts will be published. When accepting texts for publication, the opinions of reviewers regarding the scientific value of the work, originality of the problem and transparency of the argument are taken into account.
• Control of the ethical standards: Editorial Board members of the journal Acta Albaruthenica ensure that the standards and rules of ethical behaviour are applied. They counteract any practices contrary to the adopted standards.
• Fair play: Manuscripts are evaluated without regard to race, gender, religious belief, origin, citizenship or political philosophy of the author. The evaluation is done only for their intellectual content.
• Confidentiality: Editorial Board members do not disclose any information on submitted manuscripts to any unauthorized person. The persons authorized to access such information are: the author, assigned reviewers, Editorial Board members, editors, and the Publisher.
• Avoiding competing interests: Unpublished manuscripts cannot be used by Editorial Board members nor by any other person involved in the publication process without the authors’ written consent.
• Scientific reliability: Editorial Board members safeguard scientific reliability of the publications. To this end, they may appropriately correct and change submitted manuscripts. In case of suspected misconduct (plagiarism, research data falsification), they are obliged to reject the article in question.

If such a case occurs, the Editorial Board is obliged to publish appropriate rectifications, explanations or apologies.

• Article removal: The Editorial Board is entitled to remove an article after its publication, if:

– there is evidence that research results are not reliable and/or the data is falsified, as well as in case of unintentional errors (for example miscalculations or methodological errors);

– the research results have already been published;

– the work is plagiarized or it contravenes the ethical publication standards.

A notification on article removal shall be understood as a removal of the article. The notification should include information on the author (there should be at least the article title and the author(s)’(s) name(s) indicated) and the reasons for the removal. A distinction should be made between unintentional errors and deliberate misconduct which may constitute a cause for the article removal. Removed articles are not removed from the published version of the journal, their removal should be, however, clearly marked.

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If the Editors are made aware of an allegation of misconduct related to the published material, the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) guidelines will be followed.

Editors encourage Authors, Reviewers and Readers to contact the Editorial Office via email, phone, or post in the case of any suspicion of misconduct, such as (but not limited to): plagiarism, data falsification, figures/tables/citation manipulation or reuse without proper consent, unethical AI usage, authorship, and contribution problems. Allegations brought to the Editors’ or Publisher’s attention (pre- and post- publication) will result in specific-to-case measures that will be implemented according to the COPE guidelines.

Editors together with the Publisher will undertake an investigation in order to verify the allegations. The outcomes of the procedure will be communicated to the sender, to the subject of the allegations and to appropriate institutions. In the case of false allegations, the outcome will also be communicated to all parties involved, including the institution and managers of the whistle-blower.

Editor roles

The Journal follows the COPE Code of Conduct in defining roles and duties, as well as Recommendations for Promoting Integrity in Scientific Journal Publications specified by the Council of Science Editors (CSE).

Roles and responsibilities of the Editors:
− The Editor-in-Chief (EiC) is appointed by the University of Warsaw. It is the EiC’s obligation to appoint Deputy Editors and other staff needed for the Journal’s functioning.
− Editors are accountable for all the content published in the Journal.
− They are responsible for monitoring and ensuring fairness, timeliness, thoroughness, and civility of the peer-review and editorial processes.
− They maintain the integrity of the academic record of the published material.
− They are responsible for making unbiased decisions.
− They follow the COPE guidelines (https://publicationethics.org/sites/default/files/editorial-board-participation-cope-guideline.pdf) when appointing new members of the Editorial Team for a 5-year term. The term may be reduced due to a member’s biased or unethical behaviour.
– They define and execute the Journal’s policy, handle complaints and misconducts.
– They disclose any conflicts of interest, should they emerge.