ETHICAL PRINCIPLES

When submitting the paper and a signed copyright declaration form to the Editors of the Argument: Biannual Philosophical Journal:

  • Author formally declares his or her authorship of the study design and originality of the interpretation presented in the text, as well as one’s own literature or data search, and indicates the source of funding (if different than the author’s institution of present affiliation).
  • The submission of one’s paper and the above declaration also implies that the Author’s copyright is granted voluntarily (free of charge) to the journal for publishing this paper online and in print, whereas the Editors declare to make effort of promoting the journal contents and archiving it in the allied repositories, indexing databases, and the relevant websites supporting the journal’s activity.
  • In case of co-authorship, co-operation or any form of engagement of other subjects in the manuscript preparation (including the assumptions, objectives, topic range, selection of methods, translation, etc.), the submitting Author is obliged to report it and insert a suitable acknowledgement or reference (preferably, specifying contribution of each author in percentages).

Thus, the Editors actively seek to prevent any unfair, biased and unethical practices, such as ghostwriting, guest writing, and plagiarism by consulting the online databases and anti-plagiarism scanning. All detected cases of unreliability and dishonesty will result in notification of the relevant subjects (i.e. academic institution employing the Author, scientific societies, editors of other journals, etc.).

The Editors accept to publish corrections, clarifications, retractions and apologies when needed. We do not charge the Authors for publishing their scholarly papers, responses and reviews in the journal.

The Editors strive to meet the high standards defined in the Code of Conduct and Best Practice Guidelines for Journal Editors promoted by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) .

Reviewing procedure. The submitted proposals, formally approved by the editors, undergo the following procedure which usually takes eight to ten weeks, unless it is prolonged due to the reasons beyond the control of the editors. Authors are updated throughout the process whenever required. Our reviewing procedure is transparent and includes the following steps:

  • The editors check the submission to judge whether it respects the academic, ethical and editorial standards and has some chance of ultimately being accepted.
  • The submitted paper is given an ID number which replaces the name of the author on the next steps of the reviewing process.
  • The editors select and invite two external reviewers being the specialists in the field to review the submission.
  • The evaluators are asked to supply their reports within four weeks. The review is prepared according to the criteria specified in the form provided by the editors, which makes the evaluation clear and conclusive. When agreeing to assess the paper the reviewer admits there is no conflict of interest with respect to the research, the authors and/or the research funders (by “conflict of interest” we understand: (1) family relationship, (2) close professional relationship, (3) professional cooperation within two years before the review is prepared).
  • The overall evaluation of the paper proposal depends on meeting the following criteria: (1) subject area of the paper fits well to the profile of the journal and/or the leading theme of the volume; (2) paper is original, insightful, and it reveals a new aspect of the issue under question, it is thought-provoking, invites polemics and/or can inspire further research in the field; (3) paper discusses the subject matter diligently and thoroughly, it can serve as a good introduction to the issue under question, has a didactic value; (4) bibliography used in the paper is sufficient, it covers the most essential and up-to-date publications corresponding to the subject matter; (5) paper is well written, in good style proper for academic publications. Each decision on a submission falls into one of the following 4 categories:

Accepted – paper is unanimously recommended for publication in the present form or after some minor corrections suggested by the editors and/or reviewers.

Accepted with requirement of some revisions –  paper is recommended for publication only after making some corrections and improvements according to the directions given by the editors and/or reviewers.

Conditionally accepted – paper is recommended for publication conditionally after correcting and re-editing it thoroughly according to the directions given by the editors and reviewers. A reconsideration by the reviewer may be needed.

Rejected – paper is not recommended for publication. It contains some major mistakes or serious shortcomings and needs profound restructuring before it is, possibly, resubmitted.

  • Once the reviews have been received, the conclusion is sent to the corresponding author by email with the possible suggestions and criticisms serving to improve the submitted material (normally the corrections should be made within 1 week).
  • If the reviewers have no objections to the submission and when the author has complied with the requirements of the editors, the submitted paper is ultimately accepted for publication in the particular issue of the journal.

Copyright policy & self-archiving policy. The rights are reserved under Polish and International Copyright Regulations. The Editors of the journal prefer to publish the original and unpublished materials, both in the Internet and hard copy format.

  • Pre-print status: the authors can archive their pre-print papers on their personal web sites, however, the published source must be acknowledged.
  • Post-print status: the authors can archive their post-print articles acknowledging the publisher copyright and source, and linking to the published version or providing the exact bibliographic information. The published contents is accessible on a non-profit server, and the publisher’s version (PDF) may be used.

Fair use allows limited use of copyrighted material published by the Argument: BPJ without acquiring permission from the rights holders only in private non-commercial use including commentary, criticism, research, teaching, library archiving or other educational purposes, either as prints or by downloading, with full respect to the current legal Copyright Regulations and accurate acknowledgement of the source of citation or paraphrasing. This journal is licensed under a Creative Commons (CC-BY-NC-SA 4.0 International).

You are free to use the texts published on this website under the following conditions:

  • Attribution— You must attribute the work in appropriate manner (but not in any way that suggests that the licensor endorses you or your use of the work), specifying the author’s name, the title of the work, the journal name, and indicate if any changes were made. You must also provide a copyright and license notice, the journal URL or direct link to the article.
  • Non-commercial— You may not use this work for commercial purposes without the permission of the author and the editors.
  • Share Alike— You may build upon the work, but you must distribute your contributions under the same license as the original.