Ethics Statement

Ethics Statement 

UJ Press is committed to upholding the highest ethical standards in all aspects of its publishing activities. We recognize our responsibility to authors, reviewers, readers, and the broader academic community, and we strive to promote scholarship that is rigorous, transparent, and inclusive.

Our core ethical principles include:

  • Integrity: We uphold the highest standards of research and publication ethics, including authorship transparency, data integrity, and adherence to research misconduct policies.
  • Diversity and Inclusion: We actively seek to publish scholarship that reflects the diversity of society and promotes inclusivity across all dimensions.
  • Fairness and Objectivity: We ensure fair and unbiased peer review processes, free from conflicts of interest or discrimination.
  • Transparency and Openness: We are transparent in our policies, procedures, and decision-making processes. We support Open Access publishing opportunities and promote the dissemination of scholarly knowledge.
  • Intellectual Property Rights: We respect the intellectual property rights of authors and others.
  • Sustainability: We operate in a sustainable and environmentally responsible manner.

We adhere to the following ethical codes and guidelines:

  • Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) Code of Conduct and Best Practice Guidelines
  • International DOI Foundation Best Practices
  • Principles for Transparency and Best Practice in Scholarly Publishing

We expect our authors, reviewers, and editors to uphold these same ethical principles. We provide clear guidelines and resources to support them in doing so.

We are committed to continuously improving our ethical practices and encourage feedback from all stakeholders.

Research Misconduct

UJ Press strives to detect and prevent any form of research misconduct, for example, in the presentation of data, arguments, graphs, or figures already published elsewhere.  The press strives to ensure that no manuscripts are published where there are inconsistent data sets, where citations have been manipulated, or plagiarism is practised.  Should these be detected, the manuscripts will not be accepted for publication.  Should these be detected after publication, UJ Press will either retract the manuscript or issue an errata notice.  See the section on ‘Procedures for issuing errata, corrigenda, and retractions’ on the website. 

UJ Press follows the guidelines for research misconduct as set out by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE).  See COPE: Allegations of Misconduct https://publicationethics.org/guidance.

Plagiarism

UJ Press takes plagiarism very seriously.  To prevent plagiarism, all authors are required to submit a Turnitin or iThenticate report with their manuscripts and must ensure that the score is less than ten. Once a manuscript has been through the review process and the author(s) send their final draft in for language editing, the manuscript is once again submitted to Turnitin.  Should the report give the manuscript a score of ten or more, the author(s) will be required to revise the article.  No manuscript will be published with a Turnitin score of more than ten.

UJ Press follows the guidelines for plagiarism as set out by COPE.  https://publicationethics.org/guidance.

AI Tool and Integration

Concealing the use of AI tools is considered unethical by UJ Press and violates the principles of transparency and honesty in research.

This Ethics Statement is a living document and will be reviewed and updated periodically.

Note: This policy was drafted with the assistance of Google Gemini. For any feedback or additions, please contact the Press Manager.