Publication Ethics

Publication Ethics

Lex: Journal of Social Sciences and Humanities Perspectives

Publication Ethics Statement

Lex: Journal of Social Sciences and Humanities Perspectives is a peer-reviewed academic journal published by the Suwaib Amiruddin Foundation. This publication ethics statement outlines the professional and ethical responsibilities of all parties involved in the publication process, including authors, editors, peer reviewers, and the publisher.

This policy is aligned with the principles and standards established by the Committee on Publication Ethics and the COPE Best Practice Guidelines for Journal Editors to ensure the credibility, transparency, accountability, and integrity of scholarly communication.

Lex: Journal of Social Sciences and Humanities Perspectives is committed to advancing high-quality research in the fields of social sciences and humanities. The journal promotes open, honest, responsible, and ethical academic dialogue that contributes to the development of reliable and cumulative scholarly knowledge.

Upholding rigorous ethical standards is essential to protecting the integrity of research, maintaining public confidence, and preserving the trust of authors, reviewers, readers, institutions, and the wider academic community.

The Suwaib Amiruddin Foundation, as the official publisher of Lex: Journal of Social Sciences and Humanities Perspectives, is responsible for:

• Upholding editorial independence and ensuring that editorial decisions are made without commercial, institutional, personal, or political influence.
• Supporting an ethical publishing environment based on internationally recognized standards of academic integrity.
• Providing adequate resources and infrastructure to support fair peer review, editorial transparency, digital preservation, and publication quality.
• Protecting the autonomy of editors in evaluating and deciding upon submitted manuscripts.
• Responding appropriately to suspected ethical violations, including plagiarism, data fabrication, data falsification, duplicate publication, authorship disputes, and conflicts of interest.

Editors of Lex: Journal of Social Sciences and Humanities Perspectives are expected to:

• Evaluate all submissions solely on the basis of academic quality, originality, relevance to the journal’s focus and scope, methodological rigor, and contribution to knowledge.
• Ensure that manuscripts are evaluated without discrimination based on nationality, ethnicity, gender, religion, political belief, institutional affiliation, or personal background.
• Maintain the confidentiality of manuscripts, author information, reviewer identities, editorial correspondence, and supporting data.
• Prevent the use of unpublished materials, ideas, arguments, or data for personal research or unauthorized purposes.
• Identify, disclose, and appropriately manage actual, potential, or perceived conflicts of interest.
• Investigate allegations of plagiarism, data manipulation, citation misconduct, authorship disputes, or other ethical violations fairly and confidentially.
• Make publication decisions based on academic merit, peer-review reports, journal policies, and applicable ethical requirements.

Peer reviewers play an essential role in maintaining the quality, credibility, and ethical standards of academic publishing. Reviewers are expected to:

• Conduct fair, objective, constructive, and timely evaluations of manuscripts within their area of expertise.
• Provide clear and academically grounded comments that help editors make decisions and authors improve their manuscripts.
• Maintain strict confidentiality concerning manuscripts, supplementary materials, data, and editorial communications.
• Refrain from sharing, reproducing, discussing, or using unpublished manuscript content without authorization.
• Identify possible plagiarism, duplicate publication, data fabrication, citation manipulation, or substantial similarity with other works.
• Disclose actual, potential, or perceived conflicts of interest that may compromise impartiality.
• Decline a review assignment when the manuscript is outside their expertise or cannot be reviewed within the required period.

Authors submitting manuscripts to Lex: Journal of Social Sciences and Humanities Perspectives are responsible for:

• Ensuring that the manuscript is original, accurate, properly referenced, and free from plagiarism, fabrication, falsification, and inappropriate data manipulation.
• Presenting research methods, data, analysis, and findings honestly and with sufficient detail.
• Providing accurate and verifiable data and making supporting materials available when reasonably requested.
• Avoiding simultaneous, multiple, redundant, or duplicate submission of the same manuscript.
• Disclosing prior publication, conference versions, preprints, translated versions, or substantial overlap with previously published materials.
• Ensuring that all listed authors have made substantial scholarly contributions and approved the final manuscript.
• Acknowledging contributors who do not meet the criteria for authorship.
• Obtaining and stating relevant ethical approval for research involving human participants, personal data, vulnerable groups, animals, or hazardous materials.
• Obtaining informed consent when required and protecting the privacy and confidentiality of research participants.
• Declaring financial support, institutional affiliations, funding arrangements, and potential conflicts of interest.
• Promptly notifying the editor when a significant error is discovered and cooperating in correction or retraction procedures.

Lex: Journal of Social Sciences and Humanities Perspectives strictly prohibits plagiarism, self-plagiarism, duplicate publication, inappropriate paraphrasing, unattributed use of ideas, and unethical citation practices. All submitted manuscripts are screened using recognized plagiarism-detection software, such as Turnitin, before peer review.

• Manuscripts exceeding the permitted similarity threshold may be returned for revision or rejected.
• The similarity percentage is not the only basis for editorial decisions; editors also evaluate the source, context, distribution, and nature of matched text.
• Direct quotations, references, methods, institutional terminology, and commonly used academic expressions may be evaluated contextually.
• Authors are responsible for ensuring that all sources, ideas, quotations, data, tables, figures, and materials are properly acknowledged and cited.

Authors, editors, and reviewers must disclose financial, professional, institutional, intellectual, or personal relationships that could influence, or reasonably be perceived to influence, the research, review process, or editorial decision. Any disclosed conflict of interest will be managed transparently and appropriately by the editorial team.

The journal is committed to correcting the scholarly record whenever significant errors, unreliable findings, unethical research practices, or publication misconduct are identified. Depending on the seriousness of the issue, the journal may publish a correction, clarification, expression of concern, withdrawal notice, or retraction.

Ethical complaints and allegations will be handled fairly, confidentially, and consistently. The editorial team may request clarification or supporting evidence and may consult the author’s institution or other competent authorities when necessary.

Commitment to Integrity

By submitting, reviewing, editing, or publishing with Lex: Journal of Social Sciences and Humanities Perspectives, all parties commit to upholding the principles of academic honesty, transparency, fairness, accountability, confidentiality, and scholarly rigor. These ethical principles form the foundation for maintaining public trust and ensuring the responsible dissemination of knowledge in the social sciences and humanities.