Editorial Policies

These policies apply to everything IGSR publishes. They should be read together with our Submission and Manuscript Guidelines.

1. What we publish

2. Editorial independence

Editorial decisions are made by IGSR's editors on the basis of quality, originality, evidence and relevance alone. They are not influenced by funders, partners, governments, political parties or the author's affiliation. No payment, internship, role or relationship with IGSR guarantees acceptance.

3. Review process

Every submission is reviewed before publication. Journal research articles and policy briefs go through editorial screening and independent peer review; all other work is reviewed in full by the editors.

1. Initial screening. Editors check scope, originality, formatting and declarations, and run a similarity (plagiarism) check. Unsuitable manuscripts are declined at this stage.
2. Editorial review. An editor reads the full manuscript for argument, evidence, sources and clarity. Article Blogs, commentaries, book reviews and editorials are decided at this stage: accept, revise or decline.
3. Peer review (journal research articles and policy briefs). Manuscripts are sent to at least one, and normally two, independent reviewers with expertise in the subject. Review is double-anonymous wherever practicable: reviewers do not know the authors' identities, and authors do not know the reviewers'. Reviewers assess originality, method, evidence, use of sources and contribution.
4. Revision. Authors receive the reviewers' and editors' comments and submit a revised manuscript with a response to each point. Revised work may be returned to reviewers.
5. Decision. The editors make the final decision: accept, minor revision, major revision and resubmission, or reject. For independent submissions, review is normally completed within 10–20 days.
6. Production. Accepted work is copy-edited, formatted, checked against its declared AI use and image permissions, and published with its DOI and licence. Preparation for publication takes 3–4 days. The IGSR Journal is published monthly.

Editors do not handle manuscripts in which they have a conflict of interest. Work by IGSR's editors or staff is handled by another editor under the same process.

Review timelines

4. Publication ethics

IGSR follows the core practices recommended by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) for authors, editors and reviewers.

• Originality: work must be original and not published or under consideration elsewhere.
• Plagiarism: submissions may be checked with similarity-detection tools. Plagiarism, including self-plagiarism and uncredited use of others' ideas, data or translations, leads to rejection or retraction.
• Authorship: everyone listed as an author must have contributed substantially and approved the final version. AI tools cannot be authors.
• Use of AI: undisclosed use of AI is prohibited. AI tools may be used, if fully disclosed, for data analysis, generating charts and graphs, translation, language editing and similar support tasks; every disclosed use is examined during review. AI must not replace the author's own analysis and argument, and AI tools cannot be authors. Authors remain responsible for every claim and citation, and fabricated references lead to rejection.
• Conflicts of interest and funding: authors, reviewers and editors must declare any financial, personal or institutional interest that could be seen to influence the work.
• Research ethics: work involving human participants must explain how informed consent was obtained and how participants were protected.
• Sensitive subjects: work on conflict, security or contested regions must be evidence-based, must not incite hatred or violence, and must not expose sources to risk. IGSR takes no institutional position on disputed territories.
• Images and third-party material: authors must hold the rights or permission for every image, chart, map or extended quotation, and credit each one.

5. Corrections, retractions and removals

• Corrections: errors that affect the accuracy of a published work are corrected, and a dated correction notice is added to the article.
• Retractions: work found to involve plagiarism, fabrication, serious error or unethical research is retracted. The article remains online, clearly marked "Retracted", with a notice explaining why.
• Removal: content is removed only in exceptional cases, such as a legal requirement or a serious risk to someone's safety. A notice remains in its place.

To report a concern about a published work, write to info@igsresearch.org with the subject line "Publication concern".

6. Appeals and complaints

Authors may appeal an editorial decision once, by writing to info@igsresearch.org within 30 days with a reasoned explanation. Appeals are considered by an editor not involved in the original decision.

7. Open access, copyright and licensing

All IGSR publications are free to read. Authors retain copyright. Unless stated otherwise, work is published under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International licence (CC BY 4.0), which allows reuse with credit to the author and IGSR. Third-party images are credited individually and are not covered by this licence unless stated. A copyright and licence notice appears on every journal article, commentary, book review and editorial, and on each full journal issue.

8. Publication charges

IGSR receives no government or institutional funding. To sustain its publishing, a charge applies to all publication types: journal research articles, policy briefs, Article Blogs, commentaries and book reviews. It covers article processing, website maintenance, institute development and management costs.

• The charge is kept minimal and may change according to the Institute's needs. The applicable amount is communicated to the author in writing before publication.
• Payment never influences the editorial decision, and no payment guarantees publication.
• Publication free of charge is an exception, granted at the Institute's discretion.
• IGSR internships are unpaid: interns do not receive a stipend or salary.

9. Identifiers and archiving

Journal articles and policy briefs receive a Digital Object Identifier (DOI). Until IGSR's Crossref membership is confirmed, DOIs are issued through Zenodo, a free open repository operated by CERN. Once Crossref membership is in place, Crossref DOIs are assigned to new publications automatically or by the editorial team; DOIs already issued remain valid. Authors of these works are identified by their ORCID iD. Published journal articles and policy briefs are deposited in a long-term open repository so that they remain accessible if this website changes.

10. Author contact

Authors' email addresses are shown only with their consent. To contact an author, write to info@igsresearch.org and we will forward your message.