Code of Ethics

Approved by the Editorial Board, valid from  1 april 2015.

The purpose of these Ethical Standards is to define the rights and duties of the publisher (editorial bodies), authors and reviewers in the process of publishing and set policies for the publishing process to ensure transparency and best quality, objectivity and neutrality of the Vojenské rozhledy journal. These Ethical Standards are in accordance with the recommendations of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE), contained in the Code of Conduct and Best Practice Guidelines for Journal Editors.

Notes: The Vojenské rozhledy journal is published by the University of Defence. To ensure the publication of the journal, the publisher established editorial bodies, which for the purposes of this document include: the Editorial Board (including its Chairman and Secretary) and Executive Editor. A person (author, reviewer, member of editorial bodies) who commits a breach of Ethical Standards is identified as “person in breach”. 

Ethical Responsibilities and Expectations

Publisher and Editorial Staff Responsibilities:

• Act impartially, assess contributors and reviewers objectively and fairly, without any discrimination;
• Approach evaluation and publication of the contributions so that the main evaluation criterion is professional quality and benefit;
• Take measures to identify possible breaches of the Code of Ethics and introduce procedures to prevent such violations;
• Consistently follow the defined process of assessing contributions;
• Publishers and editors are willing to publish corrections, clarifications, retractions and apologies when needed;
• Reviewed articles be treated confidentially.

Author Responsibilities:

• Get acquainted with the Guidelines for Authors and the Code of Ethics;
• Assure that an identical or similarly similar contribution has not yet been published or offered for publication in another periodical or other publicly available information resource;
• Give the publisher permission to publish and distribute the paper in both printed and electronic form;
• Ensure that the contribution does not contain classified information under applicable law;
• Explicitly mention in the contribution the participation of another person or institution significantly participating in the development of the contribution, including identification of the grant, sponsor, project, etc.;
• Properly cite the sources and literature used;
• Tolerate eventual interventions in your contribution resulting from the outcome of the review process and language proofing;
• Participate in peer review process;
• Provide retractions or corrections of mistakes;
• Refrain from seeking the identity of the reviewers and alert the publisher to facts that might jeopardize the anonymity and objectivity of the review process;
• Avoid unsubstantiated assessments in the contribution that might harm others or the reputation of the journal;
• Notify the publisher of any potential conflict of interest;
• Immediately inform the publisher if a serious error or mistake appears in the published article.

Reviewer Responsibilities:

• Get acquainted with the Guidelines for Reviewers and the Code of Ethics;
• Withdraw from review if they believe that they will not be able to review the article at a sufficiently professional level;
• Evaluate the reviewed paper objectively, impartially, and review the text in time, in the required scope and quality;
• Point out relevant published works that have not been cited yet;
• Observe the confidentiality of information received from the publisher or author in connection with the processing of the review report;
• Alert publishers to any previously published or submitted text that is significantly resembling the reviewed paper;
• Reviewed articles  be treated confidentially without indicating the name of the author. Refrain from seeking the identity of the author of the reviewed paper and alert the publisher to facts that might jeopardize the anonymity of the review process;
• Inform the publishers on possible conflicts of interest in time.;
• Identify research misconduct if occurred.

Procedures for Dealing with Unethical Behaviour

Identification of unethical behaviour

Anyone can notify the publisher of the violations of the above Ethical Standards. The provider of such information should provide sufficient information and evidence for investigation to the publisher (editorial bodies).

Investigation of unethical behaviour

Handling of notifications and complaints about unethical behaviour is the responsibility of the Chairman of the Editorial Board, who may advice the Editorial Board about such cases and consult it. In the event of serious breach he informs the publisher of the journal. The publisher approaches each case of breach of Ethical Standards with due seriousness and consistency in such a way as to preserve the conditions for fair and objective investigation of the case. Any information relating to investigations and results arising from it will not be provided to other people than those who are directly concerned.

Minor breaches of Ethical Standards

In the case of minor violations of Ethical Standards the person in breach is notified by the Chairman of the Editorial Board and asked to provide their opinion and remedy. Minor breaches can be addressed non-publicly without participation of other people and bodies.

Serious breaches of Ethical Standards

Serious breaches of Ethical Standards are solves by the Chairman of the Editorial Board in an appropriate way in collaboration with the Editorial Board and publisher. In order to assess the level of prospective breach objectively it is possible to invite other persons and bodies for investigation and consultation.

Outcomes of the investigation of breaches of Ethical Standards (in increasing order of severity)

After the investigation, it is possible to draw the conclusions from the breach of ethical standards and, within a reasonable extent, take some of the following measures. These may be adopted individually or in combination:

• Informing and advising the person in breach, if their unethical behaviour was the result of ignorance, incomprehension or incorrect interpretation and application of Ethical Standards;
• Strong written notice to person in breach and warning of the consequences of unethical behaviour;
• Publication of the offence in the form of a general notice;
• Publication of the offence including detailed analysis of violations of Ethical Standards and the identification of the person in breach;
• Embargo on the acceptance of contributions (if the person in breach is an author), exclusion from the pool of reviewers (if the person in breach is a reviewer), removal from the position and cancellation of the membership (if the person in breach is a member of the Editorial Board or Advisory Board) for a limited or unlimited period;
• Formal complaint about the person in breach addressed to their employer or professional organization and passing for further investigation and action.