Публикационная этика

Ethics of Scientific Publications

The members of the editorial board of the journal Legalitas adhere to the principles and norms of the Publication Ethics for Scientific Journals of Alikhan Bokeikhan University in their professional activities. The publication ethics is developed in accordance with the international publication ethical standards of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) and the Ethical Principles of Scopus journals (Elsevier).

The publication ethics establishes the norms, principles, and standards of ethical behavior for editors, reviewers, and authors, measures to detect conflicts of interest, unethical behavior, and guidelines for article retraction, correction, and rebuttal.

All participants in the publication process, namely, each author, scientific editor, reviewer, managing secretary, and members of the editorial board of Legalitas, must unconditionally adhere to the principles, norms, and standards of publication ethics. Adherence to ethical principles is crucial for ensuring and maintaining the quality of the scientific journal and for fostering trustful and respectful relationships among all participants in the publication process.

Unethical behavior includes actions by authors, editors, or publishers, such as submitting their own articles for self-review, fraudulent or contractual reviews, using agency services to publish research results, ghost authorship, falsification and fabrication of research results, publishing unreliable pseudoscientific texts, submitting manuscripts to other publications without the authors' permission, passing authors' materials to third parties, violating copyright laws, and manipulating citations or plagiarism.

Principles of Publication Ethics for Editorial Board Members
Members of the editorial board of Legalitas are responsible for the development, improvement, and promotion of the journal in international databases. They must follow the principles of freedom of opinion, satisfying the scientific and professional needs of the authors and readers of the journal, avoiding the influence of commercial interests of the authors, reviewers, and publisher on publication decisions, and taking all possible measures to improve the quality of scientific publications and protect the confidentiality of information throughout the publishing process.

All authors should be treated equally. Members of the editorial board are responsible for making decisions about the publication of materials submitted by authors. They should evaluate manuscripts based solely on their intellectual content, irrespective of the race, gender, sexual orientation, religious beliefs, ethnic origin, citizenship, political views, or commercial interests of the authors.

Decision on Manuscript Publication
To prevent illegal borrowing, the journal's editorial team conducts mandatory checks on articles for the use of materials without proper attribution (plagiarism) through the Anti-plagiarism detection system.

The originality of the text should be at least 60%. If the article does not meet the required originality percentage, it will be sent back to the author for revision. In case of a second negative result, the article will not be accepted for publication in the journal.

All scientific articles submitted to the editorial office undergo mandatory double-blind peer review. The responsible editor determines whether the submitted article fits the journal's scope and formatting requirements and then sends it for review by a specialist with a relevant academic degree, qualifications, research experience, and expertise most closely related to the article's topic.

The review process is "double-blind": the author does not know the identity of the reviewer, and vice versa. The author receives the review without the signature and identifying information of the reviewer.

Reviewers are prohibited from using the reviewed material for their own purposes or for third parties, disclosing the article’s content before publication, transferring the review to other individuals, or using the materials for their personal interests before publication.

The review should include a thorough analysis of the article's material, an objective and substantiated evaluation, and specific recommendations. The reviewer must address the relevance of the article’s theme, its originality, key research findings, the article’s structure and logic, and the alignment of the content with the topic.

If the review contains recommendations for changes or improvements, the responsible editor will send the review back to the author for revision. A positive review is not in itself sufficient to justify publication. The final decision regarding publication rests with the editorial board.

Duties and Rights of Editors
Editorial board members are responsible for ensuring that the publication of articles adheres to the principles of scientific publishing ethics and integrity. If any breaches of publishing or scientific ethics occur during the manuscript preparation, the editor must decide whether to return the article for revision or reject it outright. Articles may be returned to authors or withdrawn by the editorial board if publication or ethical guidelines are violated. The editorial team may also refuse to publish articles or announce that no corrections will be made.