The review procedure (expert evaluation) is carried out to ensure a high scientific and theoretical level of the Journal. The purpose of the review is to promote the careful selection of author’s manuscripts for publication, to provide an objective assessment of the quality of the material submitted, as well as to determine the quality of its level of compliance with scientific, literary, and ethical standards.

The journal adheres to a “double-blind” peer review, according to which expert evaluation is carried out in an anonymous order for both the reviewer and the authors.

Internal review (preliminary evaluation in the editorial office)

All manuscripts received by the editorial board are checked by the editor-in-chief regarding the purpose, topic, and reactionary policy of the journal. Manuscripts that do not comply with the subject and editorial policy of the journal or the editorial standards of the journal are rejected for review. The editor’s introductory word and a block with information on corrections, as well as publications on the topic “to help a practicing lawyer” are not subject to review.

Manuscripts of articles that do not meet the requirements of the journal regarding the structure and design are returned to the authors for revision and re-submission. If the author has not sent a response to the editor’s request within 30 calendar days, it is considered that the manuscript is not under consideration in the editorial office of the journal.

Manuscripts of articles in which, after checking for plagiarism in the Unichesk and/or iThenticate system, a significant percentage of text borrowings were found, are returned to the authors for revision. In case of detection of signs of plagiarism, the article is returned to the author without the right to re-submit this article.

After all internal checks, the author’s original article is submitted for external review (expert evaluation).

External review (assessed by independent experts)

Manuscripts issued by the publication requirements section, which have passed the initial control in the editorial office, are allowed to the review stage.

In case of compliance with the requirements for the publication of the journal, the manuscript of the article is transmitted to the technical editor, who provides the article with the registration code and removes information about the author or authors from it (the article coding process takes place).

All articles submitted for publication are subject to double-blind peer review by at least two reviewers who are experts in the scientific field of a particular article.

Members of the editorial board recommend reviewers persons who are experts in the scientific field of a particular article and have publications on the subject of the article. Members of the editorial board may also be reviewers.

The coded article is emailed to reviewers.

Reviewers must adhere to the best international peer review practices, in particular the Recommendations for reviewers from the European Association of Scientific Editors, Web of Science Academy, the requirements of this publication.

Reviewers are required to notify the editor and/or editors of all possible conflicts of interest as soon as possible. They must also adhere to the principle of confidentiality when working with the manuscript of the article, in particular, not to use and/or reproduce it in whole or in part anywhere, and not to disclose information about the editorial address regarding peer review.

The review period for reviewers is three weeks.

Reviewers fill out standard review forms and choose one of the options:

• recommended for publication;
• recommended for publication after revision;
• not recommended for publication.

In case of refusal or need for revision, the reviewer must provide a written reasoned explanation of the reasons for such a decision write reasonable comments, and explain to the authors how to improve the article.

Editors have the right not to inform the author of those comments that contain a subjective assessment of the provisions of the manuscript, or insults.

Editors mediate all discussions between authors and reviewers when reviewing an article before publication. If agreement cannot be reached, editors may invite additional reviewers.

The responsible editor has the right to return the review for revision if the reviewer did not comply with the requirements established by the Recommendations for reviewers that the above or the review contains ambiguous comments. In case of significant comments to the reviewer, the editor has the right to exclude the reviewer from the list of persons to whom the publication refers and/or reports on his actions at the place of his affiliation.

Reviewers do not carry out structural or linguistic stylistic editing of the manuscript, but, if necessary, report editorial problems of the authors and editors of the journal in the corresponding review block.

Recommendations of reviewers are sent by e-mail to the technical editor. Articles that require revision are sent to the authors with specific recommendations to improve the quality of the material without identifying reviewers.

After that, the manuscript of the article is returned to the author/authors along with comments and suggestions from reviewers to improve the article and recommendations of editors, if any. The author is given two weeks (14 calendar days) to finalize the manuscript.

The author repeatedly sends the revised version of the article to the editors, along with clear answers to the reviewers’ comments. All changes the author must highlight in the text of the article.

The responsible editor directly evaluates the quality of changes or submits the article to reviewers for re-evaluation. The term of re-evaluation by the reviewer should not exceed two weeks.

In the case of a second round of peer review, the reviewer may be asked to evaluate the revised version of the manuscript given the reviewer’s recommendations submitted during the first round of peer review.

Reviewers should clearly and reasonably express their point of view, and be polite and constructive in their recommendations.

The author must respond to all comments of the reviewer according to the points of the review.

The journal allows a maximum of two rounds of manuscript review. In case of repeated negative reviews, the article is rejected and is not subject to further consideration.

The editors take into account the comments of reviewers, but the final decision on the publication of the article is made by the editor-in-chief of the journal. The editor-in-chief may make a final decision on the publication of the article at a meeting of the editorial board.

The decision of the editorial board is reported to the author. The editors of the journal do not enter into a discussion with the authors of rejected articles.

Further work with the article that was accepted for publication is carried out by the editorial board through the technological process of preparing the journal issue.

Reviews and recommendations for each article are stored in the editorial office in electronic form for 2 years from the date of publication of the journal issue, which contains the peer-reviewed article.

Authors’ appeal

Authors can appeal the denial of publication. The procedure for such an appeal is described in paragraph “Statements and Appeals” of the Journal’s Editorial Policy