Review process

The editorial team of the Polish Journal of Political Science subjects each received article to a detailed review process, consisting of two stages: an initial review and external reviews.

All manuscripts submitted to the journal are to undergo double-blind peer review (the identities of the Authors and the Reviewers are not disclosed). Two external Reviewers will assess manuscripts initially accepted by the Editors after a technical screening and verification of the thematic scope. Reviewers submit their reviews in writing, together with the declaration of potential conflicts of interest and information whether they discovered the identity of the Authors. The form for reviewers is available here.

The review is anonymous and confidential. If the review is not satisfactory, Editors may invite additional reviewers or discuss the case internally. It is always the Editor-in-Chief who makes the final decision on any material to be published in the Journal. The standard peer review applies to all full-length articles and review articles.
Conference materials are only available if they meet the journal’s publication criteria and are subject to a standard review procedure. Articles written by Editors, members of the Board or anyone else having a potential conflict of interest with the Journal (that needs to be disclosed) will be subject to the standard peer review procedure conducted by the Board members and Reviewers who do not have such correlation with the Authors. In the case of articles authored by the Editor-in-Chief, the review process is managed by one of the Deputy Editors who also makes the final decision. All the decisions are impartial, independent, and based only on the quality of the submitted material, also in the case of special issues or supplements. Depending on the nature of the supplementary material, such material may also be subject to the peer review process. As the Journal operates on double-blind review principle, the Authors are requested to prepare their manuscript with masked authorship details (the names of Authors, their affiliations, funding, acknowledgement, etc.) that otherwise might disclose their identity. Any special issues and supplements are subject to the standard peer review procedure. Non-scientific material that is excluded from the external peer review procedure includes: – Introductions, – Editorials, – speeches, – book reviews, – in memoriam statements, – society updates (academic events, awards, etc.).

1. Initial Review (Internal)

The submitted article is evaluated by the Editorial Team in terms of:

• compliance with basic scholarly standards;
• alignment with the journal’s academic profile;
• content quality.

At this stage, the originality of the text is also checked (using iThenticate). The article can only proceed to the external review stage if it receives a positive assessment in the initial review. The maximum time allowed for preparing the initial review is three weeks.

2. External Reviews – Double-Blind Review Process

After successfully passing the initial review, the article is forwarded to two independent external reviewers. The editorial team adheres to the double-blind review process, ensuring that neither the authors nor the reviewers know each other’s identities.

The guidelines for external reviews include:

• the reviewers’ affiliations must differ from the author’s affiliation;
• the reviewers should have different affiliations from each other;
• members of the Editorial Team are not selected as reviewers;
• the text is evaluated for its relevance to the journal’s profile, the novelty of the research topic, linguistic quality, methodology, and the quality of the references;
• reviewers complete their evaluations on a dedicated review form;
• the reviewer provides one of the following recommendations:
  • the text is suitable for publication in its current form;
  • the text is suitable for publication after revisions;
  • the text is not suitable for publication.

In the event of conflicting recommendations, a third reviewer is appointed. If there is suspicion of similarity between the reviewed article and previously published content, the reviewers are obliged to notify the Editorial Team. Reviewers with a potential conflict of interest with the author are not appointed.

The standard duration of the external review process is approximately two months.