Publication Ethics

Indonesian Tourism Justice Review is committed to maintaining the highest standards of publication ethics and research integrity. The journal follows internationally recognized principles of ethical scholarly publishing, including the Core Practices of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) and the Principles of Transparency and Best Practice in Scholarly Publishing developed by COPE, the Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ), the Open Access Scholarly Publishing Association (OASPA), and the World Association of Medical Editors (WAME).

The journal is committed to ensuring that all parties involved in the publication process—including authors, reviewers, editors, editorial board members, and the publisher—act responsibly, transparently, fairly, and ethically.

This policy applies to all manuscripts submitted to the journal, including regular submissions, invited articles, review articles, and Special Issue contributions.

1. Editorial Responsibility

The Editor-in-Chief and editorial team are responsible for maintaining the academic quality and integrity of the journal.

Editorial decisions shall be based on the manuscript's scholarly merit, originality, methodological rigor, relevance to the journal's aims and scope, and potential contribution to knowledge.

Editorial decisions shall not be influenced by:

  • the author's nationality, ethnicity, gender, religion, political views, or institutional affiliation;
  • personal relationships or academic status;
  • commercial interests or financial considerations; or
  • pressure from external individuals, institutions, sponsors, or other parties.

Editors must maintain editorial independence and exercise objective and impartial judgment throughout the editorial process.

2. Authors' Responsibilities

Authors are responsible for ensuring that manuscripts submitted to the journal represent original and ethically conducted scholarly work.

Authors must:

  • ensure that the manuscript is original and has not been published elsewhere;
  • ensure that the manuscript is not simultaneously submitted to another journal;
  • accurately report research methods, findings, analysis, and sources;
  • provide sufficient information to allow appropriate evaluation of the research;
  • appropriately cite and acknowledge the work of others;
  • disclose relevant funding and conflicts of interest;
  • comply with applicable research ethics requirements;
  • obtain appropriate permissions for copyrighted materials where necessary;
  • ensure that all listed authors meet the journal's authorship requirements;
  • obtain approval from all authors for the final submitted manuscript; and
  • promptly inform the editor of any significant error discovered in a submitted or published article.

Authors must not fabricate, falsify, manipulate, or selectively report research data or evidence.

3. Authorship and Contributorship

Authorship must be based on substantial intellectual contributions to the research and manuscript.

All individuals listed as authors must have made meaningful contributions to the work and must be able to take responsibility for their contribution.

The journal does not permit:

  • guest authorship, where individuals are listed as authors despite making no qualifying contribution;
  • gift authorship, where authorship is granted as a favor or courtesy;
  • ghost authorship, where individuals who made substantial contributions are omitted; or
  • unauthorized changes to authorship during the review or publication process.

Any request to add, remove, or reorder authors after submission must be justified and approved by all authors concerned. The journal may request written confirmation from all authors before approving such changes.

Author contribution statements may be required by the journal to improve transparency regarding individual contributions.

4. Originality, Plagiarism, and Redundant Publication

The journal does not accept plagiarism or other forms of inappropriate appropriation of another person's work.

Plagiarism includes, but is not limited to:

  • copying text without appropriate citation;
  • presenting another person's ideas, arguments, data, or findings as one's own;
  • substantial unacknowledged paraphrasing;
  • inappropriate reuse of previously published material; and
  • self-plagiarism or redundant publication that materially duplicates an author's previous work.

Manuscripts may be screened using appropriate plagiarism-detection tools before or during the editorial and peer-review process.

Authors are responsible for ensuring that all sources are properly acknowledged and cited.

Where substantial plagiarism, duplicate publication, or other forms of inappropriate text reuse are identified, the journal may reject the manuscript or take appropriate post-publication action.

5. Duplicate and Redundant Submission

Manuscripts must not be submitted simultaneously to more than one journal.

Authors must disclose any closely related manuscripts, preprints, conference papers, theses, reports, or previously published materials that could constitute substantial overlap with the submitted manuscript.

The journal may request clarification or supporting documents where overlapping publication is suspected.

6. Research Integrity and Misconduct

The journal takes allegations of research and publication misconduct seriously.

Research or publication misconduct may include, but is not limited to:

  • fabrication of data or research findings;
  • falsification or manipulation of data;
  • plagiarism;
  • inappropriate image or data manipulation;
  • duplicate or redundant publication;
  • unethical authorship practices;
  • undisclosed conflicts of interest;
  • manipulation of the peer-review process;
  • citation manipulation;
  • fraudulent or deceptive reporting;
  • unauthorized use of confidential information; and
  • other practices that undermine the integrity of scholarly communication.

When an allegation is raised, the journal will assess the concern and may initiate an investigation in accordance with applicable publication-ethics procedures and relevant institutional or regulatory frameworks.

The journal may contact the author's institution, research organization, funder, or other appropriate authority when necessary.

7. Citation Manipulation

Authors, reviewers, and editors must not engage in inappropriate citation practices.

Citation manipulation includes deliberately adding irrelevant references for the purpose of increasing citation counts, improving journal metrics, or artificially influencing the scholarly visibility of an individual, journal, institution, or publication.

Editors and reviewers must not require authors to cite articles solely to increase citations to themselves, their colleagues, or the journal.

Citations should be relevant, accurate, and necessary to support the scholarly argument.

8. Conflicts of Interest

All authors, reviewers, editors, and editorial board members must disclose actual, potential, or perceived conflicts of interest that could influence the research or editorial process.

Conflicts of interest may be financial, professional, institutional, personal, academic, or otherwise relevant to the manuscript.

Authors should disclose:

  • research funding;
  • employment or consultancy relationships;
  • financial interests;
  • institutional relationships;
  • personal or professional relationships; and
  • other circumstances that could reasonably be perceived as influencing the research or its interpretation.

Disclosure of a conflict does not automatically constitute grounds for rejection. Transparency allows editors and readers to assess potential sources of bias appropriately. International publishing guidance similarly emphasizes disclosure by authors, reviewers, editors, and editorial staff. 

9. Peer Review Ethics

The journal uses a double-anonymized peer-review process, as described in its Peer Review Policy.

Reviewers must:

  • maintain confidentiality;
  • provide objective and constructive assessments;
  • disclose conflicts of interest;
  • decline assignments where they cannot provide an independent assessment;
  • evaluate manuscripts based on scholarly merit;
  • avoid discriminatory, defamatory, or offensive comments;
  • identify relevant ethical or methodological concerns; and
  • not use unpublished information obtained during peer review for personal or professional advantage.

Reviewers must not contact authors directly regarding a manuscript under review unless authorized by the editorial team.

10. Editorial Conflicts of Interest

Editors and editorial board members must recuse themselves from handling manuscripts where they have a conflict of interest.

This includes manuscripts:

  • authored or co-authored by the editor;
  • submitted by close collaborators;
  • submitted by individuals with whom the editor has a significant personal or professional relationship; or
  • where the editor has a financial, academic, or other competing interest.

Such manuscripts must be handled by an independent editor who has no relevant conflict of interest.

11. Confidentiality

Manuscripts submitted to the journal are treated as confidential documents.

Editors, reviewers, and editorial staff must not disclose information about a submitted manuscript to anyone other than those directly involved in the editorial and peer-review process.

Unpublished information contained in submitted manuscripts must not be used for personal research or professional advantage without the authors' permission.

12. Ethical Approval and Protection of Research Participants

Authors conducting research involving human participants, personal data, interviews, surveys, observations, or other forms of human-subject research must comply with applicable ethical and legal requirements.

Where required by the relevant jurisdiction or institution, authors must obtain approval from an appropriate research ethics committee or institutional review board before conducting the research.

Manuscripts should provide an appropriate ethics statement where ethical approval or participant consent is applicable.

Authors must protect the privacy, dignity, safety, and rights of research participants.

Informed consent should be obtained where required, particularly for research involving identifiable personal information, interviews, photographs, recordings, or sensitive data.

13. Data, Evidence, and Research Transparency

Authors are expected to report research methods and evidence accurately and transparently.

Where appropriate and ethically permissible, authors should make relevant research data, materials, instruments, analytical procedures, or supplementary information available to support verification and reproducibility.

Data must not be fabricated, falsified, selectively manipulated, or presented in a misleading manner.

Where data cannot be publicly shared because of privacy, confidentiality, legal, contractual, or ethical restrictions, authors should provide an appropriate explanation.

14. Funding and Sponsorship

Authors must disclose all financial or institutional support that contributed to the research or manuscript.

Funding disclosures should identify the funding source and, where relevant, describe the role of the funder in:

  • research design;
  • data collection;
  • data analysis;
  • interpretation;
  • manuscript preparation; and
  • the decision to submit the manuscript for publication.

Funding or sponsorship must not compromise editorial independence.

15. Use of Artificial Intelligence and AI-Assisted Technologies

Authors must disclose the use of artificial intelligence or AI-assisted technologies when such tools have materially contributed to the preparation, analysis, generation, or transformation of the manuscript.

AI tools must not be listed as authors because they cannot assume responsibility for the accuracy, integrity, originality, or ethical aspects of scholarly work.

Authors remain fully responsible for:

  • the accuracy of AI-assisted content;
  • verification of references and factual claims;
  • originality and proper attribution;
  • protection of confidential information;
  • compliance with copyright and intellectual property requirements; and
  • the overall integrity of the submitted manuscript.

Reviewers and editors must not upload confidential or unpublished manuscripts, reviewer reports, or other privileged materials into AI systems that do not guarantee appropriate confidentiality and data protection.

The journal may update its AI policy in accordance with developments in responsible AI use in scholarly publishing.

16. Corrections and Post-Publication Changes

The journal recognizes that honest errors can occur in scholarly publishing.

When a published article contains a material error that affects the accuracy or interpretation of the article but does not invalidate the entire work, the journal may publish a Correction or Erratum.

Corrections should clearly identify the original article and explain the nature of the correction.

The journal maintains an appropriate version-control system so that corrections and subsequent changes to published articles remain transparent. International publishing guidance recommends that corrections be clearly linked to the original publication and that previous versions be appropriately documented. 

17. Retraction and Expression of Concern

An article may be retracted when there is clear evidence that its findings or conclusions are unreliable or when serious research or publication misconduct has occurred.

Possible grounds for retraction include:

  • substantial fabrication or falsification;
  • serious plagiarism;
  • duplicate publication;
  • major undisclosed conflicts of interest;
  • serious ethical violations;
  • unreliable data or methodology that substantially invalidates the findings; or
  • other circumstances that seriously compromise the integrity of the published work.

Where an investigation is ongoing and the available evidence raises substantial concerns but is insufficient for immediate retraction, the journal may publish an Expression of Concern.

Retraction notices should clearly identify the affected article, state the reason for retraction, and remain permanently linked to the original publication. Retracted articles should remain part of the scholarly record but must be clearly marked as retracted. 

18. Complaints and Appeals

The journal provides mechanisms for authors, reviewers, readers, and other stakeholders to raise concerns regarding editorial decisions, publication ethics, peer review, authorship, or other aspects of the publication process.

Complaints should be submitted to the editorial office with sufficient information and supporting evidence.

The journal will investigate complaints fairly, confidentially, and without retaliation.

Authors may appeal editorial decisions when they can demonstrate a significant procedural error, factual misunderstanding, or other substantive basis for reconsideration. Disagreement with an editor's or reviewer's academic judgment alone does not normally constitute sufficient grounds for an appeal.

19. Editorial Independence and Commercial Interests

Editorial decisions are independent of advertising, sponsorship, institutional interests, commercial relationships, or other financial considerations.

No manuscript will receive preferential treatment because of its authors, institutional affiliation, funding source, or commercial relevance.

The journal's editorial team retains full authority over editorial decisions and publication content.

20. Special Issues

All manuscripts submitted to Special Issues are subject to the same publication ethics, peer-review, and research-integrity standards as manuscripts submitted to regular issues.

Guest Editors must comply with the journal's conflict-of-interest requirements and must not make final editorial decisions on manuscripts where they have a conflict of interest.

The publication of a Special Issue does not reduce or bypass the journal's standard peer-review and ethical requirements.

21. Handling Allegations of Misconduct

When an allegation of misconduct is received, the journal may:

  1. conduct an initial assessment of the allegation;
  2. request clarification or supporting documentation from the relevant parties;
  3. consult independent experts or members of the Editorial Board;
  4. contact the relevant institution, research organization, or funder where appropriate;
  5. follow applicable COPE procedures and other recognized publication-ethics guidance;
  6. issue a correction, Expression of Concern, or retraction where warranted; and
  7. take other appropriate measures to protect the integrity of the scholarly record.

The journal will seek to ensure that investigations are conducted fairly and that all parties have an appropriate opportunity to respond.

22. Commitment to Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion

The journal is committed to fair, respectful, and inclusive scholarly communication.

Editorial and peer-review decisions shall be based on academic quality, relevance, originality, methodological rigor, and scholarly contribution. Decisions should not be influenced by characteristics unrelated to the academic quality of the manuscript.

The journal encourages diverse scholarly perspectives and international participation in its authorship, peer-review, and editorial activities.

23. Commitment to International Publication Ethics Standards

Indonesian Tourism Justice Review is committed to continuously reviewing and updating its publication-ethics policies in accordance with developments in international scholarly publishing.

The journal follows the principles and guidance of recognized organizations and standards, including:

  • Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE);
  • Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ);
  • Open Access Scholarly Publishing Association (OASPA);
  • World Association of Medical Editors (WAME), where applicable; and
  • other relevant international standards and best practices in research integrity and scholarly publishing.

The journal's policies apply equally to regular issues, Special Issues, invited contributions, and other forms of scholarly content published by the journal.

The journal reserves the right to take appropriate action whenever publication ethics or research integrity is compromised, with the primary objective of protecting the integrity, reliability, and transparency of the scholarly record.