Strategic Policy and Diplomacy Review (SPDR) is a peer-reviewed journal published by Hasanuddin University. The journal is committed to upholding the highest standards of publication ethics and takes all possible measures against publication malpractices. All authors submitting their works to the journal for publication as original articles attest that the submitted works represent their authors’ contributions and have not been copied or plagiarized in whole or in part from other works. This statement is based on Elsevier's Policies and Ethics and COPE Best Practice Guidelines for Journal Editors.

All of the work that is turned in will be checked by software that looks for plagiarism and irresponsible use of artificial intelligence (AI). If plagiarism and irresponsible use of AI are found, the work won't be allowed to be published again. If an author has been found to have plagiarized, they won't be able to publish in SPDR.

Ethical Guideline for Journal Publication. The publication of an article in a peer-reviewed journal Strategic Policy and Diplomacy Review is an essential building block in developing a coherent and respected network of knowledge. It directly reflects the quality of the authors' work and the institutions that support them. Peer-reviewed articles support and embody the scientific method. It is, therefore essential to agree upon standards of expected ethical behaviour for all parties involved in publishing: the author, the journal editor, the peer reviewer, the publisher, and the society.

Hasanuddin University as the publisher of SPDR takes its duties of guardianship over all stages of publishing seriously, and we recognize our ethical behaviour and other responsibilities.  

Duties of Authors, Editors, and Reviewers

Duties of Authors

1. Reporting Standards: Authors of reports of original research should present an accurate account of the work performed and an objective discussion of its significance. Underlying data should be represented accurately in the paper. A paper should contain sufficient detail and references to permit others to replicate the work. Fraudulent or knowingly inaccurate statements constitute unethical behaviour and are unacceptable.
2. Data Access and Retention: Authors are asked to provide the raw data in connection with a paper for editorial review and should be prepared to provide public access to such data (consistent with the ALPSP-STM Statement on Data and Databases), if practicable, and should, in any event, be prepared to retain such data for a reasonable time after publication.
3. Originality and Plagiarism: The authors should ensure that they have written entirely original works. If the authors have used the work and/or words of others, then it has to be appropriately cited or quoted. Plagiarism takes many forms, from passing off another's paper as the author's own paper to copying or paraphrasing substantial parts of another's paper (without attribution) and/or to claiming results from research conducted by others. Plagiarism in all its forms constitutes unethical publishing behaviour and is unacceptable.
4. Multiple, Redundant or Concurrent Publication: An author should not generally publish manuscripts describing essentially the same research in more than one journal or primary publication. Submitting the same manuscript to more than one journal concurrently constitutes unethical publishing behaviour and is unacceptable.
5. Acknowledgement of Sources: Proper acknowledgement of the work of others must always be given. Authors should cite publications that have influenced the nature of the reported work.
6. Authorship of the Paper: Authorship should be limited to those who have contributed significantly to the conception, design, execution, or interpretation of the reported study. All those who have made significant contributions should be listed as co-authors. Where others have participated in certain substantive aspects of the research project, they should be acknowledged or listed as contributors. The corresponding author should ensure that all appropriate co-authors and no inappropriate co-authors are included in the paper and that all co-authors have seen and approved the final version of the paper and have agreed to its submission for publication.
7. Disclosure and Conflicts of Interest: All authors should disclose in their manuscript any financial or other substantive conflicts of interest that might be construed to influence the results or interpretation of their manuscript. All sources of financial support for the project should be disclosed.
8. Fundamental Errors in Published Works: When an author discovers a significant error or inaccuracy in his/her published work, it is the author’s obligation to promptly notify the journal editor or publisher and cooperate with the editor to retract or correct the paper.
9. Hazards and Human or Animal Subjects: If the work involves chemicals, procedures or equipment that have any unusual hazards inherent in their use, the author must clearly identify these in the manuscript.

Duties of Editors

The editor's role is to choose which of the articles sent to the journal should be published. These kinds of decisions must always be based on how well the work in question has been proven and how important it is to researchers and readers. The editors may follow the rules set by the journal's editorial board and be limited by the laws in place at the time about libel, copyright violations, and plagiarism. When making this choice, the editors may talk to other editors or reviewers.

1. Fair Play: An editor at any time evaluates manuscripts for their intellectual content without regard to race, gender, sexual orientation, religious belief, ethnic origin, citizenship, or political philosophy of the authors.
2. Confidentiality: The editor and any editorial staff must not disclose any information about a submitted manuscript to anyone other than the corresponding author, reviewers, potential reviewers, other editorial advisers, and the publisher, as appropriate.
3. Disclosure and Conflicts of Interest: Unpublished materials disclosed in a submitted manuscript must not be used in an editor's own research without the author's express written consent.
4. Publication Decisions: The editor board journal are responsible for deciding which of the articles submitted to the journal should be published. The validation of the work in question and its importance to researchers and readers must always drive such decisions. The editors may be guided by the policies of the journal's editorial board and constrained by such legal requirements as shall then be in force regarding libel, copyright infringement, and plagiarism. The editors may confer with other editors or reviewers in making this decision.
5. Review of Manuscripts: The editor must ensure that the editor for originality initially evaluates each manuscript. The editor should organize and use peer review fairly and wisely. Editors should explain their peer review processes in the information for authors and also indicate which parts of the journal are peer-reviewed. The editor should use appropriate peer reviewers for papers considered for publication by selecting people with sufficient expertise and avoiding those with conflicts of interest.

Duties of Reviewers

1. Contribution to Editorial Decisions: Peer review assists the editor in making editorial decisions and, through editorial communications with the author, may also assist the author in improving the paper.
2. Promptness: Any selected referee who feels unqualified to review the research reported in a manuscript or knows its prompt review will be impossible should notify the editor and excuse himself from the review process.
3. Standards of Objectivity: Reviews should be conducted objectively. Personal criticism of the author is inappropriate. Referees should express their views clearly with supporting arguments.
4. Confidentiality: Any manuscripts received for review must be treated as confidential documents. They must not be shown to or discussed with others except as authorized by the editor.
5. Disclosure and Conflict of Interest: Privileged information or ideas obtained through peer review must be confidential and not used for personal advantage. Reviewers should not consider manuscripts with conflicts of interest resulting from competitive, collaborative, or other relationships or connections with any of the authors, companies, or institutions connected to the papers.
6. Acknowledgement of Sources: Reviewers should identify relevant published work that the authors have not cited. Any statement that an observation, derivation, or argument had been reported should be accompanied by the appropriate citation. A reviewer should also call to the editor's attention any substantial similarity or overlap between the manuscript under consideration and any other published paper they have personal knowledge of. 

Withdrawal/correction/retraction policy

Strategic Policy and Diplomacy Review (SPDR) handles retractions and revisions. Addendum, Erratum, Corrections, Retractions (or Partial Retractions), and Comments.

Addendum

An Addendum can be added to the original publication to include important results that were accidentally left out. The current journal issue will include the Addendum with article numbers. The original publication will link to the Addendum, but it does not need to be changed.

Erratum

Errata should be published for formatting changes that are scientifically important or for changes to authorship if the author or contributor list is wrong because a worthy author was left off or someone who doesn't meet the criteria for authorship was added. Scientifically important formatting problems that need an Erratum include figures that are missing or not clear, or mistakes that were made during proofreading (e.g., missing text). Errata are not given for spelling or grammar mistakes that don't change the way something is read or what it means. The final version should be carefully proofread by all of the authors.

Author Name Change Policy: After publication, some authors may want to change their names. In these situations, SPDR will fix the article, republish it, and send the updated metadata to the right indexing services (please note that all updates are dependent upon the policies of the databases). Our teams know that name changes can be private and/or sensitive for a number of reasons, such as to match gender identity, get married, get divorced, or change religion. So, to protect the authors' identities, there won't be an Erratum and co-authors won't be told about it. If an author wants to change their name, they should contact the journal's Editorial Office.

Corrections

If published articles have mistakes that are important to science, corrections should be sent.

The academic editors can look at any changes that are made. Corrections are used to let people know about any changes made after a paper has been published that change the scientific interpretation (for example, changes to a misleading part of an otherwise reliable paper, an error in a figure, an error in data that doesn't change the conclusions, or the addition of missing details about a method). This is a separate paper that links to the updated original paper. A note will also be added to the Article Versions Notes and the abstract page to let readers know that a new version was uploaded.

Retractions

Sometimes, a piece of research literature needs to be taken out of the whole. This could be because of mistakes made by accident during the research process, major ethical violations, making up data, a lot of plagiarism, or some other reason. These kinds of articles hurt the reliability of scientific records and should be taken down. When it comes to retractions, SPDR does what the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) says to do. The Editorial Office, with help from the Editorial Board and final approval from the Editor-in-Chief, looks into possible retractions in depth. Other people and institutions, like university officials or experts in the field, will be talked to as needed. If a Retraction is published, the original publication is changed by adding a "RETRACTED" watermark, but it will still be available on the journal's website for future reference. But retracted articles shouldn't be used as sources for more research because you can't trust them. Retractions are printed in the current issue of the journal as a separate item with the same authorship and affiliation as the article being taken down. Page numbers are added. So, the Retraction can be marked in the indexing databases after the issue is published. When only part of a result is wrong, a partial retraction might be published. A paper will only be completely taken down in very rare cases, such as when leaving it online would be against the law or would cause a lot of harm.

Expression of Concern

An Expression of Concern can be released when a situation is complicated, unclear, or going on for a long time. If investigations into alleged or suspected research misconduct haven't been finished yet or turn out to be inconclusive, an editor or journal may want to publish a "Expression of Concern," which lists the points of concern and what actions, if any, are being taken. Very seldomly.

Comments and Replies

Comments are short letters from readers to the editors that question either the results reported in an article or the way the experiment was done. If a reader finds an article interesting, he or she will usually talk to the Editorial Office or the Editor-in-Chief. When this happens, the Editorial Office may ask the reader to write a short, well-thought-out Comment about the article. After the Editor-in-Chief has thought about and reviewed the Comment, it may be published. If that happens, the Editorial Office will contact the authors of the article and ask them to write a Reply. If the reader's complaints are true, the authors or the Editorial Office may publish a "Correction" or pull the whole paper.

Both comments and replies will be reviewed by a referee to make sure that the comment addresses important parts of the original paper without turning into a new paper, that the reply answers the comment directly without being vague, and that the tone of both is appropriate for a scientific journal.

The first check on a comment will be done by academic editors. If it is accepted, it will be sent to the person who wrote the original paper, who will have the chance to respond. Usually, the editor will give a deadline for getting the reply so that the discussion can be published as soon as possible. If a response is sent in on time, the editor will review both the comment and the response. If the original author doesn't send in a reply, the editor may decide to move on without one.

Most of the time, editors will ask people who have already reviewed the article to look over both the Comment and Reply (if available). When editors get review reports, they will send the Reply and the review reports to the person who wrote the Comment. The person who wrote the Comment will only get one chance to change it.

The authors of the Reply will get the revised Comment and review reports. The authors will only have one chance to make changes to the Reply. Last, the edited Comment/Reply will be sent to the academic editor for a final decision.