AUTHORS’ DUTIES

Authorship of the work

The basic determiner of the standard of scientific works is their reliability. Accordingly, the Contributors are obliged to present results of their research in an authentic, honest and reliable manner. The term author applies and is restricted to the person who has contributed substantially to the concept and realization of the research and interpretation of the research results being published.

A manifestation of scientific unreliability is violation of ethical principles in the form of ghostwriting or guest authorship. We come to deal with the former when it is someone else who made a considerable contribution to the work submitted for publication, however their role has not been acknowledged or they have not been mentioned in acknowledgements included in the publication. Guest authorship, on the other hand, is the case where the share of a given person has been insignificant or has not taken place at all, yet the person’s name has been given as the author/co-author of the publication. Both ghost writing and guest authorship, being unethical phenomena, are unacceptable.

Standards of publication

The articles submitted to the Journal must exclusively be original works, not submitted for publication and not published in any other magazine, monograph or collective work. Neither can they violate the copyrights of third parties. It is also considered unethical to submit a scientific article that is a translation of text which has been already published or to contribute a manuscript submitted to another journal.

The criterion of evaluation of each work submitted for publication is objectivism, as well as presentation of a scientific problem, which does not raise any doubts. Citation of statements, research results or data presented by other authors must be referenced or inserted in the form of a quotation, also referenced. The authors need to prepare their articles based on available literature on the subject, including the latest works and taking care of methodological coherence, as well as high standards of the language used. It is the author’s duty to attach a list of literature to the article. As regards the formal aspect, the article that is submitted ought to be rendered in compliance with the recommendations included in “Instruction for authors”.

Author’s contribution to the work

The author is obliged to declare their contribution to the work, which must be confirmed in a relevant statement available on the webpage. In the case where there are several authors who contributed to the preparation of the article submitted for publication, each of them is required to submit such a statement.

Conflict of interests

The author submitting the manuscript for printing is obliged to notify the Editorial Board of all potential conflicts of interest, which may impact the results of the work.

Access to data

Should the need arise, the author must be ready to submit unprocessed data to the Editorial Board, with reference to the article which is submitted for publication in Opolskie Studia Administracyjno-Prawne.

Errors found following the submitting of the manuscript

In the case where the author discovers an error or inaccuracy in their text after they have submitted the manuscript, they are bound to immediately notify the Editorial Board of the fact.

Originality of the work

It is exclusively an original work which can be submitted to the Editorial Board by the author. Also, it is the author’s responsibility to make certain that the names of the authors cited in the work have been listed correctly and that the fragments of the quoted works have been referenced accurately.

Prevention and detection of cases of plagiarism

All forms of plagiarism are treated as unethical and are unacceptable. All the manuscripts are subject to anti-plagiarism procedure with the use of relevant tools on the Academic Journals Platform of Opole University. In the case where the Editorial Board see grounds for suspicion of plagiarism, it launches the investigation procedure with the participation of the Reviewers and the author who has submitted the work. Should illegal use of a text, data, statements or research results be confirmed, the work submitted for publication is rejected and the submitting author is notified of the fact. If the addressee does not respond to the notification, the Board notify the institution which the author is affiliated with.

Insertion, in the article, of extensive fragments of a publication which has already been published elsewhere, even though authored by the Contributor himself/herself is treated as the so-called self-plagiarism (duplicate publication) and is unacceptable. In such a case the Editorial Board, in consequence of not satisfying the requirement of originality, inform the Contributor of their decision to reject the article.