Open Access

NJIPS acknowledges the vital role that Open Access plays in the research ecosystem and is fully committed to promoting the broadest possible dissemination and sharing of scholarly research published in the journal. All articles published by NJIPS are made immediately available in Open Access format upon publication, thereby enhancing their accessibility, visibility, and impact.

NJIPS welcomes submissions from scholars who share its commitment to advancing knowledge through Open Access publications. The mission of the journal is to make scholarly research freely available online, enabling a diverse global readership to access and utilize the knowledge published by NJIPS. By adopting this approach, NJIPS helps to remove barriers to the access, use, and distribution of high-quality research.

Copyright and Licensing

Copyright for any article published by NJIPS, an Open Access journal, under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0) license is retained by the author(s). Authors grant NJIPS a license to publish the article and identify itself as the original publisher. This license allows users the right to access, use, distribute, and make adaptations of the content for non-commercial purposes only, provided that the original authors, citation details, and publisher are attributed.

Authorship

Criteria for Authorship: All authors listed on a manuscript must have made significant contributions to the research or preparation of the manuscript. To be considered an author, an individual must meet all of the following criteria:

• Substantial contributions to the conception or design of the work, or the acquisition, analysis, or interpretation of data for the work.
• Drafting the manuscript or revising it critically for important intellectual content.
• Agreement to be accountable for all aspects of the work in ensuring that questions related to the accuracy or integrity of any part of the work are appropriately investigated and resolved.

Acknowledgments: Individuals who do not meet the criteria for authorship should be acknowledged in the manuscript. This may include individuals who provided research assistance, financial support, or other contributions.

Changes in Authorship: The corresponding author bears the responsibility of ensuring that all co-authors are duly listed in the manuscript and have reviewed and endorsed the final version before submission. The editor may only contemplate requests to amend the authorship in exceptional circumstances, but only with the approval of all authors included in the manuscript, including any individuals added or removed. It is important to note that any changes to the authorship will not be considered post-publication of the manuscript.

Authorship Order: The order in which authors are listed should reflect the relative contribution of each author, with the lead author being the individual who contributed the most to the study. In cases where multiple authors contributed equally to the study, they may be listed in alphabetical order. It is the responsibility of the corresponding author to ensure that all authors meet the authorship criteria and that the order of authorship is agreed upon by all authors prior to submission. Any changes to the authorship order after submission will only be considered in exceptional circumstances and must be approved by all authors.

Permissions and Consent

All authors are required to obtain permission from the authors of any copyrighted works used in their manuscripts. Additionally, authors are expected to obtain informed consent from all research participants regarding the disclosure of interview data or any identifying information. Authors may be asked to share relevant documents with NJIPS during or after publication. The editor reserves the right to reject manuscripts at any stage of the publication process if the authors fail to produce the required documentation.

Data Access and Retention

The authors may be requested to provide the data and related material for editorial review, and public access to the data should be provided if feasible. Additionally, authors are advised and expected to retain such data for a reasonable period after the publication of their research.

Privacy

Collection and Processing of Personal Information: Our contributors may provide us with personal information when they are:

• accessing the website of NJIPS, including information provided when registering on the NJIPS website, reporting any problem with the site, or requesting content or any other information from the editorial team; and
• corresponding with any member of the NJIPS team by post, telephone, or email.

NJIPS values its relationship with its contributors (all individuals, including authors, interacting with NJIPS) and holds in high regard their personal information. NJIPS deems the protection of their privacy as one of its primary concerns. However, some information is meant for dissemination through publication. This includes, in addition to the short authors’ biographies provided at the time of manuscript submission, the names, email addresses (of the corresponding author), institutional affiliations, and subject specializations of the authors. We may also collect certain information about the contributing authors from any public domain. This applies to the information not provided by the authors themselves but is deemed necessary for the journal. In any such case, the respective author will immediately be notified by the editorial team. The authors reserve the right to object and withdraw from any further correspondence or processing.

Cookie Policy: The NJIPS digital portal collects technical information from the computer or any other device someone uses to access this website. For this purpose, cookies (small text files installed on the device) are used to give the users the best possible experience when visiting the website.

Authors’ rights to access their personal information: NJIPS acknowledges the rights of the authors pertaining to the personal information that the journal holds. These include:

• to obtain access to, and copies of, the personal information that NJIPS holds;
• to get any corrections or updates made to their personal information;
• to get their personal data erased from the NJIPS database;
• to transmit their personal information to another data controller upon their request; and
• to object, on grounds relating to their particular situation, to any of NJIPS's particular processing activities where they feel this has a disproportionate impact on their rights.

Manuscript Processing

Review Process: NJIPS adheres to meticulous methods of reviewing. All journal submissions are internally reviewed (by the editors) for completeness and only then be assessed by an Editor-in-Chief who will decide whether they are suitable for peer review on the basis of Editorial Review Reports.

In order to disseminate quality literature and discourse within Pakistan and abroad, NJIPS pursues a double anonymized peer-review process for each research article received. Every submission is expected to receive a minimum of two external reviews. However, the number of reviews can vary in exceptional circumstances, depending upon the assessment of editors. The selection of peer reviewers is based on many different factors, including but not limited to; expertise, repute, specific recommendations, conflict of interest, promptness, and logical reasoning. Editors will consider the peer-reviewed reports when making a decision but are not bound by the opinions or recommendations therein. A concern (highlighting rejection) raised by a single peer reviewer or the editor may result in the manuscript being rejected. Authors receive peer review reports with the editorial decision on their manuscript.

After receiving the peer review reports, authors are expected to make the changes outlined by the reviewers. The editor then decides how well the author has incorporated the reviews in the revised manuscripts and proceeds accordingly.

NJIPS strongly encourages editors to consider geographical regions and gender when inviting peer reviewers for diverse demographic representation of peer reviewers.

Manuscripts that do not report primary research or secondary analysis of primary research, such as Essays and Book Reviews, may be accepted without peer review. Such manuscripts should be assessed by the editor(s), and if the topic is not in the expertise of the editor(s), such manuscripts should be assessed by at least one independent expert reviewer.

Publication: The time frame for the journal publication process varies. The time taken from submission of a manuscript to acceptance for publication in NJIPS ranges from 2 months to 8 months. Accepted papers go through an average of two revisions. The average time from submission to publication (including revisions) for reviewed manuscripts is 4 months and 8 days. Manuscripts that are not reviewed take an average of 2 months from submission to publication. 

All authors are notified when the pre-print versions of their accepted manuscripts are published on the journal’s website. Each (upcoming) issue of NJIPS is initially published online and is freely accessible. Each journal issue is available in print after two weeks of its online publication. The print copies of the journal are also posted to the authors at the address provided at the time of manuscript submission.

Online First Policy: NJIPS adheres to the online first policy which allows the final version of the papers to be published online prior to their inclusion in a journal's volume and issue. However, if errors are identified after the online publication then errors may be corrected when the article is published in an issue, or in exceptional circumstances by uploading a new version of the article. This policy allows authors and members of NJIPS to access the very latest papers in the field and reduces the processing time between submission and publication. Each OnlineFirst manuscript is citeable using the date of the manuscript's first online posting and the DOI. Once the online first paper is assigned to its final volume, issue, and page numbers, the hosting of the papers shifts from the OnlineFirst listing to that of the completed issue. After that, authors and users will be eligible to cite the papers using both the DOI and the bibliographic data. 

Submission and Article Processing Charges (APC): NJIPS does not charge any fee for manuscript submission or Article Processing.

Further information: For any queries regarding the publication process, the Editorial Team can be reached at all times on the principal email ID given in contact NJIPS.

Misconduct and Malpractice

Plagiarism Policy: NJIPS highly discourages any form of plagiarism and duplicate submissions. Hence, we strongly recommend that our authors thoroughly check the article content before submitting it to us for publication. It is to be noted here that the manuscripts received by NJIPS are subjected to a similarity check using Turnitin, the report of which is also shared with the respective authors.
NJIPS will reject any manuscript in which plagiarism is observed by the editorial team or highlighted by the reviewers at any stage before the publication of the article. Plagiarism reported after the article has been published will result in the retraction of that article with immediate notification to the respective author(s).

Policy on data inaccuracies: The NJIPS shows no tolerance for misconduct such as citation manipulation, data fabrication, or data falsification. Authors are advised to carefully draft the manuscript to avoid any such inaccuracies. The manuscript will be returned to the author(s) for correction if any issue of this sort comes into the knowledge of the editorial team during the publication process. The decision on the acceptance of the manuscript may be subject to change depending upon the extent and gravity of the issue under consideration. Any complaints or allegations received by NJIPS after the publication of the article can result in a corrigendum or retraction once they have been verified; the author(s) will be notified in any case.

Multiple, redundant or concurrent publications: The authors are expected not to publish manuscripts describing essentially the same research in more than one journal or primary publication. The concurrent submission of the same manuscript to more than one journal constitutes unethical publishing behavior and can impact editorial decisions. The author should inform the editorial board — at the time of submission — if the manuscript has already been presented at any platform or has been extracted from any other academic work such as a thesis. Redundant or concurrent submissions can lead to rejection (prior to publication) or retraction (after publication) of the manuscript.

Declaration of Conflicts of Interest

At the time of manuscript submission, the authors are to disclose any conflicts of interest and the role of funding agencies (if any) in the research process. The concealment of any such information (revealed to the editors through other sources) can result in the rejection or retraction of the article.

The editors are also to reveal any potential conflict of interest pertaining to the received submission. The editors having any conflict of interest with the received submission shall not be involved in the editorial decision-making process concerning that submission.

The reviewers should also declare the potential conflicts of interest (if any) when they receive a manuscript for review. The referees, who fail to comply with the policy, may not be considered for peer reviews in the future.

Complaints and Appeals

Policy on Appeals: NJIPS acknowledges the authors’ right to appeal any decision made by the editorial team regarding the acceptance of the manuscript or the action taken on any misconduct reported to the journal. All appeals will be handled with great meticulousness, and the appellant will be notified of the decision maximum within two months.

Policy on Complaints: NJIPS editorial team can be approached at any time for complaints pertaining to any misconduct on the part of the author, reviewer, or editor. The complaints may be sent to the email ID or postal address given in contact NJIPS. The identities of the complainant(s) will be treated as strictly confidential. The complainee(s) will be ensured the right to respond to the complaint(s) or allegation(s) received by the journal.

Resubmission

The authors can resubmit the (revised) manuscripts to NJIPS, the former versions of which have been rejected by the journal with either minor or major changes, or else withdrawn by the authors. However, the authors are requested to declare the (new) submission as a ‘resubmission’ and respond to the (reviewers’ or the editorial team’s) comments received with the decision on the previous version of the manuscript.

Repository and Digital Archiving Policy

In accordance with the Open Access policies, the NJIPS allows authors to use the final published version of an article for self-archiving ‎and/or institutional repository without embargo. When posting, distributing, or reusing articles, ‎the NJIPS should be ‎clearly attributed as the original place of publication, and correct citation ‎details should ‎be provided. In addition, the authors must set a link to the NJIPS homepage or ‎the articles’ DOI.

When making their article publicly available according to the terms of the Open Access Licence (CC BY-‎NC), NJIPS strongly encourages authors to deposit the Version of Record. This will guarantee ‎that the definitive version is readily available to those accessing the article from such repositories ‎and that the article is more likely to be cited correctly.‎

In order to digitally preserve all published scholarly content, NJIPS submits all the metadata of the manuscripts to Open Journal Systems (OJS).  This archiving service is available for all OJS users. In addition, the journal has successfully implemented long-term digital preservation through the PKP Preservation Network (PKP PN) and CLOCKSS, ensuring secure, reliable, and permanent access to its published content.
NJIPS is committed to ensuring that the metadata of the journal is compatible with all the well-known repository services and their digital crawlers may regularly collect it for record and preservation. Also, NJIPS assigns Digital Object Identifiers (DOI) to all its issues and contents to facilitate permanent links on the internet.

Withdrawal

Authors can withdraw the manuscripts submitted to NJIPS without being charged with any withdrawal penalty. It is to note here that the withdrawal request should be placed within seven working days of submission. However, the article cannot be withdrawn — unless inevitable — once it enters the peer-review phase; the editorial board will decide on the withdrawal request. The author may be charged with the withdrawal penalty in these cases.

All withdrawal requests will be accommodated only if received from the corresponding author who is expected to have taken on board the co-authors before submitting. The submission should be considered and treated as ‘withdrawn’ only after receiving official notification of withdrawal from NJIPS. All correspondence in this regard will be made from the principal email ID (editor@njips.nust.edu.pk).

Ethics Statement

NJIPS is a member of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE). We fully adhere to its Code of Conduct and to its Best Practice Guidelines.

NJIPS follows an arduous peer-review process together with strict ethical policies and standards to ensure high-quality standards of scholarly publication. The editors of NJIPS take such publishing ethics issues very seriously and are trained to proceed in such cases with a zero-tolerance policy. In order to provide our readers with a journal of the highest quality, we state the following principles of Publication Ethics. All articles not in accordance with these standards will be removed from publication if malpractice is discovered at any time, even after the publication.

For Publisher

The Centre for International Peace and Stability (CIPS) at the National University of Sciences and Technology (NUST) is not only responsible for providing support (in terms of human as well as financial resources) to the NJIPS but also deems it important to facilitate the NJIPS staff; ensuring best practices and an enabling environment to nurture scholastic growth.

CIPS also considers it one of its essential duties to guarantee editorial independence and provide all necessary support to the editors — warranting a smooth publication process.

For Editors

The NJIPS editorial board is solely responsible for the decisions taken regarding the acceptance/rejection of the manuscripts submitted to the journal.

• The editors are obliged to apply the best of their abilities to uphold the integrity of the journal.
• Transparency and timeliness are the core features of the editorial policies and are to be diligently followed by the editorial team.
• It is the editors’ responsibility to ensure that the articles are sent to suitable and credible reviewers (considering their areas of interest) and that timely reviews are received by the journal.
• In addition to ensuring fairness in reviews, the editors are also expected to assess the (potential) conflicts of interest (disclosed by the authors and reviewers).
• All decisions will be made solely based on the content of the manuscript and completely independent of the (ethnic, racial, religious, political, or socio-economic) background of the authors and their institutional affiliations.
• The rationale behind the editorial decisions shall be communicated to the respective authors, and any appeals against the editorial decisions shall be well-catered.
• The editors are to reveal their potential conflict of interest in relation to any submission received by the journal.
• All information and correspondence related to the submitted manuscripts shall be treated as confidential and shall only be shared with the respective authors and (potential) reviewers. Furthermore, the editors are not to use any (unpublished) data for their personal advantage or research.
• It is the responsibility of the editorial team to cater to the issues pertaining to misconduct on the part of any individual involved in the publication process and respond effectively to such complaints.
• The editorial team is also expected to keep the authors updated regarding the reviewing and publication process.

For Reviewers

• The reviewers are expected to assist the editorial team in decision-making on the acceptance/rejection of any manuscript.
• The reviewers who find themselves unable to review the manuscript in the allocated time should inform the editor ahead of time.
• The reviewers should decline to review the manuscripts that they find unrelated to their research interests or out of the domain of their expertise.
• The manuscripts received for review should be treated as confidential documents, and the information should not be disseminated for any purpose.
• The reviewers are expected to communicate to the editors any ethical issues they (suspect to) find in the articles
• The reviews should be objective, rationalized – supported by evidence, and inherently to improve the quality of the article.
• Also, the reviewers should disclose any conflict of interest upon receiving the request for review.

For Authors

• The authors must ensure that the submission made to NJIPS is an original work and has been produced with objectivity as a primary consideration.
• Any conflict of interest on the part of the author(s) should be disclosed at the time of manuscript submission. In addition, the funding agencies and their influences on research (if any) should clearly be stated.
• Informed consent should be obtained from all research participants, and no such information should be revealed that invades the respondents’ privacy.
• The authors should ensure the use of inclusive language that respects diversity and does not intentionally omit any particular segment of society.
• It is the responsibility of the corresponding author to ensure that all the authors have read and approved the final version of the manuscript and have consented to its submission to NJIPS.
• It is expected that all the authors notified to NJIPS at the time of submission have a consensus over the list and order of the authors.
• The authors are responsible for the content submitted to NJIPS, and all authors (in case of multiple authors) will be held accountable in case of any misconduct.
• Authors are expected to notify the editors in case they find any significant errors in their works, whether during the publication process or post-publication. They should also coordinate with editors if such an issue is reported to them through any other means.
• The manuscripts submitted to NJIPS should not be published elsewhere or under consideration concurrently for publication in any other academic avenue. However, articles building on or extracted from any published presentation, lecture, or academic thesis can be submitted with an appropriate declaration of prior publication in any (aforementioned) form.
• The authors are expected to acknowledge and refer to the appropriate sources of information. Permission should be taken (where applicable) before quoting ideas or words that do not belong to the authors.

Publication Schedule

NUST Journal of International Peace & Stability (NJIPS) is a biannual, peer-reviewed academic journal published twice a year. The journal welcomes manuscript submissions throughout the year and operates on a continuous submission basis.

Accepted manuscripts undergo the journal’s standard peer-review, editorial, and production processes and are scheduled for publication in the next available issue, subject to the completion of all required editorial processes.

NJIPS publishes two issues annually:

Issue 1: January–June
Issue 2: July–December

The journal does not operate on fixed submission deadlines for regular manuscripts. Authors may submit their work at any time during the year, and submissions are processed on a rolling basis.

Publication in a particular issue is subject to successful peer review, editorial acceptance, and completion of the requisite production processes. The journal reserves the right to determine the final issue placement of accepted manuscripts in accordance with its editorial and publication schedule.

Article Processing Charges (APC)

NJIPS does not charge any fee for manuscript submission or Article Processing.