Declaration of Ethics

The Journal of East Asian Cultures (in Hungarian: Távol-keleti Tanulmányok), is fully committed to adhere to, represent and spread the highest ethical standards in its operations. In accordance with the Core Practices of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE), and the CSE's Recommendations for Promoting Integrity in Scientific Journal Publications, authors, editors, reviewers and others involved in our procedures must adhere strictly to the principles detailed below and are asked to follow the recommendations of COPE with regard to all their related activities.

Review procedure
Articles submitted to the journal go through a double-blind peer review procedure. Each submitted manuscript is evaluated by two reviewers. Information and messages between authors and reviewers are conveyed by the editors. Reviews are never made public.

ETHICAL PRINCIPLES BASED ON ROLES
Authors

submit articles based on their own research in accordance with the standards of acknowledging and referring to other works, refraining from any form of plagiarism – plagiarism is considered a serious violation of scholarly ethics and is not tolerated;
refer properly to other contributors involved in the research;
submit original manuscripts that have not been piublished in any other publication (digital or printed);
do not submit the same manuscript to any other medium while it is under review at the journal;
only submit manuscripts based on original results and not on reformulation of already published findings; in case of partial overlap, they refer properly to earlier publications;
handle the work of fellow scholars in a fair and professional manner avoiding any kind of personal comments or offensive language;
are responsible for the authenticity and accuracy of data used in their research, including the consequences of using generative AI (for the journal's policies on Generative AI see Author Guidelines: https://ojs.elte.hu/tkt/about/submissions);
communicate financial (or any other kind of) support behind their results (scholarships, research group memberships etc.);
cooperate with editors and accept that their manuscript undergoes a double-blind peer review and other editing procedures of the journal;
inform the editors about any conflict of interest that might affect the fair and anonymous reviewing process in any way;
report any mistake or shortcoming if discovered in their article during the preparations or after publication, enabling editors to publish corrections or retract the article.

Editors

are responsible for adherence to ethical norms, guaranteeing the exclusion of personal, financial, and other non-professional interests from the procedures applied, including avoiding manuscripts submitted to reviewers affiliated with the author's institution;
ensure that manuscripts are evaluated on a fair, professional and equal basis regardless of the race, religion, nationality, gender, seniority, or institutional affiliation of the author(s);
clearly define and publish the criteria of evaluation and the procedures applied by the journal;
are responsible for the quality of the review process, ensuring that submitted manuscripts are judged by qualified reviewers in a double-blind peer review process,
are solely responsible for the acceptance or rejection of a manuscript;
are responsible for ensuring that no conflict of interest affects any procedure of the journal, especially the reviewing process;
guarantee the anonymity of authors and reviewers at all times;
publish corrections or, if necessary, consider retracting an article (especially in cases where authorship is dubious or plagiarism is revealed);
document, investigate and clarify any complaint or controversial situation and ensure that all parties’ views are fairly represented;
strictly adhere to ethical principles of authors in case of submitting manuscripts to the journal; i.e., in such cases other editors shall be involved to ensure anonymity.

Reviewers

are responsible for accepting the request for review only if they possess the required skills and knowledge for properly and objectively judging the manuscript;
communicate to the editor if they are aware of any violation of norms or conflict of interest that would affect the objective and anonymous review process;
prepare their evaluation by agreed deadlines and in a clear and professional format adhering to the procedures of the journal, justifying each element of the evaluation;
prepare an evaluation that contains only professional opinions, and no personal comments, or humiliating or offensive language;
pay special attention to any lack of proper referencing in the manuscript;
handle the manuscript received for review in strict confidentiality.

The Publisher

provides required support for editors and all involved parties to act according to the ethical principles of the journal;
cooperates with authors, editors and reviewers to develop the processes and procedures applied;
guarantees that the standards of free scholarly research are met at all times and that the quality and integrity of the journal is not influenced by any non-professional interest.

SPECIAL CASES
Editorial Submissions and Conflict of Interest in Peer Review
In the case of submissions authored by the Editor-in-Chief, an editor, or a member of the Editorial Board, the double-blind peer review process is executed independently of the author, adhering strictly to the aforementioned principles. The author-editor who submitted the manuscript is excluded from all stages of the review process, including reviewer selection and decision-making. In such instances, the submission is assigned to a guest editor or a senior Editorial Board member to prevent any conflict of interest. The integrity of the double-blind review is preserved, ensuring that the author-editor does not have access to the reviewers’ identities (neither prior to nor following publication) or the internal editorial discourse concerning their manuscript.

Guest Editors
The Editorial Board may invite a Guest Editor to assist in assembling a thematic section of a particular issue, based on their specialised knowledge. In these instances, while the Guest Editor lends their professional expertise to the development of the section, the Editor-in-Chief and the journal’s editors retain exclusive responsibility for upholding the journal’s ethical standards, which encompass the integrity of the double-blind peer review process, impartial decision-making within the Editorial Board, and the avoidance of any conflicts of interest or biases. In such instances, the journal’s ethical standards, without exception, apply to the guest-edited section and the Guest Editor themselves.

HANDLING BREACHES OF ETHICAL PRINCIPLES
In case of an allegation of a breach of the above principles, the issue must be properly documented, thoroughly investigated, and the responsible parties shall be immediately notified, providing a fair opportunity for the person allegedly at fault to present their viewpoint.

In minor cases, the proven fault should be corrected and the person at fault warned to refrain from unethical behaviour. In serious cases, the affected manuscript’s publication should be reconsidered from the first step. Depending on the severity of the fault, legal steps may ensue.
Corrections
As a general principle, a published article is considered immutable. Corrections may only be issued if a substantial error is identified, provided it was made in good faith. If the error arises from the editing or production phase, an Erratum will be published with the author’s consent. If the author(s) are responsible for the error, a Corrigendum will be issued. Both Errata and Corrigenda are subject to the Editor-in-Chief’s discretion and must be associated with the original article.

Retraction
In the rare instance that an article necessitates retraction, such as in cases of plagiarism or copyright violation, the Editor-in-Chief is authorised to render the decision (in accordance with COPE principles). In such instances, a Retraction Notice will be published, detailing the title and authors of the article along with the reason for the retraction, and will be linked to the original article online.

Plagiarism
All instances of suspected or alleged plagiarism are addressed with utmost seriousness in accordance with the journal’s Ethical Principles. The Editor-in-Chief, with editorial support, must investigate any suspicion of plagiarism to ascertain its occurrence, degree, and intent, or, in cases of minor infractions, whether it resulted from a good faith error (extensive plagiarism cannot be deemed as occurring in good faith, as it fundamentally violates the core principles of scholarly ethics).

If plagiarism is minor and unintentional (i.e., a good faith error): for unpublished manuscripts, the author must rectify the error; for published articles, an Erratum is required. This indicates that any level of plagiarism in a published manuscript must be addressed through an Erratum.

In instances of significant and/or intentional plagiarism (irrespective of its extent): for unpublished manuscripts, the author(s)’ institution(s) must be notified of the misconduct, and the author shall be prohibited from future publication in the journal; for published articles, the article must be retracted (as previously outlined) with a statement elucidating the rationale and crediting the original author. The original author and publisher must also be informed. The author(s)’ institution(s) must be apprised of the misconduct, and the author shall be barred from future publication in the journal.

Violating the journal’s policies on using Generative AI
Authors must adhere to the journal’s policies regarding the application of Generative AI in manuscript preparation (refer to Submissions/Author Guidelines: https://ojs.elte.hu/tkt/about/submissions). Authors are hereby notified that any errors arising from the use of Generative AI will be addressed in accordance with the nature of the error, and the involvement of AI in the process does not exempt authors from compliance with any established rules or ethical principles outlined above.

Please be aware that editors can use tools to detect text similarity, such as plagiarism checkers and AI-generated content identification.

No publishing fees
Following a publication policy based on the principle of equity, the Journal of East Asian Cultures does not charge any article processing, submission or publication charges. All articles published in the journal can be accessed free of charge immediately after their publication.