SPECIAL ISSUES AND SYMPOSIA

Moral Philosophy and Politics welcomes the initiative of academics of any level of seniority
to volunteer to be the guest editor of an issue (or of part of an issue). Every paper of our guest-edited issues needs to satisfy the journal’s standards of excellence. Our standard procedure for guest-edited issues is as follows:

 

1) The potential guest editor/s (hereafter: GE) approach/es the journal with a suggested topic. This might, but need not, be at the occasion of a workshop, conference or the like that she is organising or has organised.

 

2) The editors determine whether the topic is in principle suitable for the journal.

 

3) If so, the journal asks the GE to prepare a call for papers (CFP). The deadline for submissions given on the CFP should be at least six months from the date of the CFP's first circulation. It will also be circulated by the journal. This step is crucial: we do not publish ‘closed lists’ of papers; the GE may not restrict who may submit to the proposed special issue, she may also not submit a paper herself. However, of course she is welcome to encourage particular people to submit.

 

4) MOPP does not commit to publishing any or all of the papers that get submitted for the special issue; the submissions undergo our normal double-blind refereeing, with the following two exceptions:

  • The GE may suggest a list of referees. The journal, however, does not commit to using any of referees suggested and is free to approach other referees, and so far has always done so.
  • The GE receives all reports (at least two per submission), anonymously, as well as the submission, also anonymously, and is expected to comment on them. She may, but need not, write a separate report on the paper herself. At the end, she supplies the editor with a recommendation: accept, minor revisions, major revisions, reject & resubmit, or reject. The GE's report need not be communicated to the author if the GE requests that it not be communicated.

5) The final say on which papers will be included in the special issue or symposium is usually reached consensually by the GE and the journal’s editors. If, however, one party (editors or GE) recommends that a paper not be included, the recommendation of the nay-saying party will be decisive. Consequently, a GE will never face the situation of having a piece appear in the special issue/symposium without having assented to its appearance therein.

 

6) Once the final versions of the papers are in, the GE is expected to write a concise introduction to the special issue.


Generally speaking, the submissions should be 3,000-10,000 words long. Special issues would typically contain about five to ten papers. If fewer papers pass the refereeing (but at least three), the journal would publish a symposium instead. Fewer than three papers would simply be published as normal papers, without guest editor.

 

Interested guest editors are invited to get in contact with MOPP.