Policies & Ethics

The UCR is published under the Creative Commons copyright, category CC BY-NC-ND. Under this category, authors retain the copyright and full publishing rights (to copy and distribute, in any medium or format for non-commercial purposes) as long as the articles remain unchanged, with due acknowledgement and correct citation.

The issues and articles in the University of Colombo Review (Series III) are open access immediately after they are published online. There is no subscription fee and prior registration required. The articles are covered by the Creative Commons copyright category CC BY-NC-ND. Under this category re-users can copy and distribute the articles as long as they remain unchanged, in any medium or format for non-commercial purposes and with due acknowledgement and correct citation.

The UCR (Series III) believes that such open access promotes widespread dissemination of knowledge and global exchange, which in turn can be made use of to build better societies. By doing so it also contributes to fulfilling the University’s obligation towards this goal.

The Editorial Board will call for papers periodically. While the journal typically publishes articles of any discipline, it will also host a thematic issue at times. The Journal will accept submissions from authors both within and outside the University of Colombo, within and outside academia, and within and outside Sri Lanka.

All articles published in the UCR apart from editorials, the symposium section, editorial comments, letters to the Editors and keynote addresses will be subject to peer-review. The Editors will examine submitted articles for academic rigor, appropriacy for a general scholarly audience, and in the event of a thematic issue, relevance to the theme. Submissions will go through a desk review, and if considered suitable for review, undergo double-anonymized peer-review. On review, the Editors will ask authors to rework their articles to make them more suitable for publication. Authors of articles which are not shortlisted for review will be informed of the general reasons for non-acceptance.

Articles suitable for peer review will be sent to two reviewers identified by the Editorial Board. The reviewers will be selected on the basis of their expertise relating to each article, and as far as possible one reviewer will be from the University of Colombo and the other from outside. The reviewers will be provided with a standard set of instructions for writing their peer review so that there is minimum variability in the approach of each reviewer. The peer review process will be double-anonymized. All peer reviews will be sent to authors as feedback.

Each reviewer will be asked to provide one of three decisions regarding an article: Accepted with minor revisions, accept with major revisions, or reject. An article that is rejected by both reviewers will not be chosen for publication and the corresponding author(s)will be informed of this decision. An article that requires revision will be sent back to the corresponding author(s), with suggested revisions and a deadline. Revised resubmissions will be checked by the Editors in relation to the reviewers’ initial review comments. If required, further revisions may be requested by the reviewers or Editors. Revised articles may also be rejected during the re-review process if reviewers or editors have concerns that are not addressed. The final decision on acceptance or rejection rests with the Editors.

The authors will be responsible for the accuracy of the information provided in their articles and for the rigor and objectivity of their arguments. They will be responsible for safeguarding ethical standards in relation to their work, including academic integrity and honesty, relevant ethics clearance and approval, institutional permission and regulatory approval for any original research. The authors should also declare any relevant conflict of interest. They should appropriately cite the work of others where relevant. The UCR reserves the right to check all submissions submitted to them for plagiarism with the assistance of appropriate software. Authors are encouraged to provide access to their data, where ethically and practically possible, as supplementary material. This can be done by storing the data in a data repository or research repository such as GitHub, ResearchGate or even Google applications.

Submitted articles must not be under consideration by any other publisher/s. Authors must attest to this at the time of submission in a cover email.
It is also the author’s responsibility to disclose any potential conflict of interest regarding the submitted manuscript. You can read definitions and some examples of conflict of interest here. Funding sources and research grants should be properly acknowledged and should include a statement whether such funding could lead to potential conflict of interest.
When reporting research grants and funding sources, please include the following information: name of research grant, institution grant/research funds were received from, year of receipt.