New Agenda Editorial Policies

New Agenda: South African Journal of Social and Economic Policy

JOURNAL POLICIES

Overview

 

New Agenda: South African Journal of Social and Economic Policy is the flagship publication of the Institute for African Alternatives (IFAA), a Cape Town-based think-tank and policy research institute.

 

The journal’s focus encompasses South African, African and international developments in social and economic research and policy. It aims to provide high-quality pertinent information and analysis for stakeholders in government, academia and civil society. 

 

The Publishers

 

The Institute for African Alternatives (IFAA) is dedicated to promoting economic transformation, non-racialism, anti-racism and gender equality, continental solidarity and African self-reliance, and youth participation in political and social discourse. New Agenda aims to bring solid, policy-relevant research to the public in an accessible and intelligible form.

 

New Agenda is published in partnership with the Institute for Social Development (ISD) at the University of the Western Cape (UWC). ISD is a research and post-graduate centre providing teaching and research in development studies, featuring the use of inter-disciplinary conceptual frameworks and methods. ISD has commitments to diversity and inclusion and to building transformational leaders equipped with the skills and knowledge to inform positive change in their communities.

 

ISD provides an academic home for New Agenda, in accordance with a Memorandum of Understanding signed in 2023. The aim is to broaden editorial governance, automate peer review processes and strengthen academic standards in the journal. New Agenda uses this digital platform to track the production process and monitor compliance with the requirements of academic publishing. It also expands readership of the magazine and reaches a younger readership who are familiar with digital publishing. All submissions to New Agenda are processed on the OJS/PKP platform hosted by the UWC Library.

 

The publishers are dedicated to promoting democratic participation in economic, social and political life. 

 

The Mission

 

The Journal's mission is to promote alternative ideas on social, ecological and economic transformation and to challenge inequalities based on race, gender, class, ethnicity and caste, among others, as impediments to a just and democratic society.

 

New Agenda has been in existence for over two decades. New Agenda is a peer-reviewed journal accredited by the South African Department of Higher Education and Training (DHET).

 

What sort of contributions are accepted?

 

New Agenda accepts two types of contributions:

 

Academic articles: 4,000 to 5,000 words that meet academic standards, and fit the scope of the journal. Academic contributions are subject to double blind peer review before the decision is made on whether to publish them or not. These are original articles, research letters, research papers and review articles that have not been published previously.

 

Opinion pieces: 800 to 5,000 words that are commentary or opinion. While they are not subject to the academic peer review process, they all have to satisfy the editorial policy of the journal and all are subject to rigorous selection by the editorial collective.

 

As an accredited journal, academic content has to be peer reviewed in accordance with the criteria required by the SA Department of Higher Education and Training. This does not mean the standard required for inclusion of opinion pieces is ‘lower’ than for peer reviewed academic journals, the selection process is just different.

 

Academic articles i.e. those which are subject to the blind peer review process include:

  • Political and economic analysis
  • Analysis of public policy relevant to transformation
  • Academic research
  • Review articles (longer than book reviews, and meeting academic standards)

 

Non-academic articles i.e. those which are not subject to the blind peer review process, include:

  • Interviews
  • Book reviews
  • Obituaries/tributes
  • Opinion pieces/short articles (800 to 2,000 words) as well as longer articles, usually with a policy inclination, up to 5,000 words
  • Reports on projects, seminars, webinars, workshops hosted by the publishers – the Institute for African Alternatives and the Institute for Social Development as well as others working on social and economic transformation.
  • Conference/workshop speeches (or reports on speeches/lectures, such as the annual Ben Turok Memorial Lecture)
  • Letters, comments on material previously published in New Agenda
  • The Africa Diary
  • The editorial
  • Items reprinted from other journals/websites under an appropriate Creative Commons Attribution license
  • Extracts from published books (with the permission of the publisher)

 

Contributions to the journal must be submitted in English. We welcome opportunities to publish material translated into English from African languages.

 

Publication details

 

The Journal is issued four times a year.

 

Digital copies of the journal are archived on African Journals Online (AJOL) and Sabinet. Some back copies, largely after 2019, are on the IFAA website.

 

History and evolution of New Agenda

 

Prof Ben Turok launched New Agenda in 2000 as a mouthpiece for the Institute for African Alternatives, which he had re-established in South Africa on his return from exile in 1991. Carrying advertising and advertorials, and a bold glossy cover, the journal was sold in bookstores and by subscription.

 

Over time, New Agenda moved away from an early focus on economics to encompass broader issues around social and political transformation. This has included articles on the mounting international crises of climate change, war and internecine conflict, the challenge of international migrancy and xenophobia, and the humanitarian crisis that has resulted.

 

Its record of more than 20 years of consistent publication has been broken only once, during the Covid shut-down. This disruption unfortunately followed immediately after the passing of New Agenda’s founder and long-running editor, Professor Ben Turok. Publication, normally reliably quarterly, was delayed for six months.

 

Since then, New Agenda has evolved in many ways. The journal sees itself as an Africa-wide publication, and covers issues impacting the continent as a whole as well as South Africa’s place within it. This is reflected in the regular Africa Diary column and the incorporation of content analysing crucial developments on the continent such as the African Continental Free Trade Area agreement, the role of China in Africa, the impact of climate change on African countries, and food security in Africa, to cite some examples. This shift in focus was strengthened by a decision in 2023 to constitute a new editorial board comprising academics from universities across Africa and the Global South.

 

From its early years, New Agenda has been an accredited academic journal listed by the South African Department of Higher Education and Training (DHET) New Agenda plays a dual role by publishing contemporary policy debates and opinion pieces, on the one hand, and academic research and analysis on the other. It is committed to providing a platform for activist and academic content.

 

In 2021, DHET asked ASSAf, South Africa’s official national Academy of Science, to set up a panel to undertake a peer review of all scholarly journals. The panel saw many positive features in New Agenda but identified improvements that needed to be made to meet the standards developed by ASSAf for research-led academic publishing. The panel found “that this journal plays a significant role in the policy landscape and should consider creative ways in which it may be able to function by publishing, for example, both empirical research and commentaries.”

 

The ASSAf report, released in 2022, was the starting point for two years of change and renewal in content, editorial procedures and workflow management. In part, the aim was to strengthen the standards of academic content in New Agenda. Since the end of 2024, the peer-reviewed research and academic articles have been clearly distinguished from the commentary and opinion pieces, which remain prominent to maintain IFAA’s commitment as an activist organisation to the building of a just and equal democratic world order.

 

A publishing partnership was established with the Institute for Social Development at the University of the Western Cape (UWC), which provides an academic home for the journal. Journal management went online via the open access journal portal managed by the Scholarly Communication unit of the UWC Main Library. With valued practical help and skills training in OJS software, New Agenda has been published at https://epubs.ac.za/index.php/newagenda since the start of 2024.

 

New Agenda has changed in the face of the digital revolution in media. It is now an electronic publication, with a strong online presence that is reinforced by being available on the Sabinet and African Journals Online (AJOL) websites as well as on IFAA’s own website. 

Editorial Policies

EDITORIAL RESPONSIBILITIES

 

The Editorial Collective comprises an Editor-in-Chief, an Editor, and a Production Editor. The Editor-in-Chief, who is also the Executive Director of the publisher, IFAA, has the final say in editorial decision-making and is ultimately responsible for ensuring the journal’s compliance with South African and international law and alignment with IFAA’s mission statement. The Editor is the first gate keeper and is responsible for deciding which submissions are declined before they reach the Editorial Collective. The Production Editor is responsible for editing, layout, design, and managing the production process.

 

The Editorial Collective, guided by the Editorial Policies, is responsible for deciding which articles submitted to New Agenda will be published. The Collective is constrained by existing legal requirements regarding libel, copyright infringement and plagiarism.

 

The Editorial Collective reserves the right to decide not to publish submitted manuscripts that do not meet relevant standards concerning the content and formal aspects. It also reserves the right to decline articles that are not a good fit for the journal. The Editorial Staff will inform the authors whether the manuscript is accepted for consideration within 30 days from the date of the manuscript’s submission.

 

The Editorial Collective must hold no conflict of interest regarding the articles they consider for publication. If any members of the Editorial Collective have a conflict of interest regarding a submitted manuscript, these members of the Collective will withdraw from the selection of reviewers and all decisions related to the manuscript.

 

The Editorial Collective will evaluate manuscripts for their scientific content free from any racial, gender, sexual, religious, ethnic, or political bias. (Contributions that promote unfair racial, gender, sexual, religious, ethnic, or political discrimination will not meet the selection criteria set by the editorial policies).

 

The Editor and the Editorial Staff must not use unpublished materials disclosed in submitted manuscripts without the express written consent of the authors. The information and ideas presented in submitted manuscripts shall be kept confidential and must not be used for personal gain.

 

Editors and the Editorial Staff shall take all reasonable measures to ensure that the reviewers remain anonymous to the authors before, during and after the evaluation process and the authors remain anonymous to reviewers until the end of the review procedure.

 

AUTHORS’ RESPONSIBILITIES

Authors warrant that their manuscript is their original work, that it has not been published before and is not under consideration for publication elsewhere. Parallel submission of the same manuscript to another journal constitutes misconduct and eliminates the manuscript from consideration by New Agenda. Please note that posting of preprints on preprint servers or repositories before publication is not allowed for academic articles because the anonymity of authors is required by the peer review process.

 

If a manuscript has previously been submitted elsewhere, authors should provide information about the previous reviewing process and its outcome. This provides an opportunity for authors to detail how subsequent revisions have taken previous reviews into account, and why certain reviewer comments were not taken into account. Information about the author's previous reviewing experience is to the author's advantage: it often helps the editors select more appropriate reviewers.

 

If a submitted manuscript is a result of a research project, or has been presented at a conference in the form of an oral presentation (under the same or similar title), detailed information about the project, the conference, etc. shall be provided in Acknowledgements.

 

It is the responsibility of each author to ensure that manuscripts submitted to New Agenda are written with ethical standards in mind. Authors affirm that the manuscript contains no unfounded or unlawful statements and does not violate the rights of third parties. The Publisher will not be held legally responsible should there be any claims for compensation.

Reporting standards

New Agenda is committed to serving the research community by ensuring that all content may be reproduced in other work, referenced in full and with due credit to the original author(s). Submitted manuscripts should contain sufficient detail and references to permit reviewers and, subsequently, readers to verify the claims presented in it. Supplementalmaterial, such as appendices, tables, and audio and video material that is impossible to produce within the article, can be submitted for this purpose. Approved supplemental material for New Agenda articles will be hosted on the OJS platform and linked to the full-text article.

 

Authors are exclusively responsible for the contents of their submissions and must make sure that they have permission from all involved parties to make the content public. Authors are also exclusively responsible for the contents of their data/supplementary files. Authors affirm that data protection regulations, ethical standards, third party copyright and other rights have been respected in the process of collecting, processing and sharing data.

 

Authors wishing to include figures, tables or other materials that have already been published elsewhere are required to obtain permission from the copyright holder(s). Any material received without such evidence will be assumed to originate from the authors.

Authorship

Authors must make sure that only contributors who have significantly contributed to the submission are listed as authors and, conversely, that all contributors who have significantly contributed to the submission are listed as authors. If persons other than authors were involved in important aspects of the research project and the preparation of the manuscript, their contribution should be acknowledged in an endnote or the Acknowledgements section.

 

As a guide, authors should refer to the criteria for authorship that have been developed by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE). In order to be named on the author list one must have:

  • made substantial contributions to the conception or design of the work; or the acquisition, analysis, or interpretation of data for the work; AND
  • contributed to drafting the work, or revising it critically for important intellectual content; AND
  • provided final approval of the version to be published; AND
  • agreed 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; AND
  • agreed to be named on the author list, and approved of the full author list.

 

Each author’s contribution must be detailed on the article submission cover sheet (which is not included in the peer review process). The addition or removal of authors during the editorial process will only be permitted if a justifiable explanation is provided to the editorial team and publisher. Attempts to introduce 'ghost', 'gift' or ‘honorary’ authorship will be treated as cases of misconduct.

Acknowledgment of sources

Authors are required to properly cite sources that have significantly influenced their research and their manuscript. Information received in a private conversation or correspondence with third parties, in reviewing project applications, manuscripts and similar materials, must not be used without the express written consent of the information source.

 

Writers are responsible for the accuracy of their citations and for following “fair use” principles.

 

When citing or making claims based on data, authors should provide the reference to data in the same way as they cite publications.

Plagiarism

Plagiarism, where someone assumes another's ideas, words, or other creative expression as their own, is a clear violation of scientific ethics. Plagiarism may also involve a violation of copyright law, punishable by legal action.

 

Plagiarism includes the following:

  • Word for word, or almost word for word copying, or purposely paraphrasing portions of another author's work without clearly indicating the source or marking the copied fragment (for example, using quotation marks);
  • Copying equations, figures or tables from someone else's paper without properly citing the source and/or without permission from the original author or the copyright holder.

 

Please note that all submissions are thoroughly checked for plagiarism.

 

Any manuscript that shows obvious signs of plagiarism will be declined.

 

If plagiarism is discovered in a paper following publication by the Journal, it will be retracted in accordance with the procedure described below under Retraction Policy.

Conflict of interest

Authors should disclose in their manuscript any financial or other substantive conflict of interest that might have influenced the presented results or their interpretation. If there is no conflict of interest to declare, the following standard statement should be added: ‘No competing interests were disclosed’.

 

A competing interest may be of non-financial or financial nature. Examples of competing interests include (but are not limited to):

  • individuals receiving funding, salary or other forms of payment from an organisation, or holding stocks or shares from a company, that might benefit (or lose) financially from the publication of the findings;
  • individuals or their funding organisation or employer holding (or applying for) related patents;
  • official affiliations and memberships with interest groups relating to the content of the publication;
  • political, religious, or ideological competing interests.

Authors from commercial organisations that sponsor field trials or other research studies should declare these as competing interests on submission. The relationship of each author to such an organisation should be explained in the ‘Competing Interests’ section. Submissions to New Agenda must not contain content advertising any commercial products.

Fundamental errors in published works

When an author discovers a significant error or inaccuracy in their own published work, it is the author’s obligation to promptly notify the journal Editor or publisher and cooperate with the Editor to retract or correct the paper.

 

By submitting a manuscript, the authors agree to abide by New Agenda’s Editorial Policies.

ORCID

The journal asks that all authors submitting a paper register an account with Open Researcher and Contributor ID(ORCID). ORCID numbers for all authors and co-authors should be added to the author data upon registration as a user on the New Agenda online platform and will be published alongside the submitted paper, should it be accepted.

 

ORCID registration provides a unique and persistent digital identifier for the account that enables accurate attribution and improves the discoverability of published papers, ensuring that the correct author receives the correct credit for their work.

Funding information

If a paper is a result of the funded project, authors are required to specify funding sources and any binding conditions listed on their contracts with the funder.

REVIEWERS’ RESPONSIBILITIES

Reviewers are required to provide written, competent and unbiased feedback in a timely manner on the scholarly merits and the scientific value of the manuscript.

 

The reviewers assess manuscripts for compliance with the profile of the journal, the relevance of the investigated topic and applied methods, the originality and scientific relevance of information presented in the manuscript, the presentation style and scholarly apparatus.

 

Reviewers should alert the Editor to any well-founded suspicions or the knowledge of possible violations of ethical standards by the authors. Reviewers should recognise relevant published works that have not been cited by the authors and alert the Editor to substantial similarities between a reviewed manuscript and any manuscript published or under consideration for publication elsewhere, in the event they are aware of such. Reviewers should also alert the Editor to a parallel submission of the same manuscript to another journal, in the event they are aware of such.

 

Reviewers must not have any conflict of interest with respect to the research, the authors and/or the funding sources for the research. If such conflicts exist, the reviewers must report them to the Editor without delay.

 

Any selected reviewer who feels unqualified to review the research reported in a manuscript or knows that its prompt review will be impossible should notify the Editor without delay.

 

Reviews must be conducted objectively. Personal criticism of the author is inappropriate. Reviewers should express their views clearly with supporting arguments.

 

Any manuscripts received for review must be treated as confidential documents. Reviewers must not use unpublished materials disclosed in submitted manuscripts without the express written consent of the authors. The information and ideas presented in submitted manuscripts shall be kept confidential and must not be used for personal gain.

 

Peer Review

Manuscripts submitted for consideration as academic articles are subject to a peer review process. The purpose of peer review is to assist the Editorial Collective in making editorial decisions. Through the editorial communication with the author it may also assist the author in improving the manuscript.

 

Academic contributions are subject to double blind peer review before the decision is made on whether to publish or not. This means that all of the reviewers of a manuscript remain anonymous to the authors before, during and after the evaluation process and the authors remain anonymous to reviewers until the end of the review procedure.

 

Two peer reviewers are sought for the first round of peer reviews. If peer review reports recommend major changes, the Editorial Collective may initiate additional rounds of peer reviews.

 

If no major adjustments are recommended by peer reviewers, the peer review process can take up to 60 days after an article has been accepted for consideration by the Editorial Collective.

 

The choice of reviewers is at the discretion of the Editorial Collective. The reviewers must be knowledgeable about the subject area of the manuscript; they must not be from the authors' own institution and they should not have recent joint publications with any of the authors.

 

These are the guidelines New Agenda sends to scholars who have agreed to undertake a peer review:

 

Thank you for agreeing to peer review an article for New Agenda. [The copy is attached/the access link has been sent to you]. Please keep it fully confidential. If you have a conflict of interest with the author or because of the subject of the article, please let us know, and we will assign another reviewer.

 

We would like to respond to the author [within 40 days / by <date> ] with any changes that are required, so your response within this time would be appreciated.

 

Our peer review process is undertaken to regulate the quality of journal content, and to satisfy the Department of Higher Education and Training, with which New Agenda is accredited.

 

Overall, please can you indicate whether:

  • The article is acceptable without any revision. 
  • The paper is acceptable, but with minor revisions.
  • The paper is acceptable, but requires major revisions.
  • The paper should be rejected/declined.

 

You might find the following questions and answers useful in framing your opinion:

 

What is New Agenda?

New Agenda is a South African Journal of Social and Economic Policy published quarterly by the Institute for African Alternatives (IFAA). It is a unique policy journal with access to top policy-makers and researchers. The journal carries research, opinions and interviews that focus on South African political and economic issues as well as those from the African continent more broadly.

 

What would we like you to look for?

When you review the article, please bear our readership and our values in mind. New Agenda aims to bring solid, policy-relevant research to the public in an accessible and intelligible form. New Agenda’s focus is on values-driven policy research. It wishes to develop public discourse and knowledge on alternative economics. Our readership is wide – not every article will suit every reader but each should satisfy a reasonable percentage of the readership.

 

Given the turbulence in our public life, we aim to uphold integrity as a central theme in all our work. We also believe that social and economic policy should be based on the rights set out in the South African Constitution rather than welfare-driven approaches. New Agenda is firmly committed to nonracialism and equality and will expose injustice wherever it appears, on a non-partisan basis. In promoting a democratic society, we believe that all institutions, private and public, are accountable to all citizens. 

 

What are the basic requirements for authors?

Articles published in New Agenda should be 4,000 to 5,000 words (not including references). Submissions should consistently use Harvard style referencing, as in the referencing examples in the submission guidelines for authors— (surname, date) should appear in the main text. Endnotes may be added if needed. Writers are responsible for the accuracy of their citations and for following “fair use” principles. 

 

In 2025, an addition was made to the submission guidelines on Artificial Intelligence (AI)–Assisted Technology [see below]

 

Please consider the following questions when reviewing an article:

 

  • Is the information new or is it an innovative synthesis of already-known information?
  • Is the articleclear and concise?
  • If the article reports original research is the methodology logical?
  • Are the conclusions supported by the results and discussion?
  • Do you think the article is interesting?
  • You may disagree with the opinions of the author, but are their view well-argued?
  • Does the author have an obvious bias that is affecting the article?
  • Is there any part of the article that you think could/should be improved?
  • Do you have any concerns about the article? (e.g. results too good to be true.)

 

Additional comment on the following would be appreciated:

  • Is the title of the article appropriate?
  • Is the abstract/key points a good summary of the article’s important message?
  • Is the language good enough for publication?
  • Is the article well referenced – does the author cite relevant information sources?
  • Is the article suitably illustrated?

 

Source: INASP 2020 course on Editorial Processes for Journal Editors (seehttps://www.inasp.info/sites/default/files/2018-04/INASP%20-%20Editors%20Toolkit%20-%20DIGITAL.pdf)

 

All of the reviewers of a manuscript act independently and they are not aware of each other’s identities. If the decisions of the two reviewers are not the same (accept/reject), the Editorial Collective may assign additional reviewers.

 

The anonymised comments of reviewers are made available to authors.

 

During the review process, the Editorial Collective may require authors to provide additional information (including raw data) if they are necessary for the evaluation of the scholarly merit of the manuscript. These materials shall be kept confidential and must not be used for personal gain.

 

The editorial team shall ensure reasonable quality control for the reviews. With respect to reviewers whose reviews are convincingly questioned by authors, special attention will be paid to ensure that the reviews are objective and meet high academic standards. If there is any doubt with regard to the objectivity of the reviews or quality of the reviews, additional reviewers will be assigned.

 

Members of the editorial team/editorial board/guest editors are permitted to submit their own papers to the Journal. In cases where an author is associated with the Journal, they will be removed from all editorial tasks for that paper and another member of the team will be assigned responsibility for overseeing peer review.

POST-PUBLICATION DISCUSSIONS

New Agenda encourages post-publication debate either through letters to the editor, or the submission of an article in reply.

ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE (AI)–ASSISTED TECHNOLOGY

At submission, authors must disclose whether they used Artificial Intelligence (AI)– assisted technologies (such as Large Language Models [LLMs], chatbots, or image creators) in the production of submitted work. Authors who use such technology should describe, in both the cover letter and in the appropriate section of the submitted article, how they used it. For example, if AI was used for writing assistance, describe this in an Acknowledgment section at the end. If AI was used for data collection, analysis, or figure generation, authors should describe this use in the methods. Chatbots (such as ChatGPT) should not be listed as authors because they cannot be responsible for the accuracy, integrity, and originality of the work, and these responsibilities are required for authorship. Therefore, humans are responsible for any submitted material that included the use of AI-assisted technologies. Authors should carefully review and edit the result because AI can generate authoritative-sounding output that can be incorrect, incomplete, or biased. AI may give completely incorrect references for “quotations”. Authors should not list AI and AI-assisted technologies as an author or co-author, nor cite AI as an author. Authors should be able to assert that there is no plagiarism in their paper, including in text and images produced by AI. Humans must ensure there is appropriate attribution of all quoted material, including full citations.[2]

 

Editors and reviewers must ensure the confidentiality of the peer review process. Editors must not share information about submitted manuscripts or peer review reports with any tools based on large language models and generative AI. Reviewers must not use any tools based on large language models and generative AI to generate review reports.

 

Procedures for dealing with complaints and appeals

Anyone may inform the editors and/or Editorial Staff at any time of suspected unethical behaviour or any type of misconduct by giving the necessary information/evidence to start an investigation.

INVESTIGATION

  • The Editor-in-Chief will consult with the Editorial Collective on decisions regarding the initiation of an investigation.
  • During an investigation, any evidence should be treated as strictly confidential and only be made available to those strictly involved in investigating.
  • The accused will always be given the chance to respond to any charges made against them.
  • If it is judged at the end of the investigation that misconduct has occurred, then it will be classified as either minor or serious.

MINOR MISCONDUCT

Minor misconduct will be dealt directly with those involved without involving any other parties, e.g.:

  • Communicating to authors/reviewers whenever a minor issue involving misunderstanding or misapplication of academic standards has occurred.
  • A warning letter to an author or reviewer regarding fairly minor misconduct.

MAJOR MISCONDUCT

The Editor-in-Chief will consult with the Editorial Collective, and, when appropriate, further consultation with a small group of experts should make any decision regarding the course of action to be taken using the evidence available. The possible outcomes are as follows (these can be used separately or jointly):

  • Publication of a formal announcement or editorial describing the misconduct.
  • Informing the author's (or reviewer's) head of department or employer of any misconduct by means of a formal letter.
  • The formal, announced retraction of publications from the journal in accordance with the Retraction Policy (see below).
  • A ban on submissions from an individual for a defined period.
  • Referring a case to a professional organisation or legal authority for further investigation and action.

RETRACTION POLICY

The infringement of the legal limitations of the publisher, copyright holder or author(s), the violation of professional ethical codes and research misconduct, such as multiple submissions, duplicate or overlapping publication, bogus claims of authorship, plagiarism, fraudulent use of data and data fabrication, undisclosed use of tools based on large language models and generative AI, honest errors reported by the authors (for example, errors due to the mixing up of samples or use of a scientific tool or equipment that is found subsequently to be faulty), unethical research or any major misconduct require retraction of an article. Occasionally a retraction can be used to correct errors in submission or publication.

 

For any retracted article, the reason for retraction and who is instigating the retraction will be clearly stated in the retraction notice. Standards for dealing with retractions have been developed by library and scholarly bodies, and this practice has been adopted for article retraction by New Agenda. In the electronic version of the original article, a link is made to the retraction note where it is clearly stated that the article has been retracted. The original article is retained unchanged, save for a watermark on the PDF indicating on each page that it is “retracted.”

 

Research data policy

New Agenda encourages authors to share research data required for confirming the results published in the manuscript and/or enhance the published manuscript under the principle ‘as open as possible, as closed as necessary’. We encourage authors to share supporting software applications, high-resolution images, background datasets, sound or video clips, large appendices, data tables and other relevant items that cannot be included in the article, as supplemental material (see above).

 

Exceptions: We recognise that open sharing of data may not always be feasible. Exceptions to open access to research data underlying publications include the following: obligation to protect results, confidentiality obligations, security obligations, the obligation to protect personal data and other legitimate constraints. Where open access is not provided to the data needed to validate the conclusions of a publication that reports original results, authors should make metadata available explaining the research and access rules to the data.

 

ETHICAL AND SECURITY CONSIDERATIONS

If data access is restricted for ethical or security reasons, the manuscript must include:

  • a description of the restrictions on the data;
  • what, if anything, the relevant Institutional Review Board (IRB) or equivalent said about the data sharing; and
  • all necessary information required for a reader or reviewer to apply for access to the data and the conditions under which access will be granted.

Data protection issues

Where human data cannot be effectively de-identified, data must not be shared to protect participant privacy unless the individuals have given explicit written consent that their identifiable data can be made publicly available.

In instances where the data cannot be made available, the manuscript must include:

  • an explanation of the data protection concern;
  • any intermediary data that can be de-identified without compromising anonymity;
  • what, if anything, the relevant Institutional Review Board (IRB) or equivalent said about data sharing; and
  • where applicable, all necessary information required for a reader or peer reviewer to apply for access to the data and the conditions under which access will be granted.

 

Link to research data from a Data Availability Statement within the submitted paper will be made public upon publication.A Data Availability Statement should be added to the submission, prior to the reference list, providing the details of the data availability, including the DOI linking to it. If the data is restricted in any way and/or is not being made available within the journal publication, a statement from the author should be provided to explain why.

 

Consider the following when depositing data related to a publication:

  • Check whether a repository where the data is deposited has a sustainability model.
  • The data must be deposited under an open licence that permits unrestricted access (e.g., CC0, CC-BY). More restrictive licences should only be used if there is a valid reason (e.g., legal).
  • The deposited data must include a version that is in an open, non-proprietary format.
  • The deposited data must have been labelled in such a way that a 3rd party can make sense of it (e.g., sensible column headers, descriptions in a readme text file).
  • Research involving human subjects, human material, or human data, must have been performed in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki. Where applicable, the studies must have been approved by an appropriate Ethics Committee. The identity of the research subject should be anonymised whenever possible. For research involving human subjects, informed consent to participate in the study must be obtained from participants (or their legal guardian).

 

Open Access policy

New Agenda is an Open Access journal. All its content is available free of charge. Users can read, download, copy, distribute, print, search the full text of articles, as well as to establish HTML links to them, without having to seek the consent of the author or publisher.

 

The journal does not charge any fees at submission, reviewing, and production stages.

Copyright and licencing

Authors retain copyright of the published papers and grant to the publisher the non-exclusive right to publish the article, to be cited as its original publisher in case of reuse, and to distribute it in all forms and media. Articles will be distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY NC ND 4.0) licence

 

Authors can enter separate, additional contractual arrangements for non-exclusive distribution of the published paper (e.g. post it to an institutional repository or publish it in a book), with an acknowledgement of its initial publication in New Agenda.

 

METADATA POLICY

The journal metadata are freely accessible to all, and freely reusable by all.

 

Disclaimer

The views expressed in the published works do not express the views of the Editorial Staff or the Publishers. The authors take legal and moral responsibility for the ideas expressed in the articles. The publishers shall have no liability in the event of issuance of any claims for damages. The Publishers will not be held legally responsible should there be any claims for compensation.

 

New Agenda prepared this document setting out its policies by editing a template developed by EIFL, who note that they were inspired by:

 

 

Additional guidance has been drawn from:

 

 

 

  • International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) “Recommendations for the Conduct, Reporting, Editing, and Publication of Scholarly Work in Medical Journals - Updated January 2025” [3]https://www.icmje.org/icmje-recommendations.pdf (accessed 17-Jan-2025)

 

  • Data Citation Synthesis Group: Joint Declaration of Data Citation Principles. Martone M. (ed.) San Diego CA: FORCE11; 2014 https://doi.org/10.25490/a97f-egyk (accessed 30-Jan-2025)

 

  • ANSI/NISO Z39.104-2022, CRediT, Contributor Roles Taxonomy https://www.niso.org/publications/z39104-2022-credit - “system that enables the range and nature of contributions to scholarly published output to be captured in a transparent, consistent, and structured format”. (accessed 30-Jan-2025)

 

Third draft of existing New Agenda policies for posting on OJS, version2_3 dated 23 February 2025.

 

 

 

 

[1] The present (2024/5) policies of New Agenda have been entered here on a template kindly made available by EIFL. The formulation here is preliminary. The content has been edited by IFAA, prior to consultation with partners at ISD. Thereafter, an updated version of the journal policies (without this caveat) will be posted on OJS.

[2] AI guideline adapted from the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) “Recommendations for the Conduct, Reporting, Editing, and Publication of Scholarly Work in Medical Journals - Updated January 2025” https://www.icmje.org/icmje-recommendations.pdf

 

[3] Peer review is the critical assessment of manuscripts submitted to journals by experts who are usually not part of the editorial staff. Because unbiased, independent, critical assessment is an intrinsic part of all scholarly work, including scientific research, peer review is an important extension of the scientific process.

The actual value of peer review is widely debated, but the process facilitates a fair hearing for a manuscript among members of the scientific community. More practically, it helps editors decide which manuscripts are suitable for their journals. Peer review often helps authors and editors improve the quality of reporting.