The editorial board of Democratic Governance acts in line with the COPE principles to protect the integrity of the scientific record. We place strong emphasis on originality checks and on preventing plagiarism, duplicate submissions, citation manipulation, or falsification of research results.
An article may be retracted when serious violations are proven. Grounds for retraction include plagiarism, fraudulent authorship, fabricated data, redundant or duplicate publication, compromised peer review, or evidence of unethical research. Retraction notices are published under the title “Retraction: [Article Title]”, assigned a DOI, and linked to the original paper, which remains in the archive but clearly marked as retracted. Removal from the archive occurs only in rare cases dictated by legal obligations.
When an error is discovered, different measures may apply depending on the source:
All corrections are approved by the editorial board and appear as separate documents with a DOI.
Whenever misconduct or fraud is suspected, the editorial team investigates in accordance with COPE guidelines. Authors are contacted to respond, and external experts may be consulted. Depending on the outcome, actions can include correction, expression of concern, or retraction.
Authors are expected to submit only original manuscripts. Multiple or simultaneous submissions to different journals, as well as resubmission of substantially similar work, are treated as ethical breaches and may result in rejection or sanctions. Likewise, citation practices intended solely to artificially inflate reference counts are unacceptable.
The use of falsified or fabricated data – including manipulated images – is strictly prohibited. Detection of such practices leads to rejection at submission or retraction after publication.
Before publication, authors may request withdrawal of a manuscript by submitting a signed letter from all co-authors explaining the reasons. In such cases, the manuscript is removed from the publisher’s system, though copyright remains with the authors.
The editorial board ensures that all corrections, expressions of concern, and retractions are processed without unnecessary delay. If consensus with the authors cannot be reached, the board reserves the right to act independently to preserve the reliability of the scientific record.
Democratic Governance publishes only original works that have not appeared elsewhere. To ensure academic integrity, all submitted manuscripts are screened using plagiarism detection software iThenticate. Plagiarism is regarded as a serious breach of professional ethics that undermines trust between authors, reviewers, editors, publishers and readers, and directly contradicts the journal’s principles of publication ethics.
The editorial board carefully analyses all cases flagged by the software. Based on the originality percentage, manuscripts are processed as follows: if the text demonstrates more than 85% originality, it is accepted for consideration; results between 75-85% require the author to check and correct citations and references; manuscripts with less than 75% originality are not considered for review. Reports generated by the software are evaluated individually by the editorial team, which may also take context into account.
After publication, if plagiarism or excessive text borrowing is detected, the editorial board investigates the case in detail. Authors are informed of the findings, and if a violation of ethical standards is confirmed, the article may be subject to retraction. To safeguard proper citation practices, no more than 3% similarity from a single source is permitted.