Please read carefully the Guidelines for authors to successfully edit your manuscript. You can also download the Article sample and use it to edit your paper. Sign the Affirmation of originality and authorship statement (all authors must fill out and sign the statement) and send it along with the submitted manuscript.

General information about editorial procedure. Authors have to make sure that they write their manuscripts at an advanced English language level and the specific scientific terms are correctly used. All manuscripts submitted to JSSP will go through a double blind peer-review process. All reviewers are writing a thorough review report in which they follow the guidelines of the editorial board on relevant and exigent content-related and formatting aspects established in accordance with the internationally acknowledged editorial policies. See more about COPE and PERK. Authors will receive a notification about the manuscript within 4-8 weeks of submission, in which recommendations for adjustments are suggested. Also, when submitting a manuscript all of the authors should suggest the names of two possible reviewers in the same scientific field (name and surname, scientific title, affiliation, e-mail).

Authorship Conditions

1). Meet the standards set by the editors and editorial policy.
2). Submit original research and/or review articles.
3). Bring a significant scientific contribution in the field.
4). Not reproduce the same idea in other journals.
5). Cite all the scientific resources/references and declare the source of data.
6). Acknowledge the involvement of co-author(s) who contributed to the completion of the manuscript (design, data processing, a. o.).
7). Assign the corresponding author. The corresponding author must be assigned when submitting a manuscript. They are the contact persons for both the editorial board and other scholars interested in their research results. The corresponding author should take full responsibility and acts on behalf of all authors of the article.
8). Acknowledge any financial support they benefitted from, if the case.
9). Declare any fundamental errors, even noticed later.
10). Sign the Affirmation of Originality and Authorship Statement (all authors must fill out and sign the statement according to which they brought their original contribution to the scientific concept and final editing of the manuscript, they take full responsibility for the scientific content of their work and they agree with the publication of the final version of the manuscript) and send it to the editorial board in due time.
11). In case of conflict of interest authors should contact the editorial board as soon as possible.

Final guidelines. In order for your manuscript to be considered for publication in our journal it is mandatory not to be submitted to another journal, or previously published elsewhere, even though in another language. The content of the articles included in our journal may not necessary express our editors’ opinion, therefore authors are responsible for the scientific content of their papers. Every author that submits an article for publication in Journal of Settlements and Spatial Planning must fill out the authorship statement in accordance with the journal’s policy and guidelines on publishing ethics published by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) and Elsevier’s Ethics in Research and Publishing (Publishing Ethics Resource Kit). After you sign it, please scan the form and send it together with your submitted paper by e-mail to the editorial team at:  jssp_ubbcluj@yahoo.com or jssp.ubbcluj@gmail.com.

Editorial Policies and Expectation of Ethical Conduct. The mission of the Journal of Settlements and Spatial Planning is to promote excellency in theoretical and applied geography. The editorial board of JSSP complies with the Code of Conduct and Best Practice Guidelines promoted by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) and Ethics in Research and Publishing published by Elsevier.

Ethical conduct and misconduct. Publication and research ethics. Manuscripts submitted for publication in JSSP should follow the guidelines of writing scientific articles promoted by the Babeș-Bolyai University and in accordance with the international standards regarding the editing of scientific papers promoted by Committee on Publication Ethics. We expect high level of research and ethical behaviour from both our reviewers and authors.

Policy against malpractice. Plagiarism. JSSP promotes valuable scientific contribution and does not accept any form of plagiarism on behalf of the authors. In case authors submit a manuscript and it is found plagiarized by the editorial board or the reviewers, those manuscripts are rejected from publication. The respective authors are subject of subsequent rigorous screening for any other manuscripts they submit later on.

More about plagiarism

Since scientific misconduct can take many shapes and forms experts in Ethics in research and publication (Elsevier) have developed a set of tools, an ethical toolkit meant to support editors, authors and reviewers in their activity of publishing in order to avoid misconduct of any form and comply with research ethics.

One of the most common types of publication misconduct is plagiarism–when one author deliberately uses another’s work without permission, credit, or acknowledgment. Plagiarism takes different forms, from literal copying to paraphrasing some else’s work and can include: data, words and phrases, ideas and concepts. (Publishing Ethics Resource Kit, Committee on Publishing Ethics).

Anti-plagiarism procedure applied for the manuscripts submitted to be considered for publication in the Journal of Settlements and Spatial Planning (JSSP). In accordance with the Decision CA 82/4.01.2022, the annexes thereof and the Senate Decision no. 119/23.09.2021, as well as with the Decision CA UBB 15823/14.11.2022, this document describes the procedure whereby members of the Editorial Board of the Journal of Settlements and Spatial Planning perform a thorough similarity analysis on the manuscripts submitted for publication. This procedure also establishes a set of rules and terms of use for the specialized text analysis software in order to prevent and avoid plagiarism. More details here.

Copyright policy. The copyright shall be retained by the authors. However, the journal is to be recognized as the first publisher of the article.

Originality and Authorship statement. Every author that submits an article for publication in Journal of Settlements and Spatial Planning should fill out the author statement in accordance with the journal’s policy and guidelines on publishing ethics published by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) and Elsevier’s Ethics in Research and Publishing (Publishing Ethics Resource Kit).
You can download the standard form here. Every author listed in the list of authors must fill it out and sign it. After you sign it, please scan the form and send it together with your submitted paper by e-mail to the editorial team.

Conflicts of interest. Transparency and objectivity are essential in scientific research and the peer review process. (Elsevier Publishing Ethics Resource Kit). In case of conflict of interest please contact the editorial board.

Financial disclosure.  Authors must acknowledge any financial support they benefitted from in the acknowledgements section of the article, if the case. Please contact the editorial board for any other special circumstances.