Author Guidelines
General requirements to scientific publications
The Journal accepts scientific works complying with the following formal requirements:
- the manuscript corresponds to the Journal scope and the rules of publication ethics;
- the manuscript complies with the MANUSCRIPT TEMPLATE (uploaded as a separate file);
- AUTHOR INFORMATION is submitted (uploaded as a separate file);
- color photos of the author(s) in good quality and formal style are submitted (uploaded as a separate file);
- manuscripts should be submitted electronically, exclusively via the Journal’s official website: https://lawjournal.digital. Please upload your manuscript as a Microsoft Office Word document (*.doc, *.docx and *.rtf formats).
Co-authorship
Articles can be written in co-authorship (up to 3 authors).
International co-authorship is mostly welcome.
At least one author must have Ph.D. or equal academic degree.
Large Language Models (LLMs), such as ChatGPT, do not currently satisfy our authorship criteria. Notably an attribution of authorship carries with it accountability for the work, which cannot be effectively applied to LLMs.
Language of publications
The Journal is bilingual: all manuscripts are published simultaneously in the English and Russian languages.
The Journal’s Editorial Office INDEPENDENTLY and FREE OF CHARGE translates the manuscripts from one language into another.
Requirements to length, structure, citations and references
The Journal publishes the following types of manuscripts: scientific reports (2000 to 4000 words), scientific reviews (2000 to 4000 words), original articles (4000 to 8000 words), and scientific surveys (8000 to 16000 words).
The Journal uses the following manuscript structure: Introduction, Results, and Conclusions.
The “Results” section may be subdivided into up to three levels of subsections, e.g.:
1. Title of the first level
1.1. Title of the second level
1.1.1. Title of the third level
1.1.2. Title of the third level
2. Title of the first level
2.1. Title of the second level
2.1.1. Title of the third level
2.1.2. Title of the third level
The number of authors should not exceed three, and at least one of them should have an academic degree. An exception is the “Young researcher” section, where persons without an academic degree may publish articles.
The title and location of the author’s institution should be given exactly in the form it is formulated in official documents and in the official website of the institution, without indication of its organizational-legal form.
The author’s ORCID is mandatory. The author’s Scopus Author ID, Web of Science ResearcherID, and Google Scholar ID are indicated if available.
The length of the article title should not exceed 15 words.
Abstract of an original study should have the following sections: “Objective”, “Methods”, “Results”, Scientific novelty”, and “Practical significance”. Please note that your abstract should be from 250 to 300 words long. The abstract must not contain citations, special symbols, formulas, etc. All abbreviations must be written in full.
Keywords. Please provide from 5 to 10 key words (word combinations). The key words (word combinations) should be written in one line, separated with commas, without a full stop in the end. The key words (word combinations) with an abstract meaning or terms used in other scientific disciplines should be avoided. It is not allowed to include special symbols, formulas, etc. into the key words (word combinations).
The manuscript should also contain the following sections:
1. Clarification regarding any potential or actual conflicts of interest of the authors. Please note that conflicts of interest do not impede a publication, though failure to disclose one does. In case of the absence of conflict of interests, include a standard phrase: “The authors declare no conflict of interests”
2. A brief list of funding sources for the research (g.a commercial organization, a foundation or government grant, etc.). In case of the absence of sponsorship, include a standard phrase “The research was not sponsored”.
3. Authors’ contributions are described in case the article has more than one author.
4. An optional section stating acknowledgment for any individuals or organizations that assisted in your work.
The references should be organized in APA style. The number of references should be:
- for scientific reports – not less than 10, including not less than 5 from the journals included into the Scopus and Web of Science databases;
- for scientific reviews – not less than 10, including not less than 5 from the journals included into the Scopus and Web of Science databases;
- for original articles – not less than 20, including not less than 10 from the journals included into the Scopus and Web of Science databases;
- for scientific surveys – not less than 40, including not less than 20 from the journals included into the Scopus and Web of Science databases.
Only reviewed sources must be included into the reference list. These include monographs, articles in scientific journals and collections of works. Non-reviewed sources (legal acts, court decisions and indictments, archive sources, newspaper articles, albums, catalogs, reference books, dissertations, abstracts of theses, information from websites, data of sociological polls) are not included into the reference list. They must be cited in footnotes (numbered with Arabic figures throughout the article). Self-citation should constitute not more than 10% of all references. DOI identifier must be given, if the source has it.
