Guide for authors

 
Security and Defence Quarterly accepts manuscripts that are written in English. The journal does not charge publication fees. Manuscripts should be submitted via an electronic submission system according to the formatting rules specified below (you may refer to the template or the guide).

The editors retain a right to reject the submission without review if it fails to meet the following criteria:
  • It is beyond the scope of the journal (for aims and scope see link);
  • It does not offer substantial new knowledge nor added value;
  • It fails to present the global dimension of the discussed issues;
  • It fails to meet the editorial guidelines (see below);
  • It is written in poor English;
  • It contains serious mistakes or faults;
  • It contains poor bibliography: out-of-date, locally-published literature that is not indexed in international databases (such as Scopus, Web of Science, DOAJ). The literature should be up-to-date.

Submission process see here

Manuscripts for Security and Defence Quarterly should be submitted online here. The submitting author, who is generally the corresponding author, is responsible for the manuscript during the submission and peer-review process. The submitting author must ensure that all eligible co-authors have been included in the author list and that they have all read and approved the submitted version of the manuscript. To submit your manuscript, register and log in to the submission website here. A cover letter must be included with each manuscript submission. It should be concise and explain why the content of the paper is significant, placing the findings in the context of existing work and why it fits the scope of the journal. Confirm that neither the manuscript nor any parts of its content are currently under consideration or published in another journal. The names of proposed and excluded reviewers should be provided in the submission system, not in the cover letter.

Article Types
  • Original research, with Introduction, Methods, Results, Discussion, and Conclusion sections. Submissions should be between 4,000 and 6,000 words in length;
  • Review articles, which include a comprehensive summary of research on a certain topic, with Introduction, Methods, Results, and Conclusions. They should be up to 6,000 words in length;
  • Conceptual papers, which do not present original data, but an original concept. They synthesise knowledge from previous work on a particular topic, and present it in a new light to reveal the potential for further research. They should be between 3,000 and 5,000 words in length;
  • Short papers should contain original work with focused and concise research contributions, incremental work, e.g. follow-up extensions or evaluations of existing methods, or exploratory work. They could also be of a conceptual nature. Short papers should also include Introduction, Methods, Results, and Conclusion sections and should be between 2,000 - 3,000 words in length;
  • Book reviews – should set the book in a worldwide context, provide a brief overview of the contents, critically analyse the book’s strengths and weaknesses, show how the book fills a gap in literature, and explain its international importance. Reviews of books written in English are preferred. Book reviews should be up to 3000 words long;
  • Interviews with experts – should be up to 4000 words long;
  • Commentaries are supposed to cover a contemporary issue or highlight important and/or novel conceptual issues, methodological features, results, and conclusions in relation to an article published in the Security and Defence Quarterly. A commentary can also be a comment on a newly published article or it can highlight one or more exciting research articles. Some of the most valuable aspects of a commentary are in the implications the article has for one or more of the following areas: basic science, applied research, or public policy. An abstract, an introduction, pertinent information describing the paper's position, a discussion, a conclusion, and references should be included in your submission. Commentaries should be a maximum of 1000 words and have a maximum of ten references. Typically, they do not contain figures or tables.

Authors’ responsibilities

Security and Defence Quarterly adheres to a strict code of practice to ensure a high standard of ethical behaviour and to deal with malpractice in a timely and responsible manner. The authors’ responsibilities are:
  • All listed authors have made substantial contributions to the research (the conception or design of the work, analysis, interpretation of data; they have drafted the work or substantively revised it);
  • All authors must approve the submitted version of the manuscript;
  • All authors agree to be personally accountable for the author’s own contributions and for ensuring that questions related to the accuracy or integrity of any part of the work, even ones in which the author was not personally involved, are appropriately investigated, resolved, and documented in the literature;
  • All authors are obliged to provide retractions or corrections of mistakes;
  • Authors must declare the source of any financial support that has contributed to the research or to the writing of the paper;
  • Authors must declare as part of the submission process any potential conflicts of interest that might affect the paper or the process of publication. Examples of potential conflicts of interest include but are not limited to financial interests (such as membership, employment, consultancies, stocks/shares ownership, honoraria, grants or other funding, paid expert testimonies and patent-licensing arrangements) and non-financial interests (such as personal or professional relationships, affiliations, personal beliefs);
  • Authors must seriously avoid misconduct in research including plagiarism, citation manipulation, and data falsification/fabrication, among others;
  • It is forbidden to publish the same research in more than one journal;
  • Please ensure that every reference cited in the text is also present in the reference list (and vice versa). Try to cite the main sources instead of later replications (unless replication is the point). The full URL should be given and the date when the reference was last accessed. Any further information, if known (DOI, author names, dates, reference to a source publication, etc.), should also be given;
  • Authors are obliged to participate in the peer review process;
  • One of the authors should be designated as the corresponding author; their e-mail address will be published in the paper;
  • In order to maintain the integrity, transparency and reproducibility of research records, authors must make their research data openly available by publishing the data and files as supplementary information multimedia (such as video or graphics of high resolution) in this journal. Additional data and files can be uploaded as “Supplementary Files” during the manuscript submission process. The supplementary files will also be available to the referees as part of the peer-review process. Authors should ensure the necessary permissions are obtained before using any third party supplementary material;
  • In order to qualify for authorship of a manuscript, the following criteria should be observed:
    • Substantial contributions to the conception or design of the work; or the acquisition, analysis, or interpretation of data for the work; AND
    • Drafting the work or revising it critically for important intellectual content; AND
    • Final approval of the version to be published; AND
    • Agreement 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.

Those who contributed to the work but do not qualify for authorship should be listed in the acknowledgements:
  • Authors must use inclusive language. Inclusive language acknowledges diversity, conveys respect to all people, is sensitive to differences, and promotes equal opportunities. Content should make no assumptions about the beliefs or commitments of any reader; contain nothing which might imply that one individual is superior to another on the grounds of age, gender, race, ethnicity, culture, sexual orientation, disability or health condition; and use inclusive language throughout. Authors should ensure that writing is free from bias, stereotypes, slang, reference to the dominant culture and/or cultural assumptions. We advise seeking gender neutrality by using plural nouns ("clinicians, patients/clients") as default/wherever possible to avoid using "he, she," or "he/she." We recommend avoiding the use of descriptors that refer to personal attributes such as age, gender, race, ethnicity, culture, sexual orientation, disability or health condition unless they are relevant and valid. These guidelines are meant as a point of reference to help identify appropriate language but are by no means exhaustive or definitive.
  • Editors may publish their papers; however, editors shall not be involved in the processing of their own academic work. Submissions authored by editors will be assigned to at least two independent outside reviewers. Decisions will be made by other editorial board members who do not have conflict of interests with the author.

Formatting Rules for the Preparation of Contributions

Abstract:
  • Concise description of the manuscript divided into the following sections:
    • Objectives: Briefly outline the background of the study, specify research objectives, and describe any hypotheses that have been tested;
    • Methods: Present methodology of the study, explain quantitative or qualitative methods, and specify the research instrument;
    • Results: Provide a concise summary of the most important results that have been obtained;
    • Conclusions: Indicate the main conclusions or interpretations. Explain why the study results are significant and give the key take-home message(s).
  • 200-250 words
  • The abstract is published separately by many indexing databases, so it should be complete and it must be able to stand alone.
Keywords:
  • Words that describe the content of the manuscript. They are used for indexing purposes. We recommend that the keywords are specific to the article, yet reasonably common within the subject discipline;
  • 3- 5 words should be provided.
Structure of the manuscript:
  • The introduction provides an adequate background that contextualizes the study within the broader academic field. It identifies the existing knowledge gap that the study aims to address and outlines how the research will close this gap. The objective of the study is clearly defined, detailing the research question and underscoring its relevance to the field.
  • The main body should present the results and discuss their significance. Research papers should provide sufficient methodological details to allow the work to be reproduced. This section must clarify the research procedures, how the study was conducted, the rationale for the sample size, and any tasks completed prior to the final measurement. The results section should be succinct, presenting outcomes both statistically and in the language of the research, with precise p-values, effect sizes, and confidence intervals where relevant. Experimental reports must include corresponding means and standard deviations, and these should be presented clearly, whether within the text or in a table. The findings should be contextualized within the existing body of work, illustrating how they build upon or contribute new knowledge to the field.
  • The conclusions address the purpose of the article stated in the introduction, provide a brief summary of the results and emphasize the broader implications of the findings. The findings and their implications should be discussed in the broadest context possible. Important limitations should also be addressed. Future research directions may also be mentioned.
  • References include only the scientific publications cited in the paper. The references should be up-to-date and complete (preferably indexed in international databases, such as Scopus, Web of Science, DOAJ). Please ensure that every reference cited in the paper is also present in the reference list (and vice versa). Try to cite the main sources instead of later replications (unless replication is the point). The full URL should be given and the date when the reference was last accessed. Any further information, if known (DOI, author names, dates, reference to a source publication, etc.), should also be given.
Funding: All sources of funding of the study should be disclosed. Clearly indicate grants that you have received in support of your research work. Funding information can be entered separately into the submission system by the authors during submission of their manuscript. If you did not receive any funding for this work, please state “The research received no external funding.”
Format:
  • The manuscript should not exceed 40,000 characters;
  • 1 line spacing;
  • Margins 2,5 cm;
  • Font – Times New Roman 12;
  • Justified text;
Page layout:
  • A4 paper size;
  • Margins: upper 2,5 cm, lower 2,5 cm, inner 2.5, outer 2,5 cm;
  • Lists should be made with bullet characters, consistently throughout the text. Dot is preferred;
  • Without page numbering;
  • In-text citation should be in Harvard Taylor & Francis style;
  • Title of article: Times New Roman, 14 point, bold, capitalized, intervals: before – 0 cm, after – 8 cm, centered;
  • Two-line spacing before and after the title;
  • Headings: the font type is Times New Roman, 14 point, bold, not use capitalized, intervals: before – 0 points, after – 8 points, left-aligned;
  • Use Italicized Headings for Subsections;
  • One line spacing before the headings and one-line spacing after the headings in the same style like the title.
Tables, figures, images:
  • Should be numbered;
  • Should be centered;
  • Photographs and images should be sent in *.jpeg format;
  • Files for Figures and Schemes must be provided during submission at a sufficiently high resolution (minimum 1000 pixels width/height, or a resolution of 300 dpi or higher). Common formats are accepted, however, TIFF, JPEG, EPS and PDF are preferred;
  • Title: Times New Roman, 12 point, centered, bold, tables – above, figures and others – under;
  • Source: the font type is Times New Roman, 12 point.
In-text quotation:
  • Quotations should be written in normal font (not italics) and their source should be placed in the in-text citation;
  • If a fragment of a text is omitted inside the quotation, the […] sign should be used.
In-text citation:
  • Harvard 10th edition;
  • Footnotes can be used to give an explanation at the bottom of the page, numbered.
References:
  • Font: Times New Roman 12 point;
  • Should include only the literature that was mentioned in the manuscript;
  • Should be written in alphabetical order; started on the last name of the author;
  • Websites should also be listed;
  • Each entry should contain: full surname and initials of the author, year of publication, full title of the work, in the case of edited volumes, the title and names of editors, publisher, and place of publication;
  • In the case of articles, write the title of the journal in italics, the year of publication , volume, and page numbers;
  • Whenever possible, provide the article's digital object identifier (DOI);
  • We recommend preparing the references with a bibliography software package, such as Mendeley, EndNote, ReferenceManager or Zotero to avoid typing mistakes and duplicated references.

Supplementary materials

In order to maintain the integrity, transparency and reproducibility of research records, authors must make their experimental and research data openly available either by depositing into data repositories or by publishing the data and files as supplementary information in this journal.
Additional data and files can be uploaded as "Supplementary Files" during the manuscript submission process. The supplementary files will also be available to the referees as part of the peer-review process. Any file format is acceptable; however, we recommend that common, non-proprietary formats are used where possible.

Harvard reference style guide (10th edition)

The manuscript should adhere to the Harvard reference style (10th edition) see the template or the guide).

Basic rules:
  • capitalise only the first word in journal and book titles;
  • always cite page number within in-text citation (Johnson, 2013, p. 10)
  • multiple publications with same author and same year: they are distinguished in order of publication using lower-case alphabetical suffix after the years of the publication (2017a, 2017b etc). The same suffix is used to distinguish that reference for the in-text citations.
A reference list gives details of all sources cited in the text under the heading References. Each item listed in the references must have been cited in the paper.

Order of listing/list of references is ordered alphabetically by primary authors’ surname:
  • multiple authors: use of authors' surnames exactly as given in the publication. The primary author is listed first by the publisher;
  • same authors with different years: list the author’s references chronologically, starting with the earliest date;
  • same authors with different year: use an alphabetical suffix (2017a, 2017b).
Books:
  • Single author
    • in-text example: (Brown, 2000);
    • reference list example: Brown, A. (2000) War Studies. New York: Routledge.
  • Two authors
    • in-text example: (Kay and Kay, 2011, p. 23)
    • Reference list example: Kay T. J. and Kay P. (2011) Information Society. New York: Aspen Publishers.
  • Three authors
    • in-text initially: (Coveney, Ganster and King, 2003);
    • in-text thereafter: (Coveney et al., 2003);
    • Reference list example: Conveney, M., Ganster, S. and King, D. (2003) The Strategy Gap: Leveraging Technology to Execute Winning Strategies. Hoboken, H.J.: Wiley.
  • Corporate author
    • in-text initially: (Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, 2002)
    • in-text thereafter (DFAT, 2002)
    • Reference list example: Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (2002) Connecting with Asia’s Tech Future. Canberra: Analytical Unit, Commonwealth Government.
  • Chapter: single author
    • in-text example: (Howard, 1998)
    • Reference list example: Howard, S. (1998) ‘Verbal Protocol Analysis’, in Hederson-Sellers, B., Simons, A. and Younessi, H. (eds) The Open Process Specification. Sydney: Addison Wesley, pp. 272-274.
Journals:
  • Single author
    • in-text example: (Hammer, 1990);
    • Reference list example: Hammer, M. (1990) ‘Reenergineering work: Don’t automate, obliterate’, Harvard Business Review, 14(4), pp. 104-112. doi: 00.1010/0000.000.
  • Two authors
    • in-text example: (Mearsheimer and Walt, 2003);
    • Reference list example: Mearsheimer, J.J. and Walt, S.M. (2013) ‘Leaving theory behind: Why simplistic hypothesis testing is bad for International Relations’, European Journal of International Relations, 19(3), pp. 427–457. doi: 00.1010/0000.000.
  • Published Conferences, seminars and meetings
    • in-text example: (Eidenberger et al., 2002);
    • Reference list example: Eidenberger, H., Breitenender, C. and Hitz, M. (2002) ‘A Frameworks for Visual Information Retrieval’, in Chang, S-K., Chen, Z., Lee S-Y. (eds) Recent advances in visual information systems: 5th International conference, VISUAL 2002 proceedings. Taiwan: Hsin Chu, pp. 105-116.
Newspaper
  • Print unattributed
    • in-text example: (The New York Times, 1994, p. 8);
    • Reference list example: The New York Times (1994) ‘UNSW gains top ranking from quality team’, 6 July, p. 21. Available at: http://WebsiteURL (Accessed: 11 June 2014).
  • Print attributed
    • in-text example: (Barker, 2004);
    • reference list example: Barker, G. (2004) ‘54m USD Deal To Heat Up Broadband War’, The Age, Business, 6 July, p. 2. Available at: http://WebsiteURL (Accessed: 11 June 2014).
World Wide Web (document on the WWW – author/sponsor given but not dated)
  • in-text example: According to Greenpeace (no date, p. 189) recommends that …
  • Reference list example: Greenpeace no date. The future is GE free. Available at: http://WebsiteURL (Accessed: 11 June 2014).
E-journal: single author
  • in-text example: (Lenoir, 2003)
  • Reference list example: Lenoir, L. (2003) ‘Response of the foraging behaviour of red wood ants to enclusion from trees’, Agricultural and Forest Entomology, 5(3), pp. 183-189. Available at: http://WebsiteURL (Accessed: 11 June 2014).
Normative Acts
Example:

 
eISSN:2544-994X
ISSN:2300-8741
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