About the Journal

Focus and Scope

The University of Bologna Law Review is a student-run, open access and double blind peer-review law journal published by the University of Bologna, Department of Legal Studies, and officially sponsored by Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton LLP and the International Chamber of Commerce – Italy.

The main purpose of the journal concerns being a qualified research tool for practitioners, scholars, students, legislators, and others interested in legal studies.

The journal is published twice a year, and each issue is focused on multiple aspects, analyzed with an interdisciplinary approach.

All publications are exclusively in English.

This Journal is currently included in the scientific journals' list (Area 12 / Legal Studies) by the Italian National Agency for the Evaluation of Universities and Research Institutes (ANVUR).

Peer Review Process

All submitted manuscripts undergo a verification of conformity, performed by the Editor-in-Chief, in order to ensure their compatibility with the purposes of the University of Bologna Law Review (hereinafter, UBLR). Those manuscripts that do not match the purposes of the journal or simply do not meet its current editorial needs, understood on a case-by-case basis and in a comparative perspective, are discarded. Although this is an unavoidable step, due to the large number of manuscripts submitted to the UBLR all year round, the Editors try to grant the largest possible number of authors the possibility to access the peer review stage. Indeed, those manuscripts that pass the first phase of the selection are anonymously sent to an external reviewer for formal peer review. The Editor-in-Chief then makes a decision on extending a publication offer based on multiple factors, the feedback of the reviewer being the most relevant one. The decision will then be notified to the authors as soon as it is taken (meaning that the time needed will usually be longer for manuscripts that made it to the peer review stage). All authors will be given an answer, even if negative, and the staff of the UBLR will do their best to keep the authors updated about the status of their manuscript.

Publication Frequency

The University of Bologna Law Review publishes twice a year. The issues remain open according to a continuous update mode throughout the semester.

Editorial Sections

OBITER DICTUM: Not Opened to Submissions / Indexed / Reviewed (EiC and Managing Board, only) 

ARTICLES & ESSAYS: Opened to Submissions / Indexed / Peer-Reviewed

NOTES: Opened to Submissions / Indexed / Peer-Reviewed

CONFERENCE PAPERS: Opened to Submissions / Indexed / Peer-Reviewed

Open Access Policy 

This journal provides immediate open access to its content on the principle that making research freely available to the public supports a greater global exchange of knowledge.

It releases its articles under the terms of Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

This license allows anyone to download, reuse, re-print, modify, distribute and/or copy the contributions. The works must be properly attributed to its author(s). It is not necessary to ask further permissions both to author(s) or journal board, although you are kindly requested to inform the journal for every reuse of the papers.

Authors who publish on this journal maintain the copyrights.

Authors are welcome to post pre-submission versions, the original submitted version of the manuscript (preprint) and the final draft post-refereeing (postprint) on a personal website, a collaborative wiki, departmental website, social media websites, institutional repository or non-commercial subject-based repositories. Self-archiving can happen only upon the acceptance of the submission. Pre-print versions (complied with the Journal's editorial criteria) are released to Authors upon request to the Editorial Office. 

Archiving & Repository Policies

The University of Bologna has an archival arrangement with the National Central Libraries of Florence and Rome within the national project Magazzini Digitali.
http://www.depositolegale.it/editori-aderenti/

The Journal's Repository Policy for auto-archiving is recorded on Sherpa Romeo 

Publication Fees 

The Journal has neither article submission charges (ASCs) nor processing fees (APCs).

Indexing and Abstracting

The Journal is indexed in the following databases and search engines:

  • ACNP – Italian Catalogue of Serials
  • BASE – Bielefield Academic Search Engine
  • Copac – National Academic and Specialist Library Catalogue
  • DOAJ – Directory of Open Access Journals
  • ERIH PLUS – European Reference Index for the Humanities and the Social Sciences
  • ESCI – Web of Science Emerging Sources Citation Index
  • Google Scholar – Academic search engine
  • HeinOnline – Law Journal Library
  • Index to Foreign Legal Periodicals - A subject index to selected law periodicals and essays
  • PLEIADI – Portale per la Letteratura Scientifica
  • ROAD – Directory of Open Access Scholarly Resources
  • Scopus – The largest database of peer-reviewed literature
  • Ulrichsweb – Global Serials Directory
  • Worldcat – The world’s largest library catalog
  • JournalTOCs - The biggest searchable collection of scholarly journal Tables of Contents (TOCs)
  • vLEX - The AI-powered legal research platform with the largest collection of legal and regulatory information in the world

Quality Control and Publication Ethics Code

(v.6/2023)

The University of Bologna Law Review is committed to attaining the highest publication standards. The prevention of publication malpractice is one of the most important responsibilities of the whole Editorial Board. The Code lays out the UBLR policies set in place to ensure the ethical treatment on behalf of all participants in the peer-review and publication process. The Associate, Visiting and Advisory Editors, as well as Reviewers and Authors are encouraged to study these guidelines and address any questions or concerns to the Editorial Office (bolognalawreview@unibo.it).

These guidelines apply to all manuscripts submitted to the Journal and may be revised at any time by the Editor-in-Chief and the Editorial Board.

The following duties are informed by the COPE “Core Practices”.

Preamble

The University of Bologna Law Review (hereinafter, the Journal) is a gold open-access, student-run, peer-reviewed legal journal published by the University of Bologna, Department of Legal Studies.

The Journal aims to promote high-quality legal scholarship (among students, academics and professionals), embracing a scientific role of Law in society, and it encourages a genuine dialogue amongst contemporary legal scholars through an interdisciplinary approach to legal phenomenon.

The Journal works in accordance with article 8 of the UNESCO Declaration on Cultural Diversity, articles 21§1 and 33§1 of the Italian Constitution and articles 1§1,3-5,8 of the University of Bologna Statute.

The University of Bologna Law Review is a non-profit journal.

This Preamble should be considered an integral part of the Code, and it should be used as an interpretative criterion for all the articles below.

 

Part One
Editors

Editorial Board

Duties and Responsibilities

The Editorial Board of the University of Bologna Law Review is comprised of:

  • Editor-in-Chief;
  • Managing Editors;
  • Associate Editors;
  • Visiting Editors;

The whole Editorial Board is responsible for the content of the Journal and strives to ensure the integrity of all published works, through:

- A blind peer-review process, in order to ensure the high quality of all publications;

- A full respect of the academic record;

- A steady and real motivation to improve and reassess the Journal’s standards in the light of new scientific criteria;

- A cogent criticism of work published in the Journal in order to improve a debate amongst scholars.

In order to meet these requirements the Editorial Board:

- ensures that all published article, essays and case notes have been analysed by suitably qualified Reviewers;

- adopts internal processes that encourage accuracy, completeness and clarity of research results;

- discloses all relevant information regarding the Author’s role, research grants or other scholarly work that may be connected to the works published in the Journal to the Readers.

The Editorial Board ensures that the Author’s work:

- will firstly be considered by either the Editor-in-Chief or a member of the Managing Board in order to ensure that it complies with the Journal subjects and aims. Furthermore, the Managing Board ensures that each manuscript submitted to the Journal will be reviewed for its intellectual content without having regard to the Author’s sex, gender, race, religion, citizenship and political beliefs.

- will be evaluated by an independent Reviewer in accordance with the blind peer review process whereby Authors do not know Reviewers and vice versa;

- will be accepted or rejected by the Editor-in-Chief following the Reviewer’s feedback as well as the compatibility with the Journal aims;

- will be managed by the Editorial Board which ensures that, throughout each publishing step, submitted manuscripts are processed in a confidential manner, and that no content will be disclosed to anyone other than the corresponding Author(s), and Reviewers, as appropriate. This will ensure that confidentiality is respected and that the submissions are protected from misuse whilst in peer-review. Both Managing and Associate Editors have a duty to act if they suspect misconduct or if an allegation of misconduct is brought to them. This duty extends to both published and unpublished papers submitted to the University of Bologna Law Review.
Both Managing Editors and Associate Editors must submit a conflict of interest declaration with the submitted manuscript as well as those of the Staff, Authors, Reviewers and Editorial Board members.
Both Managing Editors and Associate Editors have an internal process for handling submissions in accordance with the main Regulation of the Journal, the Open Access aims, the Indexing, Archiving and Abstracting Policies.
Visiting Editors are subject to the same duties and responsibilities as the Associate Editors.

- will be protected by the Italian intellectual property laws and international conventions, as well as the Journal’s individual data protection policy.

Managing Board

Duties and Responsibilities

The Managing Board is comprised of the Editor-in-Chief, the Vice Editor(s)-in-Chief and all Managing Editors.

The Editor-in-Chief and the Managing Editors lead the Journal’s editorial policy; they are supported by the Faculty Advisor and the Editorial Advisor in the day-to-day management.

The Editor-in-Chief, together with Managing Editors, are responsible for the selection and the publication of the articles submitted to the Journal. However, the Editor-in-Chief is the ultimate authority and has responsibility for the Journal. The Editor-in-Chief respects the Journal’s constituents (Readers, Authors, Reviewers, Editorial Staff), and works to ensure the honesty and integrity of the Journal’s contents and continuous qualitative improvement.

The decision of the Editor-in-Chief and the Managing Editors whether or not to accept a paper for publication is mainly based on the relevance and originality of its subject and whether the submission is considered suitable by the qualified external Reviewers. The Editor-in-Chief’s decision may be constrained by the limited space available in each issue, as well as by legal requirements regarding libel, copyright infringement and confirmed plagiarism.

The Editor-in-Chief will ensure that contents are published on a timely basis, following the stated frequency (i.e. 1 issue per semester), the Publication and Section Policies.

The Editor-in-Chief, together with Managing Editors, will take all reasonable steps to ensure the quality of the material published in the Journal in accordance with the OJS Editorial and Publishing Process.

The Editor-in-Chief is responsible for securing timely, independent and anonymous peer-review from suitably qualified Reviewers who possess no competing interests. Both the Editor-in-Chief and the Managing Board are responsible for ensuring that the Journal has access to an adequate number of competent Reviewers.

The Editor-in-chief, together with the Reviewers’ Committee Coordinators, will ensure that appropriate Reviewers are selected for each manuscript submitted to the Journal.

In addition to the Author’s Guidelines, the Editor-in-Chief, together with the Managing Editors, will provide guidance to Authors to encourage the accuracy, completeness and clarity of research reporting, including technical editing and the use of appropriate bibliographical guidelines and checklists.

The Editor-in-Chief, together with Managing Editors, will ensure that the material submitted to the Journal remains confidential while under review. They shall also guarantee that the personal data is kept confidential.

The Editor-in-Chief, together with the Technical Advisor, will take all reasonable steps to guarantee that the published material and its metadata are securely stored and correctly indexed and that all articles are published in open access, freely available to everyone in accordance with the Creative Commons License (CC-BY) and the Open Access aims. Permanent identifiers as DOI guarantee the long-term tracking and preservation of articles.

The Editor-in-Chief, together with Managing Editors, are committed to publishing corrections, clarifications, retractions and apologies, when necessary.

The Editor-in-Chief, together with Managing Editors, must be ready to justify any important deviations from the abovementioned editorial process.

The Editor-in-Chief, together with the Managing Editors, will respond promptly to complaints, and will ensure that there is a way for dissatisfied complainants to take complaints further. Complains and appeals can be sent to the Editorial Office email address (bolognalawreview@unibo.it).

Part Two
Advisors

Duties and Responsibilities

The Advisory Board is the guarantor of the scientific quality and integrity of the Journal. It follows the development and oversees the implementation of the Journal's scientific mission.

The Advisory Board has representative functions aimed at the enhancement of the image of the Journal and at the dissemination of its results achieved, both in Italy and abroad.

Furthermore, it has consultative and directorial functions, through assessing the scientific approach of the editorial policy and by supporting both the Editor-in-Chief and the Managing Board.

Each Advisor can be either an independent and highly qualified scholar in his/her field of research or a leading professional in the legal subjects, or professional fields related to the legal domain. The Editor-in-Chief may appoint an Advisor at any time throughout the year, following a suggestion by the Managing Board.

The role of the Advisor is open-ended and unremunerated; it expires with death, resignation, or is forfeited due to a lack of collaboration with the Editorial Board for one full year.

Part Three
Authors

Duties and Responsibilities

Authors are asked to follow the Author’s Guidelines published by the Journal, therefore ensuring the accuracy, completeness and clarity of research reporting, including technical editing.

Authors are responsible for the articles they submit: they must ensure the originality of their works, and must be aware of the consequences that derive from their misconduct in terms of copyright infringement and plagiarism (direct, indirect and auto-plagiarism). Plagiarism and Self-Plagiarism constitute unethical publishing behaviour and the Journal reserves the right to evaluate issues of plagiarism and redundancy on a case-by-case basis. The Author(s) should not submit concurrent manuscripts (or manuscripts essentially describing the same subject matter) to multiple Journals. The Journal adopts a detection plagiarism policy by means of professional IT software. Each manuscript is checked by the plagiarism detection software before the blind peer-review.

Authors must ensure that any co-author has affirmed the final version of the paper and has agreed on its final publication.

Authors should always acknowledge their sources and provide relevant citation details for all publications that have influenced their work. They will also declare any conflict(s) of interest.

Authors are asked to provide the raw data connected with a paper for the peer-review and should be prepared to retain such data for a reasonable time after publication in order to provide access to such data.

The offer to publish with the Journal shall be formalized through a disclaimer which shall be sent to the Author(s).

Authors who accept the offer to publish with the Journal are understood to have accepted the ethics code.

Authors must respect all post-review deadlines. If an Author cannot respect the deadline, he/she will have to contact the Editorial Office as soon as possible to determine whether a longer time period may be granted to him/her.

Authors must promptly inform the Editorial Office of any obvious error(s) in his or her published paper and cooperate earnestly with the Editor-in-Chief to either correct or retract the paper. If any substantial mistakes occur after the publication, the Journal will immediately inform the Readers through a correction message (lit. Errata Corrige) on its website as well as in the manuscript portfolio.

Part Four
Reviewers

Duties and Responsibilities

Reviewers are recognized academic experts in their field of research: they are selected exclusively on the basis of their academic background by either the Editor-in-Chief or one of the Reviewers’ Committee Coordinators, at any time throughout the year.

Exceptionally, members of the Advisory Board of the Journal or other international academic experts may be involved in the peer-review process if the Editor-in-Chief establishes that an additional ad-hoc Reviewer is required.

For any submitted manuscript, the Reviewer is chosen by the Reviewers’ Committee Coordinators on the basis of its topic and subject, following a substantial proximity criterion.

Reviewers evaluate manuscripts objectively and professionally. They shall avoid personal biases in their comments and final judgment; they express their views clearly with supporting arguments, ultimately providing substantiated and fair reviews.

Reviewers carry out their work with integrity and transparency: to this end, they abstain from reviewing a manuscript if they were involved, under any circumstance, in its drafting.

Reviewers abide by the principle of confidentiality regarding the content of the manuscripts submitted by Authors. They do not discuss the manuscript with anyone other than the Reviewers’ Committee Coordinators, the Editor-in-Chief and the Vice Editor(s)-in-Chief.

Reviewers assist the Editorial Board in the detection of plagiarism and ensure that Authors have acknowledged all bibliographical sources used in the research. All suspect cases of similarity of a manuscript to, as well as its overlap with, an existing publication the Reviewer has personal knowledge of must be immediately brought to the Editor-in-Chief’s notice.

The role of the Reviewer is open-ended and unremunerated; it expires with death, resignation, or is implicitly forfeited due to a lack of collaboration with the Reviewers’ Committee for one full year.

Any complaint relating to the peer-review process is directed to the Editor-in-Chief.

In accordance with the Journal’s blind evaluation policy, the Reviewers’ list is not made public, and may be disclosed to institutional bodies for accreditation purposes only.

Each year the Editor-in-Chief appoints two Reviewers, who will manage and coordinate the Reviewers’ Committee. The role of Reviewers’ Coordinator can be renewed up to five times.

Final Clause

Unless otherwise stated in this Code, the COPE “Core Practices” shall apply in terms of general principles.