Before starting preparations for the guest-edited issue, the following situations are taken into consideration:

The Relationship Between the Guest Editor and the Chief Editor

• When a special issue will be published, The Chief editor, Assistant Editor and Field Editors determine the guest editor and theme of the issue, by unanimous decision according to the scope of the journal. The case for a special issue can be made by one of the above or by a prospective guest editor.
• The chief editor ought to comprehend and consent to their duties regarding the management and supervision of these special issues, encompassing the necessity of operational groups, assistants, or additional editors.
• Make sure the guest editors have clear instructions for commissioning and editing the special issue's content, that they have read these instructions and have committed to following the journal's rules.The guest editor will be allowed to review the following document:

COPE Council. COPE Guidelines: A Short Guide to Ethical Editing for New Editors. May 2019. https://doi.org/10.24318/cope.2019.1.8 

• The role of guest editors should be well-defined, and they should possess comprehensive knowledge of the journal's culture, peer review process, and publishing model. This information is available on the journal's website under pertinent headings.

Guest Editor's Relationship with the Journal

• Guest Editors should receive comprehensive instructions on the journal's editing procedure for the special issue's content.
• A clause which states that contributions from guest editors and their close colleagues (with close professional or personal relationships) must not exceed a small portion of the content of the guest-edited special issues in order to prevent endogeny and publishing cartels, as well as actual or perceived competing interests should be included in the guidelines. The following guideline should be followed:

 COPE Council. COPE Discussion document: Handling competing interests. January 2016. https://doi.org/10.24318/ElTeSLhp  

• The special issue's guest editor will mainly choose the special issue's content, but the chief editor of the journal will ultimately decide on matters pertaining to scope, conflicting interests, and peer review. Another appropriate editor from the editorial team or staff member should be designated as the point of contact and coordinator for these inquiries if the chief editor has conflicting interests with the special issue or is unable to manage additional guest-edited issues.
• Editorial choices regarding manuscripts authored by guest editors will be decided upon independently from the guest editors.
• The Journal should conduct routine audits of the peer review process for guest-edited special issues. These audits should confirm the number and expertise of reviewers, as well as examine the process length and review report contents.
• The journal should look into any suspicions of ethical violations made by authors, reviewers, editors, or other parties. If editorial office staff or editors spot anomalies in research or publication ethics, it should also be investigated. While the investigation is ongoing, the Journal should halt the peer review and publication process for all content in the special issue. This process is particularly relevant for cases of suspected compromised peer review.

Ethical Responsibilities of Guest Editor

The standard principles and ethics of journals are relevant for the guest editor as well. Guidelines for authors and JATSS editors expressly state the ethical obligations involved. Ethical responsibilities are clearly stated under the relevant tabs on the JATTS’ website and in the author guideline.

Before Submission

Scope

The special issue's content and conformity to the Journal's guidelines should be jointly ensured by the chief editor, the guest editor, and the journal editorial team.

Competing Interests

 The guest editors of the special issue should declare any actual, potential, or perceived conflicts of interest pertaining to the research topic (e.g., patents or pending patent applications, non-disclosure agreements between organizations or companies, publishing fees sponsored by the hiring institution for the special issue, ongoing collaborations or other connections with invited authors), as well as any other pertinent conflicts of interest. The following guideline should be followed:

 COPE Council. COPE Discussion document: Handling competing interests. January 2016. https://doi.org/10.24318/ElTeSLhp  

Financial Conflicts

            The International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (https://b.link/icmje-8) guidelines should be followed if guest-edited special issues are funded by outside sources. The guest editor is in charge of the submissions' content and peer review, regardless of the interests of the outside funder (although the ICMJE produced this guidance, the principles apply to all research disciplines). The journal should keep a close eye on submission requests made in exchange for an article processing fee waiver. The journal's waiver policies should be followed by the incentives, and specifics should be outlined in the guest editor guidelines The following guideline should be followed:

ICMJE. Supplements, Theme Issues, and Special Series. Retrieved June 19, 2024, from https://b.link/icmje-supplements

Promotion

The Journal should pay particular attention to whether a special issue is being used as a tool for self-promotion, or for promotion of a particular product or company, or as an outlet for a group of researchers who have editorial control over the special issue.

Commissioning Content

 Guest editor’s personal or professional ties to authors from whom they commission content may result in a biased selection of articles. Guest editors should be convinced of the need for commissioning content that covers a wider range of perspectives and research in the field. Call for papers for the special issue should be considered. However, it is also important to define the scope and range of the special issue well.

Identity Concerns

The journal editorial team and chief editor should confirm the identity, e-mail address and institutional affiliation of the guest editor before the project is launched. Guest editors in charge of editorial choices ought to have prior editing or at the very least, reviewing academic publications experience.

Workload

The journal editorial team must make it apparent to guest editor how much work they will be expected to do (e.g., specifics of the peer review model, recruitment of editors, decisions on articles, lifespan of the special issue). In JATTS, the editor or field editor of another journal is not allowed to serve as a guest editor. More detailed information about this topic can be found in the following document:

COPE Council. COPE Guidelines: Editorial board participation — English. https://doi.org/10.24318/F3lRGybw

During Peer Review

Special issues are more likely to be the target of certain fraud schemes, and when unethical behavior is noticed or suspected, they usually necessitate deeper inquiries. The more typical forms of fraud (such as plagiarism, salami slicing, data fabrication, and authorship manipulation) can still affect guest-edited special issues, but the following is a list of dubious practices that are more frequently observed there and can have an impact on multiple manuscripts or articles:

Competing interests

 In accordance with standard peer review protocols, editors and reviewers are required to promptly disclose any conflicts of interest—real, potential, apparent, or perceived—with authors. More detailed information about this topic can be found in the following document:

COPE Council. COPE Discussion document: Handling competing interests. January 2016.https://doi.org/10.24318/ElTeSLhp

Self-Citation

A guest editor's own research may be promoted through special issues, and excessive self-citations or persistent requests for authors to cite the editor's publications should be watched out for. Indexing agencies may take note of this unethical behavior and decide to exclude the journal's content from databases as a result.

Citation Cartels

Researcher agreements to cite one another's papers are known as citation cartels. In special issue projects, this practice is more prevalent and ought to be watched out for and avoided.

Peer Review Fraud

Two prevalent forms of peer review fraud to be aware of are reviewers who use fictitious email addresses provided by authors to review their own manuscripts, and peer researcher networks in which researchers evaluate and accept each other's work, frequently using pre-written review reports.

Identity Theft

All parties involved in the peer review process (i.e., authors, reviewers, and editors) may be impacted by the fraudulent use of a researcher's identity. Before the special issue begins, the guest editor's credentials ought to be verified. It is important to verify the reviewers' identities, affiliations, and credentials (including email addresses). Every stated author should be made aware of the submission of their manuscript to the special issue and their consents should be verified.

Paper Mill Manuscripts

Paper mill businesses, which produce manuscripts and submit them to a journal on behalf of academics for a fee in an effort to make publication easier or to sell authorship, frequently target guest-edited special issues. These businesses frequently submit to guest-edited special issues because they think the guest editors will be less likely to catch dishonest behavior or because they have a complicit guest editor. More detailed information about this topic can be found in the following documents:

COPE Council. COPE Flowcharts and infographics —Systematic manipulation of the publication process —English. https://doi.org/10.24318/cope.2019.2.23

COPE & STM. Paper Mills — Research report from COPE & STM — English.

https://doi.org/10.24318/jtbG8IHL

Post-Publication

The chief editor should be aware of and accountable for the content in special issues. The guest editor should also collaborate with the editorial team to assess reader concerns.

For more information, please visit the websites given below.

Forum discussion topics (July 2023) Best practices for guest-edited special issues

Retrieved June 19, 2024, from https://publicationethics.org/resources/forum-discussion-topics/special-issues-guest-editors

Guest-edited special issues best practice, Retrieved June 19, 2024, from https://publicationethics.org/resources/discussion-documents/guest-edited-special issues

Discussion Document: Best Practices For Guest-edited Special issues,

Retrieved June 19, 2024, from https://publicationethics.org/sites/default/files/article-special issues-best-practice.pdf

See JATSS’s Publication Policy and Ethical Oversight

https://iccsor.com/index.php/jatss/ethical