Authors Guidelines

Guidelines for Contributors

In order for manuscripts to be accepted and assessed, they may not currently be under review at other journals nor may they be have been submitted to book publishers. Articles which have been published online or as gray literature may only be submitted in a substantially revised version. Please submit computer files containing one unabridged and one anonymous version of the manuscript to the ZfVP-editors.

Manuscript length and formatting:

The manuscript should be at least 62.000 characters in length and should not exceed 74.400 characters including spaces and footnotes (approx. 20-24 pages in ZfVP print format). This page guideline includes tables, graphs etc., the number of characters should be reduced accordingly. Figures should be submitted in a common computer format. The paper should be 1.5-spaced and the font size should be 12 point. References should be embedded within the text. Please use footnotes for annotations (comments only), do not use endnotes.
The list of references should be included at the end of the manuscript, including all necessary information (see below). Spelling and punctuation should meet common rules.
Emphases should be in italics only. If quotations include emphases, the reference should indicate who emphasized the word/phrase. In numbers greater than 999, please separate every third digit using a period. The percentage sign ‘%‘ should follow the number without a space inbetween. Graphs should be explicitly indicated as such, should be numbered consecutively and their title should be written above the graph as follows: Table 1: Title or Figure 1: Title Please cite the reference below the data. Figures should only be two-dimensional, different bars/lines etc. should be differentiated using varying shades of gray.

Citations and References

References should be embedded within the text by naming the author and year of publication in brackets. The page referred to should follow after the year and a colon „(Name Year: Page)“. For example: (Muller 2000: 25).
Publications by two authors should be cited by joining the authors‘ names with ‚and‘. Three or more authors should be cited by naming the first author only. For example: (Muller and Meier 2002: 16; Muller et al. 2004: 37). When citing several publications by a single author which were published within the same year, please list the year followed by ‚a, b, c‘, whereby the listing should be in consecutive order of the citation within the manuscript. When several references are included in the text, they should be separated by a semicolon. When referring to two texts by the same author, the years of publication should be separated by a colon. For example: (Muller 1999a: 37, 1999b: 87, 91; Schmidt 2001: 127).
Abbreviations such as „op. cit.“ or „ibid.“ should not be used. Instead, the reference should be cited again for the purpose of clarity.

List of References

The list of references at the end of the manuscript should be in alphabetical order according to the authors‘ surnames or, when the same author is cited, in consecutive order according to the year of publication. The authors‘ first name should be spelled out. The list of reference should include all authors of a publication - including their first names - even when more than three authors are concerned.
Referencing style for books with one/more author(s) should be as follows: Surname, first name. Year. Title. Place: Publishing House.
Surname, first name and first name surname. Year. Title. Place: Publishing House. Surname, first name, first name surname and first name surname. Year. Title. Place: Publishing House.
Edited books should include „(eds.)“ between the first name and the year - „(Hrsg.)“ for German publications.
For example:
Landman, Todd. 2000. Issues and Methods in Comparative Politics. An Introduction. London, New York: Routledge.
Chapters in edited books: Surname, first name. Year. Title. In: Surname, first Name (eds.). Title. Place: Publishing House. Page No.-Page No.
For example:
Almond, Gabriel A. 1973. Approaches to Development Causation. In: ibid., Scott C. Flanagan and Robert J. Mundt (eds.). Crisis, Choice, and Change. Historical Studies of Political Development. Boston: Little, Brown and Company. 1-42. Journal articles: Surname, first Name. Year. Title. In: Name of Journal Issue No. (year). Page No.-Page No.
For example:
Lijphart, Arend. 1971. Comparative Politics and Comparative Method. In: American Political Science Review (65). 682-693.
Websites: Surname, first name. Year. Title. URL (date viewed dd.mm.yyyy)
For example:
Freedom House. 2007. UN Democracy Fund: A First Year Analysis.
http://www.freedomhouse.org/template.cfm?page=138&report=46 (15.05.2007).
Newspaper articles: Newspaper title. Title. Day. Month Year. Page No.
When citing weekly newspapers and news magazines, please include the issue number between the title and date. Long newspaper articles which name their author may be cited in the list of references like journal articles.
For example:

Süddeutsche Zeitung. Iran macht Fortschritte. 16./17. Mai 2007. 9.

Data documentation and data access

The data documentation and access should be in accordance with common scientific standards.

Abstract

The paper should contain a German and an English abstract of approx. 800 characters including spaces. German articles should include an English translation of the title of the article.

Anonymization

The anonymous version of the manuscript which is sent to the reviewers, must not contain any indications of the authorship. This also concerns references within the text to publications by the author himself/herself, notes of thanks or similar references in the footnotes, the information given in the list of references or in the name of the file containing the manuscript.

Information about the authors

The following information should be submitted for the list of authors: Name, Title, Organisation, Address, E-mail.

Acceptance of manuscripts

Submitted manuscripts will be reviewed by two experts in a double-blind peer review process. There are four types of decisions:
1) accepted for publication
2) slight changes necessary without submission for peer-review
3) fundamental changes necessary including submission for peer-review
4) rejected
The editorial board decides upon the acceptance of manuscripts in its biannual sessions (in June and in December). The authors will then receive a letter including reasons for the decision of the board and the reviewers‘ statements.

Address

Manuscripts should be submitted to the editorial board of the journal for „Comparative Governance and Politics“ via the editorial board‘s assistant to the following e-mail address: Jenniver.Sehring@FernUni-Hagen.de.