Notes for Contributors
To submit online, please visit this page after reading the instructions below.
What are we looking for?
We publish illuminating and rigorous contributions to legal scholarship that stand the test of time by illuminating law and its operation. We publish research articles (up to 15000 words including footnotes) and review essays (up to 10000 words including footnotes). Both are refereed. The Journal seeks to publish work that reflects the rich methodological diversity and scholarly integrity of high-quality legal scholarship. Review essays engage with recently published legal scholarship at length and in doing so make a scholarly contribution in their own right.
We also publish double anonymised refereed review essays that engage in an in-depth way with recently published monograph/s or something similar. Proposals for review articles should be sent to the Review Articles Editor, Professor Jennifer Payne [email protected].
As noted above, decisions to publish a submission are based on double-anonymised review where authors do not know who the reviewers are, and reviewers do not know who the authors are. Please do not suggest possible reviewers for your manuscript in your covering letter. Please also avoid posting your paper on SSRN or other widely accessible repositories while the paper is under review. If there are reviewers that are conflicted for some reason, for example they have commented in detail on a previous draft, please list them.
Things we do not publish:
Submissions must not have already been published or be under review elsewhere. Due to the large number of manuscripts we receive, we do not consider revised versions of manuscripts that we have rejected.
Volume of submissions, and the timing of our review process
Each year we receive over 340 submissions and can only publish a small fraction of these in the 4 issues we publish annually. Our review process is a two-step process. At the first stage, there is an editorial review of a paper to see if it falls into the category of what the Journal publishes. If it does fall into that category, it is then sent out for double-anonymised review. The timing of the review process varies, but we ideally hope to have a decision in 3 months. We aim, so far as possible, to give reasons for a decision not to accept a submission.
Author self-archiving/public access policy
For information about this journal's policy, please visit our Author Self-Archiving policy page.
Submission Guidelines
Articles should be submitted electronically via the online submission web site. Please note that the Journal only accepts submissions via the website and cannot consider articles received by any other means.
Manuscripts should not be longer than 15,000 words including footnotes.
As noted above, decisions to publish a submission are based on double-anonymised review (that is, the authors do not know who the reviewers are, and the reviewers do not know who the authors are). Please do not suggest possible reviewers for your manuscript in your covering letter. If there are reviewers that are conflicted for some reason (usually because they have commented in detail on a previous draft) do list them, but this list should be as short as possible (no more than 3 names).
Any editorial or submission queries may be sent to the General Editor, Professor Liz Fisher ([email protected]).
Books for review, and proposals for review articles should be sent to the Review Articles Editor, Professor Jennifer Payne ([email protected]).
Presentation
Articles should be accompanied by an abstract of not more than 150 words.
Copy should be double-spaced. The first paragraph after a heading or a new sub-division should be flush to the margin. Subsequent paragraphs should be indented.
Footnotes should be marked clearly in the text in numeric order after a point of punctuation (...possible to resist..1), and listed at the bottom of each page.
General Style
The OJLS uses the Oxford Standard for Citation of Legal Authorities (OSCOLA). Please refer to OSCOLA for detailed information on citation style.
Headings
The main headings should be centred and numbered 1, 2 and so on; first letters of main words should be in upper case.
The next level headings should be aligned on the left and be lettered A, B, C and so on; first letters of main words should be in upper case.
The next level should be aligned on the left and be numbered (i), (ii), (iii) and so on. Only the first letter of the heading should be in upper case.
Quotations
Quotations within the text are enclosed within single quotation marks, and quotations within quotations are given double quotation marks. If quotations run for three lines or more, they should be separated from the rest of the text, and should not be enclosed within any quotation marks.
Colour
Any figures submitted to the journal in colour can be published in colour online at no cost (unless the author specifically requests that their figures be in black and white online). Authors may choose to publish their figures in colour in the print journal: you will be asked to approve this cost after your article is accepted for publication. Black and white figures will be printed without additional cost, but figures that may be converted from colour to black and white should be well prepared with high contrast, and must have a resolution of at least 300 dots per inch at their final size. Figure captions must be suitably worded to apply to both the print and online versions of the article. If applicable, you will be issued an invoice at the time of publication.
Figure accessibility and alt text
Incorporating alt text (alternative text) when submitting your paper helps to foster inclusivity and accessibility. Good alt text ensures that individuals with visual impairments or those using screen readers can comprehend the content and context of your figures. The aim of alt text is to provide concise and informative descriptions of your figure so that all readers have access to the same level of information and understanding, and that all can engage with and benefit from the visual elements integral to scholarly content. Including alt text demonstrates a commitment to accessibility and enhances the overall impact and reach of your work.
Alt text is applicable to all images, figures, illustrations, and photographs.
Alt text is only accessible via e-reader and so it won’t appear as part of the typeset article.
Detailed guidance on how to draft and submit alt text.
Permissions
In order to reproduce any third-party material in an article, including figures or tables, authors must obtain permission from the copyright holder and comply with any requirements the copyright holder may have pertaining to this reuse.
When seeking to reproduce any kind of third-party material authors should request the following:
- non-exclusive rights to reproduce the material in the specified article and journal;
- electronic rights, preferably for use in any form or medium;
- the right to use the material for the life of the work; and
- world-wide English-language rights.
Further guidelines on clearing permissions.
Authors should also include a statement indicating that permission has been obtained in the relevant legend/footnote and provide the Editorial Office with copies of any relevant paperwork.
A template permissions request letter can be found at the end of the above document.
Third-Party Content in Open Access papers
If you will be publishing your paper under an Open Access licence but it contains material for which you do not have Open Access re-use permissions, please state this clearly by supplying the following credit line alongside the material:
Title of content
Author, Original publication, year of original publication, by permission of [rights holder]
This image/content is not covered by the terms of the Creative Commons licence of this publication. For permission to reuse, please contact the rights holder.
Guide for Preparing Electronic Documents for Submission
Do
Enter text in the style and order of the journal.
Insert figure captions and tables at the end of the file.
Save any tables, diagrams, figures, graphs or illustrations electronically generated as separate files and not embedded into the text file.
Type references in the correct order and style of the journal.
Type unjustified, without hyphenation, except for compound words.
Type headings in the style of the journal.
Use the TAB key once for paragraph indents.
Where possible use Times for the text font and Symbol for Greek and special characters.
Use the word processing formatting features to indicate Italic, Greek, Maths, Superscript and Subscript characters.
Check the final copy of your paper carefully, as any spelling mistakes and errors that are not caught in copyediting will be faithfully translated into the typeset version.
Do Not
Enter carriage returns to obtain spacing between lines, paragraphs, references etc. The space required is generated automatically by the typesetters.
Use double spaces after each sentence within a paragraph.
Availability of Data and Materials
Where ethically feasible, Oxford Journal Of Legal Studies strongly encourages authors to make all data and software code on which the conclusions of the paper rely available to readers. We suggest that data be presented in the main manuscript or additional supporting files, or deposited in a public repository whenever possible. For information on general repositories for all data types, and a list of recommended repositories by subject area, please see Choosing where to archive your data.
Data Citation
Oxford Journal Of Legal Studies supports the Force 11 Data Citation Principles and requires that all publicly available datasets be fully referenced in the reference list with an accession number or unique identifier such as a digital object identifier (DOI). Data citations should include the minimum information recommended by DataCite:
- [dataset]* Authors, Year, Title, Publisher (repository or archive name), Identifier
*The inclusion of the [dataset] tag at the beginning of the citation helps us to correctly identify and tag the citation. This tag will be removed from the citation published in the reference list.
Preprint policy
Authors retain the right to make an Author’s Original Version (preprint) available through various channels, and this does not prevent submission to the journal. For further information see our Online Licensing, Copyright and Permissions policies. If accepted, the authors are required to update the status of any preprint, including your published paper’s DOI, as described on our Author Self-Archiving policy page.
Copyright
Copyright
Upon receipt of accepted manuscripts at Oxford Journals authors will be invited to complete an online copyright licence to publish form.
Please note that by submitting an article for publication you confirm that you are the corresponding/submitting author and that Oxford University Press ("OUP") may retain your email address for the purpose of communicating with you about the article. You agree to notify OUP immediately if your details change. If your article is accepted for publication OUP will contact you using the email address you have used in the registration process. Please note that OUP does not retain copies of rejected articles.
Open Access
Oxford Journal Of Legal Studies offers the option of publishing under either a standard licence or an open access licence. Please note that some funders require open access publication as a condition of funding. If you are unsure whether you are required to publish open access, please do clarify any such requirements with your funder or institution.
Should you wish to publish your article open access, you should select your choice of open access licence in our online system after your article has been accepted for publication. You will need to pay an open access charge to publish under an open access licence.
Details of the open access licences and open access charges.
OUP has a growing number of Read and Publish agreements with institutions and consortia which provide funding for open access publishing. This means authors from participating institutions can publish open access, and the institution may pay the charge. Find out if your institution is participating.
Language Editing
If your first language is not English, you may wish to retain the services of a commercial language editor to ensure that the academic content of your paper is fully understood by journal editors and reviewers. Language editing does not guarantee that your manuscript will be accepted for publication. Further information on this service. Several specialist language editing companies offer similar services and you can also use any of these. Authors are liable for all costs associated with such services.
Crossref Funding Data Registry
We require authors to name their funding sources, or state if there are none, during the submission process. For further information on this process or to find out more about CHORUS, visit the CHORUS initiative.
