Submissions

Author Guidelines

This submission policy is intended to better inform individuals seeking to contribute towards the publications of the St Andrews Law Journal (the ‘Journal’). The submission policy thus covers all articles of work – primarily ‘abstracts’, and ‘final papers’ – submitted by students of the University of St Andrews, special guest contributors, and other academics or individuals with particular association and/or interest to furthering the Journal’s corpus of works (of which contact/prior arrangement with the Managing Editors is expected).

(1) Notice of Compilation

1.1 The editorial staff (the ‘editors’ or ‘Editorial Board’) are committed to ensuring everyone interested in contributing to the St Andrews Law Journal are offered time to consider submitting works towards the relevant publication- issue. This shall usually be instigated through a ‘Call to Abstracts’ announcement made on the Journal’s relevant social media. Further notices of compilation shall be distributed for reasons including attracting Guest or External contributions. Once the ‘Call to Abstracts’ period has concluded, the editors shall process and send appropriate feedback to the authors of all submitted abstracts – feedback may include or be limited to your abstract being rejected by the editorial staff of the Journal. Further information on the review process of the Journal and its editorial staff may be found on our website in the blog post Review Policy.

(2) Unsuccessful submissions

2.1 If an article of work submitted to the Journal is unsuccessful, editorial staff are obligated to contact the author of the unsuccessful work once the relevant stage in the publication issue’s compilation has concluded. All direct communication between prospective contributors and editorial staff is managed by the Managing Editors – who do not participate in the Editorial Peer-Review Process (see Review Policy)

2.2 Additionally, the editors of the Law Journal may ask you to revisit or amend your work to be more in-line with the academic standards the Journal shares with its Publisher. The aforementioned is not a guarantee that your abstract can proceed to a full written contribution – the editors instead offer advice and guidance on refining your ideas to be more in-line with the Journal’s legal focus immediately after the conclusion of the relevant submission period.

2.3 Alternatively – or subsequently – the Managing Editors may ask you to resubmit your abstract submission during the next ‘Call to Abstracts’ period in the following semester. The editors shall provide advice and guidance on developing and progressing your abstract for the duration, however, the acceptance of abstracts is contingent on the successful submission, meeting of prerequisites, and creative scrutiny through our review process, during each semesterly submission period, independently.

2.4 The Editorial Board reserves the right to deem ‘unsuccessful’ or otherwise disqualify a paper from being included in the ultimate compilation of the relevant publication-issue should it fail to:

• Meet the prerequisites of Section (3.3)
• The authors of the relevant work fail to complete guided amendments and sufficient changes within a timely or otherwise advised deadline period following receival of feedback on their papers. The editors will make every effort to aid contributors through this process, however if they are not assured that a paper shall be in presentable order prior to the scheduled release-date of the relevant publication-issue, then they shall make every effort to contact and make alternative arrangements with the contributor, including – in the same sense – those applicable for abstracts in Section (2.3).

(3) Prerequisites

3.1 In order for an abstract to be accepted, all authors must meet the following requirements:

• Assert that investigative papers shall relate to a standardised system of law in the British Isles, preferably English but Scots is also welcomed, included or referenced in their study in contradicting or comparative form to other legal systems (such as US Constitutional Law or European Continental Law) discussed.
• The Abstract should use font ‘Georgia Pro‘ with font size 11(in-body); 9 (footnotes).
• Spacing of 1.5 (in-body); and 1 (footnotes) with Text Alignment as Justify/Centre.
• Word Count: the Journal shall not accept abstracts longer than 350 words.
• If you wish to add extended references, please format them as footnotes to the standard of ‘Chicago: Notes and Bibliography’, for a full breakdown of how to reference in this style, please see the university’s referencing styles guidelines.
• Additional stylistic guidelines are outlined on our website in the Journal blog-post titled Articulating the Abstract.

3.2 In reference to Section (2.3):

• Prospective contributors may resubmit their abstract during the next ‘Call to Abstracts’ phase as previously invited to do so.
• Each abstract will be processed according to the rules of our Review Policy, ensuring that fair and competent decisions are made without bias.

3.3 Authors of all papers must complete the following for their work to be progressed passed confirmation of their allocation to the relevant publication-issue:

• Prospective contributors (authors) must complete the document ‘License to Publish Agreement’ – completion provides the St Andrews Law Journal with the permission to publish and distribute work on behalf of the author(s) (who retain ownership of and responsibility for the contents of their submitted work). It is distributed to prospective contributors with ‘successful’ submissions, via email along with our ‘Journal Template’ and ‘Take Down Policy’ documents.
• All papers – and, depending on the amount of referencing, abstracts – must include a Bibliography section; and must meet the additional formatting requirements outlined in the Journal blog-post, found on our website, titled Contributing to the Journal.
• All papers must relate to a standardised system of law in the British Isles, preferably English but Scots is also welcomed, included or referenced in their study in contradicting or comparative form to other legal systems (such as US Constitutional Law or European Continental Law) discussed.

3.4 In addition to the above:

• If a prospective contributor submits an article of work to another publication and submits the same to the St Andrews Law Journal for consideration during a submission period, ie. Call to Abstracts, or independently, ie. external or Guest Contributions, then the Journal cannot accept the material for consideration or publication. We would classify such as ‘prohibited material’ to the extent that its inclusion would undermine the academic standards of the Journal, and our Publisher the Institute of Legal and Constitutional Research. These terms also apply to articles of work that have been previously submitted as academic pieces of work at university level (including Dissertations and Thesis papers).

For Further information on your rights when interacting with the Journal, on our various communication platforms, please consult our Privacy Policy on our website.

For any inquiries or questions on the above policy, please contact the editors via email at lawjournal@st-andrews.ac.uk