Copyright Policy

Authorship

Each author should make substantial contributions to the conception or design of the article, including but not limited to the acquisition, analysis or interpretation of data, writing a manuscript or making substantive revisions to the manuscript. All authors need to review the final version of the manuscript before submission and should also comment on the final approval of the forthcoming version of the article.

Individuals who do not meet the above requirements but have made valuable contributions to the article can be listed in the Acknowledgments of the manuscript.

The author contributions should be stated in the cover letter or the article when submitting the manuscript.

Artificial Intelligence in Writing

The use of artificial intelligence (AI) tools such as ChatGPT or large scale language models in research publications is expanding rapidly with the rapid development of AI technology. The Environmental Ethics & Law will continue to adapt and refine its policy on the use of AI tools in writing. According to COPE position statement on the response to AI tools:

  • AI tools can not be listed as authors or co-authors of papers. Because they cannot be held responsible for the submissions and do not have the ability to manage copyright and licensing agreements.
  • Authors who use AI tools in their submissions (including but not limited to: during the writing of the article or when collecting and analysing data) must be transparent in disclosing in the Methods or acknowledgements section of the paper how the AI tool was used and which tool was used.
  • Authors are fully responsible for the content of their manuscript, including but not limited to: sections produced by an AI tool or data analysed using AI tools in the research process.
  • The editors of the Environmental Ethics & Law reserve the right to reject or withdraw the manuscript directly if the use of AI tools in the manuscript is concealed.

Deceased Authors

When a co-author of an article passes away during the writing, submission or peer review process, the corresponding author or co-authors should promptly inform the editorial team of the journal. It is the responsibility of the corresponding author to acknowledge the deceased author's contribution to the article and to identify any potential conflicts of interest. After publication, the editorial team will add a note to the list of authors to clarify the identity of the deceased author and to indicate their contribution to the research work.

Authorship Changes

Once the manuscript is submitted, it means that the authorship has been determined. If the authorship needs to be changed after submission, it shall be handled according to the following instruction:

-If the authorship needs to be added/deleted or the order of the author needs to be changed before the article is published, the corresponding author needs to explain the reason for the change to the editor by email and provide a statement that all authors agree to the change, and then the editor will handle it accordingly;

-If the authorship needs to be added/deleted or the order of the author needs to be changed after the article is published, the corresponding author needs to explain the reason for the change to the editor by email and provide a statement that all authors agree to the change. After the review of the editorial office the corresponding modification will be made and a correction notice will be issued.

Copyright and Licensing

Copyright for all articles published in the Environmental Ethics & Law belongs to the author. The authors also grant permission to the publisher to publish, reproduce, distribute and transmit the articles.

Environmental Ethics & Law publishes accepted manuscripts under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC 4.0). Authors submitting papers for publication agree to apply the CC BY-NC 4.0 license to their work. For non-commercial purposes, anyone may copy, redistribute material, remix, transform and construct material in any media or format, provided that the terms of the license are observed and the original source is properly cited.

Authors must obtain permission to reproduce any published material (figures, tables, or any extracts of text) which is not in the public domain or for which they do not hold the copyright. The journal may not publish material from other publications without permission.

In exceptional cases, articles may be licensed differently. If you have specific conditions that do not allow this permission (e.g. those relating to funding), please make this clear to the journal editorial team at the time of submission. Exceptions will be at the discretion of the publisher.