The South East European Journal of Economics and Business (SEEJ) is committed to the standards of publication ethics and follows the Core Practices and guidelines of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE). The policies below apply to all parties involved in publishing in the Journal: authors, reviewers, editors, and the publisher. 

1. Authorship and contributorship

The South East European Journal of Economics and Business follows the COPE Guidelines on Authorship and Contributorship. 

Principles of Authorship. Authorship is limited to individuals who have made a substantial contribution to the conception or design of the work, or to the acquisition, analysis, or interpretation of data; who have participated in drafting or critically revising the manuscript; who have approved the final version; and who agree to be accountable for all aspects of the work. Individuals who contributed to the work but do not meet these criteria (for example, technical assistance or language editing) should be listed in the Acknowledgements. The corresponding author is responsible for ensuring that all co-authors have approved the submitted and final versions and that no eligible contributor has been omitted.

CRediT Contributor Roles Taxonomy. The South East European Journal of Economics and Business (SEEJ) implements a standardised approach to authorship attribution and contributor recognition based on the Contributor Role Taxonomy (CRediT). This approach ensures transparency, proper recognition of each contributor's role, and compliance with the recommendations of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE). 

CRediT statements should be provided during A Production stage to ensure transparent attribution before final publication. The CRediT statement should be part of the Title page.

Example of Author contributions statement:
Author 1 name: Conceptualization, Methodology, Software. Author 2 name: Data curation, Writing- Original draft preparation. Author 3 name: Visualization, Investigation. Author 4 name: Writing- Reviewing and Editing. Conceptualization, Methodology, Software.

Change in Authorship. Any request to add or remove an author, or to change the order of authors, after a manuscript has been submitted to the South East European Journal of Economics and Business must be addressed formally to the Editor-in-Chief. The request must state a clear and well-founded reason for the proposed change and include written, signed confirmation from all original authors, as well as from any author to be added or removed, demonstrating that everyone agrees to the change. The Journal considers such requests in accordance with the COPE Flow Charts. 

2. Complaints and appeals

The South East European Journal of Economics and Business is committed to providing a fair and transparent process for handling complaints and appeals. We adhere to the principles outlined by the  COPE Guidelines to ensure that complaints and appeals are addressed promptly, thoroughly, and impartially.

This policy applies to complaints and appeals related to editorial decisions (acceptance/rejection of manuscripts), allegations of research or publication misconduct, conflicts of interest, authorship disputes and other aspects of the Journal's operations. 

Complaints/appeal letters should be submitted via email to seejournal@efsa.unsa.ba. The complaint/appeal letters must clearly describe the issue, including relevant details such as dates, parties involved, and supporting documents. Upon receiving a complaint or an appeal, the editorial board will acknowledge receipt within seven business days. The case will then be reviewed by the editorial board, using the COPE guidelines as a reference framework. A final decision will typically be communicated to the complainant within 30 days of receipt. If the process requires additional time due to unforeseen circumstances, the editorial board will inform the complainant of the delay and expected timeline.

3. Conflicts of interest / competing interests
The South East European Journal of Economics and Business requires full transparency about relationships and activities that could bias, or be perceived to bias, the research and publication process. 

Authors must disclose any financial, professional, or personal interest that could be perceived to influence their research or manuscript, including funding sources, employment or consultancy relationships, financial holdings, and close personal or professional ties. At submission, the corresponding author confirms on behalf of all authors:
"The author(s) confirm that there are no potential conflicts of interest related to the research or with the journal/editorial team handling this submission. If any potential conflict of interest exists, it has been clearly declared within the manuscript."

Reviewers must declare potential conflicts when invited to review and decline the invitation where a conflict exists.
Editors and members of the editorial board are excluded from editorial decisions on manuscripts with which they have a conflict of interest, including their own submissions, which are handled independently by another editor under the standard double-blind procedure.

4. Data sharing and reproducibility

The South East European Journal of Economics and Business follows the COPE Guidelines regarding data sharing and reproducibility.   The Journal encourages authors to make the data supporting their findings as openly available as possible, and requires every article reporting empirical results to include a Data Availability Statement. The statement appears in the published article, after the conclusion and before the reference list.
A Data Availability Statement must specify:
• where the data supporting the reported results can be found, including references to publicly archived datasets analysed or generated during the study, with a persistent identifier (URL or DOI) cited in the reference list; or
• whether the data are available from the authors on request; or
• if the data cannot be publicly archived or shared due to third-party ownership (commercial databases, licensed survey data), confidentiality obligations toward respondents or firms, or legal and ethical restrictions, this must still be disclosed, together with (1) the reason for unavailability and (2) how and under what conditions the data may be requested.

Examples of Data Availability Statement

Authors may use one of the following forms, or combine them where a study draws on multiple data sources:
• "The datasets generated and/or analysed during the current study are available in the [NAME] repository, [persistent identifier/DOI]."
• "The data that support the findings of this study are available from [THIRD PARTY, e.g. the statistical office, central bank, or commercial provider], but restrictions apply to their availability. These data were used under licence for the current study and are not publicly available. Data are, however, available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request and with the permission of [THIRD PARTY]."
• "The datasets generated and/or analysed during the current study are not publicly available due to [REASON, e.g. confidentiality assurances given to survey respondents] but are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request."
• "The datasets generated and/or analysed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request."
• "All data generated or analysed during this study are included in this published article [and its supplementary information files]."
• "Data sharing is not applicable to this article as no datasets were generated or analysed during the current study."
Where data are drawn from publicly accessible sources (e.g. Eurostat, World Bank, national statistical offices, central bank databases), authors should identify the source, the specific series or dataset, and the date of access, so that results can be reproduced.

Authors remain responsible for ensuring that data sharing complies with any ethical approvals, participant consent, and data protection requirements applicable to their study.

5. Ethical oversight

All parties involved in the publication process (editors, reviewers, authors, and the publisher) are expected to observe the ethical standards defined in the Ethical Responsibilities and Publication Policy. These standards are informed by the Core Practices and guidance of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE).  

6. Intellectual property
Submissions must be the authors' original work, must not infringe any third-party rights, and must not be under consideration or published elsewhere. All sources must be appropriately cited, and permission must be obtained for the reproduction of copyrighted material (including figures and tables). All submissions are screened with similarity-detection software; plagiarism in any form, including self-plagiarism and redundant publication, results in rejection or, if discovered after publication, retraction. Authors retain the copyright to their articles, which are published under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0) licence. 

7. Post-publication discussions and corrections

The Journal welcomes post-publication discussion. Readers may address substantiated comments or concerns about published articles to the Editor-in Chief. The Editorial Team shall invite the authors to respond. Significant errors that affect the interpretation of a published article are corrected through a published correction (corrigendum or erratum) linked to the original article. Where findings are shown to be unreliable, or in cases of proven misconduct, the article is retracted in accordance with COPE retraction guidelines; expressions of concern may be issued while an investigation is ongoing. Corrected and retracted articles remain available, clearly marked, to preserve the integrity of the scholarly record.

8. Use of generative artificial intelligence

Generative AI tools do not qualify for authorship and cannot be listed as authors, as they cannot take responsibility for the work. Authors must transparently disclose in the manuscript any use of generative AI tools in the preparation of the work, including the tool used and the purpose of its use; authors remain fully responsible for the accuracy, originality, and integrity of all content. Reviewers must not upload manuscripts to generative AI tools, as this constitutes a breach of confidentiality, and must not use AI tools to generate the substance of their review. Editors apply the same confidentiality standards in handling submissions.
Open Access policy    The South East European Journal of Economics and Business is an open access journal that provides free, immediate, and unrestricted online access to all its published content for readers around the world.

Open Access License

The South East European Journal of Economics and Business uses Creative Commons 4.0 license. Articles in the Journal are currently licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC BY 4.0).

Archiving    

Paradigm archives the contents of this Journal in Portico - digital long-term preservation service of scholarly books, journals and collections.