About the Journal
FOCUS AND SCOPE
DCJ is a peer-reviewed journal. It publishes research that aims to contribute to the decolonization of criminology and justice, which encompasses theoretical, qualitative and quantitative inquiries into traditional and emerging justice topics and studies on epistemologies, methodologies and methods related to criminological research and tertiary teaching. The journal also welcomes innovative contributions regarding the development of novel criminological strands, anti-criminology and beyond criminology.
This is an open-access journal with both manuscript publications and article downloads free of charge.
NOTES FOR CONTRIBUTORS
DCJ seeks to provide a safe space that includes respectful language and constructive feedback. Hence, all peer-reviewers must agree to and abide by the COPE Ethical Guidelines for Peer Reviewers.
Academic articles
Academic articles should be between 5,000 and 8,000 words (including references and endnotes), be submitted in OpenOffice or Word format and use APA referencing style (6th edition). For detailed information, please refer to our author guidelines on the ‘article submissions’ page. Read more...
Commentaries
We invite submission of commentaries on contemporary issues of up to 4,000 words. Commentaries are expected to be sharp analyses that are novel and thought-provoking. Commentaries are peer-reviewed to different criteria than academic journal articles, allowing personal opinions to be expressed. For detailed information, please refer to our author guidelines on the ‘commentary submissions’ page. Read more...
Creative writings
DCJ provides a designated space for creative writings, such as poetry and short stories, which reflect on personal experiences with criminal justice, restorative justice, criminology or related areas. The word limit for creative contributions is 10,000 words. Works submitted for this section do not fall under the double-blinded peer-review process. For detailed information, please refer to our author guidelines on the ‘poets' corner submissions’ page. Read more...
Book reviews
We welcome suggestions for books to be reviewed and email the book editor with your suggestions. Read more...
PEER REVIEW POLICY: Double Blind Review
Submitted research articles and commentaries are initially screened by the editors. If the content of the submitted article fits the scope of the journal, it goes through a double blind review process. To that end, each paper is reviewed by two reviewers that are selected by the editor in charge. Reviewers are required to agree to and abide by the COPE Ethical Guidelines for Peer Reviewers. Reviewer comments that violate ethical guidelines will be deleted by the editors. Final decisions for revision or acceptance are made by the editors based on the recommendations provided by the reviewers. Different review guidelines apply to research articles and commentaries. Book reviews and creative writings do not fall under the peer review policy policy.
OPEN ACCESS POLICY, COPYRIGHT AND LICENSING
This journal provides open access to all of its content on the principle that making research freely available to the public supports a greater global exchange of knowledge. Such access is associated with increased readership and increased citation of an author's work. All articles are made available using a Creative Commons (CC-BY-NC-ND 4.0) internationally shareable licence, meaning that content may be shared worldwide but the source must be acknowledged appropriately. However, the licence excludes the right to create derivatives (for more details please see https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).
DCJ does not charge any fees for submission, publication or access to articles.
ARCHIVING AND PRESERVATION
This journal's content is preserved using the the LOCKSS and CLOCKSS archiving systems.
LOCKSS is a distributed archiving system among participating libraries and permits those libraries to create permanent archives of the journal for purposes of preservation and restoration.
CLOCKSS is global archive that preserves content on behalf of all libraries and scholars worldwide. CLOCKSS preserves content in 12 strategically chosen libraries across the globe to optimize the content’s safety against political and environmental threats.
