Policies and Guidelines

1. Peer Review Policy

The double-blind peer-review process is an integral component of our commitment to ensuring unbiased and constructive evaluations of submitted manuscripts. So, by implementing a double-blind peer-review process, JCIHS aims to uphold the principles of transparency, objectivity, and scholarly excellence in the publication of research in the field of sustainability.

Submission Process: Authors are required to submit manuscripts with all identifying information removed to facilitate blind review. This includes removing author names, affiliations, and any other information that may reveal the authors' identity. Manuscripts are assigned unique identifiers to maintain confidentiality during the review process. This identifier is used for all communication between authors, editors, and reviewers.

Reviewer Selection: Reviewers are selected based on their expertise and experience in the relevant field. The editorial team ensures that selected reviewers have no conflicts of interest with the authors.

Reviewing Process: Reviewers evaluate the manuscript based on its originality, methodology, clarity, significance, and adherence to ethical standards. Reviewers provide constructive feedback and recommendations for improvement, maintaining a professional and collegial tone.

Editorial Decision: The Editor-in-Chief or Associate Editors make the final decision on manuscript acceptance, revision, or rejection based on the feedback received from reviewers.

Confidentiality: All parties involved in the peer-review process, including authors, reviewers, and editors, are expected to maintain the confidentiality of the review process. Reviewers are discouraged from sharing or discussing the content of manuscripts under review with individuals outside of the peer-review process.

2. Publication Fee Policy

All articles published in the JCIHS are published under an open-access model, ensuring immediate and free accessibility on our website upon publication. To support the costs of the peer review process, website maintenance, and editorial staff, an Article Processing Charge (APC) of 30,000 PKR is applicable for accepted manuscripts.

Our open-access policy remains dedicated to providing researchers, practitioners, and stakeholders unrestricted access to valuable research findings, while the APC ensures the sustainability and quality of our publishing operations.

3. Copyright Policy

The JCIHS is an open-access journal committed to promoting the free dissemination of scholarly research. Authors publishing in JCIHS retain the copyright to their work while granting the journal the right to publish their research under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC-BY).

Creative Commons Licensing Agreement

Disclaimer: Under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0) license, authors retain copyright and grant the journal right of first publication.

Under CC-by 4.0 authors are free to:

Share — copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format.

Adapt — remix, transform, and build upon the material for any purpose, even commercially.

The licensor cannot revoke these freedoms if the license terms are followed.

Under the following terms:

Attribution — Author must give appropriate credit, provide a link to the license, and indicate if changes were made. Author may do so in any reasonable manner, but not in any way that suggests the licensor endorses author or author’s use.

No additional restrictions — Author may not apply legal terms or technological measures that legally restrict others from doing anything the license permits.

4. Accessiblity Policy

The JCIHS is committed to ensuring freely accessible content to researchers, policymakers, practitioners, and the general public worldwide. JCIHS website and content are structured to facilitate navigation, readability, and interaction for users with diverse needs. All articles published in JCIHS are freely and immediately accessible to the public upon publication. By making our content freely accessible, JCIHS contributes to the democratization of knowledge, supporting education, research, and informed decision-making for the betterment of society.

Open-access Statement: This journal operates under an open-access model, ensuring that all content is freely accessible without any cost to the user or their institution. This unrestricted access enables immediate and free availability of our publications, empowering users to read, download, copy, distribute, print, search, or link to the full texts of articles. Additionally, users are permitted to crawl articles for indexing purposes, pass them as data to software, or utilize them for any other lawful purpose. Our commitment to open access reflects our dedication to the widespread dissemination and utilization of scholarly knowledge for the greater benefit of the global research community.