Criteria for level 1

The criteria are designed to ensure that publication channels approved in the Norwegian Register comply with the principles of transparency and best practice in scholarly publishing.

We distinguish between requirements that must be met and criteria that should be met. Please note that publication channels are assessed based on an overall evaluation and professional judgement. This means that a publication channel which appears to meet all must criteria may nevertheless be rejected based on should criteria.

The reason for rejection can be found by going to the relevant publication channel in the Norwegian Register.

You should also check what you need to be aware of before suggesting a new publication channel.

Criteria that must be met for a suggestion to be processed

For a suggestion to be processed at an initial stage, the following requirements must be met:

• The submitter must be a person affiliated with Norwegian, Swedish and/or Danish research institutions, Norwegian, Swedish and/or Danish journal editorial boards/publication channels, and/or academic associations. See further information under Relevance.
• The ISSN must be approved in the ISSN Register. An ISSN is approved when it has the status “confirmed” in the ISSN Register. In the proposal form, the ISSN is automatically checked against the ISSN Register. See further information under ISSN.

Suggestions submitted by persons who do not meet the eligibility requirements will be rejected without assessment. Suggestions without a valid ISSN will also be rejected without assessment.

Criteria that the submitter must document

For a publication channel to be approved at level 1, the submitter must be able to document that the publication channel has:

• An academic editorial board – see Criteria for academic editorial board.
• External peer review – see Criteria for peer review.
• A national or international authorship base – see Criteria for authorship.
• Scientific publications – see Criteria for Publications
• Relevance to Norwegian research communities – see Criteria for relevance.

Rules for registration of publication channels

In the submission form, the submitter must choose whether to register a journal/series or a publisher. The following rules apply:

• Journals/series with their own ISSN must be registered as independent publication channels.
• Series that do not have their own ISSN and are published only with ISBNs must not be registered. In such cases, the publisher of the series must be registered as a suggestion for a new publisher at level 1. Series that do not have their own ISSN will be subject to the publisher’s level in the Norwegian Register.
• Publishers that publish only ISSN publications will not be approved, because ISSN titles are considered as independent publication channels.

Conferences

Conferences cannot be registered as independent publication channels.

• If the conference proceedings are published in a series with ISSN, the series can be registered as a new suggestion to be approved at level 1 in Norway.
• If the conference proceedings are published in a series that does not have its own ISSN, but is published only with ISBNs, the publisher of the conference proceeding can be registered as a new suggestion to be approved at level 1 in Norway.
• When conference proceedings are not published in a separate ISSN series, but are published through the institutions acting as organisers, the publisher may vary from year to year. Such contributions will not count as scientific publishing.

Series

Publications in series may have both ISSN and ISBN. Series are assessed as independent publication channels if they have their own ISSN.

• Series with their own ISSN must be suggested as new scientific publication channel.
• When you register your publication in Norwegian Research Information Repository, the ISSN series must be used as the publication channel. Even if the ISSN series has not been approved, the publisher cannot be used as the publication channel.
• For contributions in series without an ISSN, but with an ISBN, the publisher must be used as the publication channel. If the publisher is not registered in the Norwegian Register, the publisher must be registered as a new scientific publication channel.
• If the ISSN title is not indexed in the Norwegian Register at the time of reporting, the publisher may be used as the publication channel, provided that the publisher is indexed and approved in the Norwegian Register (see the Reporting Instructions).

1. Criteria for ISSN – journals and series

Publication channels (journals and series) must have:

• At least one valid ISSN registered in the ISSN Register with the status “confirmed”. The status “confirmed” means that the ISSN Register has verified the journal/series and that it meets the ISSN Register’s requirements for a valid ISSN.
• Publication channels with ISSN that have statuses other than “confirmed”, such as “assigned” or “unreported”, will be rejected without assessment.
• A website on which the ISSN is clearly displayed.

Publication channels (journals and series) should have

• A title on the website that corresponds to the title registered in the ISSN Register.

2. Requirements for the publication channel’s website

The publication channel must have its own website containing necessary and relevant information.

The submitter may upload documentation demonstrating compliance with the criteria in PDF format in the submission form. Therefore, publication channels are not necessarily rejected if some of the information listed below is missing from the website. However, lack of information on the website may contribute to rejection. Publication channels that already are approved, may be downgraded to level 0 – not approved, because of missing information on the website.

The publication channel’s website should include:

• A description of peer review procedures (see Criteria for peer review).
• A list of members of the editorial board, including their institutional affiliation and academic title (see Criteria for academic editorial board).
• An archive of at least the last two years of publications (journals and series) or a backlist (publishers).
• Information about the publication channel’s profile, aims and scope and target audience.
• A description of publication frequency. For example, if two issues per year are stated, the publication history should confirm this.
• A description of copyright policies.
• A description of ethical guidelines.
• A description of procedures for handling plagiarism.
• A description of open access procedures (see separate section).
• A description of publication costs.
• If there are no publication costs, this should be clearly stated.
• Contact information (office address, contact person/contact address.
• Consistent information across all languages in which the website is available.

3. Criteria for academic editorial board

The publication channel must have:

• An academic editorial board consisting of at least three members. An academic editorial board refers to an editor and editorial board members with scholarly affiliations to research institutions.
• The editorial board must primarily consist of researchers employed by universities, research institutes, or organisations that conduct research.

Publishers must:

• Be editorially organised to publish works that comply with the definition of academic publications.

The publication channel should

• Make information about the editorial board openly available on the website.
• List editorial board members together with information about their institutional affiliation (corresponding to author affiliations).
• If the publication channel is published by a university or institution, at least one third of the editorial board should be affiliated with institutions other than the publisher.

4. Criteria for peer review

The publication channel’s peer review procedures must be clearly described. A general statement that articles are peer reviewed is not sufficient. The following criteria apply and must be included in the description:

• Peer review must always take place prior to publication: Peer review is a process that always occurs before the publication of original research results.
• At least one reviewer must have no conflict of interest with the publisher or the author: A manuscript must, as a minimum, be reviewed by an expert in the field who has no toes to the publisher or the author. The expert may be named or anonymous.
• The reviewer must assess academic originality and quality: Assessment of academic originality must be included in the written evaluation.
• Peer review may be conducted as either closed or open review: However, the publication channel must have procedures specifying that reviewers are identified and/or invited by the editor or editorial board.
• Conflict of interest: The editorial board must ensure that there are no conflicts of interest or dependencies between authors and reviewers.

5. Criteria for authorship

The publication channel’s authorship base must be documented. Authorship refers to the author’s name and institutional affiliation. The authorship base must:

• Be international and/or national, not local. The authorship base is considered local if more than two thirds of the authors in publications from the last two years are affiliated with the same institution.
• Be documented by listing authors’ names and institutional affiliations for the last two volumes, preferably together with the authors’ publications.

Information (names and author affiliations) about authors should be openly available, either in the articles, in abstracts, or elsewhere on the publication channel’s website.

6. Criteria for publications

The publication channel must:

• Publish scientific content in accordance with the Reporting instructions (NVI)’ definition of a scientific publication. For publication channels that publish both scientific and other types of content, it must be clearly stated which publications are scientific.
  • Journals aimed at a general audience, providing information and reflection on cultural and social issues and popular science, will not be approved as scientific publication channels.
  • Professional journals aimed at non-scientific professional groups within specific professions or sectors of society will not be approved as scientific publication channels. Norwegian and Nordic professional journals organised with separate sections and separate sub-editorial boards for peer-reviewed scientific articles may nevertheless be approved. Non-Nordic professional journals can only rarely be approved, because the status of individual articles cannot be identified.
• Ensure that scientific contributions are peer reviewed in accordance with the criteria above prior to publication.
• Be able to document at least two published volumes within the last two years. For newly established publication channels with a connection to Norway, we may in some cases approve the publication channel even if this criterion has not been met.

Publishers must

• Have an academic publishing programme aimed at researchers and research institutions.

Abstracts and author information for contributions published in the last two years should be openly available.

7. Criteria for relevance

The publication channel must be relevant to the Norwegian research community. This means that the publication channel must:

• Be submitted as scientific publication channel by
• Researchers or research administrative staff at Norwegian, Swedish and/or Danish research institutions.
• Editors of Norwegian, Swedish and/or Danish publication channels.
• Members of Norwegian, Swedish and/or Danish journal editorial boards.
• Members of Norwegian, Swedish and/or Danish academic associations.
• Be submitted by an individual in accordance with the criteria above, and not by the publisher, journal, institution or association itself. This means that the submitter must log in/create a user account in their own name, and not in the name of the publisher, journal, institution or association.
• Be submitted based on the submitter’s academic interest, and not because of pressure from the publisher or editorial board.

Suggestions from individuals without affiliations to Scandinavian institutions, journal editorial boards or scientific associations will be rejected without assessment. Suggestions submitted via user accounts registered in the name of publishers, journals, institutions or associations will also be rejected without assessment.

The publication channel should:

• Be academically relevant within its field to Norwegian and/or international research communities.

8. Criteria for open access

It is not a requirement that publication channels publish with open access. However, if a publication channel states that it is and open access publication channel, it should

• Be indexed in DOAJ.
• Make all articles openly available immediately.
• Allow articles to be read without user registration or login.
• Clearly describe open access policies on the publication channel’s website.
• Clearly describe information about author fees (Article Processing Charges (APCs)) and other publication cost on the publication channel’s website.

9. Criteria for special issues

Special issues are the responsibility of the editor, and the journal’s rules and guidelines apply. Articles in special issues should:

• Have a well-defined thematic coherence, and the theme must have a clear connection to the publication channel’s profile.