RULES OF PROCEDURE OF THE JOURNAL JUSTICE AND LAW

CHAPTER I

GENERALITIES

Article 1. These rules regulate the composition and functioning of the Editorial Board of the Journal Justice and the Law, known as Editorial Board, as well as the powers and duties of its members. 

CHAPTER II

COMPOSITION, DUTIES, POWERS AND OPERATION OF THE EDITORIAL BOARD

Section I

Composition of the Editorial Board

Article 2. The Editorial Board is a permanent collegiate body comprising the Executive Board, the advisory members and the Editorial Team.

Article 3.1. The Editorial Board shall be composed of the Director, the General Coordinator, the Senior Editor and the Section Editors.

2. The editor of the journal appoints the other members of the Board.

Article 4.1. The advisory members shall be selected by agreement of the Board of Directors on the basis of a well-founded proposal by the members of the Board of Directors.

2. Advisory members may be professionals in law or other related specialities, whether national or foreign, with a recognised professional track record in terms of scientific results.

Article 5. The Editorial Team is composed of editors and other professionals involved in the editing process and technical assistance to the journal.

Sección segunda

Deberes y atribuciones del Consejo editorial

Section Two

Duties and powers of the Editorial Board

Article 6. The Editorial Board has the following duties and powers:

a) To comply with and enforce compliance with the legislation in force on intellectual property and data protection, and the editorial policy of the journal;

b) to promote the socialisation of the results of scientific research in the Court System, through the intellectual production of magistrates, judges, specialists and other members of the judicial bodies;

c) to stimulate scientific production that contributes to the continuous improvement of the administration of justice by other legal professionals or related specialities;

d) to ensure the observance of the journal's ethical standards;

e) to promote the indexing of the publication in national and international databases.

Article 7. In addition to the duties and powers set out in the previous article, it is the responsibility of the Board of Directors to

a) to approve the editorial policy, the instructions for authors and the journal's Code of Ethics, and to ensure that they are complied with;

b) Systematically evaluate the operation of the journal and take the relevant decisions for its improvement;

c) to elect the advisory members of the Editorial Board or to terminate their functions, when it deems it appropriate;

d) to select the experts who make up the Scientific Board and the portfolio of reviewers of the journal;

e) to approve the themes of each issue and the publication of special issues;

f) to carry out the final evaluation of the texts approved in the academic review;

g) to submit any questions it deems relevant to the consideration of the advisory members;

h) to receive and investigate complaints of allegedly unethical behaviour in publishing, and to deal with them in accordance with the established procedure;

i) to promote cooperative links with other scientific publications;

j) the other duties and attributions that are incumbent upon it as the journal's governing body. 

Article 8. The advisory members have the following duties and powers:

a) To comply with and enforce compliance with current legislation on intellectual property and data protection, and with the journal's editorial policy;

b) to give their opinion on the issues submitted to them for consideration by the Board of Directors;

c) to ensure that the journal's ethical standards are observed.

Article 9. In addition to the duties and powers set out in Articles 6 and 7, the editor shall be responsible for:

a) To represent the publication nationally and internationally;

b) to sign collaboration agreements with other national and foreign scientific publications;

c) to convene and direct the meetings of the Board of Directors and the Editorial Board;

d) to oversee the scientific rigour, currency and thematic diversity of the journal, in accordance with the lines of research defined for the Court System;

e) to keep the Governing Council of the Supreme People's Court informed about the functioning of the journal;

f) appoint the members of the Board of Directors;

g) to approve the work schedule and content proposals for each issue;

h) to evaluate the activity of the Editorial Board

i) to sign the certifications of the texts published;

j) to ensure the registration of the journal and its annual revalidation in the National Register of Serial Publications;

k) approving the editorial policy and monitoring its implementation;

l) to recognise the performance of the reviewers;

m) any other duties that fall to it in its capacity as the journal's highest authority.

Article 10. In addition to the duties and powers set out in Articles 6 and 7, the General Coordinator shall also be responsible for:

a) To substitute the editor of the journal in the event of the latter's temporary absence or impediment to the exercise of his or her functions;

b) to distribute the responsibilities of the members of the Editorial Team and to monitor their fulfilment;

c) to propose candidates for membership of the Editorial Board, the Scientific Board and the portfolio of reviewers of the journal;

d) to make proposals for changes to the editorial policy, the instructions to authors and the journal's Code of Ethics;

e) to advise the Chief Editor on the appointment of suitable reviewers for the review of contributions;

f) structuring and proposing the general content of the journal's issues, with the advice of the other members of the Editorial Board;

g) to draw up the editorial plan of the journal, with the advice of the other members of the Editorial Board;

h) to define strategies to achieve greater visibility and impact of the journal;

i) to promote and coordinate actions to increase the quality of the articles and their academic evaluation; j) any other responsibilities that may be assigned to the Editorial Board;

j) other responsibilities delegated or assigned by the journal's editor.

Article 11. In addition to the duties and powers set out in Articles 6 and 7, the chief editor shall be responsible for:

a) To draw up the proposed editorial policies, the instructions for authors and the ethical rules of the publication;

b) to provide the authors with instructions for the writing of contributions;

c) executive management of the editorial process of the journal, to ensure that it is carried out with the established quality and in the established time frame, in accordance with the defined policies and procedures;

d) to carry out the editorial review of contributions submitted to the journal;

e) assigning articles to the appropriate reviewers for scholarly review;

f) to protect the integrity and confidentiality of the texts received;

g) guaranteeing anonymity between reviewers and authors;

h) to notify authors of the results of the evaluation of the contributions submitted by them;

i) to prepare the minutes and follow up the agreements of the meetings of the Board of Directors and the Editorial Board;

j) to prepare periodic reports to enable the Board to take decisions on the journal's editorial policies and management;

k) to maintain communication with authors, contributors and readers of the journal;

l) to analyse complaints and suggestions sent to the journal and respond to them in a timely manner;

m) to keep the journal's contents up to date in the indexing systems where it is registered;

n) to report on the status of the journal and any ethical incident that may undermine the prestige and scientific credibility of the journal;

ñ) any other responsibilities delegated or assigned by the journal editor or coordinator.

Article 12. In addition to the duties and powers set out in articles 6 and 7, the section editor is responsible for:

a) follow up the peer review process, guarantee the transparency and scientific rigour of this and maintain systematic communication with the evaluators and authors so that the relevant modifications or adjustments are made in a timely manner;

b) to assist the main editor in the editorial evaluation of the contributions received;

c) to provide the academic evaluation protocol to the selected reviewers;

d) to evaluate the performance of the reviewers;

e) to propose the awarding of prizes to the reviewers;

f) to request authors to review the final version of their work and their agreement to proceed with publication;

g) to control and enforce compliance with the deadlines defined in the editorial process;

h) such other responsibilities as may be delegated or assigned by the senior editor of the journal.

Article 13. In addition to the duties and powers set out in Article 6, the proofreader shall be responsible for:

a) To detect and remedy spelling, lexical and syntactical errors present in texts approved for publication;

b) to increase the lexical richness of the texts, according to possibilities;

c) ensuring that the layout complies with the parameters indicated in the texts;

d) adapt the vocabulary, eliminate redundancies or inappropriate uses of terms used by the authors;

e) modify punctuation, where possible, to make texts more coherent and easier to understand;

f) improve the clarity of texts;

g) apply typographical resources (inverted commas, numbering, italics, bold, small caps, etc.) and unify criteria in aspects not subject to standards;

h) verify that citations and bibliographical references are correct, in accordance with the journal's standards;

i) to review the typeset texts and ensure that the layout does not generate partitions or other typesetting errors; j) to reconcile the proposed modifications to the text and to ensure that they are in accordance with the standards of the journal;

j) to reconcile proposed changes with the authors to ensure that they do not misrepresent the authors' intentions;

k) any other duties required for the performance of his or her functions.

Article 14. The translator is responsible for:

a) To carry out the translation of the editorial policies and instructions to authors, including all formats and templates, into the languages of publication of the journal other than Spanish;

b) review and improve the translation into English of the metadata (title, abstract and keywords) of the articles accepted for publication in the OJS platform and the other formats of the journal;

c) to translate into Spanish the articles accepted for publication that are in other languages.

Article 15. It is the responsibility of the designer or layout designer:

a) Define the general design standards for articles (possible typeface and font size, line spacing, figures, tables and links, among others) and draw up the corresponding templates in the different formats;

b) generate the galley proofs in the publication formats defined by the journal;

c) guarantee that the publication formats of the articles comply with the defined standards;

d) ensuring that the on-screen presentation of articles is in a pleasant and readable format, taking into account the diversity of electronic devices on which the journal can be read;

e) designing the visual image of the journal, including corporate logos and images, typefaces and colour palette, as well as the page layout, in such a way that readers access the inside pages and the desired information in as few links as possible;

f) preparing texts for inclusion in the different databases and indexes in which the journal is included, following the criteria and file formats of each of them.

Article 16. The technical assistance and programming specialist shall be responsible for:

a) To set up the journal's website;

b) to take care of the domain and hosting of the website;

c) configuring and administering the journal's online publishing platform;

d) carry out the periodic salvos in accordance with the defined policy;

e) to keep the journal's technological platform up to date, according to the new versions made available by the developers;

f) monitor that the journal's website is accessible and solve any problems that may arise with the administrator of the network or data centre where the journal is hosted;

g) ensure the security of the journal's website;

h) report any security issues that arise with the site.

Article 17. The communication and social media specialist is responsible for:

a) To draw up the journal's communication plan;

b) to carry out the actions defined in the communication plan to disseminate the journal's content through different channels;

c) to keep the journal's profiles and pages on social networks up to date.

Section 3

Functioning of the Editorial Board

Article 18.1. The Board of the Editorial Board meets four times a year in ordinary session and takes its decisions by simple majority vote or by consensus.

2. The Editor-in-Chief of the journal may invite the advisory members and the editorial team to participate in the meetings when the nature of the matters to be discussed so advises.

3. The Editor-in-Chief may also convene as many extraordinary meetings as may be required for the better functioning of the journal.

Article 19. The agenda of the meetings is approved by the editor of the journal and circulated to the members 72 hours in advance, accompanied by the reports or other documents that are to be analysed therein.

Article 20. The performance of the journal and proposals for its improvement are discussed at least once a year.

Article 21.1. All meetings of the Editorial Board shall be recorded in minutes, which shall be kept by the chief editor.

2. The minutes and the resolutions adopted at the meetings are numbered consecutively by year.

FINAL DISPOSITION

SOLE: These Regulations shall enter into force upon their approval by the Editorial Board.

COMMUNICATE it to the interested parties and to all those concerned for its enforcement.

Havana, December 11, 2023.