Instructions and Advices for Authors

Before the decision

Before you submit the manuscript to European Countryside, please try to answer the following questions:

Why the international public should read and cite your paper? An article published in an international journal is NOT a national paper translated into English!

How could your article contribute to a solution of rural problems?

Is the topic of your article focused on the (post-material) countryside in Europe?

Only upon satisfactory answers mentioned questions would you be able to submit your manuscript to European Countryside.

We do not have any strict manuscript length limit. However, the recommended maximum length is ca. 60,000 characters to be readable and understandable as a research paper. Enclosures (preferably coloured ones) with a maximum size of A4 are accepted with no additional charge.

Manuscripts in English have to be complete, which means that they should include abstracts, keywords, highlights, tables, graphics and references. Submit your contributions as one file including figures and tables. As the European Countryside does not have a printed version, it is enough to provide graphs and figures in the resolution for a screen. Tables should be sent in a Word or Excel format – not as pictures! The manuscripts should be submitted in an electronic form only.

Manuscripts must be in English, and authors are urged to aim for clarity, brevity, and accuracy of information and language. Authors whose native language is not English should have their manuscripts checked for linguistic accuracy by a native English speaker. It is recommended to enclose the confirmation from the proofreading agency/individual or an affidavit that the manuscript has been checked by the experienced English speaker.

If the post is too large, please use, for example, the uschovna.cz service (up to 300 MB, 14 days and 30 downloads for free).

The manuscripts should be submitted in MS Word. The text should not be formatted. Paragraphs should be separated by the key enter. The interspace between two words is formed by exactly one keystroke. Bullets and footnotes are accepted when they are created electronically. The hyphenation should be avoided. Please, do not number the references or lines.

The first page should start with the following structure: the title of the paper, name(s) of authors without academic titles. Abstract(s) (maximum 800 characters) and keywords (3-8), highlights, introduction, ...

Additional data about author(s) should be written at the end of the manuscript: name(s), academic and scientific title(s), ORCID number, affiliations, e-mails of authors.

The title should reflect the content of the paper. In the case of regionally focused papers, the respective country (region) should be mentioned in the title.

The abstract should give a short overview of the problem solved, the methodology used and the results gained. The abstract could be used separately, therefore it should not contain any undefined abbreviations or references. To strengthen not only the unity of Europe but also its diversity, abstracts in the native language of the author(s) or the country in which the investigation was made will be published - if the authors want. Author(s) are kindly asked to provide both English and the native language abstracts and keywords. The author(s) are fully responsible for the language and content of the non-English abstracts.

Keywords should be provided to be used for indexing purposes. Keywords should be chosen so that they are not too general (because search engines would find too many articles and yours could get lost among them), but not too specific (because the likelihood that someone would enter them would be low). The quality of abstracts and keywords may influence the length of the evaluation process. Inappropriate selected keywords may delay searches for reviewers as well as an unimpressive abstract may limit their willingness to evaluate the manuscript.

Highlights are a short collection of bullet points that convey the core findings and provide readers with a quick textual overview of the article. They are used by search engines to discover your articles. These three to five bullet points (maximum 85 symbols each) describe the essence of the research (e.g. results or conclusions) and highlight what is distinctive about it. Due to their purpose, highlights do not need to be formulated as complete sentences and should not contain unnecessary adjectives.

The references should be divided into Academic References and Other Sources. Academic references should contain (ordered alphabetically according to the surname of the 1st author) papers in journals, books, chapters in books, or unpublished materials like theses or research reports. Articles in proceedings should be quoted as book chapters. Academic quotations have to contain name(s) of author(s). Please cite all authors in References (the citation in the text should be cited as the first author and et al. when they exceed two authors). Corporations are not authors. Papers, books and reports downloaded from the internet should be quoted as Academic Sources when they contain respective data.

Please add the DOI index (digital object identifier), when available. It is supposed that academic references will be loaded into citation systems of Web of Science, SCOPUS and other databases. Such references have to be traceable. That is why such sources should be quoted in the original language (if they use the Latin alphabet).

Other sources (grey literature) are not supposed to be a part of citation systems. Typical examples of other sources are the following: statistical data, basic maps, web pages, government and planning documents, laws and regulations, technical norms, conference papers in case that the publication does not meet the standards (especially when the publisher is missing), conference presentations, oral information or interviews, etc. These sources should be quoted in a form enabling their identification as much as possible. Other sources may also be cited in the form of a footnote.

EXAMPLES

Journal paper [journals usually have a ISSN number; cite author(s), year, title, name of the journal, volume, number, pages, DOI; when the publication has both ISSN and ISBN numbers, the citation as a book is recommended]: Printsmann, A., Kruse, A. & Roth, M. (2012). Introduction for living in agricultural landscapes: practice, heritage and identity. European Countryside 4(2), 89-100. DOI: 10.2478/v10091-012-0016-5.

Book [book usually has a ISBN number; cite author(s), year, title, place of publication, the publisher; the relevant data can be found in imprint - not in layout]: Basile, E. & Cecchi, C. (2001). La Trasformazione Post-Industriale della Campagna. Torino: Rosenberg & Sellier.

Chapter in a book or proceedings [cite author(s), year, title, editor(s), name of the book, pages, place of the publication, the Publisher; in the case of the proceeding, do not cite redundant data like place and locality of conference (if they are not a part of the title), but cite the Publisher which is usually the university, academic institute or scientific society, but rarely faculty and in fact, never the department]: Vaattovaara, M., Schulman, H. & Kortteinen, M. (2011). A Nordic Welfare model at a turning point? Social housing and segregation in Finland. In Driant, J.-C. & Houard, N., eds., Social housing across the Europe (pp.49-70). Paris: La documentation Francaise.

Theses, Research Reports [cite author, year, specification of the cited source, the publisher]: Schnaitl, C. (2012). Offentlicher Leerstand in strukturschwachen Gemeinden - was tun? [Master thesis]. Wien: Universitat für Bodenkultur.

Cite websites only when absolutely necessary. In no case is the only address sufficient, as websites often change and disappear, so many of them are no longer searchable after a short time. They are cited as follows: author of the document (when known), title of the document, name of the website, publisher (owner) of the website, email address, date of last download.

Reference linking is the most significant benefit of electronic publishing. It allows readers to extend their reading experience immensely. That is why it is important to pay close attention to the references. They should be cited completely, correctly and be properly structured. Especially quotations of papers in journals have to contain the DOI index, if available!

Graphical enclosures (maps, cartograms, schemes) should be delivered in .jpg, .bmp, .tif or .eps formats. Graphs should be delivered in MS Excel, including the source table. Tables should be provided in Word or MS Excel. Colour photographs are expected with a resolution suitable for web publishing. The journal is designed to be read on screen. Therefore, graphics in A4 size must be of letter format, while small graphics must be of envelope format. All enclosures have to be numbered, described and introducing the source.

European Countryside publishes the following types of contributions: Research Papers, Editorials, Research Notes, Short Communications.

Editorials are defined as introductory papers of special numbers. They usually contain an introduction a number topic, basic theoretical anchoring and an overview of the number papers.

Research notes discuss new trends or aspects of a specific rural problem. They usually do not contain any empirical research.

Short communications are characterized as articles that are usually not sufficiently based on international literature or lack their own research. However, they are interesting and/or have some quotation potential from a specific viewpoint (e.g. problems of a specific region or a specific field of study not sufficiently covered by scientific literature or some application innovations - best practices)

The authors should suggest the type of paper together with its submission. Nevertheless, the Executive Board could change it.

The recommended minimum structure of a Research Paper is as follows:

Introduction

• basic context of theme including precise place of concerned area in European (and national) framework (see the three questions at the beginning)
• clearly defined research objectives, possibly hypotheses,
• basic argumentation to support the hypotheses.

Theoretical background

This part is mainly based on a critical literature review (regional and foreign authors) including one's own evaluation and interpretation.

Theoretic part, research objectives, empirical part (results), discussion and conclusion have to be linked.

Methodology

• description and justification of the applied methods,
• data sources, monitored period, etc.

Results

• research results with comments,
• explanation of causal relations,
• case study (if suitable),
• graphics (a map, photos) if suitable.

Conclusion and discussion

• summary of research findings
• comparison with another region/in European context/other research of authors/another methodological approach etc.
• comment of the research objectives and hypotheses

Acknowledgment

This section usually includes a reference to research funding and any acknowledgments to those who contributed to the result but are not the authors. Given the rapidly growing use of artificial intelligence, we also require a statement about the application of AI. Its use for language proofreading is entirely permissible. In other cases, specific details must be declared.

It is recommended to divide the manuscript by subtitles within a common structure (introduction, theoretical and methodological background based on an international literature, empirical knowledge, conclusion and discussion, acknowledgements, references). The paper should contain a unifying idea from the introduction to the conclusions.

Each paper will pass through an initial evaluation. It involves being checked by the anti-plagiarism program and an initial evaluation from viewpoints of coincidence with the aim and scope of the journal, clear definition of the aim and research question(s) of the paper and its sufficient embedding in the international literature (defined as papers in journals covered by Web of Knowledge or SCOPUS). In the case of a positive initial evaluation, the manuscript is forwarded to the external review process. The journal follows a double-blind reviewing procedure. Manuscripts are evaluated by at least two independent reviewers from different countries. Authors may propose to the editors to five reviewers who are experts in the field, have at least a Ph.D. level and have no conflict of interest with the authors.

The reviewers can recommend the acceptance of the manuscript in the original version, with minor or major changes or total re-working eventually rejection. The author(s) obtain the reviews with a standpoint or instructions of the Executive Board after the review process is completed.