Editorial Policies

1. Open Access Policy

UDA Law Review defines itself as an Open Access journal. This guarantees that all its content is freely, immediately, and permanently available to the public, without embargo periods. The journal charges no Article Processing Charges (APCs) to authors, nor subscription fees to readers or institutions. This policy aims to remove financial barriers in the dissemination of legal knowledge, ensuring process transparency and absolute free access to its contributions through the Open Journal Systems (OJS) platform.

2. Authorship and Contribution Policy (CRediT)

The journal maintains an open authorship policy, encouraging participation from students, scholars, and legal practitioners. To uphold academic integrity, authorship is granted exclusively to individuals who have made a substantial intellectual contribution to the conception, research, drafting, or critical revision of the work.

It is mandatory to specify the contributor roles of each author using the Contributor Roles Taxonomy (CRediT). Please note that financial oversight, collection of legislation/case law, or general technical assistance alone do not justify authorship (and should instead be acknowledged in an Acknowledgments section).

3. Copyright and Licensing Policy

Authors publishing in UDA Law Review retain copyright and grant the journal first publication rights under the terms of its editorial policies. All content is distributed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0). This license allows third parties to share (copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format) and adapt (remix, transform, and build upon the material) free of charge.

To exercise these rights, users must comply with three conditions:

  • (i) Attribution: Give appropriate credit, provide a link to the license, and indicate if changes were made.
  • (ii) NonCommercial: Do not use the material for commercial or monetary purposes.
  • (iii) ShareAlike: If you remix, transform, or build upon the material, you must distribute your contributions under the same license as the original.

Authors agree that the journal will seek the widest possible dissemination of their work through databases, scientific indexes, and academic networks. Additionally, authors are authorized to enter into non-exclusive license agreements for the distribution of the published version (e.g., in institutional repositories), provided that initial publication in UDA Law Review is explicitly acknowledged with a statement similar to: "This article was originally published in UDA Law Review, Vol. [X], No. [X], [Year]".

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

4. Pre-publication Policy (Preprints)

UDA Law Review accepts submissions of manuscripts previously deposited on preprint servers (such as SSRN, LawArXiv, or institutional repositories), as well as dissertations and conference proceedings, without compromising the originality requirement. Authors are encouraged to share pre-edited versions to foster early academic debate and increase citation potential. Authors must disclose any previous online availability of the manuscript during submission and provide the corresponding link.

5. Post-publication and Dissemination Policy

To maximize research impact, UDA Law Review reserves the right to produce a limited number of print copies for institutional and complimentary distribution to academic institutions and libraries, which do not constitute a formal print edition for editorial or bibliographical purposes.

The electronic version will be permanently available on the OJS portal, as well as digital repositories, international indexes, and academic social networks. Authors are strongly encouraged to share the final published version of their work on academic profiles (such as Google Scholar, Academia.edu, or ResearchGate) and personal websites. This practice enhances open-access benefits, increasing visibility and early citation rates for research published under the Universidad del Azuay Publishing House stamp.

Upon publication, authors receive a complimentary copy of the Journal in both electronic and print formats.

6. Integrity and Intellectual Property Protection Policy

The journal fully promotes academic integrity and best research practices. Manuscripts containing copied, fabricated, or manipulated research will not be accepted. Each submission is screened using the Turnitin® plagiarism detection software, establishing a maximum similarity threshold of 20% (excluding references). Direct plagiarism, self-plagiarism, or salami slicing constitute severe misconduct resulting in immediate rejection and application of sanctions according to our Code of Ethics.

7. Digital Preservation Policy

To ensure long-term accessibility of its content, UDA Law Review is integrated into the PKP Preservation Network (PKP PN) and conducts regular backups within Universidad del Azuay's technological infrastructure. The use of persistent identifiers and secure repository storage ensures data recovery under any technical contingency.

8. Funding Sources and Editorial Independence

UDA Law Review is funded through the continuous support of its Sponsors, who provide resources for logistics and institutional events, as well as technical assistance from the Universidad del Azuay Publishing House. The journal maintains complete editorial independence: content selection is based exclusively on scientific rigor and double-blind peer review decisions, without financial or institutional support influencing acceptance or rejection outcomes.