EDITORIAL
THOUGHTS ON ETHICS AND PUBLISHING
ACTA CARSOLOGICA 49/1, 5, POSTOJNA 2020
Editorial is a privilege of the editors to share their opin-
ions and news with the readers. It’s been a while since the 
last editorial was published in Acta Carsologica. In the 
following, I present my opinion on some issues related to 
our work and publishing. It was provoked by the Opin-
ion, written by W olfgang Dreybrodt and published in this 
issue. We are all aware that the way we do and publish 
scientific work has been changing fast and dramatically. 
Rapid progress, broad and productive collaborations, 
ever better access to sophisticated research equipment, 
the need for publishing and the search for funds some-
times distract us from deep thinking on the research 
questions that should be the key element of scientific 
work. The somehow provoking Opinion opens up many 
concerns that we all face. It does not reflect the opinion of 
the editorial board, although I agree with most of them. 
At some point one might say that times have changed, we 
need to collaborate and promote our work in order to be 
seen. However, basic scientific ethics as stressed in the 
Opinion, should not suffer from the changes. 
One ethical question facing the editors is whether 
we should publish in our own journals. A principle an-
swer would be no. Acta Carsologica has an inherent in-
terest in the research at Classical Karst, where most of 
our editors work. Therefore, we publish in our journal, 
but we do not interfere into the editorial process of our 
manuscripts.
In times when you have to pay either to read and/or 
publish a manuscript, new opportunities arise for jour-
nals like ours. These journals can attract authors who, for 
whatever reason, cannot or do not want to spend money 
on publication and want to keep their work open. How-
ever, authors and readers should be aware that publish-
ing is not our main task and that it is difficult to offer 
such good services as in journals belonging to the large 
publishing groups. In addition to managing reviews and 
making decisions, the editors’ tasks often include pro-
viding funds for layout and printing, reporting, website 
maintenance, proofreading, translation, transport, pack-
aging and dispatch of issues. Surely this should not be 
an excuse for the delays in publication or the long edito-
rial process, but I hope for some understanding of those 
waiting. We can of course improve.
The whole system of scientific publishing is depend-
ent on the review process. The everlasting problem of 
this and other journals is to get reviewers and then the 
timely reviews. Looking at the number of publications 
processed at any time, even in a “narrow” field like ours, 
we can imagine how many reviewers are needed. Most 
potential reviewers are busy, active researchers who are 
aware of the importance of the reviews, but are unable 
to respond to the requests. If a review takes one day, how 
many reviews per year can one accept? And, when it 
comes to selection, why not do a review for a high-rank-
ing journal in which you want to publish your own work. 
Journals like ours therefore depend on a strong commu-
nity interested in ensuring that their research field vivid 
and recognised. Small focused journals provide such a 
platform. I am asking you all to consider your own role in 
the karst community and accept the review from our and 
other karst science journals. This will keep us well and 
alive, and your work published and seen as well.
Franci Gabrovšek