All stakeholders (authors, readers, researchers, publishers, referees and editors) of Balkan Journal of Social Sciences BJSS are expected to bear the following ethical responsibilities within the scope of publication ethics. While creating the following ethical duties and responsibilities, the "COPE Code of Conduct and Best Practice Guidelines for Journal Editors" and "COPE Best Practice Guidelines for Journal Editors" guidelines published by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) were taken into consideration.

Editor (s)
• The editor and field editor(s) should acknowledge receipt of submitted manuscripts to the authors within seven days. The editor and field editor(s) have responsibility for deciding which of the submitted manuscripts could be published.
• The editor and field editors are responsible for the equal, fair and timely completion of the evaluation process through expert referee(s) in the relevant field. Unless any additional referees are required, the editor or field editors ensures that the article submitted to the journal is evaluated by at least two external and independent reviewers.
• Studies without plagiarism / similarity report are rejected by the editor or field editors.
• The unpublished data, information and method in the submitted manuscripts should not be used by anyone in her/his study without the written permission of the author.
• The submitted manuscripts should be evaluated in accordance to the framework of solely intellectual norms in regardless of social, religious, cultural, economic background of authors.
• The submitted manuscripts should not be disclosed by the editor or field editors to anyone other than the author (s) of the study and referees. The confidentiality of all articles submitted to the journal, communications with relevant parties and the identity of referees must be protected by the editor and the field editor.
• Individual and joint articles of the editor, members of the editorial board, and editors and editorial board members of the past years are not included in the publication / evaluation process of the journal.
• The final decision concerning the acceptance or rejection of the submitted manuscripts belongs to the editor. The decision should be made according to the originality and significance of the submitted manuscripts.
• The editor should not oblige to the authors to cite any article in the journal or other study in the other journals for the acceptance of the articles submitted to the journal.
• The editor or field editor(s) are responsible for following processes without compromising intellectual property rights and ethical standards.

Referee(s)

• The referees who feel that they do not have sufficient qualification about the study or are unable to complete the review process on time should leave their evaluation duty by informing the editor or the field editors.
• Referees should make their evaluations in accordance with the confidentiality principle. Referees should not share or discuss information on the submitted study with no one except the editor and the field editor(s).
• Referees should not disclose and share any data/content and opinions of the submitted manuscripts and should not use them for their personal interest. Furthermore, the referees should not utilize any data of the unpublished paper.
• The criticism of the referees should be based on objective and scientific perspective. The referees should avoid from personal criticism against the author(s). The referees should express their opinions with supporting arguments.
• Referees should provide clear and detailed reasons for the rejected manuscripts.
• If the referees detect any similarities between the assigned manuscript and another published articles in the journal or in another journal, they should notify the editor about this situation.
• Referees should not evaluate manuscripts whose authors have conflict of interest with them.
• The proposal of the referees appointed to evaluate the paper should be scientifically reasonable for referencing their own work.
• Referees can recommend their or their partner’s studies to be cited. However, this should be scientifically reasonable without the intention of increasing their citations.

Author(s)

• Authors who submit a research article to the journal should make sure that the content of the article includes original results and discussions that emphasize the importance of the study.
• The author (s) must have a document showing that they have the rights to use the data used, the necessary permissions for the research / analysis or that they have carried out the authorization procedures for the experimental subjects.
• Authors should basically not publish a text describing the same research in more than one article and submit it to a journal.
• Authors should not publish the results of basically the same research in more than one article and should not send them to the journals.
• The author (s) should not submit the same article, partially or entirely, to more than one journal. This type of behavior is unethical and not accepted by the journal.
• Authors should provide data on their work within the framework of ethical principles. The publisher, editor, and referee may request the raw data that underpin the work from the author(s).
• Studies submitted to the journal should contain sufficient source information and details. Fraudulent and deliberate misrepresentation is unacceptable as it will lead to unethical situations.
• Unethical issues such as plagiarism, controversial and misrepresentation are never acceptable in the content of an article.
• The submitted manuscripts should be original and the originality of the study should be ensured by the author(s). If others’ papers and/or words are used in the context of the submitted manuscript, the reference should be provided in accordance to appropriate style. Also, excerpts should be in an appropriate style in accordance to the writing rules of the journal and scientific ethics. Authors must cite previous publications that affect the essence of their submitted work.
• Authors are obliged to declare a conflict of interest and the organizations and financial resources that support their submitted work.
• Any person contributing to the design, implementation, or interpretation of the submitted manuscript should be identified in the study. All significant contributors should be listed following the first author. Other contributors should be added to the "Acknowledgment" part of the study.
• If the author detects a material error or flaw in the published manuscript in the journal, the author is obliged to immediately report this situation to the editor or publisher of the journal and to cooperate with the editor to correct the existing error or flaw.