Revista de Investigações Constitucionais
1. BIBLIOGRAPHICAL INFORMATION
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2. FOCUS AND SCOPE
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A Revista de Investigações Constitucionais (ISSN 2359-5639) is an open-access, quarterly (with rolling publication), electronic scientific jornal, promoted by NINC – Núcleo de Investigações Constitucionais da Universidade Federal do Paraná (www.ninc.com.br). Its main objective is to publishing excelling law articles by national and foreign researchers in the constitutional field, and to be read by legal scholars, researchers and law students from different countries interested in constitutional law, through the publication of articles in English, Spanish, Portuguese and French. Its Editorial Board is composed of renowned jurists affiliated with higher education institutions in Brazil, Germany, Austria, Argentina, Australia, Chile, China, Colombia, United States, Spain, France, Italy, Ireland, Portugal, Singapore, and Venezuela. The journal’s editorial line follows the main research areas developed by the research center (NINC-UFPR), with focus on the critical study of Constitutional Law, prioritizing themes directly related to constitutional dogmatics, such as fundamental rights, constitutional courts, judicial review, relationship between the Powers, federalism, legislative process and constitutional reform, electoral systems, Comparative Constitutional Law, among others. According to CNPq (the Brazilian National Council for Scientific and Technological Development) classification, the journal covers the following area:
Great area: Applied Social Sciences (6.00.00.00-7) |
3. BRIEF HISTORY
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Revista de Investigações Constitucionais was created in 2014, on the initiative of its Editor-in-Chief, Prof. Dr. Daniel Wunder Hachem, Academic Director of the NINC – Núcleo de Investigações Constitucionais da Universidade Federal do Paraná. The founding of the journal was based on two main objectives: (i) to create an open access scientific journal in the area of Constitutional Law, which would meet the criteria of high editorial quality established by the COPE – Committee on Publication Ethics and by the most relevant indexers and databases on the international scene; (ii) to open space for the dissemination of constitutional investigations from different countries, both in Latin America and other parts of the world, contributing to the study of Comparative Constitutional Law. The Editorial Team, Editorial Policies and Guidelines for Authors were structured after a thorough study of international quality parameters for scientific journals. As a result, the journal was indexed in the four most demanding and important databases on the international scene: Web of Science (2017), Scopus (2017), SciELO (2018) and Redalyc (2018). At the national level, it was classified as Qualis A1 by CAPES (Coordination for the Improvement of Higher Education Personnel – Brazilian Ministry of Education) in all classifications since its creation (Quadrennia 2013-2016 and 2017-2020).
In terms of funding, the journal was awarded resources from CAPES and CNPq in the following funding calls: |
4. PUBLICATION FREQUENCY
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The Journal adopts the method of rolling publication. Three issues are released per year, one every four months:
Articles are inserted continuously into published issues, according to approval and layout, without the need to close a complete issue for publication. Each article is published within an issue with its own table of contents and identified within that issue using the e-location (code composed of the letter “e” and three digits - example: e231). |
5. PEER REVIEW PROCESS
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5.1. Articles are selected through peer review, in two stages: (i) internal review by the Editorial Board (desk review); and (ii) external peer review, which may take different forms in accordance with Open Science practices, as described below. 5.2. In the desk review stage, the article is checked to see whether it strictly complies with all the requirements set forth in the Guidelines for Authors, such as authorship requirements, respect for the number of pages, compliance with the journal's methodological standards regarding citations and bibliographic references, the theme's fit within the editorial line, originality and innovation of the approach, quality of writing, among others. In the event of non-compliance with any of the guidelines, whether for reasons of form or content, the article will be rejected outright. 5.3. Once approved in the desk review stage, the article is submitted to the peer review procedure, adopting the double-blind method as the initial standard: double anonymity of the author and the reviewers. The article is sent without identification of authorship to at least two reviewers holding a PhD degree who are members of the journal's Board of Reviewers or designated ad hoc, affiliated with national (exogenous to the State of Paraná) and foreign higher education institutions. 5.4. Authors who choose to deposit their articles on preprint servers are aware that the deposit makes the work public and allows possible identification of authorship, so that reviewers may occasionally come to know the authorship of the reviewed work. In this case, the double blind peer review process (with double anonymity, of the author and the reviewers) becomes single blind peer review (peer review with simple anonymity), in which only the anonymity of one of the parties to the process – the reviewers – is guaranteed. 5.5. In accordance with Open Science practices, the author has the option of authorizing the editors to promote their direct interaction with the reviewers of the article, waiving the anonymous nature of the review, if the reviewers also agree. In this case, the open peer review modality is adopted. This option must be expressed by the author at the time of submission of the article, in the Form 1 – Authors Data and Open Science Compliance, available for download at: https://revistas.ufpr.br/rinc/libraryFiles/downloadPublic/8. If this modality is adopted, the authors agree that the journal will grant the reviewers the possibility of publishing the reviews in the same issue in which the article will be published. 5.6. To be approved, the article must receive two favorable opinions for publication, either as it is or through corrections suggested by the reviewers. If there is at least one opinion for rejection, the article may be rejected, if the Editorial Board considers the reasons for this to be sufficient. In the event of a dispute between the two reviewers, the article will be submitted to a third reviewer.
5.5. The criteria used in the evaluation form are as follows:
5.6. The possible results of the evaluation process are as follows: 5.7. The evaluation process usually takes up to 2 months in cases of rejection by desk review, and 3 to 6 months in cases of submission of the article for peer review. |
6. DIGITAL PRESERVATION AND ARCHIVING
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The journal follows the standards defined in the Digital Preservation Policy of the SciELO Program. It uses the LOCKSS system to create a distributed archive system among the participating libraries and allows the creation of permanent archives of the journal for preservation and restoration.
Digital preservation is carried out by Cariniana – Brazilian Network of Digital Preservation Services (IBICT – Brazilian Institute of Information in Science and Technology) through the LOCKSS system. Information about preservation is available on the Archival Status tab on the journal's page on The Keepers Registry portal.
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7. ARTICLE PROCESSING AND PUBLICATION COSTS (APCs)
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Submission, processing and publication of articles are free of charge, with no fees (APCs) charged to authors. |
8. SPONSORS
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The journal would like to thank CAPES (Coordination for the Improvement of Higher Education Personnel – Brazilian Ministry of Education) and CNPq (Brazilian National Council for Scientific and Technological Development) for the funding received. It was awarded financial resources in the following funding notices:
- Chamada CNPq nº 12/2022 - Programa Editorial |
9. INDEXING
10. SOCIAL MEDIA
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The journal is present on the following social media:
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This journal adheres to the Principles of the SciELO Program as an Open Science framework and a global public good, agreeing with the Declaration in Support of Open Science with the IDEIA Principles – Impact, Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Accessibility – and the UNESCO Recommendation on Open Science. The Open Science practices adopted by the journal are:
1.1. Open Access Statement: Immediate Free Access to Content The journal adopts the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC-BY) for both its website content and published articles, with copyright retained by the authors.
1.2. Preprints, Postprints, and Self-Archiving
Preprints are articles that have not yet undergone peer review within the editorial process of a scientific journal or have been peer-reviewed but not yet published. These can be deposited in certified servers without compromising the originality of the research. In such cases, authors should be aware that: 1.3. Open Research Data To promote data accessibility, transparency, and the reproducibility of research, the journal adopts parameters for the sharing of research data in accordance with the Guide to promoting the opening, transparency and reproducibility of research published by SciELO journals.
Articles based on empirical data collected by the authors (e.g., sets of decisions from a specific court; interviews conducted with participants), in addition to a literature review, must deposit the research data files in SciELO Data (an official data repository), within the Revista de Investigações Constitucionais dataverse (https://data.scielo.org/dataverse/brrinc), observing the following: 1.4. Possibility of Open Peer Review and Publication of Review Reports
The author has the option to authorize the editors to facilitate direct interaction with the article’s reviewers, waiving the anonymous nature of the review, provided that the reviewers also agree. In this case, the open peer review model is adopted. This option must be indicated by the author at the time of article submission in the Form 1 – Authors Data and Open Science Compliance, available for download at: https://revistas.ufpr.br/rinc/libraryFiles/downloadPublic/8. 1.5. Publication of the Names of Responsible Editors Starting in 2024, the names of the editors responsible for overseeing the article’s review process will be indicated at the end of the article. |
2. PUBLISHING ETHICS AND BEST PRACTICES POLICY
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To ensure an ethical and scientifically integral process of editing, reviewing, and publishing articles, the journal uses the following documents as guidelines for its editors, Editorial Board members, reviewers, and authors:
Below is a summary of the main duties addressed to editors, authors, and reviewers, which do not exclude others mentioned in the documents above, which should be considered as an integral part of the journal’s Publishing Ethics and Best Practices Policy: 2.1. Main Duties of Editors
2.2. Main Duties of Authors
2.3. Main Duties of Reviewers
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3. CONFLICT OF INTEREST POLICY
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Public trust in the peer review process and the credibility of published articles partially depend on how conflicts of interest are managed during the writing, peer review, and editorial decision-making processes. The journal adopts the following guidelines on this matter:
3.1. Authors submitting an article to the journal are required to declare whether or not conflicts of interest exist. |
4. MISCONDUCT, ERRATA, AND RETRACTION POLICY
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4.1. Process for the Verification of Misconduct and Violations 4.1.2. If a suspicion of misconduct or violation of the journal's Editorial Policies is found, either by the editors or through submitted reports, the editors will conduct a thorough and detailed examination of the situation, gathering as much documentary evidence as possible regarding the potential violation. 4.1.3. Once evidence of a possible violtaion is found, the editors will notify the parties involved via email of the identified irregularity and allow a 15-day period for response, which may be reduced to 5 days for serious violations. 4.1.4. After receiving the responses from the accused parties, the editors will analyze the arguments and make a decision regarding the occurrence of misconduct or violation, consulting the Editorial Board members for opinions if necessary, to assist in the decision-making process.
4.1.5. If misconduct or violation is confirmed, the editors may apply the following sanctions, separately or cumulatively, depending on the severity of the facts: 4.1.6. If the process originated from a report, the editors will inform the reporter of the conclusion of the process and the grounds for the decision.
4.2. Process for the Publication of Errata and Article Retraction 4.2.2. Errata will be published when authors, editors, reviewers, or readers identify the need for corrections in documents published by the journal due to errors or failures that do not constitute misconduct. 4.2.3. When serious problems or misconduct are identified in already published articles, the journal may proceed with: (i) partial retraction: registration and disclosure of the issue in an excerpt of the publication; (ii) total retraction: cancellation of the entire content of the publication. 4.2.4. Retraction will be carried out by publishing a "Retraction Notice" explaining the reasons for the retraction in the most recent issue of the journal. This notice will be added to the original article file in the issue where it was published. The article will not be removed from the issue in which it was published but will include the "Retraction Notice" and: (i) in the case of partial retraction: a black mark with a retraction notice on the affected figure, table, paragraph, or section; (ii) in the case of total retraction: a watermark reading "RETRACTED ARTICLE" on all pages of the document. 4.2.5. If the reason for retraction involves misconduct or a violation of the journal's Editorial Policies, it will be preceded by the "Process for the Verification of Misconduct and Violations" described above. |
5. PLAGIARISM POLICY AND SIMILARITY CHECK SOFTWARE
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The journal uses Turnitin’s iThenticate software to check for plagiarism and similarities between the submitted article and previous publications. Plagiarism checks are conducted during the desk review stage, after the article’s compliance with the Author Guidelines has been verified and before the article is submitted for peer review. If plagiarism is detected in the article, the procedure described in the "4.1. Process for the Verification of Misconduct and Violations" section above will be followed, potentially culminating in the total retraction of the article as outlined in "4.2. Process for the Publication of Errata and Article Retraction". The steps of the process adhere to the COPE flowchart Plagiarism in a submitted manuscript. |
6. INCLUSION AND DIVERSITY POLICY
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6.1. Gender Equity in the Editorial Board
6.2. Consideration of Gender Diversity in Journal Issues Composition
6.3. Guidelines on Sex and Gender Equity in Empirical Research |
7. LICENSE AND COPYRIGHT POLICY
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The journal adopts the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License for both its website content and published articles.
1. Authors retain copyright and grant the journal the right of first publication with the article simultaneously licensed under the Creative Commons - Attribution 4.0 International which allows sharing the work with recognition of the authors and its initial publication in this Journal.
7.4. Authors have the right to:
7.5. Under the following terms:
7.6. Notices: |
8. ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE TOOLS POLICY
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8.1. The use of generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) tools by authors, such as ChatGPT and other tools based on large language models (LLMs), is authorized solely and exclusively as a basic support tool for authors for the purpose of refining or correcting spelling and grammar, editing, and formatting the text. In such cases, the author is fully responsible for the accuracy and precision of any information provided by the tool, as well as for any potential violations of the journal's Editorial Policies.
8.2. Authors are strictly prohibited from using generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) tools to: 8.3. Generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) tools cannot be listed as coauthors of an article, as they cannot be held accountable for the submitted article, in accordance with COPE’s position statement on Authorship and AI tools . 8.4. The use of generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) tools by authors, in cases permitted by this policy, must be disclosed in a footnote of the article, detailing which tool was used and how it was utilized. |
9. PRIVACY POLICY
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All data provided by authors to this journal will be used exclusively for the services provided by this publication and will not be made available for other purposes or to third parties. |
Editor-in-Chief
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Deputy Editor
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Associate Editors
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Editorial Board
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1. Article submission and outright rejection
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Proposals for articles for publication in the journal must be submitted through the electronic submission system (free of charge) by registering in the UFPR Electronic Journal System and accessing it through login and password at this link. Proposals submitted via email will not be accepted. The journal reserves the right to accept or reject any manuscript received, based on the recommendations of its Editorial Board, as well as the right to propose any necessary changes. Articles may be rejected outright by the Editorial Team, in a non-appealable decision, for the following reasons:
1.1. Addressing a topic that is outside the scope of the journal’s priorities, either by being unrelated to its focus and scope or by covering a transient or overly specific subject that holds little interest for the journal's readership. |
2. Types of Accepted Documents
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The journal publishes the following types of documents:
2.1. Original articles, defined as research results with an original and innovative approach, not limited to a literature review without new contributions (90 to 100% of the documents in each issue). |
3. Author Qualifications
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At least one of the article’s authors must hold a Doctoral degree (Dr.), Doctor of Juridical Science (J.S.D. or S.J.D), Doctor juris (Dr. iur. or Dr. jur.), Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.), or Legum Doctor (LL.D.). This requirement may be relaxed, without exceeding 30% per journal issue, in exceptional cases such as: (i) articles by authors affiliated with foreign institutions, without simultaneous affiliation to Brazilian institutions; (ii) articles written in English. |
4. Transparency on Authorship and Level of Contribution to the Research
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4.1. The journal accepts co-authored articles with up to three authors. In cases of empirical research involving the analysis of a large amount of data, articles with more than three authors may be accepted, provided that a well-founded justification is presented in the Form 2 – Specification of Co-authorship Contributions, available for download at: https://revistas.ufpr.br/rinc/libraryFiles/downloadPublic/9. 4.2. COPE – Committee on Publication Ethics recommends that journals adopt transparency policies regarding the authors of articles and the level of contribution of each author. Therefore, for co-authored articles, it will be necessary to complete and submit the Form 2 – Specification of Co-authorship Contributions along with the article, available for download at: https://revistas.ufpr.br/rinc/libraryFiles/downloadPublic/9. The form adopts the CRediT Taxonomy, which specifies 14 possible roles performed by co-authors in the development of the research. The form will require specifying which of these 14 roles were performed by each co-author: 1. Conceptualization: Ideas; formulation or evolution of overarching research goals and aims; 2. Data Curation: Management activities to annotate (produce metadata), scrub data and maintain research data (including software code, where it is necessary for interpreting the data itself) for initial use and later re-use; 3. Formal Analysis: Application of statistical, mathematical, computational, or other formal techniques to analyze or synthesize study data; 4. Funding Acquisition: Acquisition of the financial support for the project leading to this publication; 5. Investigation: Conducting the research and investigation process, specifically performing the experiments, or data/evidence collection; 6. Methodology: Development or design of methodology; creation of models; 7. Project Administration: Management and coordination responsibility for the research activity planning and execution; 8. Resources: Provision of study materials, reagents, materials, patients, laboratory samples, animals, instrumentation, computing resources, or other analysis tools; 9. Software: Programming, software development; designing computer programs; implementation of the computer code and supporting algorithms; testing of existing code components; 10. Supervision: Oversight and leadership responsibility for the research activity planning and execution, including mentorship external to the core team; 11. Validation: Verification, whether as a part of the activity or separate, of the overall replication/reproducibility of results/experiments and other research outputs; 12. Visualization: Preparation, creation and/or presentation of the published work, specifically visualization/data presentation; 13. Writing – Original Draft: Preparation, creation and/or presentation of the published work, specifically writing the initial draft (including substantive translation); 14. Writing – Review & Editing: Preparation, creation and/or presentation of the published work by those from the original research group, specifically critical review, commentary or revision – including pre- or post-publication stages. |
5. Originality and Exclusivity
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5.1. Texts submitted for publication in the journal must be original and intended for exclusive publication. Once published in this journal, they may also be included in books and collections, provided that the original publication is cited with an indication of the link to the published document in the journal. |
6. Languages
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Articles written in Portuguese, Spanish, English, or French may be submitted. |
7. Metadata Registration in the Electronic Submission System
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7.1. At the time of article submission in the electronic system, the metadata fields must be filled out according to these guidelines, under penalty of summary rejection of the submission.
7.2. Manuscript Transfer
7.3. Authors:
7.4. Title and Abstract: 7.5. Keywords: Provide 5 keywords in the article's language (in lowercase and separated by semicolons). 7.6. Funding Agencies: Articles resulting from funded research projects must indicate the source of funding in this field. 7.7. References: Insert the complete list of references cited in the article, with a space between each entry. 7.8. Conflict of Interest: Indicate any potential conflicts of interest. Follow the instructions in “3. Conflict of Interest Policy” in the Editorial Policies section. |
8. Text Presentation and Pre-Textual Elements
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8.1. The work must be between 15 and 30 pages of content (A4 size - 21 cm × 29.7 cm), including the introduction, development, conclusion (not necessarily with these titles), and a list of bibliographic references effectively cited in the text. For the calculation of the minimum and maximum number of pages, pages containing pre-textual elements (abstract, keywords, etc.) and the bibliographic reference list are not considered. Articles with fewer than 15 pages will be summarily rejected. The maximum number of pages may be relaxed in exceptional cases, as decided by the Editorial Team. 8.2. The margins should be: left and top at 3 cm, and right and bottom at 2 cm. 8.3. The body of the text should use Times New Roman font, size 12, 1.5 line spacing, and 0 pt spacing before and after paragraphs. 8.4. Footnotes should use Times New Roman font, size 10, with single line spacing. 8.5. Paragraphs in the body of the text should have a 1.5 cm indentation from the left margin. Titles and subtitles should be aligned to the left margin without indentation.
8.6. The structure should follow this order: 8.7. Any emphasis intended for the text must be done using italics; the use of bold, underlining, or uppercase letters for emphasis is prohibited. 8.8. Figures and tables must be inserted in the text and not placed at the end of the document as appendices. |
9. Reference Style Guidelines
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9.1. References to books, chapters in collective volumes, articles, theses, dissertations, and undergraduate or postgraduate monographs cited or used as the basis for writing the text must be included in footnotes with complete information, following the Brazilian technical standards (ABNT NBR 6023:2018), and specifically indicating the page from which the information was drawn immediately after the reference. 9.1.2. Articles written in the (AUTHOR, YEAR) format will not be accepted for publication.
9.1.3. References should follow the format below:
9.1.4. The elements of the references must follow this standard:
9.1.5. In cases where it is absolutely impossible to obtain some of the information above, the absence should be indicated as follows:
9.2. Direct quotes should follow these guidelines: |
10. Writing
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10.1. Texts should be reviewed and use language appropriate for scientific publication. |
11. Articles Resulting from Funded Research
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Articles resulting from funded research projects must include, in a footnote at the end of the article's title in the language of the text, information regarding the research funding. |
12. Copyright Statement
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Authors who publish in this Journal agree to the following terms: 12.1. Authors retain copyright and grant the journal the right of first publication with the article simultaneously licensed under the Creative Commons - Attribution 4.0 International which allows sharing the work with recognition of the authors and its initial publication in this Journal. 12.2. Authors are able to take on additional contracts separately, for non-exclusive distribution of the version of the paper published in this Journal (eg.: publishing in institutional repository or as a book), with a recognition of its initial publication in this Journal.
12.3. Authors are allowed and encouraged to publish and distribute their work online on personal blogs, institutional repositories, academic social networks, and personal social media platforms, provided that a full citation to the journal's version of the work is included. This may be done at any stage before or during the editorial process, as it can lead to productive exchanges and increase the impact and citation of the published work.
12..4. Authors have the right to:
12.5. Under the following terms:
12.6. Notices: |
13. Responsibilities of Authors
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13.1. Authors are responsible for the content published and commit to actively participating in the discussion of the results of their scientific research, as well as in the review process and approval of the final version of the work. |
14. Conflict of Interest
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Public trust in the peer review process and the credibility of published articles partially depend on how conflicts of interest are managed during the writing, peer review, and editorial decision-making processes. The journal adopts the following guidelines on this matter:
14.1. Authors submitting an article to the journal are required to declare whether or not conflicts of interest exist. |
15. Forms to attach to article submission
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15.1. Mandatory for all submissions: Form 1 – Authors Data and Open Science Compliance |
CONTACT
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Publisher
Editor-in-Chief
Deputy Editor (Technical Support) |
