Local journal syndrome in the international network

Abstract EN

A local journal is a periodical serving a localised geographical readership and edited by local voluntary enthusiasts from the same region who are amateur journalists but experienced professionals.

In many countries these journals are edited and published from the same office usually a government or related agency (ie.

ministry, departments etc), academic and research institution (i.e.

universities, research centres, etc), professional and learned bodies (i.e.

society, association, etc), or voluntary group of dedicated professionals.

The main objectives of the editors of these local journals is to provide a podium for local research works, maintain the publication frequency of the journal with reasonable “quality” of published works and aim at gaining entrance into the international network.

To achieve these, the editors of local journals frequently run into series of problems which lower the quality of the journal resulting in what often referred to as “local journal syndrome” (LJS).

The international network refer to periodicals serving world-wide readership, edited by groups of remunerated professional editors, published by an international publishing agency and listed by many international database indexers.

As opposed to local journal it receives and publishes up-to-date high quality scientific material from worldwide centres and shows consistency in all aspects of editorial procedures.

The network is not necessarily affiliated to any organisation and their commercial and editorial sections are separated.

The international publishing agencies and database indexers can also be regarded as part of the “international network” because of their prejudice against local journals.

LJS is a state of progressive deterioration of the outcome and administration of local journals (as judged by increasing local criticism) due to lack of recognition of local (academic and service institutions) and international organisations as well as lack of financial support.

It has four levels of negative manifestations namely those on the quality of published works, editors and referees of same journals, local academic and service institution, and country of origin of the journal.

It is important to consider primarily the contents and consistency of all published material particularly their originality, importance, scientific relevance, contribution to science, validity, editorial procedures, layout, graphics, illustrations, ethics, copyright, adherence to format, scope and policies of the journal, etc.

There is a misunderstanding that it is prevalent in the developing countries and absent in Europe and America.

It should be noted here that some of the most important