Author Guidelines

Scope and Topics Covered

The Legon Journal for International Affairs and Diplomacy (LEJIAD) is an international refereed publication of the Legon Centre for International Affairs and Diplomacy (LECIAD). It serves as a platform for informing, educating and stimulating interest and debate among scholars and practitioners of international studies and diplomacy, as well as the general public, on matters relevant to the geopolitics of Africa and the wider world including security, economics, politics, community relations and law. The journal is also interested in manuscripts that explore relationships between public policy and international affairs.

Information for Contributors

In order to ensure impartiality in the selection of manuscripts for publication, all papers deemed appropriate for LEJIAD will be sent out anonymously to reviewers. To protect anonymity, authors should submit a separate cover page with the manuscript title and author names, affiliations, and contact information. Authors should also remove names and affiliations from the Abstract, manuscript, and/or tables and figures.

LEJIAD has the right to first publication of all submitted manuscripts. Manuscripts should not be submitted simultaneously to another publication. Submission of a manuscript to LEJIAD is taken to indicate the author’s commitment to publish in LEJIAD. No paper known to be under review by any other journal will be reviewed by LEJIAD. Authors will not be paid for accepted manuscripts. If manuscripts are accepted and published, all rights, including subsidiary rights, will be owned by LECIAD. However, the author will retain the right to use his or her article without charge in any book of which he/she is the author or editor after it has appeared in LEJIAD. There are no submission fees or article processing charges to publish in this journal. 

Types of Submissions

The Journal accepts contributions in the form of articles, practitioners’ notes, review essays and book reviews.

    Articles should be original papers inspired by theory or praxis and contextualised within scholarly literature and/or existing debates (8,500 words maximum, including footnotes and bibliographical references).

     Practice Notes up to 4,000 words detailing field experiences of practicing and/or retired diplomats from Ghana, Africa or the wider world.  

      Book reviews of current publications in international affairs — prospective authors are advised to consult with the editor prior to preparing book reviews to obtain the specific review guidelines.

Preparation and Submission (Editorial Policies)

Submissions, correspondence, revisions, and other communications should be made, whenever possible, electronically. Authors should:

• Type and double-space all copy
• Include an abstract not exceeding 200 words and a maximum of 5 keywords;
• Follow the format for references in the text and appendix set forth below;
• Sub-headingsshould be used to help structure your paper and reflect the logic and flow of the article;
• Articles should not exceed 8,000 words, inclusive of the abstracts, keywords, citations and references;
• Submit the manuscript in word document format  via the journal’s website https://journals.ug.edu.gh/index.php/lejiad/index
• Promptly respond to proposed edits and revisions.

Author details. Please include all authors’ full names, affiliations, postal addresses, telephone numbers and email addresses on the cover page. One author will need to be identified as the corresponding author; Authors’ affiliations are the affiliations where the research was conducted. If any of the named co-authors moves affiliation during the peer-review process, the new affiliation can be given as a footnote. Please note that no changes to affiliation can be made after your paper is accepted. 

Any Acknowledgements or Funding information should also be included. It is helpful if you provide this identifying information (including biographical notes and [if applicable], Acknowledgements, and Funding information) on a cover page or separate file to the main manuscript so that it can easily be removed to anonymise the manuscript for peer review.

Citations and References

In-text citations and references should follow the author-date format of The Chicago Manual of Style. In-text citations should be parenthetical. For example, sources should be identified at an appropriate point in the text by last name of author, year of publication, and pagination, all within parentheses e.g. (Gebe, 2016, 24-27).  Use of footnotes should be minimized and used only for substantive observations.

In an appendix entitled “References,” list all referenced items alphabetically by author, then by year of publication beginning with the most recent year. For multiple authors or editor listings, provide all the names of the authors. Use italics for titles of books and journals.

Funding details. Please supply all details required by your funding and grant-awarding bodies as follows: 

For single agency grants 
This work was supported by the Funding Agency under Grant number xxxx. 

For multiple agency grants 
This work was supported by the Funding Agency #1 under Grant number xxxx; Funding Agency #2 under Grant number xxxx; and Funding Agency #3 under Grant number xxxx.

Figures and tables Figures and tables should be cited within the text – e.g., ‘See Table 1’; ‘(Figure 1)’. Graphs and charts generated in special drawing software should be supplied in an appropriate format (such as tif, eps or jpeg). Graphs/images generated in MS Excel or PowerPoint should be supplied in that format. 
Tables should present new information rather than duplicating what is in the text. Readers should be able to interpret the table without reference to the text. Please supply editable files.

Using third-party material in your paper 
If you wish to include any material in your paper for which you do not hold copyright, you will need to obtain written permission from the copyright owner prior to submission.

Contact

For any further inquiries on LEJIAD, please direct correspondence to lejiad@ug.edu.gh.