Focus and Scope

The Journal of Current Chinese Affairs is an internationally refereed academic journal published by the GIGA Institute of Asian Studies, Hamburg. The journal focuses on current developments in Greater China. It is simultaneously published (three times per year) online as an Open Access journal and as a printed version with a circulation of 1,000 copies, making it one of the world’s most widely read periodicals on Asian affairs. The Journal of Current Chinese Affairs, unlike some other Open Access publications, does not charge its authors any fee.

The Journal of Current Chinese Affairs reaches a broad international readership in academia, administration and business circles. It is devoted to the transfer of scholarly insights to a wide audience. The journal is committed to publishing high-quality, original research on current issues in China in a format and style that is accessible across disciplines and to professionals with an interest in the region.

The editors welcome contributions on current affairs within Greater China, including Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan. Submissions can focus on emerging topics and current developments as well as on future-oriented debates in the fields of China's global and regional roles; political, economic and social developments including foreign affairs, business, finance, cultural industries, religion, education, science and technology; and so on.

Contributions are published in one of three sections: Research articles cover original research, are theoretically grounded, empirically sound and reflect the state of the art in modern China studies. Analyses reflect new thinking, are based in practical and/or professional experience and are non-partisan contributions to an understanding of policies, business, economic and cultural practice, and other evolving themes. Review articles provide an overview over recently published studies and the state of the art of current affairs within Greater China.
 
All manuscripts are peer-reviewed for acceptance, and the editors will respond within three months. Research articles should not exceed 10,000 words; analyses and review articles should not exceed 5,000 words (both incl. abstract and references). The Journal of Current Chinese Affairs only accepts English-language manuscripts, which must be submitted exclusively to this publication.

Interested readers can access the abstracts and tables of contents of earlier issues of the journal via the webpage http://www.giga-hamburg.de/de/publikationen/archiv.

 

Section Policies

Featured Topics - Analyses

Checked Open Submissions Checked Indexed Checked Peer Reviewed

Research Articles

Checked Open Submissions Checked Indexed Checked Peer Reviewed

Analyses

Checked Open Submissions Checked Indexed Checked Peer Reviewed
 

Peer Review Process

Authors are asked to submit their contributions under the following sections:

  • Research Articles
  • Analyses
  • Review Articles
The Journal of Current Chinese Affairs is an internationally refereed academic journal published by the Institute of Asian Studies (part of the GIGA German Institute of Global and Area Studies) in Hamburg, Germany. All articles published in the journal have been subjected to a double-blind peer review. This peer-review process is an independent quality-control procedure for articles submitted to journals and is vital for enhancing the quality, credibility and acceptability of published research papers.

The editors of the Journal of Current Chinese Affairs are responsible for maintaining high editorial standards and ensuring that the journal fulfils its stated mission as formulated both on the institute’s website and in the journal itself. The editors decide if a submitted manuscript is suitable for inclusion and falls within the journal’s remit. If a submitted manuscript is peripheral to the area of interest covered by the Journal of Current Chinese Affairs, it will either be rejected or the editors will ask the author to resubmit the paper after it has been revised. If the editors decide that an article is suitable for publication, it will then enter the review process.

The evaluation of each contribution submitted is done through a double-blind peer review. The editors usually select two independent reviewers (sometimes three) who conduct research or work in the same area as the author and are subject specialists. In the double-blind process all information on the manuscript which identifies the author is removed before the manuscript is sent to the reviewers. The reviewers then judge the manuscript in accordance with a set of standardised criteria and return it to the editors. The editors subsequently pass any comments made by the reviewers back to the author in an appropriate and anonymous format. Neither the author nor the reviewers know each other’s identities, thus ensuring impartiality.

The criteria that editors and reviewers of the Journal of Current Chinese Affairs use for evaluation purposes correspond to international standards, i.e., measures that are commonly used as benchmarks for academic journals. They are as follows:
  • Is the article concerned with a subject of high relevance to modern Chinese studies and current developments in China?
  • Does the article add substantial new insights and contribute original research outcomes to existing scholarship in terms of theoretical development, the exploration of new empirical material or the reappraisal of existing materials?
  • Is the article clearly related to relevant existing scholarly literature?
  • Are the arguments based on empirical evidence and are they presented in a clear and logical structure?
  • Is the article well written and clearly presented?
  • Are the conclusions made strong enough, and does the article achieve its stated aims?
The editors use a reviewing scheme which focuses on these questions and includes a series of boxes to tick. Sufficient room is also provided for reviewers to make lengthier comments if necessary.

Once a manuscript has been reviewed, it is then placed in one of three categories: rejected, accepted, or returned for revision with the suggestion that the author makes amendments to the article which might meet the reviewers’ satisfaction. If the reviewers ask for a manuscript to be revised, the author has the opportunity to amend the text and resubmit the revised manuscript together with a revision report stating the ways in which s/he has addressed the issues raised by the reviewers. The editors then decide if the alterations the author has made have sufficiently taken the points raised in the review into account. When evaluating this revision the editors may consult the reviewers. Accordingly, the manuscript will be finally accepted or rejected. If an author is unhappy with any stage of the review process, s/he is free to withdraw the manuscript and submit it to a different journal, subject to prior notice.

 

Open Access Policy

This journal provides immediate Open Access to its content on the principle that making research freely available to the public supports a greater global exchange of knowledge.

 

Privacy Statement

The names and e-mail addresses entered in this journal's site will be used exclusively for the stated purposes of this journal and will not be made available for any other purpose or to any other party.

 

Indexes and Abstracts

Articles in the Journal of Current Chinese Affairs are abstracted and indexed by Bibliography of Asian Studies (BAS), Columbia International Affairs Online (CIAO), Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ), EBSCO Discovery Index and Political Science Complete, Elsevier Scopus, Research Papers in Economics (IDEAS/RePEc), International Bibliography of Periodical Literature in the Humanities and Social Sciences (IBZ), International Political Science Abstracts (IPSA), Public Affairs Information Service International (PAIS), Summon (ProQuest), Ulrich’s Periodicals Directory, and World Affairs Online (WAO/FIV-IBLK).

 

History of the Journal

Since our journal was established as the German-language monthly China aktuell in 1972, China has undergone tremendous change and development. Subsequent editors have adjusted to the new trends, changes in the academic environment, and new scholarly demands in the field of modern China studies. Having started as one of the few available sources of academic analysis on China in the 1970s, by the 1980s the journal had become the showcase of the China-watching capabilities of the research staff working at the Institute of Asian Affairs (now the GIGA Institute of Asian Studies). As information from within China became more accessible during the reform era, the journal successfully deepened both its scholarly discussion and its international impact. It was exactly this apparent over-abundance of information and data from China, and the new challenges to researching current phenomena posed by the sheer volume and diversity of information and data, which led the publisher to initiate the next phase of reform during the first years of the new millennium, transforming the originally German-language in-house publication China aktuell into a top-quality academic journal for international scholarship in modern China studies under its new title, Journal of Current Chinese Affairs.

 

Publication Ethics and Malpractice Statement

The journal adheres strongly to the guidelines of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE). All instances of publishing misconduct, including, but not limited to, plagiarism, data fabrication, image/data manipulation to falsify/enhance findings, etc., will result in rejection/retraction of the manuscript in question.



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