Review Policy

Peer Review Policy

Pariwisata Budaya: Journal of Religious and Cultural Tourism

1. Peer Review Principles

Pariwisata Budaya is committed to maintaining high standards of academic quality, research integrity, transparency, and editorial independence. All research articles considered for publication undergo a rigorous peer-review process designed to assess their originality, methodological soundness, theoretical contribution, relevance to the journal’s aims and scope, and potential contribution to scholarship in cultural tourism, religious tourism, heritage tourism, and sustainable tourism.

Editorial decisions are based on scholarly merit, the quality of the evidence presented, and the relevance of the manuscript to the journal’s scope. Decisions are not influenced by the authors’ nationality, institutional affiliation, religion, gender, ethnicity, or personal and political views.

2. Type of Peer Review

The journal applies a double-anonymized peer-review process. Authors and reviewers are not informed of each other’s identities during the review process.

Authors must remove identifying information from the manuscript file and ensure that self-citations, acknowledgements, supplementary materials, and other manuscript elements do not unnecessarily reveal their identities. Reviewers must maintain confidentiality and avoid attempts to identify the authors unless disclosure is necessary to address a legitimate research-integrity concern.

The editorial office takes reasonable measures to protect the anonymity of both parties. Absolute anonymity cannot be guaranteed in every case, particularly when the research context or publicly available data makes identification possible.

3. Initial Editorial Screening

Upon submission, the editorial office conducts an initial screening to assess:

  1. Compliance with the journal’s aims and scope.

  2. Manuscript completeness and adherence to author guidelines.

  3. Originality and similarity concerns.

  4. Clarity of the research problem, objectives, and contribution.

  5. Basic methodological and ethical requirements.

  6. Quality of the English language sufficient for scholarly assessment.

Manuscripts that fall outside the journal’s scope, do not meet basic submission requirements, present substantial originality concerns, or lack the minimum scholarly quality required may be rejected before external peer review.

Passing the initial screening does not guarantee acceptance.

4. Selection of Reviewers

Manuscripts that pass the initial screening are assigned to qualified reviewers with relevant expertise in the subject area, theoretical framework, research methods, or empirical context of the submission.

The journal seeks to appoint reviewers who are independent of the authors and their institutions whenever practicable. Reviewers must disclose potential conflicts of interest before accepting an invitation.

Editorial board members may provide scholarly advice, but the journal should seek independent external reviewers for substantive evaluation in accordance with its reviewer-selection procedures.

5. Review Criteria

Reviewers are requested to evaluate manuscripts using the following criteria:

  1. Originality and significance: Whether the manuscript addresses a meaningful research problem and offers a clear contribution beyond existing knowledge.

  2. Theoretical engagement: Whether the manuscript critically engages with relevant literature and develops a coherent conceptual or theoretical argument.

  3. Methodological rigour: Whether the research design, data collection, sampling or case selection, analytical procedures, and ethical considerations are appropriate and sufficiently transparent.

  4. Quality of findings: Whether the findings are clearly presented, adequately supported by evidence, and interpreted without overstatement.

  5. Discussion and contribution: Whether the discussion explains the significance of the findings for theory, practice, policy, or future research.

  6. Relevance to the journal: Whether the manuscript makes a substantive contribution to cultural tourism, religious tourism, heritage tourism, destination management, tourism sustainability, or related areas within the journal’s scope.

  7. English language and presentation: Whether the manuscript communicates its argument clearly, accurately, and professionally.

  8. References and research integrity: Whether sources are relevant, accurately cited, sufficiently current, and appropriately acknowledged.

Reviewers should provide constructive, evidence-based comments and distinguish essential revisions from optional suggestions.

6. Editorial Decisions

Following peer review, the editor may issue one of the following decisions:

  • Accept: The manuscript is suitable for publication without substantive revision, subject to final editorial checks.

  • Minor Revision: The manuscript requires limited revisions that do not fundamentally alter its central argument or research design.

  • Major Revision: The manuscript requires substantial revisions to its theoretical framing, methodology, analysis, interpretation, or presentation. A further review may be required.

  • Reject: The manuscript does not meet the journal’s scholarly, methodological, ethical, or scope requirements.

The final decision rests with the Editor-in-Chief or an authorised handling editor. Reviewer recommendations inform, but do not automatically determine, the editorial decision. The journal does not guarantee acceptance or a specific review duration.

7. Revision and Resubmission

Authors invited to revise their manuscripts must submit a revised version and a point-by-point response explaining how each reviewer comment has been addressed. If a recommendation has not been followed, the authors should provide a clear scholarly justification.

Revised manuscripts may be returned to the original reviewers or assessed by the handling editor, depending on the nature and extent of the revisions.

Failure to address essential comments adequately may result in further revision or rejection.

8. Confidentiality and Use of Artificial Intelligence

Manuscripts submitted for review are confidential documents. Editors and reviewers must not share, reproduce, or use unpublished manuscript content for personal, professional, or research advantage.

Reviewers must not upload confidential manuscripts or identifiable manuscript content to external generative artificial intelligence systems or other services that could compromise confidentiality, unless expressly permitted under the journal’s policy and appropriate safeguards.

Artificial intelligence tools must not replace the independent scholarly judgement of editors or reviewers. Any permitted use of such tools must comply with the journal’s confidentiality and disclosure requirements.

9. Conflicts of Interest

Reviewers must decline an invitation or notify the editor if a personal, professional, financial, institutional, collaborative, or other relationship could reasonably compromise their impartiality.

Editors must also disclose and manage their own conflicts of interest. A manuscript involving an editor as an author, collaborator, or otherwise conflicted party must be handled by an independent editor who has no relevant conflict.

10. Research Ethics and Misconduct

Reviewers should alert the editor to potential concerns involving plagiarism, duplicate publication, fabricated or falsified data, inappropriate image manipulation, unethical research involving human participants, undisclosed conflicts of interest, or other research-integrity issues.

Reviewers should report concerns confidentially to the editor and avoid making unsupported accusations. The journal will assess such concerns in accordance with its publication ethics policy and relevant guidance from the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE).

11. Appeals and Complaints

Authors may appeal an editorial decision by submitting a reasoned written explanation identifying a possible factual error, procedural irregularity, or substantial misunderstanding of the manuscript.

An appeal will be assessed by an editor who is independent of the original decision wherever practicable. Disagreement with a reviewer’s scholarly opinion alone does not necessarily justify reversal of an editorial decision.

Complaints concerning editorial conduct or the peer-review process may be submitted to the Editor-in-Chief or the publisher through the contact information provided on the journal website.

12. Continuous Improvement

The journal periodically reviews its peer-review procedures to promote fairness, consistency, confidentiality, timeliness, and academic quality. The journal may update this policy when necessary to reflect developments in scholarly publishing standards and research-integrity practices.

The journal will publish its review procedures transparently and ensure that editorial practices remain consistent with the policy stated on its website.