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In February 2008, all 2,000 of Elsevier’s Health Sciences and Science & Technology journals became automatic members of the Committee on Publishing Ethics (
COPE). Publishing ethics is an important factor in the peer-review process, so the partnership was a way for Elsevier to offer its editors a dedicated, external channel for their ethics queries.
Among a range of benefits, COPE members also have access to:
• Confidential advice on sensitive ethical issues;
• Members-only area of COPE’s new-look website;
• Online distance-learning course on publication ethics, launching later in 2009.
“Probably COPE’s greatest resource is the 17 flowcharts that provide algorithms for editors to follow when they suspect publication misconduct,” says Sabine Kleinert, Vice-Chair of COPE, These flowcharts are being or have been translated into Mandarin, Japanese, Korean, Turkish, Croatian, Farsi and French, suggesting that editors all around the world find them helpful.
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