Students of the Mário Soares promotion are launching a peer-reviewed student-run journal, “Duodecim Astra – College of Europe Student Journal of European Studies”. The Call for Articles for the journal’s first issue is now open.
About the journal
Duodecim Astra is an interdisciplinary journal specialised in European affairs, run by College of Europe students coming from the Bruges and Natolin campuses. The journal is published under the supervision of the College of Europe.
Submissions may be sent in English or in French. The journal accepts submissions from College of Europe students and alumni, as well as from students and alumni of other universities. Articles may fall under any of the academic disciplines taught at the College of Europe.
The theme of the first issue is “Future of Europe”. The theme is broad, and enables you to discuss a wide range of topics related to the EU and European affairs. You may either start writing from scratch, or turn a past unpublished work of yours (for example a course essay or dissertation) into an academic article.
The length of the articles published in the journal is 5,000 – 8,000 words, including footnotes but excluding bibliography.
Submission instructions
You can respond to the Call for Articles by emailing the Editor-in-Chief Juuso JARVINIEMI, Deputy Editor-in-Chief Benoît COMMESSIE and the Head of Editing Ciara CAMPBELL. You may also address any further queries to Juuso, Benoît and Ciara. You may communicate in either English or French.
Your submission should include the following:
- A short description of your proposed article (150 - 300 words). The description may be either an abstract, or a free-form explanation of the topic you will discuss and the angle you plan to take.
- You are expected to articulate your indicative research question(s) in your submission.
- Optionally, you may provide a short list of works you may cite in your article.
- Optionally, you may attach any draft you already have, for example the past work that you wish to convert into a journal article.
There are two deadlines for submission:
- If you submit your proposal by 23:59 CET on Sunday 28 February, your proposal will be assessed early on in the week starting on 1 March.
- If you submit your proposal by 23:59 CET on Sunday 7 March, your proposal will be assessed early on in the week starting on 8 March.
The submission may be made in the name of one or two individuals.
Timeline and next steps
If the journal’s editorial team accepts to work with you on your article, an Editor will be assigned for your article. Acceptance at this stage does not constitute a guarantee that your article will be published in the journal’s next issue. The Editor is a student studying the discipline covered by your article. The Editor will comment on your article, and help you develop the structure, methodology and argument of your article. The Editing process will last until mid- to late April.
At the end of the Editing process, the journal’s editorial team decides whether to send your article for peer review. Peer review is conducted by PhD students or scholars with knowledge of the field covered in your article. The journal follows the double-blind peer review process, which means that neither the Peer Reviewers nor the authors know each other’s identity. During the peer review process, you may be requested to make minor revisions to your article.
If your article is accepted at the end of the peer review process, it will be published in the journal. Publication of our first issue is indicatively scheduled for May/June. The journal will be published online.
Terms and conditions
Your article should not be currently under review by another journal. When submitting an article for review by Duodecim Astra, you are asked to accept that the article will be published exclusively by the journal. Articles published by the journal will be freely available online, and may be cited according to academic conventions.