CJAS Protocol for Special Issue Proposals

The Canadian Journal of African Studies publishes occasional special issues devoted to furthering understanding of a particular theme, concept, or debate. Proposals for special issues must be submitted by May 15 each year for consideration by the Editorial team. Please note that only one of the submitted proposals will be selected for further development and potential publication in CJAS. Decisions on all proposals will be relayed within two months of the submission deadline, including reasons for rejection where relevant. For the successful proposal, it is expected that the special issue will normally be published twelve to twenty-four months after proposal acceptance.

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The Editorial team evaluates proposals in terms of (1) correspondence of the special issue with CJAS’s aims and scope, (2) originality and significance of its contribution to research and scholarship in African Studies, and (3) coherence and complementarity among the individual articles making up the proposed issue. Other factors that count in aproposal’s favour are: inclusion of African and Africa-based authors, as well as authors at different career stages; having a mix of articles in English and French; and clear leadership by a designated guest editor or editors.

The proposals should be sent as an email attachment to the Coordinating Editor, Belinda Dodson (bdodson@uwo.ca), as well as to editorial board members Hang Zhou (hang.zhou@pol.ulaval.ca) and Benoît Henriet (benoit.henriet@vub.be). The proposal document should be no more than six pages long and must include:

• A statement outlining the theme of the special issue and the ways in which it offers original scholarly insight;
• A table of contents, including the author and title of each paper;
• Explanation of how individual contributions each address the theme/thesis of the special issue, and how the papers relate to each other;
• The academic qualifications or professional experience of the contributing authors, including institutional/organisational affiliations where relevant;
• Details on the origin of the proposal, e.g. a workshop, conference session, research project, or research network;
• A timeline for preparation and submission of the manuscripts, including a plan for preliminary review by the guest editor(s) prior to submission of articles to CJAS
• Names of 10-12 external reviewers who would have the expertise to assist with the peer review process.

Once a special issue proposal has been accepted, guest editors are responsible for soliciting manuscripts and conducting a preliminary editorial review. Individual papers must then be submitted by their authors directly to CJAS via ScholarOne Manuscripts within 12 months of the proposal being accepted. Once submitted, papers are sent for external peer review. CJAS has the prerogative to reject, at any stage of the review process, any individual contribution to a special issue if it does not meet the standards of the journal. This may mean publication of the remaining, accepted papers as a themed section within a regular issue rather than a full special issue. CJAS also reserves the right to schedule the publication of special issues in a manner that maintains a desirable balance between regular and special issues. Similar to individual article submissions, special issues remain the copyright of the Canadian Association of African Studies.

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