Publikationsrichtlinien

Publishing in Online Magazines

Submit a contribution

Please send us your contribution by email to jusletter@weblaw.ch.

With these guidelines, Editions Weblaw would like to to achieve a consistent formal structure for the Online Magazines published by Editions Weblaw. These guidelines apply, unless specified otherwise, for the Online Magazines Jusletter, Jusletter IT – The Magazine for IT and Law, the Swiss Judges' Journal «Justice - Justiz - Giustizia» and dRSK (digital jurisdiction commentary). For you as authors as well as for us, the formal unification with its smooth processing facilitates the work.

The document at hand is structured in the following way: First, you will gain an insight into the basic workflow of our Online Magazines, from submitting the manuscript up until the publication. You will be introduced to the rules of formation and citation. Afterwards, the particularities of the individual Online Magazines are constituted. Additionally, you will come to know about your rights and obligations as an author of one of the Online Magazines aforementioned.

A Word style sheet that applies to all of our Online Magazines can be found here.

For the magazine ASA, we’d like to refer to the separate Publication guidelines ASA.

1. Procedure of Publishing in Editions Weblaw – Online Magazines
In the Online Magazines of Editions Weblaw, an editorial staff / editors will proofread and evaluate all articles. The editorial staff / editors will ultimately decide whether and in which form an article can be published.

First Formal Control
The head of the particular Online Magazine, upon receiving the manuscript, subjects this to a short first formal control and then forwards it to the relative editorial staff / editors. After approximately 2-4 weeks, you will receive a report via e-mail, stating whether and when your article will be published. If you do not get feedback within this time period, it does not automatically mean that your article has been declined. But, despite of all accurateness we always attempt to provide, there might be decelerations. In this case, please remind us of the delinquency.

Professional Monitoring by the Editorial Staff
After the professional monitoring has been carried out, there are multiple possibilities:

Your article has been accepted for publication.
In this case, the head of the particular Online Magazine will brief you via e-mail and convey the date of publication.
Your article has been accepted for publication under the condition of carrying out content-related corrections.
In this case, the head of the particular Online Magazine will forward the corrections proposed by the editorial staff / editors to you, asking you to revise the article. At the same time, a period of time for the revision will be set. The adapted manuscript will be reviewed one more time by the editorial staff / editors. Now, only case a. or c. can occur; a third professional control is not intended.
Your article has been declined.
If your article has been rejected, this is an authoritative and irrevocable decision, a revision of the text is not scheduled. Missing topicality respectively scientific importance, severe legal inadequacies in the argumentation, missing logical structure, serious linguistic deficiencies can be, among others, reasons for the refusal. Representing a different view (from doctrine or practice) will not be estimated as a reason for refusal by our objective editorial staff / editors, unless other – e.g. aforementioned – mistakes are present.

Monitoring by the Author
After receiving the «Good for Publication» by the editorial staff / editors, your article will be imported into our system internally. Afterwards, you will receive a link to your article in order to examine it. You may then send us possible change requirements and corrections, preferably via e-mail (or via fax). For this purpose, you can either print out the document and send us back a scan with handwritten requests or copy the text into a Word document and edit it in the mark-up mode. Please do not send us your original document back where you have, as the case may be, made modifications directly. On the one hand, you might overlook changes already made from our side; on the other hand, we will have to re-import the text, if we are not able to retrace your corrections.

Proofreading by Editions Weblaw.
Editions Weblaw will proofread your article modestly, meaning that grammatical and orthographic errors as well as the form of citation will be improved and adapted. These corrections will not be communicated. If further enhancements are proposed (adaption of sentence structure, content-related amendments), these will be discussed with the author.

«Good for Publication» by the Author
After conducting in-house as well as his own corrections, the author will receive a «Good for Publication», which she/her is obliged to grant within one to three days as a rule.

2. Design of your text – Online Magazines.

Format and Formatting.
Please submit your text as a PC-compatible Microsoft Word-File without macros or field functions. Deactivate the automatic hyphenation respectively remove it from your text. For possible footnotes, please use the footnote function provided by Word. Please use our style sheet.

Language.
Editions Weblaw’s Online Magazines are generally published in the languages German, French and English; Articles written in Italian will be accepted, but it is recalled that a content monitoring can only take place if the editorial staff has knowledge of the language. In these cases, Editions Weblaw will not proofread the article. Publications in English will also (except for Jusletter IT) undergo a limited proofreading.

Structure and Length.
Generally, according to the medium, there are no specifications regarding the length of the text respectively this will be agreed upon with the editorial staff / editors. In dRSK, the statements should not exceed 10‘000 characters (incl. blanks). In Jusletter, Jusletter IT and the Swiss Judges' Journal «Justice - Justiz - Giustizia», the articles will be categorized differently depending on the extent (cf. below, specifics of the individual Online Magazines).

Title (obligatory; about 60 characters incl. blanks; no footnote references)
Subtitle (optional; no footnote references)
Name of the author (obligatory, no naming academic or professional titles; no footnote references)
Abstract (obligatory; a short summary of the text, about 2–5 sentences; max. 650 characters incl. blanks. Due to technical reasons, the abstract must not include footnotes or hyperlinks. Ideally, you compose the abstract in both publication languages of the Online Magazine)
Table of contents (will be automatically generated by Editions Weblaw; exception: dRSK does not have a table of contents)
Text (obligatory; paragraph numbers will be assigned by Editions Weblaw)
Personal description (obligatory; name including complete academic title and current professional activity / activities as well as further information [additional title, other employments et cetera]. Please declare these at the end of the text, not in a footnote.)
Relevant: If your text is a question of a legal opinion for a specific field of interest or if you have represented a party in the course of the legal issue dealt with or have acted in any other personal interests, this has to be revealed to the readers unconditionally in the personal description. Particular remarks (e.g. acknowledgements) are likewise stated in the personal description and not in a footnote.
Footnotes (optional; references to indications of sources within the text are generally not intended, exception is dRSK, where footnotes are not provided and all references have to be stated within the text)

We would like to abstain from utilizing bibliographies in our Online Magazines to the greatest possible extent. The cited works are to be quoted in the footnotes consecutively.

Lists of abbreviations will not be displayed.

Citation.
Whenever a multi-page document is cited, first of all please generally indicate the first page and put the precise reference afterwards. This facilitates locating the text passage (e.g. in BGE, publications of the Official Compilation of Federal Legislation, Federal Gazette).

Citation of Judgements of the Federal Court.

BGE 127 I 164 consid. 3c p. 171 (if necessary)

Citation of judgements that have been published in the Official Compilation (OC, hard copy and web). Possible indication of the consideration is optional; it stands, as the case may be, in front of the page reference, which is also optional. No commas within one reference, several references are separated by commas.

If several BGE are cited consecutively:

Each reference consists of a complete chain of «BGE», number of volume, roman number of the part and first page of the decision, potentially supplemented by «consid.» and «p.».

Judgement of the Federal Court 9C_654/2007 of 28 January 2008, destined for publication

Citation of judgements that are whether published in the OC nor in a trade journal, which are destined for publication.

Judgement of the Federal Court 2A.254/2000 of 2 April 2001 consid. 1

Citation of judgements that are whether published in the OC nor in a trade journal, irrespective of whether they are published online or not.

Judgement of the Federal Court 1P.440/2000 of 1 February 2001, (publ. in:) SJ 2001 I p. 221 or SJ 2001 I p. 221, 1P.440/2000

Citation of judgements that have been published in a trade journal.

Further information: www.bger.ch/01_zitierregeln_d.pdf, citation rules by the Federal Court published in May 2013 (available in German, French and Italian).

Citation of Judgements of the Federal Administrative Court.

BVGE 2007/1 consid. 1.1.1 p. 4

For judgements that are published in the OC. Possible indication of the consideration is optional; it stands, as the case may be, in front of the page reference, which is also optional. No commas within one reference, several references are separated by commas.

If several BVGE are cited consecutively:

Each reference consists of a complete chain of «BVGE», year and number of the decision, potentially supplemented by «consid.» and «p.».

Judgement of the Federal Administrative Court B-2125/2006 of 26 April 2007, destined for publication

For judgements, which are destined for publication in the OC, but have not yet been published at the moment of citation.

Judgement of the Federal Administrative Court A-3478/2007 of 1 September 2007 consid. 1.1.1

For judgements that are not part of the OC of determinative decisions, irrespective of whether they are published online or not.

Judgement of the Federal Administrative Court A-3478/2007 of 1 September 2007, (publ. in:) SJ 2001 I p. 221 or SJ 2001 I p. 221, A-3478/2007

For Judgements that have been published in a trade journal.

Further information: www.bger.ch/zitierregeln.pdf, citation rules by the Federal Court published in May 2012 (available in German, French and Italian).

Citation of Judgements of the Federal Criminal Court

TPF 2004 40 consid. 2.1 p. 43

If several TPF are cited consecutively:

Each reference consists of a complete chain of «TPF», number of year / volume and first page of the decision, potentially supplemented by «consid.» and «p.».

Judgement of the Federal Criminal Court TK.2006.133 of 21 September 2006,
destined for publication

For judgements, which are destined for publication in the OC, but have not yet been published at the moment of citation.

Judgement of the Federal Criminal Court BB.2005.35 of 10 October 2005 consid. 2

For judgements that are not part of the OC of determinative decisions, irrespective of whether they are published online or not.

Judgement of the Federal Criminal Court BB.2005.35 of 10 October 2005, (publ. in:) SJ 2001 I p. 221 or SJ 2001 I p. 221, BB.2005.35

For Judgements that have been published in a trade journal.

Further information: www.bger.ch/zitierregeln.pdf, citation rules by the Federal Court published in May 2012 (available in German, French and Italian).

Documents of the Federal Gazette (BBl)

BBl 2002 7859, p. 7864 (p. is optional)

Documents of the Official Compilation of Federal Legislation (AS)

AS 2004 1677, S. 1687 (p. is optional)

Citation of Judgements of German Federal Courts

Federal Constitutional Court
= BVerfG

Cited e.g.

BVerfG, Order of the second Chamber of the First Senate of 11 November 2002 - 1 BvR 2145/0, BVerfGE 57, 70 <98 f.>

Federal Surpreme Court
= BGH

Cited e.g.

BGH, Judgement of 25 July 1989 - 1 StR 479/88, BGHSt 36, 231, 234;

BGH, Judgement of 13 January 2011 - I ZR 111/08;

BGH, Judgement of 4 march 2010 - III ZR 79/09, BGHZ 184, 345;

BGH, Order of 10 January 1995 - X ZB 11/92, Rn. 12, BGHZ 128, 280, 283

Senat für Anwaltssachen: AnwZ (B) 22/09

Senat für Notarsachen: NotZ 9/09)

Federal Administrative Court
= BVerwG

Cited e.g.
Order of 3 February 2011 - BVerwG 10 B 32.10;
BVerwG, Judgement of 15 December 2010 - BVerwG 8 C 37.09

Federal Labour Court
= BAG

Cited e.g.
BAG, Senat 27 November 2008 - 6 AZR 632/08 - Rn. 20, BAGE 128, 317

Literature.
Cited authors are generally written in small caps.

As we’d like to keep the citations as consistent as possible, please follow these rules: When first citing a book or an article, state the complete first and last name(s) of the author(s); first and last name(s) of the editor(s); title of the book or the article; title and volume of the magazine resp. title of the work and place as well as year of publication; page or paragraph number or footnote (for stating a cited footnote in the cited work).

Commentaries and Online Magazines published by Editions Weblaw shall be cited according to the own recommended forms of citation.

In the second citation, you can revert to a shortened way, e.g. without first name, without stating the title, but referring to the first detailed citation (footnote).

Incidentally, we recommend the common forms of citation that are described for example in Martin Wyss / Franz Kummer / Rafael Häcki, Suchen – Finden – Überzeugen, Arbeitstechniken im juristischen Alltag, 2nd edition, Editions Weblaw, Berne 2014.

Abbreviations.
In relation to abbreviations, we also pursue an application as uniform as possible. At this juncture, we differentiate between two categories:

Abbreviations introduced by the author: If an author introduces abbreviations, these are to be used consequently. Only at first mentioning the written out form is desired, followed by the parenthesised abbreviation.
Common abbreviations: e.g., i.e., etc., viz., n.b., Inc., Ltd., FDFA, FDHA, FDJP, DDPS, FDF, EAER, DETEC (7 Federal Departments). The common abbreviations never need to be used in written out form.

Links.
We are thankful for links to additional information that are accessible online. Correctly cited Judgements of the Federal Court (BGE-Publications, Judgements destined for publication and Judgements not destined for publication), VPB-Editions, SR-Numbers, OC-Editions will be automatically linked by us.

3. Particularities Jusletter.

Jusletter – The generalistic designed specialist journal for swiss jurists has been published every Monday since 2000, about 45 times a year.

The Most Important Article Categories.

Scientific Articles
Commented overview of jurisdiction
Judgement reviews
Articles
Essays
Conference proceedings
Recensions

Requirements for Articles.

With regards to content «correct» and argued in a reasonable / comprehensible manner;
is in its formulation discernibly addressing a juristic audience;
footnotes are not mandatory;
references in the law are cited;
contents references to the essential literature;
contents references to the essential jurisprudence;
content is conveniently structured and organized;
offers an added value for the reading public interested in the subject.

Additional Requirements for Scientific Articles.

As a general rule, a topic is discussed deeper and further than in an article. By trend, it is also more extensive than an article, though this is neither mandatory nor the sole criteria. The scientific article is essential or, at least, important if dealing with the complying topic.
As dealing with literature and jurisprudence systematically, ideas and viewpoints are developed scientifically and correctly in form as a rule.
Relevant literature is assimilated and cited;
relevant jurisprudence is assimilated and cited;
references in the law are cited capaciously;
where needed, legislative materials are cited;
cross-references within an article are desirable.

Requirements for Judgement Reviews.

Discussion or rather commenting of a judgement (Federal Court, Federal Penal Court, Federal Administrative Court, cantonal courts, if the decision is of particular importance):
at least contains concrete references such as in which considerations the court has expressed itself to what points.

Requirements for an Essay.

Short, witty article;
legal topic, but not mandatory a purely legal article;
possible are e.g. topics like legal policy;
focus is the authors’ personal confrontation with the topic;
with regards to content «correct» and argued in a reasonable manner;
criteria of strictly scientific methodology can be waived.

Contact: jusletter@weblaw.ch

4. Particularities Jusletter IT – The Magazine for IT and Law.

Jusletter IT is published four times a year and is structured internationally, multi-lingual and interdisciplinary. Jusletter IT focuses on the fields of IT and Law. The articles are sorted by field of law, region and article category (scientific articles, articles and judgement reviews – see above:

3. Particularities Jusletter).

With Jusletter IT Flash, we have introduced a new service of Jusletter IT in December 2015. At irregular intervals and between the regular issues, articles (succinctly at max. 3 to 5 pages), podcasts and important information are going to be published here.

Contact: jl-it@weblaw.ch

5. Particularities of the Swiss Judges' Journal «Justice - Justiz - Giustizia».

«Justice - Justiz - Giustizia» reports on all concerns of the judiciary in Switzerland, including the prosecuting authorities, and is published four times a year. In particular, the magazine is the official publication medium of the Swiss Association of Judges.

The most important categories:

Science;
Forum;
Column SVR
Associations;
News CH;
News Abroad;
Judicature.

The editorial team is responsible for the quality of «Justice - Justiz - Giustizia».

The Swiss journals' correspondents monitor important developments in in the judiciary of their scopes of report. They report particularly about structural, legal politically and personal alterations on a regular basis.

Contact: richterzeitung@weblaw.ch

6. Besonderheiten LeGes – Gesetzgebung & Evaluation

Die Zeitschrift LeGes – Gesetzgebung & Evaluation publiziert wissenschaftliche Beiträge zu den Themen Recht, Politikwissenschaft, Linguistik und Soziologie. Die Beiträge beziehen sich auf die normative Tätigkeit, die Rechtssprache und die Evaluation der öffentlichen Politik, unabhängig von der jeweiligen Verwaltungsebende (Bund, Kantonen und Gemeinden). LeGes erscheint dreimal jährlich: Anfang Mai, Mitte September und Ende Dezember.

Die Beiträge können auf Deutsch, Französisch, Italienisch und Rätoromanisch sowie in begründeten Fällen auf Englisch verfasst sein.

Die LeGes-Publikationsrichtlinien finden Sie hier hier.

Rubriken und Umfang.

Wissenschaftliche Beiträge diskutieren ein wissenschaftliches Thema, geben einen Einblick in die dazu publizierten Theorien und die verschiedenen Diskussionsstandpunkte. Umfang: 22‘000–45‘000 Zeichen.
Werkstattberichte beschreiben die Abläufe, Ziele und Ergebnisse von Projekten aus der Praxis. Umfang: 9‘000–27‘000 Zeichen.
Kritiken / Unter der Lupe: Diese Rubrik bietet die Möglichkeit, die eigene Meinung zu einem bestimmten Thema zu äussern oder einen bestimmten Sachverhalt aus der Praxis kurz darzustellen. Umfang: 3‘600–18‘000 Zeichen, wird ohne Lead publiziert.
Rezensionen: Umfang: 3‘600–9‘000 Zeichen; Kurzrezension: max.1‘800 Zeichen, wird ohne Lead publiziert.

Das Redaktionsteam zeichnet für die Qualität von LeGes verantwortlich.

Zitate und Zitierweise.

Kürzere Zitate sind in gewinkelten Anführungs- und Schlusszeichen («») in den Textfluss zu integrieren. Längere Zitate (ab 4 Zeilen) kommen – ohne Anführungszeichen – in einen eigenen Absatz. In LeGes wird nach dem sogenannten «Autor-Jahr-System» zitiert.

Beispiel: (Kuffner 2000), (Widmer/Kälin 2000, 257).

Literaturverzeichnis.

Das Literaturverzeichnis sollte alle Quellen umfassen, die im Text genannt werden. Zitierweise: Name, Vorname, Jahr, Titel, Ort, Seitenangabe:

Hotz, Reinhold, 1983, Methodische Rechtsetzung, Zürich.
Cancelleria federale svizzera, 2003, Direttive di tecnica legislative (DTL), Berna.
Drosdeck, Thomas, 1997, Der Rechtsfall als Konstrukt, in: Schmid, Jeannette / Drosdeck, Thomas / Koch, Detlef (Hrsg.), Der Rechtsfall – ein richterliches Konstrukt, Baden-Baden, S. 5–30.
Wyss, Martin, 2000, Normative Umsetzung internationaler Policy-Standards, LeGes, H. 1, S. 27–40.

Kontakt: leges@weblaw.ch

6. Particularities dRSK.

More than 30 editorial teams observe the jurisdiction of the highest courts in their respective specialist fields. Authors are commenting significant decisions of the highest Swiss judicial instances. The quality of their commentaries is guaranteed by a peer review of specialised editors.

On the one hand, the commentaries are published in «Push-Service Entscheide», on the other hand a «monthly review» is published at the beginning of each month in dRSK.

Particularities.

Extent of the commentary: max. 10‘000 characters incl. blanks;
references: footnotes are not possible, please list references directly in the text;
number and date of the commented decision are to be presented.

The article is to be divided into following categories:

Situation
considerations
commentary.

Contact: drsk@weblaw.ch

7. Particularities Podcasts / Videos / Videocasts (hereafter referred to as Podcasts).

As an additional «form of article», podcasts can be published in the online magazines Jusletter, Jusletter IT, «Justice - Justiz - Giustizia» and dRSK.

As a general rule, these are film and sound recordings of a presentation, presentation including sound recording of the speech or sheer sound recordings with a length that should not exceed 30 minutes.

To be able to guarantee the ability of searching, these «articles» also need an abstract in accordance with the style sheet. Additionally, information as literature, materials, media releases or judgements can be consigned and linked.

Otherwise, the specifications listed under 1 (Procedure of publishing in Editions Weblaw – Online Magazines) and 2 (Design of your text – Online Magazines) can be applied.

Contact: franz.kummer@weblaw.ch

8. Copyright / Transfer of Rights / Right of Access.

Copyright.
The authors assure and avouch that they are entitled to the sole copyright to their work and that by now they have not made any provisions that would oppose the transfer of rights of these guidelines.

If the work contains parts of other works (linguistic, text, imagery or musical works of a lesser extent, single works of the visual arts or individual photographic works), the author is obliged to designate (indication of source) the works or parts of the works contained.

The author handles the obtaining of reproduction permissions for pictures or texts. The authors bear the costs.

Transfer of Rights.
The edition (Editions Weblaw) receives the following exploitation rights without a claim to exclusiveness:

The author grants the publisher the right of publishing his articles online in Jusletter, Jusletter IT, dRSK and the Swiss Judges' Journal «Justice - Justiz - Giustizia» as well as in printed or other digital forms (e.g. e-books, Podcasts). The edition has the right to compose and publish summaries, automatically create and publish registers (indexes, registers of law acts, lists of abbreviations) as well as to extend the work by references to the original sources (jurisdiction, legislation) by means of technical additives.

Bibliographic key constraints as well as the abstracts may be incorporated into free-access or fee-based databases. For retrieval of the full text, the original source has to be indicated. Assimilating the full text into commercial data bases like so-called online-repositories or rather open access databases is not granted. The edition holds the sole right to make the article available in free-access or fee-based databases. In the future, all articles will be archived in e-Helvetica by the Swiss National Library.

The edition is obligated to disclose the date of first publication and the author. The re-publication by the author has to be approved by the publisher.

Apart from that, the author generally remains free to use his article, she / he is in particular allowed to publish it on her / his own website without retention period. The author retains her / his copyrights and may publish the articles in other media. With a citation, she / he indicates the first publication in our Online Magazine. The publication of Podcasts published in Online Magazines has a retention period of 6 months and needs to be approved by the edition. Other than that, the above mentioned provisions regarding citation and indication of original source apply. Podcasts that are made freely available by the edition may be uploaded to the referent’s website without retention period, meeting the mentioned provisions regarding citation and indication. Podcasts that have been published in other series (e.g. Podcasts@Weblaw Financial Market Law), that are secured by access authorization or subscriptions against payment, may not be made available in other media, unless the edition gives an explicit authorization.

Right of Access.
As an author of an Online Magazine, you will receive this magazine for free for two years and will have full access to its archive. Afterwards, the contract will expire automatically. With each published text, a new two-year-period starts running. Already concluded paid subscriptions will not be refunded, these will expire automatically after the contractual period (1 year normally), the author is exempted of the notice period.

For students and campus members, Editions Weblaw’s Online Magazines are available free of charge at many universities Caampus (Campus).

The present edition of the Publication Guidelines is updated to 18 August 2016.