Submissions

Submission Preparation Checklist

As part of the submission process, authors are required to check off their submission's compliance with all of the following items, and submissions may be returned to authors that do not adhere to these guidelines.

• The German Journal of International Criminal Law is a platform for concise yet academically rigorous contributions. The specified lengths are standard guidelines; longer texts may be considered in exceptional cases after consultation with the editorial team.
  Length:
  · Articles: Generally up to 45,000 characters including spaces, footnotes, and abstract (approx. 15 manuscript pages). Submissions should also include 4-6 keywords.
  · Commentaries, Current Developments & Case Notes: Generally up to 15,000 characters including spaces, footnotes, and abstract (approx. 5 manuscript pages).
  · Reviews & Conference Reports: Generally up to 10,000 characters including spaces, footnotes, and abstract (approx. 3.5 manuscript pages).
  
• Sprache: Die ZVStR legt Wert auf inklusive, diskriminierungssensible Sprache: Personenbezeichnungen möglichst geschlechtergerecht formulieren, stereotype Darstellungen vermeiden, respektvoll und präzise schreiben.
• Wissenschaftliche Standards & KI: Der Beitrag wurde eigenständig verfasst; die Autor:innen tragen die volle Verantwortung für Inhalt, Argumentation und wissenschaftliche Qualität. KI-gestützte Werkzeuge sind nur zur Recherche und sprachlichen Überarbeitung zulässig. Im Übrigen gelten die COPE-Guidelines.
  Guidelines on the Use of Artificial Intelligence
  German Journal of International Criminal Law
  Version: May 2026
  Preamble
  We recognise that AI-based tools are increasingly shaping scholarly work and can provide valuable support in research, drafting and analysis. At the same time, integrity, transparency and human responsibility for published content remain indispensable foundations of academic discourse.
  These guidelines apply to all submissions, peer reviews and editorial activities within the journal.
  1. Principles
  4. AI systems (including large language models such as ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini and the like) cannot be named as authors. Authorship presupposes intellectual responsibility, accountability and the ability to vouch for the integrity of the work – qualities that AI systems do not possess.
  5. Authors bear unrestricted responsibility for all content of their contribution, regardless of whether and to what extent AI tools were used. This includes the duty to verify the factual accuracy, originality and academic quality of all AI-generated content.
  6. The use of AI does not replace independent legal analysis, argumentation and reasoning.
  2. No Disclosure Obligation (Assistive Use of AI)
  The use of AI tools to provide technical support for one's own text does not require separate disclosure. This includes in particular:
  • correction of grammar, spelling and punctuation;
  • improvement of the flow, tone and stylistic consistency of one's own text;
  • formatting assistance (e.g. citation formatting, bibliography formatting);
  • translation of individual terms or short passages to verify one's own wording;
  • use of spell-checking programs or simple text-assistance tools.
  In every case, the precondition is that the intellectual substance – the research question, the argumentation and the conclusions – originates from the authors themselves.
  3. Disclosure Obligation (Generative Use of AI)
  The use of AI tools that goes beyond assistive corrections and substantially contributes to the creation, analysis or presentation of content must be transparently disclosed. The following uses are subject to disclosure in particular:
  • creation or substantial revision of text sections (e.g. introduction, analysis, conclusion) by AI;
  • AI support in literature research or in summarising sources;
  • creation of figures, tables or visualisations with the help of AI tools;
  • AI-assisted analysis of legal texts, judgments or documents (e.g. transcripts of international criminal tribunals);
  • creation or review of code or database queries by AI that are used for the research;
  • translation of entire sections or central sources by AI;
  • compilation, completion or verification of bibliographic references by AI.
  3.1 Form of Disclosure
  Disclosure is made in a separate section of the manuscript, to be inserted after the acknowledgements and before the bibliography, bearing the heading "Use of AI Tools" or "Note on the Use of AI". The statement should contain the following information:
  • the name and version of the AI system used (e.g. "ChatGPT 4o", "Claude 3.7 Sonnet");
  • the purpose and scope of use (e.g. "to revise the abstract", "to research secondary literature");
  • a statement that all AI-generated content has been reviewed and is the responsibility of the authors.
  Example: "For the preparation of this work, Claude 3.7 Sonnet (Anthropic, 2025) was used to revise the German-language version of the abstract and to assist in researching English-language secondary literature. All content was independently reviewed by the authors, who take responsibility for it. References were verified against the original documents."
  4. Impermissible Uses
  The following uses are impermissible and may lead to the rejection or withdrawal of a contribution:
  • complete or predominant creation of the manuscript by AI without independent scholarly work by the authors;
  • generation or falsification of data, case figures, statistics or evidence by AI;
  • invention, falsification or incorrect attribution of references and citations (so-called AI "hallucinations" must be identified and corrected);
  • use of AI for the substantive analysis of unpublished manuscripts in the course of peer review (a breach of the confidentiality of the peer-review process);
  • creation of decision letters, expert opinions or editorial assessments by AI on the part of the editors;
  • AI-generated images presented as original research visualisations without indicating this;
  • use of AI to conceal plagiarism or to circumvent originality obligations.
  5. Peer Review
  Reviewers are required:
  • to treat submitted manuscripts as confidential documents and not to feed them into AI systems;
  • to draft their reviews independently and to use AI tools at most to improve the language of their own review text, but not for the substantive assessment of the manuscript;
  • to disclose any use of AI (beyond mere language correction) to the editorial office.
  Reviews that have evidently been produced in substance by AI systems will not be taken into account in the decision-making process. Reviewers who breach these guidelines in this manner will no longer be invited in future.
  6. Editorial Office and Editorship
  Members of the editorial board and the editorial office may use AI tools for internal text support (e.g. language correction of communications), but not for:
  • the substantive evaluation of submitted manuscripts;
  • the creation of rejection or acceptance letters in the name of the editorial office;
  • the analysis or summary of unpublished submissions.
  7. Breaches and Consequences
  Breaches of these guidelines – in particular the concealment of a use of AI that is subject to disclosure – are treated as academic misconduct. The editorial office reserves the right:
  • to reject submitted contributions at any time during the review process;
  • to subject already published contributions to a re-examination procedure in line with the COPE guidelines;
  • where there is sufficient suspicion of serious misconduct, to withdraw the contribution and to inform the relevant institutions.
  Suspicions of impermissible or undisclosed use of AI may be reported to the editorial office in confidence.
  8. Ongoing Review of These Guidelines
  The development of AI technologies is advancing rapidly. These guidelines are reviewed regularly – at least annually – and adjusted as necessary. Significant developments in the field of publication ethics (in particular through COPE, the STM Association and the policies of leading publishers) are taken into account. Updates are published on the journal's website and announced in the first issue of each year.
  
• Unveröffentlicht: Der Beitrag ist bisher unveröffentlicht und wurde keiner anderen Zeitschrift vorgelegt (andernfalls liegt eine Erklärung unter „Kommentare für die Redaktion" bei).
• Formvorgaben: Der Text folgt den stilistischen und bibliografischen Vorgaben der Richtlinien für Autor/innen (zu finden unter „Über die Zeitschrift").