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Canadian Public Policy/Analyse de politiques is Canada's foremost journal examining economic and social policy. The journal strives to publish original research that will stimulate discussion and future research of public policy problems in Canada. It is directed at a wide readership including decision-makers and advisers in business organizations and governments, and policy researchers in private institutions and universities. Because of the interdisciplinary nature of many public policy issues, the journal publishes articles in various disciplines.
Papers should be appraised from the point of view of their relevance for public policy and public management. Publishable articles should be grounded in peer-reviewed literature of the given discipline(s) and provide original evidence or analysis on a relevant public policy issue. Canadian Public Policy expects papers to be of a high intellectual standard, yet comprehensible to a general audience—readers outside the author's own discipline.
CPP/Adp primarily considers original research articles for publication but also welcomes articles that review the state of knowledge in particular policy areas as commentary pieces. These submissions should be assessed based on their comprehensiveness, accuracy, accessibility to a general (rather than) disciplinary audience and the extent to which they add to the literature.
Canadian Public Policy uses a double-blind reviewing process. Referees and submitting authors remain anonymous to the one another. CPP requests that referees assess both the appropriateness and contribution of submitted papers. Referees should submit a cover letter to the CPP editor or co-editor and an anonymous report on the paper that will be sent to the authors. These referee submissions can be made online using the link embedded in the email referees received with the original request for a review. Expectations for these two parts of the referee submissions are as follows:
Cover Letter to the CPP Editor: Referees should provide an overall evaluation of the paper and a clear recommendation to publish, to request a major or minor revision, or to reject the submitted paper. Recommendations for rejections may be based on inappropriate fit for the journal as well as substantial errors or omissions in the paper.
Anonymous Report to the Authors: The specific structure of the report can vary, but typically the report should contain the key elements of the referees evaluation of the paper. The report can provide general comments, addressing the main contribution of the submitted paper and the appropriateness of the paper for publication in CPP as well as specific comments, addressing the organization of the paper, methodology used in the paper, correctness and significance of the papers results and conclusions, and exposition and logic of the papers argument. All comments should be considerate in manner and constructive. If a recommendation of revise and resubmit is given to the editor, then detailed comments regarding the requested revisions would be most helpful for the authors.
Referees are expected to complete their reports within six weeks of receipt, but additional time may be requested when first accepting the request for review. Referees unable to provide a timely report either due to other demands or a mismatch in expertise are requested to let the editor or co-editor know as soon as possible. Suggestions for alternate referees are always appreciated.