Guide for Authors

The journal Collected Papers of the Faculty of Law in Novi Sad publishes, either partially or entirely, papers that have not previously been published elsewhere. As a rule, manuscripts are submitted in some of the world languages (English, German, French, Russian, Spanish, etc.)

Original scientific papers, review papers and professional papers must be compiled with an abstract, summarising the basic content of the paper in not more than 20 lines, followed by up to five key words. If the paper is written in another world language, it must end with the title, abstract and key words in Serbian (for the provision of translations into Serbian, foreign authors may refer to the Editorial Board).

Papers must be anonymous, with no mention of the author’s name anywhere in the very text, in order to allow for anonymous review. The review procedure shall mean double-blind peer review of each paper (except for book reviews).

Papers should not exceed the size of one author’s sheet (16 pages, with 28 lines of text per page and 66 characters per line, not exceeding 30,000 characters with spaces, font Times New Roman, size 12 points). The publication of papers exceeding this size shall be decided by the Editorial Board.

Title of the paper must be centre-aligned and written in capital letters (upper case, regular), using 14-point sized font. Section headings shall be centre-aligned, in capital letters, font size 12, and numbered consecutively using Arabic numerals. If sections are further divided into subsections, these shall be numbered consecutively in Arabic numerals, as in the following example: 1.1. – regular, small letters (lower case), font size 12, 1.1.1. – small letters in italics (cursive).

Footnotes shall be numbered consecutively and written below the text on the corresponding page.

Editorial Board reserves the right to make technical revisions in papers to ensure adherence to general journal editorial rules and language standards.

Editorial Board particularly appreciates if authors’ contributions reflect their familiarity with papers published in previous volumes of the Collected Papers on the same or related topic.

All submissions must be made via the electronic journal management system Assistant. At any point in time, authors can monitor, by logging into their user accounts, all important facts related to the process of editing, reviewing and publishing of their papers. The system operates in Serbian and English. The Assistant program is available at the following link:

http://aseestant.ceon.rs/index.php/zrpfns/login.

Citation guidelines

  1. Books shall be cited as follows: first name and surname of the author (Petar Petrovic), title of the book in italics (Law), place and year of publication – regular font style, without comma (Novi Sad 2014), and page number (30 or 30-32 or 2 and 4). Author’s full name shall be indicated only in the first reference; in all further references to the same book only the author’s first initial (followed by a period) and surname shall be used (P. Petrovic).
    When citing the publisher as well, the name shall be written in regular style, before the place of publication (Petar Petrovic, Law, Publishing House, Novi Sad 2014, 29-30). Citing publishers is optional.
    If the citation refers to a footnote, the abbreviation ‘fn.’ shall be added after the page number. (Petar Petrovic, Law, Novi Sad 2014, 35, fn. 3).
    If the book lists multiple places of publication, either one or the first two, separated by an en dash, shall be cited (Robert Robertson, Constitution in the World, Oxford – New York 2014, 25)
  2. Articles shall be cited as follows: first name and surname of the author, article title in sentence case – regular style, within quotation marks (“Court procedure”), journal name in italics, issue number, year, and page number (Collected Papers of the Faculty of Law of Novi Sad 4/2013, 19). Author’s full name shall be indicated only in the first citation, while in all further references to the same article only the author’s first initial (followed by a period) and surname shall be cited. If the journal title is too long, the first citation shall include the corresponding acronym in brackets, which shall be used thereafter (Collected Papers of the Faculty of Law in Novi Sad (Collected Papers of FLNS) 4/2013, 19).
    Similar format shall be used in citing scientific meeting proceedings: first name and surname of the author, title of the paper (communication) – regular style, within quotation marks, title of the meeting in italics, month and year, name of institution, issue number (if multiple), meeting place and page number (Dimitrije Bogdanovic, “Krmcija Svetoga Save”, International Scientific Meeting Saint Sava, History and Tradition, December 1976, Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts, Book 7, Belgrade, 91-99).
  3. If books or articles have two or three authors, the names shall be separated by comma(s) (Petar Petrovic, Milan Popovic, Dragan Ilic). For more than three authors, the format shall be: the first initial (followed by a period) and surname of the first author, plus the Latin abbreviation for et alia, in italics (P. Petrovic et al). Author’s full name shall be indicated only in the first citation.
  4. When a paper quotes only one text of a particular author, in the repeated citations of the same text, after the author’s first initial (followed by a period) and surname only the page number shall be included (P. Petrovic, 53). If it quotes two or more papers of the same author, whether books or articles, given that the first reference to each paper cites their full title, enclosed in brackets after the author’s first initial (followed by a period) and surname shall be the books’ or articles’ year of publication. If the author has two or more cited papers published in the same year, these should have Latin letters a, b, c, d, etc. added after the year, followed only by page number (P. Petrovic (1995a), 6).
  5. When citing a quote that stretches over multiple precisely determined pages, these shall be separated by a hyphen (P. Petrovic, 53-67). In citing multiple pages with no final number determined, the number that indicates the first cited page shall be followed by ‘and the following pages’ (‘ff.’ in English) (P. Petrovic (1995a), 53ff.).
  6. Where a footnote cites the same page from the same book or article as the immediately preceding footnote, the Latin abbreviation for ibidem, in italics, shall be used, without mention of the author’s name and surname (Ibid). If it cites the same book or article as the immediately preceding footnote, but different page, the citation shall use Latin abbreviation for ibidem in italics, followed by page number, with no mention of the author’s name and surname (Ibid., 69).
  7. In the citation of an article from a collection of papers in Serbian, after the collection’s name the abbreviation for editor (ed.) and the name and surname of the editor(s) shall be enclosed in brackets. In the citation of articles from the collections of papers in English or in other foreign language, the collection’s name written in italics shall be followed by the editor’s name and the abbreviation for ‘editor’ (ed) enclosed in brackets, and for more than one editor the abbreviation for ‘editors’ (eds), before their respective names. Convenient abbreviations for editors shall be used for other languages as well (e.g. in German ‘Hrsg.’). Example: Aleen Buchanan, “Liberalism and Group Rights”, Essays in Honour of Joel Feinberg (eds. Jules L. Coleman, A. Buchanan), Cambridge 1994, 1– 15.
  8. Citations of legislative acts shall include their full title – regular style, followed by the italicised name of the journal in which they are published, with the issue number and publication year after the comma, again in regular style. In the case of subsequent citations of an act, in the first citation it shall be accompanied by the corresponding acronym (preceded by an en dash) by which it shall be referred to thereafter (Contracts and Torts Act – CTA, Official Gazette of SFRY, No 29/78 or Enforcement Procedure Act – EPA, Official Gazette of RS, No 125/04). If an act had been revised and amended, the citation should include issue numbers and years of publication of the respective revisions and amendments (Act on the Fundamentals of the Education and Upbringing System, Official Gazette of RS, Nos 62/03, 64/03, 58/04 and 62/04).
  9. Articles, paragraphs and items of legislative acts shall be cited using their abbreviated forms art., para., it. (art. 5, para. 2, it. 3 or arts. 5, 6, 9 and 10 or arts. 4-12). Numbers 10 and above shall be written in Arabic numerals, while numbers from zero to nine shall be spelled out. Dates shall be written in regular style, combining Arabic numerals and words (11 January 2000).
  10. Citations of court decisions, international agreements and other legal sources should provide as complete information as possible: type and number of the decision (agreement), date of issue, and the publication in which it appears.
  11. Latin and other foreign terminology, website addresses and alike shall be written in italics, in the original language and form.
  12. Citations of online texts shall include title of the cited text, website address written in italics and date on which the website was accessed (European Commission for Democracy through Law, Opinion on the Constitutions, http://www.venice.coe.int/webforms/events/, 24 May 2013).
  13. Names of authors, books and articles shall be cited in the original language and script (Serbian language, Cyrillic or Latin script, foreign language and script). Names of foreign authors in works cited in footnotes shall be stated in the original language, with the surname followed by its phonetically transcribed equivalent in Serbian (Cyrillic) in brackets, for example Charles-Louis de Secondat Montesquieu (Монтескје). In all subsequent citations of authors and works, the stated rules shall apply, with no repetition of the transcribed surnames. When making use of translations of works by foreign authors, the citation shall also include the translator – regular style, enclosed in brackets (Charles Montesquieu, On the Spirit of the Law I-II (trans. A. Mimica), Belgrade 1989). In the main text of the paper, names of foreign authors referred to shall be cited in Cyrillic transcription, whereas the first citation shall also include the surname in the original language and script, in brackets, italicised, for example ‘… in the opinion of Жан-Жак Русо (Rousseau)…“.
  14. For ‘see’ the abbreviation ‘Vid.’ (only in Serbian) shall be used, for ‘compare’ the abbreviation ‘Cf.’, and for ‘as cited by/in’ (when another author cites the book or article to which you indirectly refer) the abbreviation ‘cit. by/in’. These abbreviations shall be followed by the citation of books or articles in accordance with the above stated rules.
  15. All footnotes shall close with a full stop. All abbreviations (et al., Ibid., ed.) shall be followed by a full stop.

Special rules pertaining to the citation of historical sources:

  1. Ancient sources by authors whose just one book has been preserved shall be cited only by author’s name, book number and chapter number (Her. IV, 2 = Herodotus, The History, book four, second edition. Thuc. II, 8 = Thucydides, The Peloponnesian War, book two, chapter 8, Liv. IV, 2, 8 = Titus Livius, From the Foundation of the City, book four, chapter two, eighth sentence). When referring to the corresponding translations, the translator must also be cited (see point 13).
  2. When using other ancient sources, these shall be cited by author’s name – regular style and source title – italicised, in accordance with internationally accepted abbreviations, book, chapter and possibly sentence number (Cicero, De legibus, I, 3,2 = Cicero, On the Laws, book one, chapter three, second sentence).
  3. Plato’s and Aristotle’s works shall be cited following the designations used by Alexandrian philosophers (Plat. Leg. 632 A. = Plato, The Laws, Aristot. Polit. 1288 a. = Aristotle, The Politics).
  4. Works of poetry and drama in verse shall be cited by verse number (Hom. Od. vs. 56 (vs. the abbreviation for versus – a verse) = Homer, The Odyssey, Arist. Eq. vs. 102. = Aristophanes, The Knights). When citing a national poet (in Serbian), instead of vs. the Serbian equivalent (‘stih’) or its abbreviation (‘st’.) shall be used (Njegos, Gorski Vijenac, st. 25).
  5. Chapters from the Bible shall be cited in accordance with common international abbreviations: Gen. (Genesis = The Book of Genesis), Exod. (Exodus = The Book of Exodus), Matt. (Matteas = The Gospel of Matthias).
  6. For works published in internationally recognised editions, citing of editions and editors is compulsory (Dion, Roman History, LIII, 17, ed. E. Сагу, Loeb Classical Library, Cambridge Massachusetts – London England 1917, 234).
  7. Where the works of ancient authors have been preserved in fragments, the citation shall include the number of the fragment and the title of the collection in which it appears (Ant. Fr. 40, Die Fragmente der Vorsokratiker, ed. W. Kranz, Berlin 1935).
  8. The most important sources of Roman law: D. 1, l, 2 = Digest, C. J. (or C.) 3, 1, 4 = The Code of Justinian, Just. Inst. 4, 2 = The Institutes of Justinian, Gaius, Inst. 2, 7 = The Institutes of Gaius, Nov. Just. 2, 4 = Justinian Novelties, C. Th. (or Cod. Theod.) 2, 3, 2 = The Code of Theodosius.
  9. When referring to information from a collection of sources, citation shall include the source of the information – regular style, within quotation marks (“The Agreement between King Milutin and Dubrovnik of 1302″), publisher (edition) – regular style (edition by Alexander Soloviev), title of the work, in italics (Selected Historical Documents of Serbian Law), place and year of publication and page number (Belgrade 1926, 48).