[ATTW-L] Ethical Question about TC Peer Review

[Joanna Wolfe]

I think it would be wrong to subvert the editor's policies.

Editing a journal is a lot of work and I am extraordinarily grateful to
those people who take on that work. I think the editors should have the
privilege of setting the journal policies, even if I disagree with them. As
you indicate, individuals have the right to decline reviews if they
disagree with those policies (though of course you should not submit to a
journal that you are not willing to review for).

I also personally think the ethical arguments in favor of double-blind peer
reviews outweigh those against it. I worry that if the norm is to be
public, junior scholars will be reluctant to reject articles by people who
might one day be in a position to review their tenure case (or other
publications).

Also I was in the position of receiving a signed review on one of my
submissions recently. When it took over 8 months (!!) to get a response on
my revise-and-resubmit, I was tempted to reach out to the reviewer who had
signed. I found myself wishing I did not know the person's identity so I
would not be tempted to reach out.

But to the larger question, I think it would be bad for the field for
reviewers to undermine the policies set by journal editors.

My $.02.
Joanna

On Wed, Jan 3, 2024 at 12:56 PM Duncan, Michael <duncanm at uhd.edu> wrote:

>
>
> I have an ethical question about TC peer review for this listserv.
>
>
>
> I recently completed a peer review for a journal in the TC orbit, to
> remain unnamed. As usual, I requested that my name be included in the
> review. I have done this for every peer review I’ve written since 2015.
> It’s an ethical issue that I’ve written about twice, once in the Chronicle
> and another in a journal article. I don’t feel comfortable hiding behind
> anonymity. I’ve never had an editor object in the past, though it’s
> possible that some editor has left my name off a review without telling me.
> But this is the first time that I know for certain that it’s happened, and
> without the editor asking me if it was ok. I received a copy of the peer
> reviews after the publication decision, plus an email asking me not to sign
> reviews. My response to the editor was to note my name was removed without
> consent, that I would decline to review further for the journal, and if I
> had been asked to remove my name prior to it being sent out, I would have
> withdrawn the entire review. The editor made a perfunctory apology but did
> nothing otherwise.
>
>
>
> The milk is spilled, yes, but here’s the ethical question. I anticipated
> something like this happening some years ago, but not the exact scenario. I
> started to leave a unique phrase in my peer reviews, different each time.
> If the text of the peer review itself constitutes a kind of private key,
> the phrase is a public key that would allow anyone with access to the peer
> review to know who I am, without me knowing who they are. For example, if I
> announced somewhere that the public key for a recent peer review was
> “timey-wimey epistemological handwringing,” if you saw that in a peer
> review that you’d received, you’d know I’d wrote it (please note that is
> not the actual key and exists solely for dramatic purposes).
>
>
>
> So, would it be ethical for me to publish that phrase online? On the
> negative side, it would violate double blind (assuming the author received
> the key and figured it out, of course). And, of course, peer-reviewed
> journals are granted by their respective fields, at least informally,
> rather broad discretionary powers over their editorial processes with which
> meddling is generally frowned upon – although, I feel that balance of power
> tends to favor those that already have power, which is why I sign, so
> people can know what ratfink wrote that review. On the positive side, the
> review is completed as actually written, given that I expressly wrote the
> review with the understanding it would be single-blind. I can be held
> accountable for any incompetence, the editor’s misstep is answered in kind,
> and perhaps the author could confirm, at least, that their peer reviews was
> not written by an enterprising chatbot. Personal ethics vs. professional
> ethics? Virtue vs. duty?
>
>
>
> My current thinking is that the benefits of correcting a wrong outweigh
> the sidestepping of a custom. However, it could be argued that I have
> already corrected the wrong by walking away from the journal. I am
> amendable.
>
>
>
> Mike Duncan, Ph.D. (he/his/him)
>
> Professor of English
>
> University of Houston-Downtown
>
> Managing Editor, *Technical Communication & Social Justice*
>
>
> _______________________________________________
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> ATTW-L at attw.org
> http://attw.org/mailman/listinfo/attw-l_attw.org
>


-- 
Joanna Wolfe
Teaching Professor, English
Associated Faculty, Mechanical Engineering
Carnegie Mellon University
5000 Forbes Avenue
Pittsburgh, PA 15213
Zoom: https://cmu.zoom.us/my/jowolfe
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