Safeguarding science: The centrality of publication ethics

This Speaking Out attends to the opacity and injustice of scientific manuscript evaluation. Its focus is upon the embeddedness of editors, reviewers and authors in a moral order conditioned by an asymmetrical structure of power relations that is sustained by deference and secrecy. Attention is given to the shortcomings of complaints and appeals procedures that currently provide the principal, non-independent means of safeguarding science by interrogating the adequacy of manuscript evaluation processes. To transform the structure of power relations, and thereby strengthen the “gold standard” of peer review, some ways of increasing the openness and accountability of manuscript evaluation are proposed.