Guide for Authors
Instructions for Submitting Articles
Published by The Association of Private Enterprise Education (APEE),The Journal of Private Enterprise brings together the work of scholars from disciplines including economics, entrepreneurship, ethics, finance, history, law, management, philosophy, and religion who have done research on topics pertaining to systems of private enterprise worldwide.
Articles of 15-25 pages of double-spaced text are preferred, but different length manuscripts will be considered if the content appears worthwhile. In addition, a regular section of The Journal is devoted to educational notes that average six pages. These short accounts describe innovations in teaching topics in private enterprise of interest to journal readers.
1. There is no submission fee.
2. Submissions should be uploaded to ourEditorial Manager(opens in new tab)portal (https://www.editorialmanager.com/jpenterprise/(opens in new tab)).
3. If you are so inclined, please fill out the recommended reviewers field, as that helps us compile our list of primary and backup referees.
4. By agreeing to submit to the Journal of Private Enterprise, authors must read and agree to follow the artificial intelligence policies of the American Economic Association and the American Psychological Association printed below.
Formatting Instructions for Accepted Articles
1. Reference list:Before publication, references must be formatted exactly according toThe Journal of Private Enterpriseguidelines. These are similar to American Economic Association guidelines, with some modifications based on the Chicago Manual of Style. See ourformatting references guidefor examples of how to cite the most common types of publications.
2. In-text citations:Sources should be cited in the text by the author's name and year of publication, for example (Smith 1996, p. 3). A full reference list should appear at the end of the article. Only references that are cited in the text should appear in the reference list.
3. Footnotes:Only notes that add comments beyond the citation require a separate footnote. Please use footnotes rather than endnotes.
4. Acknowledgements:Acknowledgements and related information should appear in a footnote indicated by an asterisk after the last author's name; further footnotes should be numbered consecutively and indicated by superscripts.
5. Contact information:We do not publish author contact information, but do provide the name of the institution each author is affiliated with. Please also provide the best email address for us to reach you during the editing process.
6. Abstract:All papers should include an abstract of not more than 100 words.
7. JEL codes:All papers should include one to threeJournal of Economic Literature (JEL) codes(opens in new tab)below the abstract.
8. Keywords:All papers should include three to six keywords below the abstract. Keywords should be lowercase (unless they are proper nouns) and separated by commas.
9. Spelling, Grammar, and Style:Articles should conform to current stylistic guidelines based on the Chicago Manual of Style and Merriam Webster's Collegiate Dictionary.
10. Format:Please keep the formatting and layout of the text as simple as possible, as we will format your article to fit The journal’s layout.
11. Sections:Please break up the paper into several sections to make it easy to read. Use bold text and Roman numerals for section headings; use italics and capital letters for section subheadings (section subheadings are optional). Please do not use your word processor’s automatic formatting to number the sections.
Example:
I. Introduction
This paper will explain why Austrian economics provides a better analytical framework than Keynesian economics.
A. History of Austrian Thought
The Austrian school of economics originated in...
B. History of Keynesian Thought
Keynesianism is associated with John Maynard Keynes...
12. Emphasizing text:Useitalicsas needed; please avoid all caps and underlining.
Formatting Instructions for Tables and Figures in Accepted Articles
Authors are required to format tables, so they appear professional and are easy to interpret. Please check recent issues of The Journal for samples. For example, do have a table with uniform borders around each cell, or for regressions, do not just report t-statistics. Include notes like: *, **,*** denotes significance at the .10, .05, .01 levels, two-tailed test. Clearly highlight the dependent variable and, when reporting independent variables, minimize the use of abbreviations. Your statistics software may like abbreviations, but do not require readers to interpret abbreviations when you can simply type out names. Minimize the use of abbreviations in the rest of your text.
Figures and tables should be numbered separately (e.g., Figure 1, Table 1, Figure 2, Table 2). Explanatory titles should be part of the text, above the image, rather than part of the image. Likewise, the source and notes for the image should be included as text directly below the image.
The journal has a 4.5” column width, and prints in black and white, so these guidelines should be followed for the best print result and for readability:
Text Font
Use Garamond for the text and numbers within tables and figures. If you are having difficulty fitting the text, use the more condensed Arial Narrow.
Text Size
Your graphic will be reduced in size for the journal.
For example, if your manuscript is a U.S. letter-sized document with 1” margins, your graphic will be reduced 60%. Use 14 point type.
If 14 point is too large to work in your graphic, just make the font as large as possible.
Do Not Embed the Title in Your Graphic
This will be typeset separately.
Line Weights
Remember that your graphic will be reduced in the journal, and so will the line weights. Try to use at least 1.5 point weight and higher.
Grayscale
The journal prints in black and white, so color cannot be used reliably to indicate differences or comparisons. Use tints of black, for instance, for pie charts, or different line weights of black lines, tints of black, or dotted lines for charts.
If Possible, Include a Text-Editable Version of the Graphic
American Economic Association Editorial Policy on Use of Artificial Intelligence
“Artificial intelligence (AI) software, such as chatbots or other large language models, may not be listed as an author. If AI software was used in the preparation of the manuscript, including drafting or editing text, this must be briefly described during the submission process, which will help us understand how authors are or are not using chatbots or other forms of AI. Authors are solely accountable for, and must thoroughly fact-check, outputs created with the help of AI software.
“The reviewer's report is expected to reflect their own careful reading and evaluation of the paper. Any use of AI during the review must be disclosed in the reviewer's cover letter and must be limited to tools that guarantee that the manuscript will not be used for training AI models.”
American Psychological Association Policy on Use of Artificial Intelligence
“Generative artificial intelligence, specifically the kind based on Large Language Models (LLMs) like ChatGPT, has become a transformative force in many fields. Scholarly writing and publishing are no different, and generative AI has begun to have an impact on scholarly work. In response to this impact, the APA Publications and Communications Board has approved policies regarding the use of generative AI in scholarly materials. These policies (as well as APA policies on other potential issues in scholarly publishing, and additional reading on the subject) can be found on the APA Publishing Policies page and will continue to develop as we gain a better understanding of the effects of generative AI on scholarly publishing.
“APA’s current policies on generative AI are:
- When a generative AI model is used in the drafting of a manuscript for an APA publication, the use of AI must be disclosed in the methods section and cited.
- AI cannot be named as an author on an APA scholarly publication.”
Authors
“APA policy states that authors are responsible for the accuracy of any information in their article. This means that authors must verify any information and citations provided to them by an AI tool. Authors may use, but must disclose, AI tools for specific purposes such as editing.
For guidance about when and where to disclose the use of a Generative AI tool, please see the disclosure guidance section below.
“Additionally, please note that when information is entered into generative AI, the organization which runs the generative AI will likely have access to this data. Authors should be aware of this possibility and how it may impact the privacy of participants in their studies, as well as how it may impact their own privacy and intellectual property. For this reason, journal editors and reviewers may not enter materials from submitted manuscripts into generative AI as it would constitute a violation of the confidentiality of the peer review process.”
Disclosure guidance
“Guiding principles for authors and editors about what output to disclose from generative AI tools:
- Authors need to be transparent, providing the necessary information for readers to understand how generative artificial intelligence (AI) was used during the research and manuscript drafting process. Disclose the use in the most relevant place in the manuscript, most likely the Introduction or Method sections.
- Authors need to maintain ethical approaches to using generative AI, including not entering confidential material into open generative AI tools, for example, research data or client notes that may make a participant/client identifiable.
- Authors need to take responsibility for the information provided by generative AI tools, including verifying the information received via generative AI searches by reading original sources used in AI output.
- Authors need to provide attribution to the generative AI tool in cases where the tool was used to generate ideas, content, analysis, code, or research elements. If you would provide attribution to a human contributor, you should most likely provide attribution to a generative AI tool for a similar activity.
“Authors should consider the disclosure of AI in the context of existing resources such as the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association (7th ed.), the Ethical Principles of Psychologists and Code of Conduct, the Contributor Role Taxonomy (CRediTopens in new window), and guidance provided by the institution that approved the author’s research. For curated AI topics, consult the APA Style website and blog.
“Noncomprehensive examples of these principles are provided next to aid authors and editors in thinking about what needs to be disclosed when using generative AI. Some examples recommend that authors preserve the output of generative AI in their private records in case it is requested during peer review or after publication. Researchers should document for their own records the prompts used with AI tools. To the extent that it helps readers, these prompts can be included where the AI use is disclosed, or elsewhere as appropriate, such as an appendix.
Guidance on what to disclose and where in manuscripts or coursework.”
| Generative AI use | How to disclose | Similar principle |
| Generate a resource list on a topic to inform your literature review, metasynthesis, meta-analysis, or similar | In the introduction section, including your prompts, keywords, and AI used. (Preserve the output in case of inquiry) | Listing databases queried with what keywords and filters were used when describing literature search strategy for a literature review, metasynthesis, or meta-analysis |
| Translate text included in the manuscript or implement extensive copyediting (more than you’d traditionally find in Microsoft Word and similar tools) | In a general note in the author note, including the tool used | Similar to the Writing – Review and Editing CRediT role, only generative AI may not be listed as an author |
| Create or refine code | In the Method section, including the tool used and number of iterations (preserve the output in case of inquiry) | Describing the statistical package used in analysis, such as R or SPSS |
| Analyze, refine, format, or visualize data | In the Method section, including the tool used and number of iterations (preserve the output in case of inquiry) | Describing the statistical package and visualization tools used in analysis, such as R or SPSS |
| Write or draft manuscript content, including literature summaries and outlines | In the introduction section, including your prompts and tool used | |
| Create or edit figures, tables, and/or images | In the section where the figures, tables, and/or images appear (e.g., Results section), including your prompts and tool used (preserve the output in case of inquiry) | |
| Create or edit research design elements, data, or results | In the Method section (preserve the output in case of inquiry) |