Taking a stand to eliminate coercive citation practices in supply chain management and business logistics research

Citation

Ellinger, A., Richey, G., Kovács, G., Spens, K., Autry, C. and Banomyong, R. (2012), "Taking a stand to eliminate coercive citation practices in supply chain management and business logistics research", International Journal of Physical Distribution & Logistics Management, Vol. 42 No. 5. https://doi.org/10.1108/ijpdlm.2012.00542eaa.001

Taking a stand to eliminate coercive citation practices in supply chain management and business logistics research

Article Type: Editorial From: International Journal of Physical Distribution & Logistics Management, Volume 42, Issue 5

A recent article in the Policy Forum of Science (Wilhite and Fong, 2012, p. 542) suggests that coercive citation is “uncomfortably common and appears to be practiced opportunistically” in academic publishing. The authors describe coercive citation as:

[…] requests that (i) give no indication that the manuscript was lacking in attribution; (ii) make no suggestion as to specific articles, authors, or a body of work requiring review; and (iii) only guide authors to add citations from the editor’s journal.

The article also contends that coercive citation practices are “more prevalent in most business disciplines,” that journals published by commercial, for-profit companies show significantly greater use of coercive tactics, and that “the strategic nature of coercion continues to put pressure on editors to coerce”.

As editors and the publisher of the oldest journal in the field of supply chain management and business logistics strategy, we are taking a stand to discourage and hopefully eliminate coercive citation practices in our field. The good news is that none of the journals in our sub-discipline are listed in the extensive list of offender journals published in the Science article. The potential bad news is that the long-awaited arrival of impact factors for the leading supply chain management and business logistics journals provides incentive for coercive citation practices to gain currency. Our position at IJPDLM is that we are delighted to have a highly competitive impact factor (2.617 for 2011) that appears to be encouraging authors from all over the globe to submit their best work to our journal. In the first two months of 2012, we have received 50 regular submissions (not including special issues) putting us on track to receive 300 regular submissions in 2012, and suggesting that our impact factor is providing ample incentive for international authors who previously may not have considered IJPDLM as an outlet.

We have therefore decided to join the group of journal editors who are adopting the Ethical Practices of Journal Editors (EPJE): Voluntary Code of Conduct. The EPJE (published in its entirety below) is the product of discussions among a group of editors who believe that the need to affirm the integrity of our science requires a strong, public stance regarding the ethicality of business journals and more specifically on the publication processes of refereed academic journals in the business disciplines. The EJPE is a non-binding voluntary process designed to create implicit and explicit social norms that will be revisited as needs evolve. The current code 1.0 (see below) permits journal editors to be included in an online “affirmation” list by contacting Dr Steven G. Rogelberg, Editor, Journal of Business and Psychology (sgrogelb@uncc.edu). Alex Ellinger and Glenn Richey have already joined the editors of Academy of Management Journal, Journal of Applied Psychology, Personnel Psychology, Journal of Business and Psychology and Journal of Management as early adopters of EJPE: Voluntary Code of Conduct and we encourage editors of the other journals in our field to join us. We believe that embracing EPJE: Voluntary Code of Conduct will leave our many global contributors secure in the knowledge that citation coercion is not part of getting published in the field of strategic supply chain management and business logistics.

Papers in this issue

This issue brings together four papers addressing distinctly different areas, yet all of extreme strategic importance to supply chain management and logistics (SCML). The first two papers look deeply into the highly important topic of supplier selection. First, Kaufmann et al. address a topic that is prevalent in all supplier selection processes – bias – in “The impact of individual debiasing efforts on financial decision effectiveness in the supplier selection process”. Using a large survey respondent sample, 12 sub-hypotheses and structural equation modeling, the authors test the positive and negatives of employing debiasing tactics in supplier selection. Their study is of distinct importance in the supplier selection area as the examined outcome is financial performance. The authors also provide a research agenda to encourage additional work in this area. In the second paper, Herbon et al. contribute an advanced approach to supplier selection in “Dynamic weights approach for off-line sequencing of supplier selection over a finite planning horizon”. Using a triangulated methodology, the authors describe how the dynamic environment can be accounted for to increase supplier selection efficiency. The result is a practical tool for decision support deployment that is applicable in both service and manufacturing industries.

Next, Kerkfeld and Hartmann add to the numerous examinations of resources and capabilities in SCML in “Maximizing impact of investments into purchasing and supply management”. Grounding their study in the Resource Based View of the Firm, the authors survey SCML executives to ascertain the effect of different degrees of organizational effectiveness for leveraging knowledge-based resources. The study details the positive impact of knowledge-driven resources and supplier-related capabilities on operational performance. We anticipate that this paper will help guide executives towards more effective investments in operant resources.

Finally, in “Comparing port performance: Western European versus Eastern Asian ports”, Feng et al.’s detailed comparison of European and Eastern Asian port facilities responds to our editorial objective of increasing submissions that address truly international topics. An extensive questionnaire is employed in this international evaluation of port performance that yields direct suggestions for Improving global port facilities. Speaking broadly, the study indicates that Western European need improvements in efficiency and communication, while Eastern Asian ports need improvements in customs services and overall service effectiveness. The tables alone are of great value to both researchers and industry.

Alex Ellinger, Glenn Richey, Gyöngyi Kovács, Karen Spens, Chad Autry, Ruth BanomyongThe IJPDLM Editorial Team