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The Humanitarian Leader

Submissions to the Humanitarian Leader are currently open. Please submit your paper here.

Types of submissions  

Submissions are encouraged to challenge our collective assumptions about the humanitarian system. We welcome papers that deal with concepts of leadership in the humanitarian system, as well as ideas useful to humanitarian decision-makers, or that challenge the core concepts of the humanitarian system. 

The Humanitarian Leader/Leader Humanitaire publishes conceptual and theoretical pieces, commentary, perspectives and thought pieces, as well as articles that involve evidence synthesis and secondary data analysis.   

We do not publish articles that involve primary data or systematic reviews.  

Please note that HL/LH does not provide funding for research projects. We do not charge Article Processing Fees (APF).  

Themes/topics  

We publish multi-disciplinary articles, but submissions must broadly align with one or both of the following themes to be considered: 

  • Systems transformation  
  • Humanitarian leadership  

Click here to view the CHL Research Pillars to understand how we approach and discuss systems transformation and humanitarian leadership.  

We have a strong history of publishing articles that are fundamental to the day-to-day work of those working in emergencies, disasters, conflicts and humanitarian crises, as well as papers exploring leadership and transformation in the sector. 

For the full list of previous papers, please browse our Open Journals archive.  

We particularly encourage submissions from those in crisis-affected settings and the Global South. 

Languages 

Articles can be submitted in English or French, and accepted papers will be translated to be published in both languages. Given sufficient justification, the journal occasionally translates papers into languages other than French and English. To see an example, click here.  

If you have another language into which you would like your paper to be translated, please indicate this on the submission form. Consideration will be given to costs and available resources to complete the translation and layout. Additional editorial support is also available for authors whose first language is not English or French.  

Article requirements  

Before submitting your paper, it’s important to ensure it meets the following requirements. Papers which don’t satisfy these requirements will not be considered for publication by the editors.   

  • A word count of approximately 5,000 words. Papers significantly under or over the word count will not be forwarded to the editors for review. Word count does not include the abstract, author information, leadership relevance response, or bibliography 
  • Whilst the HL/LH is not a peer-reviewed academic journal, we do expect authors to reference appropriately, providing evidence for claims and acknowledging any relevant major works. Referencing must be in APA7 format 
  • A 150-word abstract must be included, as well as a 50-100 word leadership relevance response answering the question: How does this paper inform humanitarian leadership practice OR systems transformation? (Both the abstract and response are excluded from the overall word count) 
  • Papers can be written in first or third person 
  • Spelling and punctuation should be as polished as possible in submission. Accepted papers will receive professional copyediting 
  • The paper should be in MS Word 
  • Relevant images should be submitted in JPEG or PNG format as separate files, and have a minimum resolution of 300 dpi. 

Please note that we do not review abstracts prior to submission of a full paper. Abstracts that are submitted via the submission portal will not be reviewed by the Co-Editors.  

Author requirements 

All authors must provide the following information when submitting their paper:   

  • Funding acknowledgement (to indicate funding sources for research projects, where funding has been received from any source to enable the author to produce the submitted paper) 
  • Ethics approval or statement (if required)  
  • Conflict of interest statement  
  • Authors’ contributions (optional, can be useful when multiple authors have written a paper) 
  • Authors’ information (100-word summary bio of the author/s) 
  • Acknowledgements (100-word summary of any general support received, or acknowledgement of the support of particular people/organisations) 

If any of the sections are not relevant to your paper you can indicate ‘Not relevant’ on the submission form.  

Plagiarism checks

All articles received will undergo an academic integrity check upon submission. If the check uncovers evidence of plagiarism, it will be rejected and not sent to the editors for consideration.  

Artificial Intelligence (AI) authorship

The Humanitarian Leader/Leader Humanitaire will not accept generative editorial work and autonomous content creation by AI chatbots, such as ChatGPT. The use of AI tools for “AI assisted copy editing” purposes is allowed, for example, using a chatbot to generate AI-assisted improvements to human-written sections of text solely for readability, style, and correcting spelling and grammar. In all cases, there must be human accountability for the final version of the text and agreement from the authors that the edits reflect their original work. 

Publication process 

Each submission, if it passes the academic integrity check, will be screened for relevance by at least one editor. If the paper is then accepted by the editor/s, the CHL Communications Team will work with you through the following process:   

  1. Copyediting by a professional editor  
  2. Any significant changes or queries are returned to the author for review and comment  
  3. The paper is translated into French for publication as Le Leader Humanitaire 
  4. A graphic designer completes the layout of the paper  
  5. The paper is finalised and proofread 
  6. The paper is published on OpenJournals@Deakin and highlighted on the CHL website   
  7. The paper is promoted via the CHL communications channels, including social media and EDMs 

Note: Editorial support is available for people for whom English and French is not their first language 

Publication timelines 

The Humanitarian Leader/Leader Humanitaire runs submission call-outs twice per year, which are communicated via social media and the CHL e-newsletter. The time between acceptance of a submission and publication varies, and depends on the volume of submissions received, and the number of existing publications in the pipeline. The journal Co-Editors can fast-track submissions should the subject be time sensitive.  

Copyright details

The author/s retain ownership of the intellectual property in their working paper and grant to the Centre for Humanitarian Leadership the right to publish the Working Paper on our website. The author/s warrant to the Centre for Humanitarian Leadership that their Working Paper does not infringe any third party’s intellectual property rights, nor does it contain any defamatory material.

Publishing in the Humanitarian Leader will not prevent later publication in a journal and all rights remain with the author/s.

Submit a paper

Submissions are currently open. Please email research@cfhl.org.au if you have any questions.