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Let's say that you thank Professor X in your paper that you will submit to a Journal Y for providing you some insightful comments. It is never possible to know but let's assume that Professor X is the anonymous referee for your paper. This is possible since you make a list of potential referees (this is quite common for some journals).

What would be the reaction of an editor?

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As an editor in both computer science and biology, I would generally consider a person listed in the acknowledgements to be involved enough to have a conflict of interest, and therefore would not invite them to be a reviewer. This is a heuristic, not an absolute rule.

It is also worth noting that I usually solicit a review from precisely one of the recommended reviewers, since recommended reviewers are often "close" in the network of the authors, and I want to have more independent perspectives as well. It's still worth listing multiple recommended reviewers, since some may be unavailable, but it's not useful (for editors like me) to make a very extensive list.

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  • Wouldn't it be rather easy to exploit that rule to make sure that someone is not going to review my paper?
    – FooBar
    Sep 24, 2018 at 7:53
  • @FooBar that's probably why it's "a heuristic rather than an absolute rule". After all, there's a difference between a quick chat at a conference with someone you don't know well and a former colleague whose lab you just visited for a week.
    – Chris H
    Sep 24, 2018 at 8:20
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    @FooBar It's a practice that definitely has been exploited before (I can't say how common it is - hopefully not very). If I can find the link I'll comment it - but there's been a question here about that before, where a group was repeatedly ackowledging an individual (that had no relation to them) to avoid ever having them review their papers.
    – Bilkokuya
    Sep 24, 2018 at 10:13
  • @FooBar Editors get to use their judgement, if something seems fishy. And if there's actually an issue with somebody's work, it won't generally be the case that precisely one individual is critical to detecting it.
    – jakebeal
    Sep 24, 2018 at 10:54
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Nothing would happen. In my area (math) it is quite possible that X will end up being the referee in spite of the fact that you mentioned them. Providing someone with insightful comments is not considered to be a connection strong enough to constitute a conflict of interest, so the editor would not normally have any reason for concern.

I should note that in math, authors submitting papers for publication are not typically asked to suggest names of potential referees, so perhaps that makes the answer less relevant for you.

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