Asked to suggest referees 9 months after submission: what to do? [closed]

Question

I submitted a research paper to a mainstream journal of my math subject domain in December 2023. I did not hear anything from them since, so last month I reached out to them. My editor informed me that she had sent my paper in January 2024 to two referees, none of whom have responded to her invitation till now. She then asked me to suggest "a few names" of some people who I believe could be "good referees" for my paper. She said that she would choose two of them anonymously and invite them to referee my paper but if they too eventually don't respond, then my paper will be rejected.

There are various situations I am thinking about. Most of these have been described in THIS post (suggested to me in the comment below). The simplest thing is to go ahead and suggest her some names from my field. In this regard, my question (which has not been answered in the above post) is this: can I suggest the names of two people who are acknowledged in my paper? Will it be ethical? I am leaning towards suggesting them because those are the only two people I can GUARANTEE will agree to referee my paper.

Another thing I can do is withdraw my paper from the journal without suggesting her referees or waiting anymore. While the journal is not very prestigious, I am sure I will submit some of my other papers to this journal in the future (2-3 years). I am an early career researcher and I have seen a decent number of papers from my math field getting published here in the last 10-15 years. My question (which has not been answered in the above post) is this: By withdrawing my paper now in response to the editor's above message, can I come across as rude or arrogant and potentially sabotage my chances of publishing in this journal in the future?

Answer 1

Yes, you can suggest people you acknowledge in the paper. It should be obvious to the editor that there is some relationship and that the likelihood is of a positive review. You should, however, point out that they are acknowledged. The editor is the one making decisions about whether to invite them and how to evaluate their review, so there is no ethical issue. It might be wise to suggest a couple of others, however.

Withdrawing and submitting elsewhere is also an option, but probably not a better one. For some papers (maybe in math especially) there are a limited number of qualified reviewers in the world and another journal's reviewer stable might overlap with this one. But, I wouldn't consider it rude.

Answer 2

You’re overthinking the issue. She asked you to suggest names, so suggest names. That’s all there is to it. Any ethical implications of who the journal chooses to ask to review your paper are the responsibility of the journal and not your concern. This is assuming you are not hiding any material information on your relationship with the prospective referees you are suggesting (e.g., that one of them is a family member), and that you have not corruptly colluded with or bribed any of the people you are suggesting to guarantee a positive outcome.

Do not suggest your PhD advisor or any other person who has an obvious conflict of interest. Even if you are not hiding the nature of the relationship, such a person cannot be used as a referee. However, just being named in the acknowledgements does not constitute a conflict. And it’s expected that you suggest people who are somewhat familiar with the paper, so it’s quite likely such a person might be mentioned in the acknowledgements.

You can withdraw the paper, and I don’t see a reason why that should hurt you, but I don’t see how it would help either. You may as well try out the editor’s suggestion first and see what happens.

Answer 3

There're two different questions in the OP:

can I suggest the names of two people who are acknowledged in my paper? Will it be ethical?

The danger here is that the reviewers will have a conflict of interest. If they are acknowledged, then they presumably have firsthand knowledge of the work. For many editors/publishers that would be sufficient to disqualify them as reviewers; for other editors/publishers it could still be OK as long as the conflict of interest is disclosed.

You can pass the decision to the editor by disclosing that the suggested reviewers are acknowledged. If the editor invites them anyway, then it would be on the editor. Because there's a chance the editor will say no, you might want to suggest other, non-acknowledged reviewers as well to speed things up slightly.

By withdrawing my paper now in response to the editor's above message, can I come across as rude or arrogant and potentially sabotage my chances of publishing in this journal in the future?

Probably not. Journals see so many papers that most individual papers fade into the background. If your paper is unique in some way - which doesn't have to be the academic content, it could e.g. be if you submitted as a solo author while a PhD student and listed three different affiliations - then the editor might remember it. Even then they're unlikely to take retributive action. It's ultimately the author's prerogative which journal to submit to; furthermore if they agree that 9 months with no visible sign of review reflects badly on them (most people would), then they're more likely to be embarrassed than angry.