Is it ethical to withdraw a paper after acceptance in order to resubmit to a better journal?

Question

I think the title asks the question, but once again in more words:

Suppose you submit a paper to a journal and it is accepted by the journal. By this I mean that the journal tells you that they have decided to publish your paper but you have not submitted or examined final proofs and -- especially -- not signed any paperwork allowing the journal to publish the paper.

I wonder how people feel about the ethics of deciding not to go through with the publication because you now feel that the paper could be published in a better journal? This could happen either because of outside feedback you received in the meantime or because of feedback from the referees/editors of the journal itself. (Added: In case this was not clear, I am assuming that upon submission one was seeking to publish in that journal conditional on not learning that one has "shot way too low".)

As far as I can see, it is absolutely legal to do this, so I am not interested in the legality of it, but rather its ethics and ramifications as an academic practice. I also think I will get better answers if I do not telegraph my own feelings about this; I will be happy to document them later on. Let me just say (i) this is a hypothetical question, but (ii) based on my own experience it is not ridiculous that it might be in the interest of the author to engage in this practice, if it happened to be kosher to all parties involved.

Note: I had previously asked a related question, at the time wondering whether it would be better asked separately. Based on the way things have gone thus far, I now think it is better to post this followup question separately (not necessarily right away).

Answer 1

There are certainly cases in which withdrawing a paper after acceptance is reasonable, for example if the author feels misled or mistreated by the journal (as Benoît Kloeckner points out in his answer). However, when the journal and referees have behaved blamelessly, it's hard to justify unilaterally withdrawing the paper after acceptance. When you submitted the paper, you implicitly agreed to publish it there if accepted. This is part of the research community's norms: a submitted paper is a request for publication, not a request for the option to publish.

Of course it's not a legally binding promise, or even a particularly grave moral promise, but it's still not something you can reasonably violate without a compelling reason beyond self interest. I don't think this is even worth considering except in extraordinary circumstances, such as a paper that was submitted in good faith but turned out to be far more important than the author could have foreseen. Fortunately, there's a simple solution in these cases, namely asking the editor for permission. It's a little awkward, but certainly less so than just going ahead and withdrawing the paper without asking, and an apologetic explanation can help. If there's a truly compelling reason to withdraw the paper and resubmit elsewhere, then there's a good chance of getting the editor's blessing, which would resolve the ethical issues. If, on the other hand, the editor disagrees with the reasoning, then the author is stuck. But it's better to be stuck publishing in a low-prestige journal than to do something inappropriate or unethical, and being unable to convince the editor is a bad sign regarding the ethics.

This is a special case of a broader principle: if you believe unusual circumstances justify behavior that might otherwise be considered unethical, and there's someone who could in principle grant permission, then it's generally better to ask for permission than to take action unilaterally.

Answer 2

It is not ethical to withdraw a paper that has been accepted. Journals, editors, and reviewers invest time in the publication process. To withdraw a paper after it has entered this process is a waste of their time. While the legal ramifications of is behaviour are probably limited, it will result in bad feelings.

As for not having the money to publish. Assuming the journal fees are available prior to submission, and reputable journals make their fees known, then if you don't have the money, then you don't get to submit. If they have a paid expedited service and you are worried about the back log, then ask up front. The only case that it might be acceptable is if he review process drags on for so long that your funding ends.

Answer 3

Suppose I submit a paper to Journal A. Under what circumstances can I then ethically withdraw it?

• Upon receipt of the reviews. The review process can be thought of rather like the (English) law on contracts. I offer Journal A a paper in a certain form. They think about it for a while, and then (typically) reject my initial proposal, but offer to publish a related paper ("If you add X and Y we'll take it"). Typically, I then make revisions and submit them, forming a new "offer". Eventually, we reach a stage where the proposal is acceptable to both parties, and the paper is accepted. However, I'm under no obligation to continue to negotiate with the journal if at some point I decide that I don't like the terms they're offering (e.g. the reviewers ask for changes that I don't want to make). Does it make a difference if the reviews are largely positive, instead of largely negative? Intuitively, I'd say it does, but I'm struggling to come up with a sound justification for this. [Edited to add:] I suppose the difference is that withdrawing after good reviews would seem to indicate that I'm acting "in bad faith"; see below.

• If I discover a serious flaw in the paper. Clearly, I have a responsibility to withdraw it as soon as the flaw is recognised, to avoid wasting everyone's time. Once the flaw has been fixed, the paper may well look quite different (in content); thus, it seems implausible that I am bound to choose the same journal upon resubmission.

• If I realise the paper could be significantly improved. This is a trickier one. You might well argue that it was unethical of me to submit it in the first place, as it wasn't "complete". On the other hand, this could easily arise without me being at fault: perhaps someone else has just published a new statistical test which provides additional insights into my results; perhaps I'm working in a field where data is sparse, and an additional set of data points have just been obtained. It seems weird to suggest that it's wholly unethical to withdraw the paper and improve it. (Indeed, it seems arguable that it's more ethical than allowing the incomplete paper to be published, and then immediately writing a follow-up.) Again, when it comes to resubmission, it makes sense to decide the venue based on a fresh assessment of the merits.

Furthermore, I don't see that these latter two points necessarily cease to apply once the paper is "accepted" (rather than "in review"). Certainly, I'm still responsible for fixing any flaws. On the other hand, in the "legal" analysis, acceptance constitutes the making of a contract, which cannot then be broken without consequences.

So, to go back to the original question: if I (a) originally submitted in good faith, and (b) would need to do some nontrivial amount of work to adapt the paper for the more prestigious journal, it seems that it's not unethical for me to withdraw with the intention of "moving upmarket", at least provided I do it before acceptance. After acceptance, it is probably unethical.

However, there are a lot of interesting grey areas. Do I have a responsibility to my funding providers to get maximum exposure for the research they support? What if my paper will directly help, say, a cure for cancer - so that getting it widely known in the relevant community has positive implications for humanity?

The main argument against permitting withdrawal would appear to be the fact that it wastes people's time. Again, a legal comparison is instructive: if you walk away from contract negotiations, you are not in any way breaching the contract: it hasn't yet been made. However, if the other side think they can argue you weren't acting in good faith, you may well find yourself being sued for their costs. However, I would class that as a business matter, not an ethical one.

Finally, to address a point made in the comments: does an editor have a responsibility to inform an author that they're underselling their work? I'm not sure that they do (just as, provided I have not made any misrepresentations, I'm not obliged to tell a prospective buyer that he's offering me too much money for my house). If editors start second-guessing authors' choices in submitting to this or that journal, the system would quickly descend into chaos. However, reviewers (who act like the legal advisors on the house-sale analogy) may well be obliged to make the significance of the work clear (though, perhaps, not to go as far as recommending the author take one course of action over another).

Answer 4

I can imagine some cases where withdrawing an accepted paper would be ethical.

Some where already given by Avid's answer, e.g. when the author realize that the paper is flawed. Another one would be if the author realize after acceptance that the journal editorial policy is far below what is expected (e.g. the author realizes that the journal is predatory). More specific cases could be:

1. the author receives a very quick positive report, where the reviewer makes it pretty clear he or she did not read the paper,
2. the author is asked pages charges, or article processing charges while the journal did not made it clear that they are charging the author,
3. the editor accepts the paper but (kindly) asks the author to add some references to the journal so as to increase their impact factor (sadly, this is not a fictional case).

I would say that most of the time, withdrawing after acceptance is on the unethical side of the border line (for the reason given by StrongBad: it wastes other's time), but that some specific circumstances make it ethical or even the way to go.

Answer 5

While this sort of behavior is not unheard of in the social sciences, it is certainly frowned upon. It could also lead to you being blacklisted by the original journal, if not more serious negative sanctions.

You also have to remember that in many fields that:

• Journal editors know each other and socialize together
• The number of referees for any random obscure topic is low

If you did this, you would get caught either 1) when the 2nd journal accepts the paper and publishes it; 2) before this when the journal editor #1 has drinks with journal editor #2; or 3) by random luck, journal editor #2 sends it to the same referee who green lighted it for journal #1.

Don't mess with journals. It's much better to have a first article in a journal with a low citation index than it is to create bad blood with journal editors.

If you're smart enough, you can write a second essay on a following topic that you can send to journal #2 once you've established yourself with your initial essay in the original journal #1.

[Edited for clarity]

Answer 6

I want to make it clear I would never do this nor do I fully endorse it but I think the argument has validity. You ask is it ethical or moral.

1) Many journals make plenty of money, not all but many. “According to The Economist, Elsevier made $1.1 billion in profit in 2010 with a profit margin of 36%, which grew to a reported profit margin of 39% in 2013, and 37% in 2014. T&F’s profit margin was 25% in 2010, per T&F” (MIT Library 2015). Journal publication is a free-market industry that is often cutthroat and makes large profits on our graft. You have every right to withdraw your paper. It is not your issue or fault that for-profit journals do not properly compensate editors or reviewers and this appears to be the major argument others use stating why it is unethical. It is my fault I give my time freely to these companies and you should not feel ethically obligated to me for doing this. It is nice that you are but you should not feel this way.

2) This is your intellectual property at this point as you have not signed over any material and hence you can withdraw your paper as long as you did not commit to not doing this in some box you checked or similar. It may be problematic morally for many reasons but it is not wrong. This is the result of your labor and intellect and if you decide not to sign the final publication agreements then so be it. Maybe you should not have submitted to this journal and you certainly should have withdrawn earlier to help your colleagues not waste time on review but it is not unethical in such a free-market for-profit industry. At this point if you get cold-feet we have to just accept it. Again, I make the for-profit distinction.

3) It is a two-way street. They can often decline you without much reason at the start of the process (editorial decline) so why can you not withdraw for no good reason at the end of the process? You can withdraw for any reason or no reason. Again, it is not your fault that we as academics do not insist on proper compensation from for-profit journals when we review or edit for them.

I would say think about it deeply but if this is a for-profit journal and you want to withdraw your paper at the last minute for any reason or no reason (good or bad) then so be it. It is a free, competitive, and often cutthroat industry. If this is a non-profit journal and we are all giving our time freely for the good of society I would not do it, ethical issues exist then. You see we as academics are generally reasonable and nice people (why it is often great to work in academia) and we want to be nice to our colleagues who have edited or reviewed a paper but in the end if this is a for-profit journal then it is us that should be demanding compensation for doing these activities (I repeat >$1,.1 billion profit for one journal publishing group) and you should not worry about withdrawing your paper.