Ramifications of withdrawing publication offer (question from student editor)?

Question

I am the editor of a student-edited journal at a graduate school. We extended a publication offer to an author that has published with the journal in the past, and with whom I do not wish to burn any bridges. The normal process of an offer goes like this: (1) extend the offer, (2) author either accepts or rejects, (3) send copyright agreement, (4) author signs and returns copyright agreement, (5) we edit and publish the article.

The author accepted the offer within the time frame (step 2), but we have not progressed beyond that. I have to withdraw/rescind the offer because we have maxed out our page numbers for this year. I tried telling the author that I would be happy to work with the incoming editor in chief to see if they want to make him an offer to publish next year, but he insists that because he accepted the offer we are now obligated to publish it next year. I reminded him that we have not sent him a copyright agreement or entered into a publication contract, and even if we did so the journal reserves the right to terminate the agreement at its sole discretion. He essentially said that his acceptance of the publication offer formed the publication contract and now we have to publish him or else (said he turned down other offers, etc.).

I feel terrible about the situation (we've tried our best to never put authors in this position, and have never had to rescind/withdraw an offer before). Since I've only experienced this from the editor's point of view, I'm wondering what published authors have to say about the situation? Is it your understanding that once you accept an offer you've formed a contract with the publication, and they are obliged to print it? Have you ever had an offer withdrawn, and did it burn all bridges with that institution/publication?

Answer 1

I believe the author is in the right here. Accepting an article is morally binding and should commit the journal to publish it, barring exceptional circumstances. Authors should be entitled to rely on that commitment.

Although you may not have any legal obligation to publish the paper at this point, to refuse to do so would be extremely unprofessional and reflect very poorly on the journal. Given the deadlines, you can't publish in the current issue, but you should queue it for publication in the next issue with available space, ahead of any other articles not yet accepted.

Your idea seems to be that the incoming editor should have sole authority to determine the content of the next issue, and as such that he should have the right to decide not to publish the article if he so chooses. I would disagree with that. I believe the incoming editor has a professional duty to treat your acceptance of the article as binding on him as well. If you want to think of the journal as a continuing entity, rather than a sequence of unrelated anthologies, there needs to be continuity of this kind.

It is somewhat awkward for the incoming editor, as now he will have less space to fill with articles he selects. He may have a right to be annoyed with your poor planning, but that's between the two of you; you shouldn't make the author suffer for it.

I'd make exceptions only in very unusual cases, such as if the incoming editor discovers fraud or plagiarism in the article, or finds that your review process grossly violated the journal's stated standards.

Answer 2

I presume this is a law review. If so, you should really talk to your faculty advisor, who is, presumably, a lawyer. From my non-lawyer perspective, where is the consideration necessary to form a contract? What are his damages if he were to try to sue? Specific performance doesn't seem likely if he were either.

The legal publishing world is very different from the typical academic publishing community. He probably shopped this article to lots of different journals, and he strategically chose among several offers. There's always a chance something could have fallen though at any stage after your verbal/email acceptance. He might have not liked your edits or some other aspect of your (now unsigned) publishing agreement.

Reneging on an agreement certainly agreement isn't professional. I presume there were some extenuating circumstances that caused the delay in the process. Is there a reason the page count cannot be extended?