Journals & conflict of interest declarations

In our newest "how can we help you?" thread, a reader asks:

I recently submitted a paper to Phil Studies, which was sent back by Springer's editorial office because I didn't include a conflict of interest statement *in the blinded manuscript*.

I have never been required to do this before, and it seems quite obvious that this potentially violates the manuscript's anonymity. For example, my research is funded by a scholarship that is only awarded once every year, so it is very easy to deduce my identity.

Has anyone heard of such requirements before? I just cannot quite comprehend that this is the policy at Springer journals, but maybe I'm missing something.

I have to confess that I've puzzled over this too, as it has happened to me too. Another reader submitted the following reply:

Once one of my manuscripts was bounced back for the same reason, but then all they wanted me to write down was a line that essentially said, "Here is my statement on conflicts of interest. There aren't any". So, it did not violate anonymity, but it did feel silly.

This seems right (it's what I've done too), but it still raises the questions: (1) Why are some journals now doing this?, and (2) is there any (justified) point to it?

I suspect that the answer to (1) is probably straightforward: publishing companies may require statements like these as some sort of legal cover in case problems arise (as they sometimes do in science, when for example studies on the health effects of tobacco are funded by tobacco companies), and these companies simply develop policies and apply them indiscriminately.

But this brings us to (2): is there any justification for the practice, say in philosophy specifically? I'm actually a bit more uncertain about the answer to this question than I suspect many readers might be. Why? Well, because private funding seems to be playing an ever-increasing role in higher education, including in philosophy and the humanities more generally--something that has often been called the 'privatization of higher education.'

If (e.g.) a given paper or philosopher is funded by a particular private agency, and (let's say) that private organization is active politically (e.g. supporting particular parties or political candidates), then is that a "potential conflict of interest" worth disclosing?

I dunno...maybe?--if only to disclose and keep track of the ways that non-academic economic and political forces may be exerting influence over academic work. At least offhand, these do seem to me to be things that we should want to keep track of--not because I think that we should exclude private investment from academia (which I am uncertain about), but because it seems to me to be wise for the public to be aware of potential outside influences on research trends, etc. 

So, maybe as silly as these kinds of journal requirements may seem (and as irrelevant as they may be for many philosophy papers), maybe there is a justified point to having them (though, I would add, it's not entirely clear that there are clear norms in our discipline for what would constitute a conflict of interest--something that seems to me to be worth clarifying!).

But these are just my thoughts. What are yours?

Comments

[Conflict of interest]

I'm the OP, thanks for posting this. I wanted to add two points:

1) I am not against conflict of interest statements per se. What surprised me in particular is that they were required in the blinded manuscript, and so visible to peer reviewers. I think it is worthwhile to be transparent about conflicts of interests when a paper is published, and also towards editors so they can ensure impartial review (although I also agree that in philosophy there seems to be less need for it than in say medical science). But I don't see why reviewers should see this information, and I think it might actively harm philosophy if such information biases reviewers. For example, suppose that my research *is* funded by the tobacco industry, but it is actually scientifically in perfect order. If the referee has no knowledge about the funding, then hopefully they'd reach the verdict that the paper is publishable. But if they read, prior to reviewing the paper, that it was funded by the tobacco industry, that might influence their opinion in a negative way and lead them to reject the paper.

2) I think for most people in philosophy, the only conflicts of interest to declare are sources of funding. I believe these are typically included in conflict of interest statements. I understood this to include bona fide public funding bodies, such as the research councils in the UK - or am I mistaken? So, a more specific question is whether it is important to be transparant about that kind of information in particular, both before and after peer review.

[a postdoc]

I've had manuscripts sent back for this reason several times in the last year and don't recall encountering the issue before then. It'd be nice if journals with this sort of policy would inform authors of it during submission or have a form about it authors must complete during submission.

[elisa freschi]

The point is just declaring that you have no conflict of interest.
Springer publishes a lot of journals and in the case of medicine the problem is real, e.g., you might be working for a certain company and write against the medicine produced by your rival company.
Declaring your source of funding is NOT part of your conflict of interest statement unless they have "skin in the game". You just thank them in the acknowledgements, that peer reviewers don't see.

[Elisa]

Concerning "Conflict of interest": Could it be that you should have just selected "no conflict of interest", just in order to tick that box? Having a scholarship is not a conflict of interest! The point of this Q is rather for stuff like you publishing about medicine B while working for company A, that produces a direct competitor to B.