About This Journal
Comparative Philosophy is a peer-reviewed, open-access/non-profit international journal of philosophy. With comparative philosophy understood as a general way of doing philosophy through cross-tradition engagement toward world philosophy, the Journal emphasizes the constructive engagement of distinct approaches and resources from different philosophical traditions (whether distinguished culturally or by style/orientation) for the sake of their joint contribution to the contemporary development of philosophy and society worldwide; the Journal also stresses general theory and methodology of comparative philosophy.
International Character and Co-Publishers
Comparative Philosophy is an independent international academic journal. The International Editorial Board of the Journal consists of its Advisory Board and its Editorial Committee. Taking the open-access approach, the Journal is not published by a commercial press but co-published by a non-profit international philosophical society and university institutions through universal accessibility of the Internet. No article submission or processing charges are required from prospective authors. All content is freely available without charge to the user or his/her institution. Users are allowed to read, download, copy, distribute, print, search, or link to the full texts of the articles, or use them for any other lawful purpose, without asking prior permission from the publisher or the author. The journal is published in English on the World Wide Web; its current co-publishers are the International Society for Comparative Philosophy toward World Philosophy (CPWP: www.cpwponline.org), the Center for Comparative Philosophy & University Library at San Jose State University, California, USA, with the support of bepress, USA. The coverage of Comparative Philosophy includes cross-tradition-engagement studies of distinct approaches/resources from different philosophical traditions understood broadly (whether distinguished culturally like Chinese, Indian, Western and other traditions, or by style of doing philosophy like “analytic”, “Continental”, and other traditions, or by strategic orientation of exploration like Buddhist, Confucian, Daoist, Marxist and other traditions, in the order of their alphabetic labels) or from (ancient) philosophical tradition and contemporary scholarship (philosophy or other intellectual pursuits). The emphasis of the Journal, regarding conceptual/explanatory resources and modes of thinking in philosophy, is not exclusive to any ad hoc way of thinking alone (e.g., neither the Greek-style nous alone nor the Chinese-style dao alone) but open-minded and inclusive, generally speaking; however this emphasis is also sensitive to the nature and features of specific philosophical issues/topics and the demand of situations, specifically speaking. On the other hand, the Journal is inclusive but not merely for the sake of being aware of views from other traditions without critical engagement. The Journal emphasizes critical engagement but does not go without serious consideration of positive and constructive contributions. Rather, the Journal explicitly emphasizes the constructive engagement of distinct approaches in light of critical examination. It is to inquire into how, by way of reflective criticism (including self-criticism) and argumentation/justification and with the guidance of adequate methodological guiding principles, distinct modes of thinking, methodological approaches, visions, insights, substantial points of view, or conceptual and explanatory resources from different philosophical traditions (understood broadly as indicated above) can talk to, engage with and learn from each other and jointly contribute (in a complementary way) to our understanding and treatment of a range of a range of (perennial, existing or newly identified) issues of philosophical value and significance that can be jointly concerned and approached via appropriate philosophical interpretation and from a higher and/or broader philosophical vantage point.Contents and Open-Access Approach
The contents of Comparative Philosophy are to be intrinsically relevant to the philosophical interest and inquiry of philosophy scholars and students, no matter which culturally distinguished traditions they study (e.g., Chinese or Indian philosophy) and no matter which style of doing philosophy they instantiate (e.g., analytic or "Continental" philosophy), given that they work on issues and topics under examination in the Journal articles. For a philosopher would be intrinsically interested in distinct approaches to the issues and topics under his/her philosophical (instead of merely historical) examination and in their reflective relation to his/her current working approach, whether or not he/she takes some other distinct approach also as his/her (current) working approach, which may be related to his/her training/specialty background, personal research interest or the need of the current study. In this connection, the journal's emphasis on constructive engagement and philosophical relevance serves as, or constitutes, one pivot at which these philosophical explorations on distinct resources from different traditions can be intrinsically and effectively unified through comparative philosophy, which otherwise could be easily dismissed as irrelevant to each other. The target reader-audience of Comparative Philosophy, due to its nature and focus, consists primarily of academic philosophers and philosophy students throughout the world and across the boundaries of various philosophical traditions, both in developed countries or areas with relatively sufficient resources and in developing countries with insufficient resources. It is also intended to make excellent scholarship in comparative philosophy (as a general way of doing philosophy through cross-tradition engagement toward world philosophy) available to researchers in other fields and non-academic readers who are interested in philosophical issues and topics. With this extensive readership in mind, and in view that some institutions (especially those in developing countries) cannot afford expensive journal subscriptions, Comparative Philosophy takes the open-access approach through universal accessibility of the Internet without cost. The open-access approach taken by the Journal is thus not merely an economic means to philosophy journal production but also a substantial way of maximizing the impact of philosophical research and enhancing constructively-engaging feedback and dialogue.Publication Criteria and Formats
Comparative Philosophy is to primarily publish original articles of high-quality (‘articles’ for short below). Submissions of articles to Comparative Philosophy are judged through a blind refereeing process and selected for publication on the basis of their academic quality (rigorous argumentation/explanation, clear presentation, etc.), relevance to constructive engagement, and significance to comparative philosophy. [A submitted article will be first given an initial pre-review inspection by the editorial team to examine whether the coverage, focus, format, etc. would meet the Journal’s relevant basic expectations; if a submitted article is suitable for the Journal’s peer review procedure, it will be blindly reviewed by expert peer referees (from one to three, usually two, depending on cases.] Depending on need, the Journal might include a special column of essays on a specific theme; the essays to be included in the column are reviewed by the special column editor and other peers. An issue of the Journal might contain the “Constructive-Engagement Dialogue” section and/or the “Recent Work” section. A “Constructive-Engagement Dialogue” section includes critical discussion writing(s) on certain view(s) in its author's published paper(s) either in this Journal [then together with the author's response(s)] or in some other academic publication(s). [This section may or may not include the author's (further) response(s), and, due to the nature of this section, critics' contributions can be solicited and might be from the editorial team.] The “Recent Work” section includes writings on recent work in the constructive-engagement scholarship of comparative philosophy: the writing might be a reflective report of the significant result of a conference, or a “state of the art” survey, or a book review. Contributions to the above two sections will be given editorial and/or peer examinations (due to the nature of the writing) in view of relevant academic expectations and of how they are related to the emphasis of the Journal. Submissions are to be made in clear and accessible English (whenever logical notation is not being used) electronically via internet.Comparative Philosophy is currently planned to be a biannual journal (to be published in January/February and July/August of each year), starting its first issue (Volume 1, Number 1) at the beginning of 2010. With the journal quality as top priority concern, we plan to start steadily without rush. The Editorial team is free to publish as few articles as are judged to meet a high standard of quality. The Journal is to be published in a typeset format that can be read on-screen or printed by the reader. Besides the ISSN of the Journal, the physical appearance and Universal Resource Locator (URLs) are permanently fixed to allow for reliable citations. Interested readers as well as potential authors/reviewers are welcome to register yourself at the section “Register” of this website for a variety of need and convenience. The journal adheres to the COPE Code of Conduct for Journal Publishers and follow the recommendations of COPE's Core Practices. Our focus as an academic publisher is to preserve the accuracy, integrity, and completeness of the scholarly record by ensuring that we promote honest and most-accurate publishing through stringent policies. The copyright of an article published by Comparative Philosophy will remain with its author(s). Due to the open-access nature and for the sake of the Journal’s open-access management records, the Journal can manage rights and permissions for other uses of the article (such as its translation or reprint) if the relevant requests are made to the Journal, while the author(s) also can handle such cases by themselves in accordance with the open-access policy, provided that full reference is made to Comparative Philosophy as the original (English) medium of publication and that the case result is notified to the Journal. The digital articles published in the Journal can be used within the online environment. Institutions can preserve a second copy of articles published by their researchers in the institutional repository.[For an overall understanding and elaboration of the "constructive engagement" emphasis of Comparative Philosophy, see the journal theme introduction on pages 1-32 of Volume 1, No 1 (2010).]
Journal Contact
Principal Contact
Bo Mou
Professor of Philosophy
Department of Philosophy
San Jose State University
San Jose, California 95192-0096
USA
http://www.sjsu.edu/faculty/bmou
Phone: (O) 408-924-4513
Email: bo.mou@sjsu.edu
Indexed in ESCI [Emerging Sources Citation Index system by Clarivate Analytics (previously Thomson Reuters) which includes peer-reviewed publications of regional importance and in emerging scientific fields], DOAJ (Directory of Open Access Journals), ASCI (Asian Science Citation Index) and EBSCO Index Database.
