About Special Issues

Lifescience Global/IJCS publishes Special Issues which are collection of articles related to a specific topical research area within the scope of a journal. Such issues are published to enable the authors sharing targeted research on emerging areas of the field, emphasizing on important existing subfields with a deeper insight, and throwing light on novel cross-disciplinary applications. The proposals for special issues are submitted by the “Guest editor(s)” however, all such proposals are subject to review and approval by members of the journal's permanent Editorial Board Members. It is noteworthy that all articles submitted for publication under the umbrella of a special issue are double-blind-peer-reviewed, just like articles published in the regular issues of the journal.

The Guest editors and Lifescience Global actively promotes Special Issues and invite relevant scholars and researchers across the world to ensures that the issues gain global attention on emerging and highly discussed areas of the field.

Once a Special Issue theme/proposal is finalized and gains approval by the journal’s Editorial Board, it is made visible on the journal’s website along with the guest editors’ name(s) and open for submissions through the journal’s article submission process.

The Call for Papers to invite authors is prepared by the Guest editor(s) briefly describing the theme of their Special Issue.

The Guest editors and Lifescience Global take part to actively promote Special Issues and invite relevant scholars and researchers across the world to ensures that the issues gain global attention on emerging and highly discussed areas of the field.

The Guest Editor(s), editorial members of the journal and the publisher are free to send Call for Papers via email to scholars/researchers working in the relevant field. The potential readers are also notified about the call for papers through the journal’s website. However, the support and promotion of special issues by the Guest Editors maximizes the likelihood of a successful Special Issue.

Articles’ submission, handling and publication for Special Issues

Guest Editor(s) may publish their articles in their own special issue. To prevent any possible conflict of interest, articles submitted by Guest Editor(s) are not reviewed by any member of the Guest Editorial Team rather, these are handled by the journal’s permanent Editorial Board Members and an external double blind review process is selected for these. The Guest Editors work for their special issue in a way similar to the journal’s editors for the regular issues. Based on their subject-specific expertise they are responsible for selecting the right articles suited to the theme of their Special Issue, choosing appropriate reviewer with field expertise for submitted papers ensuring a double-blind review process and avoiding any potential conflict of interest, and making final decisions of acceptance/rejection of articles based on the reviewers’ reports. No article submitted to a special issue is exclusion to the double blind review process.

The editorial staff of the journal will be available for any administrative assistance that Guest Editors may need for the successful publication of their Special Issue. Editorial staff is responsible for sending reminder emails to authors and reviewers, contacting late reviewers, notifying authors of Guest Editor’s decisions about article acceptance/revision/rejection, along with various other administrative tasks.

Once manuscripts submitted to Special Issues have been accepted by the Guest Editors based on the reviewers’ reports, these are immediately published. They will appear online on the relevant Special Issue page of the journal website.

All manuscripts published in Special Issues will be indexed in the same databases as articles published in the regular issue of the journal. They can be viewed in the relevant databases in which the journal is indexed.

We allow six months from the initial Call for Papers to the final submission deadline. After the deadline, new submissions to the Special Issue will not be accepted; however, new articles may continue to appear in the Special Issue as manuscripts already under peer review may find acceptance by the Guest Editor(s).

In case a Special Issue is cancelled during its publication owing to any unforeseen reasons, all under consideration and published manuscripts within the Issue will be transferred to the regular issue of the journal.

Articles submitted to Special Issues are subject to an Article Processing Charge (APC) provided they are accepted for publication after peer review.

For more details on article processing charges, please follow the "Article Processing Charges" of the journal.

Fateh Muhammad Burfat earned his B.A (Hons) , (Sociology, 1981) , M.A (Sociology, 1982) and Ph.D  (Sociology 1998) degrees at University of Karachi. He has specialized in Sociology, Social Anthropology and Criminology. He is working as Full Professor, Department of Sociology, University of Karachi, from January,2001, and is Director Student’s Guidance Counseling, Placement & Overseas Examinations Bureau, University of Karachi. He is currently teaching Sociology of Economic Development, Sociology of Education and Violence, Terrorism and It’s Control. He has published numerous research articles on Juvenile Delinquency, Drug Abuse, Street Children, Poverty, Social Change, Gender, Violence and Terrorism in International and National Research Journals.
His one book contribution was published in the book “Delinquency and Juvenile Justice Systems in the Non-Western World” edited by well-known Criminologist Paul C.Friday and published by Criminal Justice Press, Monsey, New York, USA. He successfully supervised 20 Ph.D Thesis and 08 M.Phil/M.S Thesis. Currently, he is the president of Pakistan  Sociological Association and Vice-President of South Asian Sociological Society. He is a member of the Population Association of Pakistan, the International Union of Social Scientists for Population, the American Sociological Association and the American Society of Criminology. He is also a member of An Advisory Committee on Curriculum and Textbooks Reform, and member Panel for Scrutiny of Feasibility Reports for Institutions/Universities ,Govt.of Sindh , Education& Literacy Department.

 Currently, he is the Principal Investigator in the project “Third Party Validation of Need-Based Scholarship” for Higher Education Commission/World Bank from August 2013. He was the Project Director (Sindh Chapter) on a UNESCO’s project “Globalization and the International Drug Problem in Central Asia and Pakistan” MOST. He was the Principal Investigator on the projects of “Social Audit of Local Governance and Delivery of Public Services” UNDP, Pakistan (Sindh Chapter) in 2010 and 2012.
He was the core member of an International team on “Cultural Strategies For Drug Abuse Intervention Programs in Asian Settings” from 1992 to 2001, sponsored by the Commission of European Communities. Dr.Burfat has organized several International and National Conferences, Seminars and Workshops on different Sociological and  Criminological Issues of Pakistan. Also participated in International workshops/seminar and conferences.