The ABCD Journal Takes a Major Step Forward: Now Available on the MTA Library’s OJS Platform
| 2026. August 30.
The Journal of Advanced Studies on Borders, Cooperation and Development (ABCD Journal) has reached an important milestone: it is now available through the Open Journal Systems platform operated by the Library and Information Centre of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences.
The ABCD Journal is an international, peer-reviewed, open-access journal dedicated to borders, cross-border cooperation and the development of border regions. Its mission is to bridge the gaps between science and development, research and policymaking, and theory and practice. It therefore provides a forum not only for theoretical research but also for policy-oriented analyses and practically relevant contributions addressing the challenges faced by border regions.
Published by the Central European Service for Cross-Border Initiatives (CESCI) in cooperation with and under the umbrella of the Transfrontier Euro-Institut Network (TEIN), the journal brings together internationally recognised researchers and practitioners. Its Editor-in-Chief is James W. Scott, Professor at the University of Eastern Finland and an Honorary Member of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences.
Why is joining the OJS platform important?
Open Journal Systems is a publishing platform designed specifically for scholarly journals. It supports the entire publication process, from manuscript submission and editorial management to peer review, publication and archiving. It also handles structured, machine-readable metadata and supports integration with DOIs, ORCID and academic discovery services, helping research outputs become more accessible and easier to find.
The journal’s presence on the institutional platform of the Library and Information Centre of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences therefore represents much more than a change of web address. It provides a stable and transparent publishing environment, strengthens the professionalism of the editorial workflow and creates better conditions for the journal’s international visibility and future inclusion in major scholarly indexes.
All articles published in the ABCD Journal are freely and immediately available online. The journal charges no submission, publication or page fees, while research articles are evaluated by independent, anonymous experts through a peer-review process.
From a pilot publication to a fully established scholarly journal
The pilot issue, published in 2024, presented lessons from the b-solutions initiative, focusing on legal and administrative obstacles along European borders and innovative approaches to overcoming them.
The first regular issue that followed features selected contributions from the international conference What Future for the Concept of Borderless Europe?, held at Ludovika University of Public Service in Budapest in May 2025. The conference was organised by the LUPS–CESCI Research Group on Cross-Border Cooperation and TEIN.
The issue examines how migration, security, public-health and war-related crises are transforming European border regimes. Its articles address border identities, Schengen and border control, cross-border governance and legal instruments, as well as the role of education, neighbouring languages and citizenship in sustaining cooperation across national borders.
The launch of the ABCD Journal’s OJS site is an important step towards establishing the journal as a lasting and widely accessible international forum for border studies—one that connects researchers, practitioners and policymakers and helps turn academic knowledge into practical responses to the challenges faced by Europe’s border regions.
