Editorial

Regarding the reclassification of Cuadernos de Contabilidad: the purpose of indexation

Cuadernos de Contabilidad has been recently reclassified into the B category of the National Science, Technology and Innovation System coordinated by Publindex; such a result was obtained with the 27th and 28th issues. The publication waits for a new reclassification starting from 2012 with the next issues, numbers 29 and 30.

This positive result happened because of a managerial effort of the editorial team and the Universidad Javeriana Publishing House and many more actors and authors, editors, committee members, etc. Nevertheless, we consider it important to rethink the effects of indexation beyond the formalities and operational managements implied, which despite being relevant and important do not generate a higher impact in middle and short periods.

When indexation is approached in a restrained way, it is easy to say that achieving these results requires a righteous and scheduled process of format filling. Notwithstanding, in the case of Cuadernos de Contabilidad the process has produced additional effects of an academic and institutional kind with a much larger magnitude, derived from the fulfilment of indicators and factors evaluated by Publindex.

On the first hand, the index for Quality and Scientific Content in journal is gradually increased in order to improve the classification. This generates two big implications: first, in order to obtain a higher amount of articles available for evaluation and approval by the mechanisms displayed on each publication it becomes necessary to create, improve and strengthen academic networks, through the identification of research groups, researcher professors and efforts for the construction of accountable knowledge at the local, national, regional and global levels. In this manner, interaction between journals and diverse academic communities "opens" programs of each university, reduces endogamy, validates research efforts and products from each institution and strengthens academia, discipline and profession.

At the same time, having a larger amount of articles being evaluated -as consequence of a better journal ranking- increases the criteria for quality and demand of journals, while also demanding for a better qualification from evaluating pairs. The particular case of Cuadernos de Contabilidad encourages a substantial improvement of the scientific quality of works published; an equally possible goal thanks to the many results achieved.

On second place, indicators referring to Publishing Committees and Referees require the building-up of an academic community outside the editor institution, working on a cooperative way to achieve common objectives. As institutional journals own defined politics and identities, Committees build and contrast discipline-particular knowledge everytime members of the Editorial team review works from diverse ontological, epistemological and methodological approaches. In opposition to the risk this process is believed to pose on the identity of each journal and institution, such a contrast enriches and strengthens it.

These indicators are built in such fashion that the community of professors and researchers inside Committees is not only conformed only once, but it also maintains throughout time a contact with the journal and a permanent monitoring of new publications and works produced by its members.

As publications aim at higher categories within the System, the participation of international actors -both as authors and referees- increases significantly. This requires that the editor not only becomes a journal manager, but also an actor in the community that is being built, being able to take part of international events, seminars, forums and networks, with the due institutional support and in subjects attached to those of the publication.

In this sense, the management of an academic journal also strengthens the academic skills of the institutional staff involved in its production and publication. It also implies that the Editor needs to be supported by bonds with teachers and researchers from each institution contributing with "operational" processes at first, but ultimately -when they are adequately and strategically articulated- improve the quality not only of Accounting research, but above all of the teaching environment inside bachelor programs, majoring programs and master degrees, each time such said "contacts" become a permanent part of teachers' work.

Third, indicators of editorial quality increase the journal's notoriety and the possibility for authors to be visible for the rest of the accounting community. In particular, abstracts and keywords in foreign languages allow communities in other parts of the globe -specific publics- to use the journals as good instruments for spreading their works.

On the fourth place, indicators of stability imply an important institutional commitment that helps journals "be ready on time". Stability not only is related to individual Editor efforts and the commitments of different actors involved, but also demands sufficient conditions and resources from institutions, in order to generate results.

It is possible that many institutions consider having indexed publications as a possible thing and will encourage departments and programs to produce them. Many institutions include this result as one of their strategic goals. Nevertheless, the necessary resources for their production are seldom assigned. Economic and time resources, as well as academic and management-related personal, are basic for journals.

Journals, then, are more than "appendages" of the academic labour produced by departments; they are rather their core components.

Finally, on the fifth place, indicators of visibility allow the journal to generate meaningful impact on the community to which it is addressed. However, it is important that university journals not only worry for their external visibility, through issues such as databases, websites or subscriptions, but they most be useful for the academic purposes of programs and teachers at the editor institution and other institutions receiving it.

It is rather positive that articles and works included in one journal, are also part of catalogues, syllabus or curriculums at graduate and undergraduate courses, being object of study, reflection, analysis and criticism by both teachers and students. This academic "environment" will undoubtedly improve the professional teaching processes.

Achieving the latter is not easy at all, as it assumes that within the pertinence of research projects that generate articles, their bond, articulation and support to the subjects taught at institutions have been considered. In many cases, this visibility becomes more important, but also the less perceived.

External visibility is also of main importance. If the journalis read, consulted and the works contained are quoted, the impact it expects to produce immediately increases. This form of visibility generates some ethic and moral risks when inadequately managed. Thus, encouraging schemes of "I quote you, you quote me"¹ will lead to an increase in the fulfilment of such indicator and a rapid loss of the journal's legitimacy and its inception within national and international academic scenarios.

In order to end its sheer formal character, visibility must look for legitimacy before the "mere" fulfilment of tasks. The moral and ethical commitment of the publication and its editorial staff is foundational.

In this sense, indexation is not only a formal effort, but also -when properly managed- an instrument able to bring important effects and academic profits for the universities involved in the publication of such journals.

The present 30th issue of our journal aims at displaying a reflection on these conditions.

Even though the number of articles contained in the current issue of "Notebooks on Accountancy" may not be significant compared with consolidated and highly categorized journals, it is the highest number of articles produced in research projects in accounting subjects and other subjects related to the journal. This increasing of the number of received works allowed -as stated at first- an augmentation of exigency and quality levels during both the evaluation and the editorial process itself.

At the same time, it is evident that the participation of international authors is growing systematically as a consequence of the strategy of international-event participation lead by professors from Universidad Javeriana with the support of the Department of Accounting Sciences, the Faculty of Economics and Management and the Academic Vice-Rector Office. Equally, international referees have had a significant participation in the current issue -different from any other occasion- not only by the amount of evaluating teachers, but also through the nature and range of their concepts, that after being righteously included into the articles, have improved them in many ways.

This international participation is comprised by the work; "ABC system of costs within Mexican industrial medium businesses" by professors María Rosa López Mejía, Alicia Gómez and Salvador Marín Hernández.

The production of the 30th issue has also improved the construction of networks where professors form other universities can permanently send works to our journal. Such is the case of Universidad Militar Nueva Granada (UMNG) and Universidad Santo Tomás, both in Bogotá. This issue includes the works "Research tendencies in managerial accounting in IberoAmerica (1998 - 2008)" by professor Jorge Andrés Salgado; "Being and understanding the accounting teacher: self-ethnographic explorations" by professor Edison Freddy León Payme, from UMNG; finally, the article "Distribution of the tributary load in Colombia: an approach from accounting categories to the Rent Tax 1990 - 2002" by researcher Jairo Alonso Bautista from Universidad Santo Tomás.

In the same way, we wish to keep receiving works form professors at universities such as Universidad Jorge Tadeo Lozano and Universidad Nacional de Colombia, who included the next articles in the present number: "An approach to studies on accounting thought" by professor Nohora García, Universidad Nacional de Colombia; "Theoretical framework for the optimal capital structure: from Modigliani-Miller to Myers" by professor Sonia Mondragón; and "Information and communication technologies in the education of Public Accountants: use and application analysis in five Colombian universities" by professors Oscar Mauricio Barreto, Sonia Alexandra Mondragón and Sandra Milena Cárdenas, Universidad Jorge Tadeo Lozano.

We also include one article that is not product of a research project, "Budgets under uncertainty" by professor Emerson Durán, Universidad Minuto de Dios (UNIMINUTO).

This set of articles allow us to believe that the journal is consolidating as a valid and visible space for teachers of other universities and we expect to continue strengthening this issue at national and international levels.

Nevertheless, this visibility has not stopped professors of our own Department of Accounting Sciences from being an active and central part of the publication. Permanent work strategies with teachers at this unit have produced a systematic inclusion not only of works generated by their research projects, but also non-derived articles that remain pertinent for the editorial policies and that approved a double evaluation through the "doubly blind" mechanism.

Thus, Universidad Javeriana included three works in the 30th issue: "Analysis of non-financial implications when applying IFRS to SME in medium institutions in Colombia" by professor Edgar Emilio Salazar Baquero; "Assets valuation: a view from International Financial Reporting Standards and the current Colombian context" by professors Martha Liliana Arias and Aracely Sánchez; finally, "Review services, an alternative for the insurance of financial information" by professor Germán Eduardo Espinosa Flóres.

Arranging the composition described plus a number of significant efforts such as the inscription of the journal in databases like Scielo, RedALyC, Dialnet and others where we formerly belonged, such as Fuente Académica, Latindex, Ebsco and, of course, Publindex, will facilitate the presentation of the journal for the A2 category in the next all of Colciencias.

Thus, the journal remains interested in gaining this ranking improvements departing from two assumptions: we still have to work steadily in order to improve the scientific and academic quality of the published articles, and we must transcend the formal aspects -without forgetting their importance- in order to benefit students and professors at Pontificia Universidad Javeriana- on the first place, and the rest of universities in the country.

Undoubtedly, improving classification is a very important goal that is a natural consequence of an academic and investigative work performed by the editorial team, this being the main purpose of Cuadernos de Contabilidad. We need to keep receiving the precious support of authors and members from the scientific and editorial committee of referees, to whom we thank once again.

I would not want to close this editorial without sincerely thanking Paula Andrea Grajales Sánchez, Public Accountant, who worked in the current issue as Editorial Assistant for the journal. Without a doubt, Cuadernos de Contabilidad exists today as it does thanks to what she has helped to build.

Gabriel Rueda-Delgado
Editor, Cuadernos de Contabilidad
June, 2011

^1.For example, when a research group exclusively quotes its own works, or those of others every time they quote them first.