Refereeing process in mathematics and physics: Meaningful changes and models for improvement

Contemporary scientific publishing in mathematics and physics (as in other exact sciences) is a complex and rapidly changing process. The most important element of this process, namely, the refereeing process is considered. In particular, meaningful changes towards refereeing process in mathematics and physics are identified and predicted. Considering a transition that takes place from the traditional refereeing system to other models and introducing the four basic parameters of the refereeing process, namely, the review stage, the openness for editors, referees and authors, journals and e-journals, feedback and e-feedback, several different models are proposed and described for improving the traditional refereeing system (e.g., 2-stage open and semi-open pre-review models, 1-stage open and blind pre-review models, and 0-stage open post-review models). © 2013 Springer Science+Business Media New York.