[cross-posted from The Faculty Lounge]
The Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) was established in the UK by academic journal editors, and it now has members around the world. Among other activities, COPE publishes an extensive set of Ethical Guidelines for Peer Reviewers, which runs to five pages. It covers accepting and declining reviews, confidentiality and timeliness during the review, the content of the report, and expectations post review. Here are some of the provisions:
Peer reviewers should:
• only agree to review manuscripts for which they have the subject expertise required to carry out a proper
assessment and which they can assess in a timely manner.
• respect the confidentiality of peer review and not reveal any details of a manuscript or its review, during
or after the peer-review process, beyond those that are released by the journal.
• declare any potentially conflicting or competing interests (which may, for example, be personal, financial,
intellectual, professional, political or religious), seeking advice from the journal if they are unsure whether
something constitutes a relevant interest.
• decline to review if they feel unable to provide a fair and unbiased review.
• decline to review if they have been involved with any of the work in the manuscript or its reporting.
• decline to review if asked to review a manuscript that is very similar to one they have in preparation or
under consideration at another journal.
• be specific in their criticisms, and provide evidence with appropriate references to substantiate general
statements such as, ‘this work has been done before’, to help editors in their evaluation and decision
and in fairness to the authors.
• remember it is the authors’ paper and not attempt to rewrite it to their own preferred style if it is
basically sound and clear; suggestions for changes that improve clarity are, however, important.
• not suggest that authors include citations to the reviewer’s (or their associates’) work merely to
increase the reviewer’s (or their associates’) citation count or to enhance the visibility of their or their
associates’ work; suggestions must be based on valid academic or technological reasons.
There are dozens more of these provisions. There is an admonition, for example, to "be objective and constructive in their reviews, refraining from being hostile or inflammatory and from making libellous or derogatory personal comments," and another to "recognize that impersonation of another individual during the review process is considered serious misconduct." (UK spelling of "libellous" is in original.)
It seems obvious that problems arise in peer review -- such as libel and impersonation -- that we just don't see in law reviews.
You can read the entire COPE Ethics Code here.