Many of the policy problems confronting Indonesia, from climate risk in smallholder agriculture and land subsidence in coastal cities to the delivery of primary health care in remote districts, are shared by other low- and middle-income countries and by several high-income ones. Yet the empirical literature remains largely confined to single-country studies, which limits the transferability of findings and the identification of the institutional conditions under which interventions succeed or fail. Systematic cross-national comparison, grounded in comparable indicators and transparent sources, offers a means of addressing this gap.
Research Center Progresif therefore invites researchers based outside Indonesia, including Indonesian scholars at overseas institutions, to author — as first author or co-author — comparative studies built on existing manuscript drafts that analyse publicly available Indonesian evidence. Each contributor extends a draft with commensurable evidence from his or her own country, so that the final article offers a genuine multi-country comparison.
The call is open to academic staff, researchers and postgraduate (master's or doctoral) students affiliated with a university or research institute outside Indonesia. Only one contributor per country is admitted to each manuscript, so that every country perspective is represented by a single accountable author; colleagues from the same country are encouraged to choose different manuscripts.
Contributors are expected to add a substantive country component, typically 1,500–3,000 words, comprising:
All data must be genuine and verifiable. Primary research involving human participants requires the ethical approval applicable in the contributor's country, with the approving body and reference number stated in the manuscript.
Every contributor whose contribution meets the ICMJE/CRediT criteria becomes an author. Researchers from any country may be the first author: by default the contributor who first completes a substantial component leads the article, and contributors may agree on a different order that reflects their actual contributions before peer review. Individual roles are reported in a CRediT statement. The initial drafts were prepared by Research Center Progresif from public data with the assistance of a generative-AI writing tool; this is disclosed in a dedicated declaration in every article, and all co-authors take full responsibility for the final content. Each completed manuscript undergoes double-blind peer review by at least two external reviewers who are not members of the journal's editorial board. Publication is not guaranteed and depends solely on the outcome of peer review.
Accepted articles are published in English in the relevant Research Center Progresif journal under a CC BY-SA 4.0 licence. All journals are Diamond Open Access: no article processing, submission or publication charges are levied on authors, and articles are freely available to readers. First editorial decisions are typically issued within four weeks of submission.
| Call opens | 6 November 2026 |
| Expression of interest and manuscript selection | Open continuously until the closing date |
| Closing date for country contributions | 18 December 2026 |
| Submission of the integrated manuscript and peer review | December 2026 – February 2027 |
| Expected publication | Issues of April–June 2027, subject to peer review |
A manuscript enters peer review once contributors from at least two countries outside Indonesia have completed their components, or at the closing date if at least one has done so.
Register through the programme page to receive a personal workspace in which all open manuscripts can be read online and one can be selected. After selection, the editable draft is made available, and the completed version is uploaded through the same workspace.
Editorial Office, Research Center Progresif (Pusat Kajian Progresif), PT Zuliya Smart Consulindo, Jl. Dinar Elok No. 18, Meteseh, Tembalang, Semarang 50271, Indonesia · redaksi@researchcenterprogresif.org