Reviewer appointment, independence, and signed review protocol

Protocol ID: LL-FDE-REV-001
Version: 0.1.0
Status: proposed; no named reviewer or completed external review is established by this document

1. Review claims this protocol controls

The phrases externally reviewed, independently reviewed, methods reviewed, measurement reviewed, peer reviewed, and reproduced are controlled claims. Each requires a public record identifying the person, qualifications, independence, scope, materials, method, findings, conflicts, date, and signed outcome.

Peer reviewed is reserved for a documented scholarly peer-review process that supports the phrase. A consultant review, friendly read, internal approval, automated audit, code review, or repository contribution is not peer review.

2. Reviewer roles and minimum fit

Qualifications are evaluated against scope, not prestige. Employer name, degree, follower count, title, certification, or past association alone is insufficient.

3. Intake workflow

1. Nominate. Record who nominated the reviewer and why their competence matches the scope.
2. Verify identity and qualifications. Verify only the minimum information needed; retain the evidence under controlled access.
3. Disclose relationships. Review employment, financial, authorship, method-design, supervisory, customer/vendor, training, personal, and other relationships.
4. Independent conflict assessment. A conflict reviewer other than the candidate records independent, independent_with_disclosed_relationship, not_independent, or recusal_required with rationale.
5. Freeze scope. Bind exact questions, materials, versions, digests, out-of-scope areas, deliverables, schedule, access, confidentiality, compensation, and publication terms.
6. Accept appointment. Reviewer affirms competence, independence disclosure, confidentiality, and right to retain dissent.
7. Conduct review. Findings are itemized, severity-classified, artifact-bound, and preserved even when disputed.
8. Respond and re-review. Authors respond separately. The reviewer, not the authors, decides whether a finding is resolved.
9. Sign disposition. The final review letter is digest-bound. Critical open findings prevent approval.
10. Revoke access and publish disclosure. Controlled access is closed; public record identifies the review and exact limits.

4. Copy-ready reviewer intake form

Complete every field. Write not applicable with a reason; do not delete fields.

REVIEW ID:
PUBLICATION / STUDY / RELEASE ID AND VERSION:
REVIEW TYPE(S):

REVIEWER
Legal name (controlled):
Public display name:
Affiliation and role:
ORCID or public professional record, if available:
Qualification summary tied to this scope:
Identity/qualification evidence location and custodian:

RELATIONSHIP DISCLOSURE — state present / absent / unknown / not applicable and explain
Employment or contractor relationship:
Financial interest or compensation beyond review fee:
Authorship or contribution:
Method, ontology, code, task, or instrument design:
Supervisory or reporting relationship:
Customer, vendor, sponsor, training, or platform relationship:
Personal relationship:
Other circumstance a reader could reasonably consider relevant:

INDEPENDENCE DECISION
Conflict reviewer:
Decision:
Management or recusal plan:
Rationale:
Decision date and evidence digest:

FROZEN SCOPE
Questions the reviewer must answer:
Exact materials, versions, URIs, and SHA-256 digests:
Known limitations supplied to reviewer:
Explicitly out of scope:
Controlled-data access class:
Confidentiality terms:
Compensation and payer:
Due date:
Required deliverables:
Public disclosure terms:

APPOINTMENT ACCEPTANCE
I accept the scope and disclose the relationships above:
Reviewer decision, date, and signature/receipt:
Appointing authority, date, and signature/receipt:

5. Review questions

Every reviewer answers these baseline questions plus scope-specific questions:

1. Are the intended interpretations and prohibited uses explicit?
2. Does each material claim resolve to sufficient evidence for its exact wording?
3. Are methods, data boundaries, uncertainty, missingness, and deviations inspectable?
4. Are alternative explanations, negative evidence, and limitations treated fairly?
5. Does the work overstate review, validation, representativeness, fairness, conformance, or causality?
6. Which issue would most seriously mislead a reader or affect a participant?
7. Which critical issue, if unresolved, should block publication or fieldwork?

6. Finding and response format

FINDING ID:
SEVERITY: observation / minor / major / critical
AFFECTED ARTIFACT(S) AND VERSION(S):
FINDING:
EVIDENCE OR REASONING:
REQUIRED ACTION OR DECISION:
AUTHOR/STEWARD RESPONSE:
REVIEWER DISPOSITION: open / resolved / disputed / withdrawn
RESOLUTION EVIDENCE DIGEST:

Disagreement is retained. Disputed does not mean resolved. Authors may reject a recommendation with evidence, but they cannot rewrite the reviewer’s signed finding.

7. Final signed review record

The final record must state:

• exact review claim permitted, such as “externally reviewed for protocol completeness by [name] on [date]”;
• claims not permitted, including validation or peer-review wording outside the scope;
• reviewer outcome: approve, approve with bounded conditions, revise and resubmit, reject, or recuse;
• all open, resolved, disputed, and withdrawn findings;
• access closeout and any controlled materials that cannot be made public;
• compensation, funding, affiliation, conflicts, and independence conclusion; and
• reviewer and publication-owner signatures bound to the final digest.

Machine records must conform to SCHEMAS/research-ops/0.1.0/review-record.schema.json and its semantic invariants.

8. Current disposition

No person is appointed by this protocol. No review claim becomes available until a real record passes these steps. Synthetic fixtures test the contract only.