Central: a journal of living knowledge for justice, policy & practice
Coming in 2027!! This page is still being developed
Published by New Central Media · Sheffield, United Kingdom
ISSN [once assigned] · Quarterly · Open access
The same high bar. We change what it measures.
ABOUT
Central is a peer-reviewed online journal that treats lived experience as a source of authoritative knowledge, not as illustration or anecdote. We publish work by people with direct experience of the justice system, addiction and recovery, often alongside practitioners, policymakers and researchers. Our purpose is to bring that knowledge to the centre of how justice, treatment and recovery is understood, governed and delivered.
Current issue
Volume 1, Number 1 · April 2027
Our first issue will be published in April 2027. Submissions are now open.
Archive
Each issue of Central is numbered by volume and issue and stays permanently available here.
Who we are
Central is published by New Central Media, which publishes lived experience authors and returns the value of their work to them. New Central Media has supported more than fifty people in recovery to become paid, published authors, with all profits paid to authors. Its work has been presented at the United Nations, discussed with the Department of Health, and deposited in the British Library’s national collection. Central applies the same commitment to scholarly publishing.
The journal was founded by Dr David Patton, Associate Professor in Criminology at the University of Derby, whose research focuses on recovery, desistance and lived experience.
How we review
Every submission is peer reviewed. Our review process deliberately brings lived experience reviewers alongside academic and practitioner reviewers, so that a piece is judged by people who can assess both its rigour and its truth to experience.
Get involved
We welcome submissions from authors with lived experience and from people working alongside them. You can also join us as a reviewer, or subscribe to hear when new issues are published. As we don’t charge subscription fees you can also donate to support the continuation of this work.