Editorial Principles at AJPS

From: Dan Reiter and Adam Berinsky, editors-in-chief

General Statement of Principles

AJPS has for decades been recognized as one of the top two or three journals in all of political science.  The central goal of the new editorial team is to maintain and, if possible, further strengthen this reputation.

AJPS endeavors to publish the most significant research in political science.  The significance of a submitted manuscript is generally determined by three different factors:

• Importance of scholarly question for political science discipline
• Theoretical innovation and contribution
• Empirical contribution

We offer the following observations on how to think about these three criteria of significance, and other pertinent issues.

1. Each article may excel more on one dimension, but we would expect most articles to hold high standards on multiple dimensions.
2. The importance of the scholarly question is a gateway criterion. Manuscripts that tackle relatively minor scholarly questions should be redirected to more appropriate journals. Further, manuscripts addressing non-political questions, such as geographic determinants of economic growth, should also be redirected to other journals.
3. Most manuscripts other than methodology manuscripts should have at least some theoretical content, in the sense of proposing, presenting or synthesizing broader theoretical assumptions to motivate hypotheses and empirical analysis. Though normative political theory manuscripts of course differ in structure and aspiration.
4. Most manuscripts with empirical contributions, but without theoretical innovation, are less likely to find a home at AJPS. This is true even for manuscripts presenting new empirical data. Manuscripts that offer new empirical tests of standing theories and hypotheses are widely published in the growing set of subfield and specialty journals.
5. A leading trend in recent years has been growing concern with causal inference, and constructing empirical tests that convincingly demonstrate causal processes outlined in theories. AJPS can and should continue to demand that authors do their best to address issues of causal inference, using the most advanced available methods. In addition, authors should in their manuscripts give an honest accounting of what findings can be interpreted causally and under what assumptions such findings hold when making such claims. At the same time, it is important to remember that an exclusive focus on causal inference risks narrowing the field, in the sense that inevitably some areas of great scholarly significance experience limits regarding the degree to which causal inference can be established within plausible empirical designs. Innovative and high-quality descriptive work can find a home at AJPS as well. Thus, AJPS welcomes work dealing with questions of great political significance, including papers that address causal questions and those providing new descriptive or predictive understandings.
6. AJPS welcomes formal theory manuscripts that also contain careful empirical tests.  However, inclusion of careful empirics alongside a formal model is not necessary or always possible, especially given word count constraints.  That said, it is important for all formal theory papers to retain some connection to empirics, even if only the use of historical or policy illustrations, or discussion of how the theory provides new insight into existing empirical work.
7. Continuing past policies, AJPS will decline manuscripts that are purely focused on historical cases or contemporary policy debates without connection to theory or method. AJPS also declines papers that are primarily pedagogical, surveys of existing results (meta-analyses notwithstanding) and manuscripts that are not building on contemporary political science scholarship (though recognizing that innovation outside of existing research paradigms is something to strive for).
8. It is the burden of the author to make their manuscript clear to reviewers. If reviewers are unable to understand the central components of a manuscript’s claims, then that is the fault of the authors, not the reviewers. Manuscripts must strive to be clear to reviewers, all of whom have scholarly backgrounds.
9. Pre-registration of an analysis plan is committing to analytic steps without advance knowledge of the research outcomes. Pre-registration is neither necessary nor sufficient for good research. But pre-analysis plans (PAPs) help conducting well-considered research in a transparent way. Pre-registration reminds us to carefully think through the research question, our expectations and all the minor and major decisions that may influence the research outcomes before our data is collected and our analyses are done. AJPS does not require authors to submit PAPs for any studies, but encourages authors to consider such plans, when appropriate. For instance, many reviewers of experimental work ask to see PAPs.
10. Authors should describe in detail their sampling procedure. In the case of survey and experimental work, this description should include explicit statements of sample design and the treatment of non-response. The AJPS does not have any requirements for specific sampling procedures, but authors should be prepared to justify and defend their sampling choices. During the review process any criticism of samples must be based on a serious discussion of why the sample is not appropriate for the given analysis conducted by the author.
11. For the first time, AJPS will publish shorter essays, called “Research Notes.” Research notes will have a 4,000 word limit. The title of each Research Note will start with the words, “Research Note,” as in, “Research Note: Populism and Violence Against Immigrants,” to help distinguish research notes from full-length articles.  Research notes at AJPS will be confined to methodology papers (including methodology papers in normative political theory) and meta-analyses.  Research notes will not be essays that primarily present new data, or that offer replications of previous studies without significant theoretical or research design innovations.