Editors’ Report for 2022

doi:10.1017/S0022050723000049

Editors’ Report for 2022

Published online by Cambridge University Press: 16 March 2023

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Type: Editors’ Notes
Information: The Journal of Economic History , Volume 83 , Issue 1 , March 2023 , pp. 309 - 315

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/S0022050723000049 [Opens in a new window]
Copyright: © The Author(s), 2023. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of the Economic History Association

Bishnupriya Gupta has begun her first year editing the Eurasian submissions. Eric Hilt is entering his third year editing the non-Eurasian submissions. John Parman is the book review editor for the Americas. Juan Flores Zendejas is the book review editor for the rest of the world. The Journal is fortunate in having Lily Welch continue as the Journal’s Editorial Assistant and Sally Sztrecska as its Production Editor.

The Journal has benefited greatly from the expert guidance and advice of our Editorial Board and more than 323 referees who contributed their time and expertise to maintaining and enhancing the Journal’s quality. Editorial Board members typically serve three-year terms. Those departing from the Board this year are Mark Koyama, Leigh Gardner, Steven Nafziger, Lisa Cook, and Noam Yuchtman. We have four new board members, Denis Cogneau, Amanda Gregg, James Kung, and Suresh Naidu. We also recognize and appreciate numerous scholars’ contributions to the Journal’s book reviews. The editorial office is grateful to all who have worked on behalf of the Journal over this past year.

The number of new submissions to the Journal in recent years is shown in Table 1. From 2013 to 2018, the average number of submissions per year was approximately 160, but there was a noticeable jump in the number of submissions to 195, 209, and 206 in 2019, 2020, and 2021. In 2022, submissions fell somewhat to 186, but remained well above the 2013–2018 average. The Journal published 29 articles in total in 2022, not counting John Wallis’ presidential address.

TABLE 1 SUBMISSION AND PUBLICATION RATES

The “published” count includes refereed articles and notes. It does not include the presidential address, which is published in June, nor “reviews and reflections” articles.

The publication ratio displayed in Table 1 is the number of refereed papers and notes published in the current year divided by the number of new manuscripts submitted in the previous year. In 2022, the publication ratio was 0.14 (29/206), the same as it was in 2021. This ratio is lower than it had been in the years 2018 and earlier, reflecting the greater number of submissions.

Table 2 reports the response-time statistics for the corresponding submissions. To place the numbers into context, our goal is to have a decision back to the author within 90 days. In 2022, the median response time for all submissions (included revised manu- scripts) was the same as it was for 2021, 63 days. However, for new submissions, this past year’s performance has been somewhat slower than previous years, with a median response time of 75 days. Unfortunately, a small number of papers have taken longer to review. We apologize to authors of manuscripts that experienced substantial delays. We continuously work to reduce the time for this small number of manuscripts, taking into consideration that we are primarily focused on the quality of editorial decisions, rather than their speed.

TABLE 2 RESPONSE TIME STATISTICS

The distributions of submissions are documented in subsequent tables. We show the data for eras in Table 3 and for topics in Table 4. The data on regions is shown in Table 5. Each of these tables presents data for 2017 through 2022, the period for which we have consistent data.

TABLE 3 DISTRIBUTION OF SUBMISSIONS BY ERA, MULTIPLE SELECTIONS PER SUBMISSION POSSIBLE

TABLE 4 DISTRIBUTION OF SUBMISSIONS BY TOPIC, MULTIPLE SELECTIONS PER SUBMISSION POSSIBLE

TABLE 5 DISTRIBUTION OF GEOGRAPHICAL AREA

The Journal’s coverage remains broad. Table 3 shows that the distribution of submis- sions over eras has been fairly steady in recent years, with the nineteenth and twentieth centuries accounting for the bulk of submissions. Table 4 shows that submissions in political economy and growth continue to be particularly strong. Labor has remained the third most-common topic. Nonetheless, the top-three topic areas together account for only about 40 percent of all submissions, reflecting broadly dispersed interests within the field. Table 5 shows that manuscripts on Western Europe and the United States are most common, and account for about half of all submissions. Manuscripts focused on Asia, Eastern Europe, and Latin America together accounted for another 30 percent of submissions.

Book reviews are an important component of the Journal, and we sincerely thank the many reviewers. We also remind our membership to have their press send a copy of any new books to the relevant book review editor. In recent years, the Journal has also sought occasional “reviews and reflections” synthetic articles, extended book reviews, and roundtable book reviews when appropriate. In 2022, the Journal published one “reviews and reflections” article, entitled “Indigenous Nations and the Development of the U.S. Economy: Land, Resources, and Dispossession,” by Ann M. Carlos, Donna L. Feir, and Angela Redish.

Readers will recall that at the 2013 meetings, the EHA board of trustees approved a policy to make publication conditional on archiving the data sufficient to replicate the results in accepted articles. The authors of all new submissions from 1 January 2016 onward that were accepted for publication have been required to post data and replication files to maintain and advance the Journal’s efforts to ensure transparency and scholarly integrity. A branded page can be found with openICPSR, and depositors can submit files into openICPSR per the instructions available at http://www.icpsr.umich. edu/files/openICPSR/JEH-deposit-instructions.pdf. The editorial office and ICPSR continue to work to enhance the interface.

Referees for 2021–2022 were: