Review the APSR Submission Guidelines, the APSA Style Manual, the FAQs, Registered Reports at APSR, and the guidelines outlined below before submitting your manuscript.
Format
- Research Articles that use original work to advance understanding of important political issues, speaking to the field of political science (any length is acceptable, but typically submissions are less than 12,000 words).
- Replications and Reappraisals that revisit results previously published in the APSR or in other journals.
- Registered Reports that are submitted and evaluated prior to data analysis (see detailed guidance here).
Prior Publication Policy
The APSR publishes only original work. Please see Cambridge's Preprint Policy for exceptions. Authors who have submitted or published work that is similar or closely related to their submitted manuscript must notify the editors upon submission in their cover letter.
Transparency and Reproducibility
APSR takes seriously its role as a space for scholarly communication within the political science community. The Journal will continue to collaborate with authors to meet DA*RT standards. We recognize that there are many ways to meet those standards depending upon the type of scholarship, research context, and other factors that vary across the discipline. However, all approaches recognize the importance of clear and transparent communication about the procedures used to collect and analyze evidence. While epistemological and methodological diversity is a strength of the political science community, this diversity also makes more imperative scholarly communication that is as transparent and accessible as possible across disciplinary subfields and approaches.
Verification of Reproducibility Packages for Conditionally Accepted Manuscripts
If a conditionally accepted manuscript substantially relies on computations, the authors will be required to deposit a reproducibility package containing data, code, and documentation necessary for other scholars to reproduce the manuscript's findings. We will verify that the package reproduces the paper's results and is documented well enough that future researchers can understand and benefit from it. Our detailed guidelines for reproducibility packages can be found below.
Our guidelines discuss circumstances where data cannot be shared for ethical and/or legal reasons. Authors who anticipate problems adhering to our guidelines for this or other reasons should get in touch before their manuscript is reviewed.
Verification of Formal Claims in Conditionally Accepted Manuscripts
Papers containing formal claims should be submitted with complete proofs, either in the text or in an Online Appendix, to be available to the reviewers and editors during the review process. Formal claims will be reviewed in detail by an editor and assistants at the conditional acceptance stage for consistency and readability. Authors are expected to collaborate with the journal in addressing any potential issues raised by this technical verification.
Ethics
The APSR expects all authors to comply with ethical and transparency obligations described in APSA's A Guide to Professional Ethics in Political Science (2012) and in Principles and Guidance for Human Subjects Research (approved by the APSA Council, April 4, 2020).
Researchers have ethical obligations to:
- ensure that research that directly engages human participants in the research process adheres to APSA’s Principles and Guidance for Human Subjects Research, and, if it does not for well-founded reasons, provide reasoned justification in scholarly publications and presentations (APSA 2012, 9);
- declare what compensation was paid (if any) to human participants and how the amount was determined;
- declare any potential or perceived conflicts of interest arising from their research (APSA 2012, 9);
- disclose sources of financial support for their research (APSA 2012, 9);
- “facilitate the evaluation of their evidence-based knowledge claims through data access, production transparency, and analytic transparency so that their work can be tested or replicated” (APSA 2012, 9) whenever legally, ethically and epistemologically possible; and
- acknowledge contributions to the research, including authorship and citations to previous work, as appropriate (APSA 2012, 9, 11).
To ensure that research published in the ASPR
- if the submission draws on research directly engaging human participants, including human subjects, expert interviewees, and those exposed to experimental interventions. If yes, authors should answer "yes" to the screening question (even if ruled exempt from further review by the relevant ethics review board) and
- discuss in the text or an appendix their ethical practices concerning human participants, particularly those included in the Principles such as consent, deception, confidentiality, harm and impact, as well as whether and how participants were compensated
- confirm compliance with APSA’s Principles and Guidance for Human Subjects Research, or if it is not in compliance, provide reasoned justification for deviation(s) in the main text, with additional explanation provided in an appendix (included at the time of submission) if needed;
- whether they adhere to the other ethical principles listed above, including explaining how any other real or perceived ethical issues or conflicts of interest, were addressed, including where these issues are discussed in the manuscript or an appendix as needed;
- to declare any agencies, organizations, or institutions that funded the research;
- to indicate where in the manuscript or an appendix the data collection procedures (if relevant) are explained; and
- to confirm that, if the paper is accepted, quantitative data and related code necessary to produce the results will be made publicly available on the APSR Dataverse, or in cases where such confirmation is not possible, provide a reasoned justification in the text or an appendix concerning the legal, ethical, or methodological constraints that prevent public, free access to the data.
This information (including any appendix that provides further details) will be shared with reviewers as appropriate. Reviewers will be invited to comment on the extent to which the research or researchers have adequately addressed ethical and transparency obligations.
Manuscript Preparation and Formatting
Authors should follow the manuscript preparation guidelines below. Submissions that do not follow these guidelines will be sent back to authors, which will delay the review process. Repeated submission of manuscripts that do not meet our standards may result in rejection.
Self-citation and Anonymous Review
Manuscripts should be written in such a way that they preserve the anonymity of the author. In order to ensure anonymous review, authors should avoid citing themselves unnecessarily or excessively, and should ensure that any self-citation does not reveal their identity. To that effect, obvious references to the author should be removed (e.g., "As I wrote in 1993,...").
Authors also have the option of using the APSR template in the free-to-use online collaborative LaTeX tool, Overleaf. This tool helps authors follow the APSR manuscript format and provides a number of other useful features, including: an intuitive interface; version control and a typeset preview of the article; collaborative tools allowing the sharing of the article with co-authors and the ability to highlight and comment on the text. More information is given below.
Preregistration
Authors who have preregistered their research should submit an anonymized copy of the preregistration plan or an anonymized link to it, which will be shared with reviewers. Authors should clearly state how their research has, or has not, deviated from the original plan. Deviation is not a disqualification - we do not want confirmatory work to discourage exploratory work - but it is essential to clarify.
Manuscript Formatting for Review at a Glance
- There is no strict word limit for the APSR, as some articles need more space than others. However, we expect most articles to be less than 12,000 words, and some may be half that size (the equivalent of a research note or letter). All should include a total word-count on the front page. Abstracts must be 150 words or less. This website provides a free (and fairly accurate) word count tool for counting words in PDFs.
Formatting
- Font should be 12 point for main text and appendices.
- Double-space main text (not necessary for footnotes, and references).
- Page numbers are required on all pages.
- Use footnotes, not endnotes.
- Avoid acronyms or computational abbreviations when discussing variables.
Cover Letter (optional)
- Reserved for issues not handled in the manuscript.
- May address overlap with work that is published or to be published elsewhere.
- May address special considerations for the selection of reviewers.
- May address problems of confidentiality that are difficult to resolve without withholding relevant information.
Figures and Tables
- Place figures and tables where they should fall in the manuscript, or, if need be, use a place holder [Figure/Table 1 about here], with the figure directly following on a new page.
- Please number figures and tables consecutively.
- Variables that appear in tables and figures should be described in appropriate detail in the text or appendices.
Figures
- Should be readable in grayscale. If submitting in color, please vary colors not by shade, but by intensity and tones. We recommend increments of 15-85%.
- NOTE: When printing in grayscale, classic blue, black, red and green all look the same.
- The costs of printing published color figures are the responsibility of the author.
References
- Author-Date system of the 17th Edition of the Chicago Manual of Style
- Information can be found in Chapter 15, Documentation II: Author-Date References
- Click here for access to the Chicago-Style Citation Quick Guide. Please be sure to change to Author-Date
- See below for a basic reference list example.
- Please provide authors' first and last names, rather than last name and first initial
- All listed references must be cited in the text, and vice versa. Do not include non-cited material in references.
- Please include a link to all non-published work, i.e., working papers, conference papers, etc.
- Publication information for each reference must be complete and correct at time of submission.
- If you are using the following research tools, we recommend:
- LaTeX – biblatex, style=chicago-authordate,
- MS Word 2016 includes CMS, for previous Word versions, try the Zotero MS-Word add-in
- Zotero – Chicago Manual of Style 17th Edition (author-date)
- EndNote – download the Chicago Manual of Style 17th Edition Author-Date (B)
In-Text Citations
- Use the Author-Date system in the following format: (Author Year, Pages). Note there is no comma between the author and the year. Separate mass citations with a semicolon.
- Do not redact your self-citations.
- Do not use footnotes for simple citations.
- Examples:
- “In the book by Ahlquist and Levi (2013), …”.
- Or at the end of a sentence (Mansbridge 1986).
- Citations may appear at the end of each (in-)dependent clause.
Appendices
- Figures and Tables appearing in the appendices should be lettered to distinguish them from those in the manuscript (Table A.1, A.2, Figures A.1, A.2 etc.).
- Each appendix should have a descriptive title.
- Restart the page count.
- Distinguish between online appendices and those you intend to publish in print.
ORCID Identifier
Beginning January 1, 2019, an ORCID iD is a requirement for corresponding authors submitting to APSR
Reproducibility Guidelines
Details on Reproducibility Guidelines can be found at Journals Policy > Research Transparency.
Reproducibility and Reliability
The Journal follows COPE guidelines scrupulously, which means that any errors discovered after publication may entail a retraction, corrigendum, or expression of concern. The Journal also publishes replications and encourages comments on each article's publication DOI on Cambridge Core, both of which are intended to encourage post-publication discussion of work in our pages.
This upshot is this: If your paper is published in the APSR there is a very good chance it will be scrutinized in a high-profile fashion by the academic community. To save time and potential embarrassment, authors should carefully consider the reproducibility and reliability of their work, prior to submission. Can the findings be reproduced? How robust are they to different choices in design (measurement, sample, specification, estimator)? Are weaknesses, assumptions, and limitations openly acknowledged?
We hope that post-publication scrutiny leads to better practices, and not to intellectual temerity. It is not our intention to discourage exploratory work. We also hope to normalize the process of post-publication debate and discussion, which means bringing honest mistakes to the fore without shame or recriminations. Intellectual activity is always risky, and sometimes errors offer the quickest path forward. Engagement is always preferred to withdrawal so long as it is in the service of truth and not undertaken in an ad hominem fashion
Review Transfer Policies
To speed the review process along, encourage reviewers to provide detailed and forward- looking advice (for example, if a paper belongs somewhere, but not the APSR), and reduce redundant reviewer workload, we allow the transfer from the APSR of manuscripts that have been reviewed and rejected to another participating journal (“transfer out” policy). We will also allow the transfer of reviewed manuscripts to the APSR (“transfer in” policy).
Transferring a Reviewed Manuscript to Another Journal (Transfer Out Policy)
When a paper is rejected by the APSR with reviews, the corresponding author will be notified in the rejection letter that they have the option to transfer their manuscript and reviews to another journal within 4 weeks of their rejection. This policy is implemented as follows:
- The author is notified in the rejection letter about this option.
- If the author wishes to take this step, they ask the managing editor to initiate a transfer to another participating journal.
- We send the anonymized MS and the anonymized reviews to the new editor.
- If the recipient journal’s editor wishes to know the identities of the reviewers, they respond to apsr@apsanet.org and request that information.
Our initial request for review alerts reviewers of the possibility of this transfer.
The journals that are currently participating in this practice are listed below. Please consult with the new journal submission guidelines prior to initiating this transfer to understand their policies about transfers. Journals may ask you to submit a cover letter detailing any changes you have made or would propose to make if they review your manuscript.
Conflict Management and Peace Science
Critical Review of International Social and Political Philosophy
European Journal of Political Theory
International Political Science Review
International Studies Quarterly
Journal of Conflict Resolution
Journal of Experimental Political Science
Journal of Race, Ethnicity, and Politics
Journal of Theoretical Politics
Review of International Organizations
Texas National Security Review
Please consult with the new journal submission guidelines prior to initiating this transfer to understand their policies about transfers. Journals may ask you to submit a cover letter detailing any changes you have made or would proposed to make if they review your manuscript.
Transferring a reviewed manuscript to the APSR (Transfer In Policy)
When a paper is rejected by another journal with reviews, if the journal has a transfer-out process, we will accept the transfer of the anonymous manuscript and identified reviews to the APSR to assist in our review process. We will accept reviews only from journals that allow the transfer of reviews from the APSR and where manuscripts are reviewed anonymously by external reviewers.
To initiate such a transfer, an author should proceed as follows:
- The author completes a normal new submission to the APSR. In the note to editor box in the submission system, the author should explain that they are requesting a transfer of reviews from another journal and specify that journal. The paper must have been rejected fewer than 4 weeks ago by the other journal.
- The author is encouraged to submit a cover letter detailing any
changes they have made, or would propose to make, if the manuscript were
to be reviewed at the APSR
- Simultaneously, the author requests from another journal that their manuscript and reviews be transferred to the APSR by having them sent by the other journal to apsr@apsanet.org. All reviews must be sent. The author should inform the transferring journal of their manuscript ID at the APSR to help us in linking the old reviews to the new submission.
- If reviewer identities are not included in this initial correspondence from the other journal, upon receipt of this email, the APSR managing editor will request the reviewer identities.
- This information, with any attachments, will be forwarded to the editor in chief and subsequently to the handling editor.
- The reviews and any cover letter will be consulted in making a desk rejection decision. As with any other submission, a paper can be desk rejected, sent out for review, or offered a “reject and resubmit.” If a paper is sent out for review, a prior reviewer may be consulted again if the editor believes it would be helpful, particularly if a manuscript has been revised since initial submission. The editor is under no obligation to rely on these external reviews or to ask for additional comments from any prior reviewers.
- As with any other submission, a decision on a manuscript is final. In particular, a manuscript submitted to the APSR through the transfer process could not be resubmitted as a regular submission.
References:
At the initial submission, we accept all reference styles. After the conditional acceptance, the authors should format the references list using the 17th Edition of the Chicago Manual of Style.
Books
Cohen, Cathy J. 1999. The Boundaries of Blackness. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
Hardy-Fanta, Carol, Pei-te Lien, Dianne Pinderhughes, and Christine Marie Sierra. 2016. Contested Transformation. New York: Cambridge University Press.
U.S. Department of State. 1979. Foreign Relations of the United States, 1951. Vol. II: United Nations; Western Hemisphere. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office.
Periodicals
Gay, Claudine. 2001. “The Effect of Black Congressional Representation on Political Participation.” American Political Science Review 95 (3): 589-602.
Junn, Jane. 2007. "From Coolie to Model Minority: US Immigration Policy and the Construction of Racial Identity." Du Bois Review 4: (2): 355-73.
Wedeen, Lisa. 2002. "Conceptualizing Culture: Possibilities for Political Science." American Political Science Review 96: (4): 713-28.
Chapter in Edited Collection
Ravi K. Perry and X. Loudon Manley. 2017. “Case Studies of Black Lesbian and Gay Candidates: Winning Identity Politics in the Obama Era.” In LGBTQ Politics: A Critical Reader, eds. Marla Brettschneider, Susan Burgess, and Christine Keating, 295-308. New York: NYU Press.
Edited Collections
Brettschneider, Marla, Susan Burgess, and Christine Keating, eds. 2017. LGBTQ Politics: A Critical Reader. New York: NYU Press.
Dissertations
Smooth, Wendy. 2001. "African American Women State Legislators." PhD diss., University of Maryland, College Park.
Websites
American Political Science Association. 2013. "About the APSA Africa Workshops." Washington, DC: American Political Science Association. Retrieved October 10, 2013 (http://www.apsanet.org/~africaworkshops/content_58417.cfm).
Datasets
Dawson, Michael C., Ronald E. L. Brown, and James S. Jackson. National Black Politics Study. [Computer file]. Ann Arbor, MI: Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research [distributor], 1993. https://doi.org/10.3886/ICPSR02018.v3
Further Questions
For answers to questions unaddressed here, please contact the