Instructions to Authors
The Editors welcome submissions to The Economic Journal which adhere to the Instructions to Authors. Manuscripts that do not meet the requirements below will not be considered for publication.
For support and more information please contact the editorial office at ej@editorialoffice.co.uk.
- 1 About the journal
- 2 Submission requirements
- 3 Ethics policies
- 4 Replication policies
- 5 Submission preparation
- 6 Manuscript preparation for Accepted Authors
- 7 Processes
- 8 Licensing and charges
- 9 Preprint policy
- 10 Permissions regarding re-use of OUP material
1 About the journal
The Economic Journal is one of the founding journals of modern economics. Since 1891 the journal has provided a platform for high-quality, imaginative economic research, earning a reputation for excellence as a general interest economics journal with a broad international readership. The Editorial Board is comprised of leading international scholars covering a wide range of expertise.
The Economic Journal publishes academic papers that significantly advance knowledge. We welcome high-quality submissions in all fields of economics, independent of method and perspective, including applied submissions on policy-relevant questions that make an important contribution by demonstrating precisely-identified zero effects.
The Editorial Board is committed to providing rapid feedback to submitting authors.
2 Submission requirements
To be eligible to submit to The Economic Journal authors must ensure that
- they agree to pay the relevant fee for their submission to be considered at the end of the submission process; please see the RES submission fee policy for further details;
- they have included their name on the paper;
- their submission is contained within one PDF file (including appendices, but not including cover letter or past reports);
- any material not for publication is clearly marked.
All original articles are submitted and reviewed via the journal's online manuscript submission system. New authors should create an account prior to submitting a manuscript for consideration.
To become a member of the Royal Economic Society visit this page.
Questions about submitting to the journal should be sent to the editorial office at ej@editorialoffice.co.uk.
3 Ethics policies
The Economic Journal has produced ethics policies for authors, reviewers and editors. To consult the policies, please see further information on ethics policies.
Authors should follow best practice in research. Falsification or fabrication of data, plagiarism, self-plagiarism (i.e., duplicate publication of the authors' own work), misappropriation of work, as well as p-hacking (i.e., deliberate manipulation of data and estimation methods to produce results with low p-values knowing that these results are unrobust) are all unacceptable practices. Any cases of ethical or publication malpractice are treated very seriously and will be managed in accordance with the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) guidelines. Further information about OUP's ethical policies.
3.1 Submissions
The Economic Journal considers all manuscripts on the condition that:
- the manuscript is original work and does not duplicate any other previously published work, including the author's own work;
- the manuscript has been submitted only to The Economic Journal. The manuscript should not be under consideration or accepted for publication elsewhere;
- the manuscript will not be submitted elsewhere whilst under consideration at The Economic Journal;
- any conflicts of interests are fully disclosed;
- all appropriate acknowledgments are made, including (but not limited to) former co-authors, research assistants and funders;
- the manuscript contains nothing that is abusive, defamatory, libellous, obscene, fraudulent, or illegal;
- you consent to making your data programmes available upon acceptance of your empirical/experimental paper, unless an exemption is requested and granted upon submission of your paper;
- in cases of research involving the participation of human or animal subjects, the research reported in the paper has been approved by the Research Ethics Board of one of the authors’ institutions and explicit reference to the approval (IRB approval date and number) is provided in the acknowledgments section of the submitted paper;
- all co-authors share joint responsibility for adhering to the journal's ethical policies.
In addition to our regular submissions, the Journal also encourages the submission of short papers, along the lines of the AER:Insights style (<6,000 words, 5 exhibits). Submissions in this category should clearly state that they are intended as short, self-contained papers, and should be written accordingly. Short papers will be held to the same quality standards as regular submissions, and the same editorial decision processes in terms of refereeing and turnaround times apply.
3.2 Plagiarism
The re-use of text, data, figures, images without acknowledgment or permission is considered plagiarism, as is the paraphrasing of text, concepts, and ideas, without proper attribution. Self-plagiarism, where an author reuses his/her previously written text, data or ideas, without appropriate reference, is also considered a form of misconduct.
Manuscripts submitted to The Economic Journal may be screened with iThenticate anti-plagiarism software in attempt to detect and prevent plagiarism. Any manuscript may be screened, especially if there is reason to suspect part or all of the text has been previously published. Therefore, it is advisable to ensure that all references are fully and correctly cited throughout the paper on initial submission to the Journal. Prior to final acceptance any manuscript that has not already been screened will be put through iThenticate. Any indication of plagiarism highlighted by our software may result in the revocation of an accept decision.
All cases of suspected plagiarism will be handled in accordance with COPE guidelines.
3.3 Disclosures
Authors are asked to declare any potential conflict of interest. Sources of potential conflict of interest are any relationship, personal or professional, that could affect the objectivity of the review process. These include (but are not limited to) commercial associations, employment, personal relationships and academic competition.
Any sources of research funding are to be acknowledged in the manuscript. At the point of submission, each author should reveal any financial or other interests or connections that might raise any question of bias in the work reported or the conclusions. This declaration will be held in confidence by the editors during the review process and after rejection of a manuscript. It will become part of the published article in the case of acceptance.
For further information please see the FAQs. If there are no disclosures, please declare no conflicts of interest.
3.4 Violations
In cases where the ethics policy has been violated, or other forms of author misconduct have been found to occur, the Editors will assess instances on a case-by-case basis but will follow COPE guidelines.
The Economic Journal reserves the right to disallow authors from submitting to the Journal for repeat offenses. The Board of Managing Editors will jointly evaluate potential cases of violation and decide on the appropriate action where a violation is confirmed.
Please consult the Editors in case any questions arise.
3.5 Appeals & Complaints
The Editors are committed to handling manuscripts fairly, unbiasedly and promptly, in accordance with the Journals’ own Ethics policies and with the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) guidelines. Authors have the right to appeal any decision taken on their manuscript at any stage. An appeal letter should be sent to the editorial office (ej@res.org.uk) and should explain clearly why the author disagrees with the decision, including detailed responses to any reviewers’ comments. Appeals are handled on a case-by-case basis by the editorial office, the Editors or in any other instance by the Royal Economic Society, under the oversight of the Society’s Publications Committee.
Complaints against the Journal, its procedures, staff, editorial board or publisher should be directed to the Society’s Publications Committee. Where applicable, the Publications Committee will investigate the complaint in line with the relevant guidance from COPE. A complaint letter, along with any supporting documentation should be directed to complaints@res.org.uk.
If a complainant remains unsatisfied after a reply from the Society's Publications Committee, the complainant may submit their concern/issue to COPE. COPE’s Facilitation and Integrity Subcommittee will facilitate the resolution of disputes.
4 Replication policies
The Economic Journal requires authors of empirical, experimental or numerical papers to provide documentation of how their results were obtained in sufficient detail and accuracy to allow their results to be replicated. When you submit a paper for consideration, you will be asked to confirm that you are willing to comply with this policy. It is essential that you request a data exemption at the point of first submission if you face any restrictions that prevent you from publishing your data or, in general, from complying with any of the provisions of this policy.
4.1 Empirical papers
For papers that contain descriptive, econometric or simulated analysis of data, the authors must provide sufficient detail in the paper (or in an appendix) for the reader to understand the nature of the data used and how it was analyzed to produce the results, as well as a replication package containing the following:
- A ReadMe file (ReadMe.pdf) describing the content of the package, the data sources (including citations), any manipulation that was carried out to generate the final datasets, how the data and programs can be used to replicate the results in the paper, the version of the software the code was written for and the respective versions of extra packages, as well as an estimate of the computation time. In case of commercially available or restricted access data sources, detailed instructions (e.g. extraction code) to obtain the datasets should be included in the ReadMe file.
- The raw datasets used in the paper and appendices (including online), including a complete, transparent and precise documentation describing all variables. If the data is provided in a proprietary format, such as in Stata format, then an ASCII file should also be provided.
- All codes necessary produce the analysis data and to re-produce the tables, figures, and in-text numbers in the paper as well as supplements and appendices. In case of simulation/Monte Carlo studies, the authors are requested to set a seed so that the exact numbers that are reported can be obtained. If the code uses additional packages that are not part of the standard distribution, then these packages should be included so that the code still runs after many years.
Authors who have requested an exemption for the publication of their datasets can either (1) grant temporary distance or physical access to the data to the journal's staff for the sole purpose of replication (the data will not be published), or (2) supply a simulated dataset or a synthetic dataset instead of the actual dataset(s) used for the analysis for replication purposes. The nature of the data used for the reproducibility checks will be indicated on the published version of the paper.
Acceptance will only be granted after the results have been checked for reproducibility.
If the paper is accepted for publication, the replication package will be posted on the journal's repository and it will be linked with the paper. Alternative repositories may be acceptable as long as they are considered “trusted” by the journal. Submission indicates that you license users to download, copy, and modify this material. Users of the material must acknowledge all authors as the original creators and cite both the replication package and the paper accordingly. The editorial board of the Economic Journal reserves the right to refuse publication of those papers whose authors do not comply with these requirements.
4.2 Experimental papers
For papers that contain analysis of experimental data, we require the authors to provide at the time of submission of the paper (authors are asked to include all information as part of the main pdf file rather than as separate items):
- A document outlining the design of the experiment.
- A copy of the instructions given to participants, in both the original language and an English translation.
- Information on the selection and eligibility of participants.
- Explicit reference to the approval of the Institutional Review Board of one of the authors' institutions (IRB approval number, date, name of the institution).
In addition, before final acceptance, the authors will be asked to submit a replication package containing:
- A ReadMe file (ReadMe.pdf) describing the content of the package, how the data and programs can be used to replicate the results in the paper, the version of the software the code was written for and the respective versions of extra packages, as well as an estimate of the computation time.
- The programs used to analyze the data and/or run the experiment.
- The raw data collected from the experiment.
- A document outlining the design of the experiment.
- A copy of the instructions given to participants, in both the original language and an English translation.
- Information on the selection and eligibility of participants.
- A copy of the IRB approval.
Acceptance will only be granted after the results have been checked for reproducibility.
If the paper is accepted for publication, the replication package will be posted on the journal's repository and it will be linked with the paper. Alternative repositories may be acceptable as long as they are considered “trusted” by the journal. Submission indicates that you license users to download, copy, and modify this material. Users of the material must acknowledge all authors as the original creators and cite both the replication package and the paper accordingly. The editorial board of the Economic Journal reserves the right to refuse publication of those papers whose authors do not comply with these requirements.
Submission preparation
5.1 Supporting information−past reports
To improve the speed and quality of decisions authors are encouraged to include editors' letters and referee reports from failed submissions at other journals. The editors reserve the right to use their own referees and provide these referees with copies of this correspondence. If you have uploaded a decision letter and referee reports from previous submissions, please tick the relevant box in Editorial Express to confirm that you have established that the decision letters and reports are not confidential.
5.2 Supporting information−appendices
Please include any appendices or supplementary material for referees (even if the material is not meant to be published) in one single PDF-file with your main text.
5.3 Journal of Economic Literature (JEL) classification code(s)
Authors are asked to provide the relevant JEL codes when submitting via Editorial Express.
Please see the Checklist for authors for further information.
6. Manuscript preparation for Accepted Authors
Authors of accepted manuscripts are asked to consult and follow the Guide for Accepted Authors.
Manuscripts in Latex - For creating manuscripts in LaTex, The Economic Journal strongly recommends the use of its TeX template found here.
7. Processes
7.1 Peer review
All submissions to the journal are initially reviewed by one of the journal editors. At this stage, manuscripts may be rejected without peer review if it is felt that they are not relevant to the journal or are not of high enough priority. This fast rejection process means that authors are given a quick decision and do not need to wait for the review process to be completed.
Manuscripts that are not instantly rejected are sent out for peer review, usually to two independent reviewers. Based on the feedback from these reviewers and the editors' judgement, a decision is given on the manuscript.
The Economic Journal adheres to a policy of single-blind reviewing, in which the identity of the reviewer is, as far as possible, kept from authors.
7.2 Production
The Economic Journal publishes authors' accepted manuscripts on the Advance Access page within 24 hours of the authors completing their licence agreements after their manuscript has been received at OUP. Manuscripts are then copyedited, typeset, proofed out, and corrected. Once the manuscripts are finalised, the uncorrected manuscripts are replaced with the final corrected article on the Advance Access page.
Authors will receive a link to the PDF proof of their manuscript on our online system by email, and it is essential that a current email address is supplied with all manuscripts. Proofing instructions will accompany the PDF file, but the proof should be checked immediately upon receipt and uploaded in accordance with covering instructions. Only essential corrections should be made at the proof stage.
8 Licensing and charges
The Economic Journal offers the option of publishing under either a standard licence or an open access licence. Please note that some funders require open access publication as a condition of funding. If you are unsure whether you are required to publish open access, please do clarify any such requirements with your funder or institution.
Should you wish to publish your article open access, you should select your choice of open access licence in our online system after your article has been accepted for publication. You will need to pay an open access charge to publish under an open access licence.
Details of the open access licences and open access charges.
OUP has a growing number of Read and Publish agreements with institutions and consortia which provide funding for open access publishing. This means authors from participating institutions can publish open access, and the institution may pay the charge. Find out if your institution is participating.
Colour figures: Colour figures that appear in the print version of the journal will incur a charge of £350/$600/525 euros per figure at the author's expense. Colour figures that appear only in the online version and not in the print version of articles incur no charges. Authors will be asked at proof stage to confirm whether any figures provided in colour should be printed in colour, and will be invoiced for any charges due accordingly.
9 Preprint policy
Authors retain the right to make an Author’s Original Version (preprint) available through various channels, and this does not prevent submission to the journal. For further information see our Online Licensing, Copyright and Permissions policies. If accepted, the authors are required to update the status of any preprint, including your published paper’s DOI, as described on our Author Self-Archiving policy page.
