Welcome to the European Political Science Review. This journal is intended to provide a new publication outlet for the best research in contemporary political science, and to publish high-quality research coming from all areas of this rather diverse discipline. There are other journals which also publish articles coming from a variety of approaches, and attempt to represent the breadth of this diverse discipline. That said, however, we believe that we are launching a journal that will fill an important niche in political science and will perform an important service for the profession.

First, we are not only open to research from across the discipline, but we also want to speak to scholars working in all sectors of the discipline. Therefore, we attempt to make each article we publish speak not only to the specialists in that field, but also to speak to the other areas within political science, and perhaps also to cognate disciplines. We believe that too much of the research being published now addresses extremely narrow issues and only a few scholars across the world. There is certainly a place for that type of specialized publication, but we believe that there is also a need to provide a more integrated conception of the questions and the answers that we address in our discipline.

A second goal of the EPSR is to bridge national differences in the style of political science research, and in the questions that are being asked. This is most obvious in the differences between North American and European political research, but there are also some important differences among the countries of Europe. We believe that the presence of national specific approaches to political science is enriching, but also that more conversation between the various approaches is needed and would like to contribute to this, both in Europe and beyond Europe.

This is why, while we want to provide an avenue for the quickly growing discipline in Europe, we do not want to restrict either the focus of the research or the contributors to Europe alone. We aim instead at covering a variety of topics and attract good scholarship from all over the world. This pluralistic choice is evident in the choice of editors as well as in the composition of the Editorial Board. It is also evident in the articles being published in this first issue.

Following from the second point, we will be open to a broad range of methodological and theoretical perspectives. The world of politics and government is too diverse and too complex to be captured adequately by any single approach and we wish to foster not only diversity but also debate about the appropriateness of various approaches to studying politics. We therefore hope, and expect, lively discussions of theoretical and methodological issues and the ways in which we can move our discipline forward.

There are lofty ambitions for this new journal, but we believe that we can fulfill them. This optimism is due, in no small part, to the support and encouragement we have received from a number of sources. We, as the editors, need first to thank the Associate Editors for their support and their willingness to give of their time and talents. Likewise, Lorenzo Mosca has been more than just an excellent managing editor, he has been a full partner in the editorial work. The Editorial Board has also provided encouragement as well as some hard work in getting us to this point. The academic leadership and the staff of the European Consortium for Political Research has also provided great encouragement and used their substantial professional skills in helping us get this enterprise started. Last, but far from least, Cambridge University Press has been a real pleasure to work with, and will ensure that the production and distribution of the EPSR will be of the highest possible quality. The European University Institute and Pittsburgh University have offered us space and resources.

Again, we welcome you to this new journal. We hope that it will be a source of enrichment for your own research and teaching, and that it will be able to make a contribution to the development of political science as a discipline.