ERRATUM
In the December 2011 issue of the Journal, in the editors’ notes, the dissertation title of this year's Gerschenkron Prize winner, Olivier Accominotti, was printed incorrectly. The correct dissertation title is “Foreign Exchange Reserves, Financial Instability, and Contagion: Three Essays on the Great Depression.”
EDITORS’ REPORT SEPTEMBER 2011
The Journal operations have run smoothly over the past year. Jean-Laurent Rosenthal and I continue to be fortunate to work with a fine group of people. Sabrina Boschetti at Caltech has been our Production Editor for several years. Brendan Livingston has taken a job as an assistant professor at Rowan University and has stepped down as my assistant at Arizona. Taylor Jaworski, a Ph.D. student at Arizona, has taken over Brendan's position. We have a very strong editorial board. Term limits force us to lose nine excellent members: Martha Bailey, Dan Bogart, John Brown, Mauricio Drelichman, Eric Hilt, Doug Irwin, David Jacks, Ian Keay, Kris Mitchener, and Sevket Pamuk. We add to the Board a superb group of scholars, including Joyce Burnette, Bruce Campbell, Marc Flandreau, Bishnu Gupta, Michael Huberman, Trevon Logan, Joseph Mason, and Alan Olmstead. They will each serve four-year terms. Phil Hoffman and Paul Rhode continue as book review editors. Gillian Greenough has been our liaison with Cambridge for the past year and has made several improvements to the editing and distribution process. Paul Rhode of the University of Michigan will take my place as editor of the western hemisphere articles in the Journal in July 2012.
The number of submissions to the Journal in Figure 1 fell slightly to 118 but remained well above the recent trough of 98 in 2008/2009. The all-time peak was 158 in 2007/2008. The distribution of topic areas in Table 1 has evened out a great deal over the past few years. A Herfindahl index for topics has fallen from 1,460 in 2006/2007 to below 1000 for the past two years. The share of political economy articles fell from around 25 percent to 5 percent in 2008/2009 but recovered some to above 12 percent after Phil Hoffman's clarion call for more political economy in his editorial report two years ago. After two years with a 20 percent share, the share of labor papers has fallen sharply to only 8 percent this past year, while the share of papers in demography has risen from 2 to 8 percent. The share of papers on economic growth had bounced around 10 percent for several years and then rose sharply this past year to 15 percent.
The coverage of regions in Table 2 has evened out some at the expense of the United States and Canada. After several years with a 40 percent share of papers, the share on the United States and Canada has fallen to 28 percent, and a significant number of those papers make comparisons between North America and other parts of the world. The share of papers on Africa has fallen back slightly from a peak of nearly 5 percent in 2009/2010. The Asian share of topics has traced out a J-shape from a peak at nearly 10 percent in 2007/2008 to a trough of 4 percent in 2009/2010 and upward to 7 percent last year. Great Britain's share continues to surge to 18 percent.
The nineteenth and twentieth centuries continue to account for about two-thirds of the papers in Table 3. As coverage shifts further back in time, the share of papers falls off. There is one caveat about all of these statistics. The editors classified the papers up through 2007/2008, and the classifications have been chosen by the submitting authors since that time.
To put the response-time statistics in Table 4 in context, here are some insights as to how we have been operating the Journal through Manuscript Central. When the paper is submitted, we check for membership in the Economic History Association or the payment of the journal submission fee for nonmembers. A lapsed membership or nonpayment of the submission fee will slow the process because we can do nothing with the paper until the fees are paid. We also do our best to check that there is no information in the submitted files that identify the author. Sometimes the information is hidden. The Word software (under Prepare then Properties) often has information on the owner of the software that needs to be cleansed. Once the fees are paid and the paper cleansed of author information, we try our best to contact referees within a week, and we give them a deadline of eight weeks. We send reminder emails a week before the report is due, the day it is due, and then after it is due. We also try to contact people directly if these don't work. Our goal is to have a decision back to the author within 90 days. Table 5 shows that our average and medians for the past several years have ranged between 70 and 90 days. We have tried to shorten the time frame for articles that we expect to be rejected. We tend to take more editorial time on papers in the revise and resubmit stage because they are more likely to be accepted. This is one reason why the statistics for all articles are roughly the same as for new submissions even though we shoot for a six-week turnaround time with referees on resubmissions. Compared with other fields in economics, the Journal's turnaround time is very fast. Economic history journals in general have been good about this and we have a friendly competition going with other economic history journal editors to try to maintain these turnaround times.
The publication rate in Figure 2 is the number of refereed papers and notes published in the current year divided by the number of new papers submitted in the previous year. The publication rate peaked at 45 percent in 2000 and fell to a low around 20 percent in 2009. After rising to nearly 35 percent in 2010, it has fallen back to around 25 percent. The number of refereed articles and notes published does not change much from year to year, so the publication rate typically fluctuates in the opposite direction of the number of new submissions. As a result, the low publication rate in 2009 in Figure 2 is associated with the spike in the number of new submissions in 2008 in Figure 1, and the rise in the 2010 publication rate resulted from the sharp drop-off in submissions in 2009.
Note:
The numbers include new submissions only. The totals equal the number of new submissions received because a paper is classified in only one topic category. Until March of 2008, the North American Editorial Office was responsible for articles on the United States and Canada; thereafter, it took charge of submissions on Latin America too. In 2008, the Americas office had 67 total submissions, 51 new and 16 resubmitted. The office for the rest of the world had 64 total submissions, 46 new and 18 resubmitted.
Note:
The numbers include new submissions only. Totals exceed new submissions because a paper can be classified as pertaining to more than one region.
Note:
The numbers include new submissions only. Totals exceed submissions because a paper can be classified as pertaining to more than one period.
Notes:
Does not include submissions that were pending as of August 19, 2011.
Referees for the year were:
Ran Abramitzky
Olivier Accominotti
Brian A'Hearn
Robert Allen
Sam Allen
Douglas Almond
Lee J. Alston
George Alter
Terry Anderson
Manuela Angelucci
Leticia Arroyo Abad
Jeremy Atack
Anthony B. Atkinson
Gareth Austin
Martha Bailey
Daniel Benjamin
James Bessen
Howard Bodenhorn
Dan Bogart
Maristella Botticini
Leah Boustan
Fabio Braggion
Elizabeth Brainerd
Loren Brandt
Richard Britnell
Stephen Broadberry
Carsten Burhop
Joyce Burnette
Charles Calomiris
Bruce Campbell
Cameron Campbell
Forrest Capie
Albert Carreras
Linda Carter
Marco Casari
Benjamin Chabot
Eric Chaney
Latika Chaudhary
Gregory Clark
Karen Clay
Philip Coelho
Raymond L. Cohn
William J. Collins
Metin M. Cosgel
Nicholas Crafts
Lee A. Craig
Francois Crouzet
Guillaume Daudin
Donald Davis
Joseph Davis
Marc Deloof
Tracy K. Dennison
John Devereux
Jan De Vries
Mark Dincecco
Jeremiah Dittmar
Mauricio Drelichman
Alan Dye
Jari Eloranta
Rebecca Emigh
Stanley Engerman
Rui Esteves
Stefano Fenoaltea
James Fenske
Joseph Ferrie
Alexander Field
Ronald Findlay
Price Fishback
Marc Flandreau
Robert Fleck
Robin Fleming
Juan Flores
Roderick Floud
Robert W. Fogel
Caroline Fohlin
Jonathan Fox
Carola Frydman
Jeffrey Furman
Francesco Galassi
David Galenson
Christina Gathmann
Oscar Gelderblom
Sun Go
Claudia Goldin
Jack Goldstone
Gary Gorton
Regina Grafe
George W. Grantham
Timothy Gregory
Avner Greif
Ola Grytten
Guido Guerzoni
Timothy Guinnane
Bishnupriya Gupta
Sonam Gupta
Theresa Gutberlet
Stephen Haber
Steven J. Haider
Gillian Hamilton
Mary Hansen
C. Knick Harley
Ron Harris
Mark Harrison
John Hatcher
Aviad Heifetz
R. Max Henderson
Jessica Hennessey
Barry Higman
Eric Hilt
Philip Hoffman
Paul M. Hohenberg
Adrienne Hood
Sara Horrell
Michael Huberman
Elise Huillery
Jane Humphries
Joseph Inikori
Douglas Irwin
Lakshmi Iyer
David Jacks
John James
Matthew Jaremski
Taylor Jaworski
Robert Jensen
Saumitra Jha
Clemens Jobst
Noel Johnson
Paul Johnson
Ryan Johnson
Joost Jonker
Matt Kahn
Shawn Kantor
Ian Keay
Lane Kenworthy
Lionel Kesztenbaum
Sukkoo Kim
Christopher Kingston
Carl Kitchens
Peter Klenow
Gerrit Knaap
Morgan Kousser
Randy Kroszner
Timur Kuran
Sumner La Croix
Pedro Lains
Naomi Lamoreaux
Markus Lampe
Tim Leunig
Frank Lewis
Bozhong Li
Gary Libecap
Peter Lindert
Trevon Logan
Jason Long
Debin Ma
Thomas Maloney
Robert Margo
Martine Mariotti
Andrei Markevich
Joseph R. Mason
Noel Maurer
Nicholas Mayhew
Robert McGuire
Richard McKenzie
Ian W. McLean
Christopher Meissner
Victor Menaldo
Jacob Metzer
Mark Metzler
Chris Minns
David Mitch
Kris Mitchener
Carolyn Moehling
Joel Mokyr
Philippe Mongin
Alexander Moradi
Kenneth Morgan
Jose Morilla-Critz
Petra Moser
Bernardo Mueller
Sharon Murphy
John Murray
Aldo Musacchio
Steven Nafziger
Suresh Naidu
Larry Neal
Todd Neumann
Tom Nicholas
Pilar Nogues-Marco
Nathan Nunn
John Nye
Wallace Oates
Patrick O'Brien
Sheilagh Ogilvie
Cormac Ó Grada
Lee Ohanian
Philip Ollerenshaw
Alan L. Olmstead
Martha L. Olney
David Ormrod
Kevin O'Rourke
Suleyman Ozmucur
Sevket Pamuk
John Parman
Rodrigo Parral Duran
Daniele Paserman
Dwight H. Perkins
Kenneth Pomeranz
Leandro Prados de la Escosura
Stephen Quinn
Paul Rhode
Gary Richardson
Richard Roberts
James Robinson
Hugh Rockoff
Nathan Rosenberg
Joshua Rosenbloom
Joan Ramon Rosés
Elyce J. Rotella
Peter Rousseau
Richard Salvucci
Dov Samet
Catherine Schenk
James Schmitz
Andrew Seltzer
Jerome Sgard
Carole Shammas
Carol Shiue
Richard Sicotte
Curtis Simon
James Simpson
Philip Slavin
Richard Smith
Tuanhwee Sng
Todd Sorensen
David Stasavage
Richard Steckel
Jochen Streb
Roman Studer
John Styles
William Summerhill
William A. Sundstrom
Nathan Sussman
Richard Sutch
Richard Sylla
John Tang
Jason Taylor
Peter Temin
Melissa Thomasson
Ross Thomson
John Treble
Francesca Trivellato
Werner Troesken
Michael Turner
Nuno Valério
Milja Van Tielhof
Francois Velde
David Vines
Nancy Virts
Oliver Volckart
Hans-Joachim Voth
Kenneth Wachter
Daniel Waldenstrom
James Walker
John Wallis
Marianne Wanamaker
Kirsten Wandschneider
Marianne Ward
Warren Weber
Marc Weidenmier
Barry R. Weingast
David Weir
Jacob Weisdorf
Thomas Weiss
Robert Whaples
Warren Whatley
Eugene White
Dean Williamson
Jeffrey G. Williamson
Paul Wilson
R. Bin Wong
John Wood
Robert Wright
Noam Yuchtman
Richard Zeckhauser
Peter Zeitz