This year has seen a number of changes at Legal Theory. After helping to found Legal Theory and serving as an editor since its inception, Larry Alexander has stepped down from the journal. His successful efforts to launch Legal Theory as one of the first peer-reviewed journals in analytical jurisprudence and legal theory have been an enormous benefit to scholars writing in these areas. We were sad when he announced that it was time to move on. But we are more grateful than we can adequately express for his extraordinary contributions as founder and for his exemplary service as longtime editor. Scott Hershovitz, Professor of Law at the University of Michigan Law School, has joined the group of editors, and we are delighted to have him onboard.
In early January of 2020, our amazing managing editor, Ginger Clausen, stepped down from Legal Theory to focus on her own philosophical work. We reported on Professor Clausen's herculean efforts to get the journal back on track after her first year of service. We here renew our deep thanks to her for all she has done to restore the journal, and we wish her all success in her future endeavors.
As Professor Clausen stepped down, Mariam Kazanjian assumed the position of managing editor. Ms. Kazanjian has already brought her considerable skills to bear in helping us to adapt to changes in the online system. We are grateful to her for taking on the job of seeing to it that Legal Theory runs smoothly.
Unfortunately, the journal encountered technical difficulties when it came time to remove one editor and add a new editor to the ScholarOne online system. Because the tech folks for the journal couldn't resolve all of the glitches, we had to make changes to our screening process. We anticipate that these changes will benefit authors by significantly reducing the time of screening decisions. As you might expect, the unanticipated technical difficulties caused unfortunate delays in processing manuscripts. We have recently made final decisions on submissions that got hung up at one point or another in the process. We apologize to those who experienced these delays, but we are happy to report that the technical issues have now been adequately resolved.
In many cases of delay, we have had great difficulty finding two reviewers, or one reviewer has failed to submit a promised review. If you have not received final word on your manuscript within five months of submission, please contact the managing editor, who will be able to follow up.
In light of the increasing difficulty Legal Theory (and all journals) have encountered in securing reviewers, Cambridge University Press began allowing Legal Theory to provide a small token of thanks to our top reviewers in a given year—one Cambridge University Press book selected by the reviewer. In choosing the recipients of these awards, the editors consider the number of reviewing invitations accepted (versus declined), completion time, and quality of review. The winners for 2018 were Brian Bix (Minnesota), Christopher Essert (Toronto), and Douglas Husak (Rutgers). And the 2019 winners were Ronald Allen (Northwestern), Charles Barzun (Virginia), John Goldberg (Harvard), and Sarah Moss (Michigan).
We try to monitor how well we are doing on our time-to-completion each year. Here are the figures for 2018 and 2019.
We hope to continue to improve our turnaround time, particularly with respect to our efforts to secure reviewers and ensure their timely submission of reviews.
Because we periodically make changes to the information for authors, we ask that even authors who have submitted to or published in Legal Theory before review the instructions before submitting. Any questions regarding submission of articles should be directed to the managing editor, Mariam Kazanjian. More generally, because we aim to preserve the authors’ and reviewers’ anonymity throughout the review process, we ask that all questions concerning submission, or review of a submitted manuscript, be directed to the managing editor, not to the editors.
As always, we welcome your feedback and wish you well.
