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.

FIGURE 1 NEW SUBMISSIONS IN YEAR ENDING JUNE 30, 1988–2011

TABLE 1 ARTICLE SUBMISSIONS BY WORLD AREA BROKEN DOWN BY TOPIC, JULY 2008–JUNE 2011

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.

TABLE 2 REGULAR ARTICLE NEW SUBMISSIONS BY REGION, 1 JULY–30 JUNE

Note:

The numbers include new submissions only. Totals exceed new submissions because a paper can be classified as pertaining to more than one region.

TABLE 3 REGULAR ARTICLE SUBMISSIONS BY PERIOD, 1 JULY–30 JUNE 2008–2009, 2009–2010, AND 2010–2011

Note:

The numbers include new submissions only. Totals exceed submissions because a paper can be classified as pertaining to more than one period.

TABLE 4 TIME BETWEEN SUBMISSION AND EDITOR'S DECISION (in days)

Notes:

Does not include submissions that were pending as of August 19, 2011.

Notes: Publication Rate for 2010 is the refereed number of articles and notes published between July 1 and June 30 of 2010 as a percentage of the number of new submissions between July 1 and June 30 of 2009, and similarly for prior years. Presidential addresses and book reviews are not included. In years prior to 1997, the June issue of the Journal was devoted to publishing papers presented at the annual Economic History Association meetings, so the meaning of publication rates differed.

FIGURE 2 PUBLICATION RATE, 1997–2011

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