jegeo-topic-selection

Topic Selection (jegeo-topic-selection)

When to trigger

• The core question is set but you are unsure it reads as economic geography rather than urban economics, trade, or generic applied micro
• The paper has strong empirics but no obvious reason a geographer would care, or rich geography but nothing that engages the economics frontier
• You suspect the question is really a Journal of Urban Economics or Regional Studies paper wearing a JEG cover letter
• A coauthor asks whether the topic clears JEG's bar before months of data work

The two-community test (the first gate)

JEG's defining constraint is that it serves geographical economics (formal/quantitative NEG and quantitative-spatial models) AND proper economic geography (institutional, evolutionary, qualitative human geography), with an editorial board drawn roughly equally from both. The fastest way to lose at JEG is to write a paper only one community can love. Before anything else, force the question through both lenses:

• Economist's lens: Is there a clear economic mechanism (agglomeration externality, knowledge spillover, trade cost, sorting, increasing returns) and a credible way to learn about it? Would a quantitative spatial economist see a real question, not a regional case report?
• Geographer's lens: Does place do real work — is the spatial structure (scale, proximity, networks, path dependence, institutions) constitutive of the answer, or just a fixed effect? Would a human geographer see space as analytically central, not decorative?

A JEG topic passes when both answers are yes. If only the economist's lens lights up, the paper drifts to JUE/RSUE; if only the geographer's lens does, it drifts to Economic Geography or Regional Studies.

Which JEG conversation are you entering?

Topic family	What makes it a JEG question	Where it slips out of scope
Agglomeration / clusters	spatial externality measured at a defensible scale, with a mechanism	becomes a pure firm-productivity paper (JUE)
Regional development / divergence	why places diverge, with institutions or path dependence	becomes macro growth with no geography
Place-based policy	spatial treatment + spillovers to untreated places	becomes a generic program evaluation
Innovation / knowledge spillovers	geography of knowledge flow (patents, mobility, networks)	becomes innovation econ with space as a control
Trade & GVCs in space	how the geography of production reshapes regions	becomes international trade (JIE)
Evolutionary / institutional EG	branching, relatedness, lock-in, regional resilience	becomes a descriptive case with no generalizable claim

Three questions that separate a JEG paper from a sibling paper

Run a candidate topic through these before committing data effort:

1. Would the answer change if you ignored space entirely? If no, geography is decorative and the paper belongs elsewhere. If yes — because proximity, scale, networks, or regional institutions alter the result — it is a JEG question.
2. Can both an economist and a geographer name what they would learn? If only one can, you have a one-community paper that will draw a hostile second referee.
3. Is there a mechanism, or only a pattern? "Activity concentrates here" is a pattern; "activity concentrates here because knowledge externalities decay sharply with distance" is the mechanism JEG rewards.

A topic that survives all three is rare and worth the investment; one that fails any of them should be reframed now, not after the empirics are built.

Sizing the question to JEG

• The empirical/spatial frontier is genuinely moved, not merely extended to one more country or city — but JEG does reward a clean, well-identified spatial result with a sharp mechanism over grand-but-vague theory.
• The unit and scale of analysis (region, commuting zone, NUTS-2/3, grid cell, firm-location) are chosen for substantive spatial reasons, and you can name why that scale and not another.
• There is a one-sentence answer to "what do we now know about space and the economy that we did not before?"
• The shorter Emerging Voices format exists for tighter contributions (≈5,000 words, few exhibits) — note if the question fits that lane (检索于 2026-06；以官网为准).

Worked vignette (illustrative)

A team has firm-level data showing that startups near universities grow faster, and plans to send it to JEG "because it is about location." Run the two-lens test. Economist's lens: the mechanism (university knowledge spillover) is real and learnable, but the design is "near = dummy," so it currently reads as applied micro with a spatial control — drifting to JUE. Geographer's lens: place is not yet constitutive; nothing about the spatial structure of the knowledge (distance decay, network ties, regional absorptive capacity) is in the question. The topic becomes a JEG question only when reframed so geography does work: how does the spatial reach of university knowledge depend on regional institutional thickness, and at what scale does the spillover die? Now both lenses light up, and the unit (commuting zone, with distance rings) is chosen for a substantive reason.

Checklist

• The question passes both the economist's and the geographer's lens, stated explicitly
• Place/spatial structure is constitutive of the answer, not a nuisance fixed effect
• The mechanism is nameable in one sentence (what spatial economic force is at work)
• Unit and spatial scale are justified substantively, not by data convenience
• You can say in one line why this is JEG and not JUE, RSUE, JIE, or Economic Geography
• The contribution is to economic geography, not just "applied X with a map"
• A geographer and an economist would both see a real, open question — not only one of them

Topics JEG actively wants vs. topics that drift away

JEG actively rewards	Drifts to a sibling
agglomeration economies measured with a defended scale and mechanism	firm-productivity estimation with a city dummy (JUE)
place-based policy with cross-region spillovers	a generic program evaluation that happens to have regions
the geography of knowledge flows (mobility, patents, networks)	innovation economics with space as a control
how trade/GVCs reshape the location of activity within regions	aggregate bilateral trade flows (JIE)
evolutionary/institutional accounts with a claim that travels	a single-region descriptive narrative (Regional Studies)
quantitative-spatial models with a told economic-geography story	spatial-econometric machinery with no interpretation (RSUE)

Use this as a fit screen before you commit: if your one-line topic lands in the right column, reframe so geography and mechanism do real work, or send it to the sibling it actually fits.

Anti-patterns

• A formal model with no geographic mechanism, or a case study with no engagement with the quantitative frontier — the one-community trap
• "Applied micro with a spatial fixed effect" dressed as economic geography
• Choosing the spatial scale because the data came at that scale, then never defending it
• A regional case with no claim that travels beyond the one region
• Pitching a JIE trade paper or a JUE urban paper at JEG because it mentions geography

Output format

【Journal】Journal of Economic Geography
【Skill】jegeo-topic-selection
【Question】one sentence; what we learn about space and the economy
【Economist's lens】mechanism + how we learn about it
【Geographer's lens】why place is constitutive (scale/proximity/networks/institutions)
【Two-community verdict】passes both / one-community risk → fix
【Why JEG not sibling】vs JUE / RSUE / JIE / Economic Geography
【Format】full article / Emerging Voices
【Next skill】jegeo-literature-positioning