wp-review-process

Review Process (wp-review-process)

Knowing how World Politics screens and decides lets you pre-empt the failure modes before submitting. World Politics uses a triple-blind process and screens for scope (comparative politics / IR; no opinion, policy, theory-only, historical, or journalistic pieces) before and during review.

When to trigger

• Before submitting, to stress-test against scope and methods expectations
• Interpreting a decision letter and setting expectations
• Understanding what reviewers are instructed to weigh
• Confirming human-subjects/ethics obligations

How World Politics review works

1. Triple-blind. Reviewing is "based on the anonymity of the author and the confidentiality of readers' and editors' reports." Author anonymity is preserved through the editorial decision-making process. Reviewers and handling editors are anonymous to authors. All manuscripts — including commissioned review articles — go through triple-blind review.
2. Reviewers. Referees are drawn from the social-science community; published articles "have usually been reviewed by at least two non-Princeton reviewers and often … one of the editors."
3. Timeline. Authors "can expect to receive decisions on their submissions within four months" (a norm, not a guarantee — 待核实).
4. Scope screening. A paper deemed inappropriate for World Politics may be withdrawn from consideration by the editors. Out-of-scope categories: opinion pieces, policy pieces, articles expounding political theory, historical articles, current-affairs/journalistic narratives.
5. What reviewers weigh (Reviewer Guidelines): clear research goals; engagement with theoretical and substantive literatures; analytic clarity and logic; explicit research design and appropriate methods; substantively important conclusions — with separate expectations for quantitative and qualitative work. Read the live guidelines before submitting.

Ethics / human subjects

• Research engaging human participants must affirm adherence to the APSA Principles and Guidance for Human Subjects Research (2020), endorsed by the World Politics editorial committee. ScholarOne prompts IRB/ethics questions at submission; discuss relevant ethical issues in the text or appendix.

Shape the paper to pass

• Make the cross-case contribution explicit (avoids a scope/significance screen).
• Engage theoretical and substantive literatures (a reviewer expectation).
• Be explicit about research design and use appropriate methods, judged on the tradition's own terms.
• Anonymize fully for triple-blind (see wp-submission); clear ethics/IRB up front.

Anti-patterns

• Submitting a single-case description with no cross-case payoff (weak fit)
• Submitting an out-of-scope piece (policy/opinion/theory-only/historical/journalistic)
• Leaving identifying information that defeats triple-blind anonymity
• Ignoring the APSA human-subjects affirmation when research engages participants

Desk-screen and reviewer-objection map

Screening at World Politics is a scope-and-significance gate before the methods read. Knowing which failure triggers which response lets you pre-empt it.

Failure at screen/review	What happens	Pre-empt before submitting
Out of scope (opinion/policy/theory-only/historical/journalistic)	May be withdrawn by editors	Reframe as a comparative or IR empirical study, or target another venue
Single-case description, no cross-case payoff	Weak-fit / low-significance read	Attach the case to a portable mechanism that travels
Literatures or design left implicit	Reviewer criticism	Engage the live debate; state design and methods explicitly
Identifying info left in text/metadata	Anonymity broken	Strip self-references and file metadata

Calibration anchor: World Politics is a leading peer-reviewed journal of comparative politics and international relations, methodologically plural (comparative, quantitative, qualitative, and formal), and it prizes a big political question with theory that travels over narrow empirics. Tune to that bar, not a generalist or IR-only one.

Review-risk pass for World Politics

Run this as a concrete capability pass. First lock the political mechanism, case scope, evidence warrant, and comparative or international implication; then test whether the manuscript addresses comparative and international politics reviewers who expect a big political question, credible evidence, and theory that travels beyond one case.

• Primary move: Turn likely reviewer objections into a ledger with response evidence, manuscript location, and the decision-maker who must be convinced first.
• Decision ledger: return claim / evidence / blocker / next edit rows so the next pass can patch the manuscript directly.
• Sibling comparison: compare against International Organization for IR institutions/political economy, Journal of Politics for wider political science, Comparative Political Studies for comparative breadth; if the neighboring outlet has the stronger audience claim, recommend re-routing before polishing.
• Verification floor: before submission-ready advice, re-open resources/official-source-map.md for volatile rules and name the one unresolved fact that could change the recommendation.

Output format

【Scope check】comparative/IR, not opinion/policy/theory-only/historical/journalistic? [Y/N]
【Travels】cross-case contribution explicit? [Y/N]
【Literatures + methods】engaged and explicit? [Y/N]
【Anonymized for triple-blind】[Y/N]
【Ethics】APSA human-subjects affirmation handled? [Y/N/NA]
【Next】wp-submission (or wp-rebuttal if decided)

Supplementary resources

• ../../resources/official-source-map.md — triple-blind process, reviewer norms, timeline, scope, APSA ethics