From the Editors: what makes a study sufficiently international?

Abstract

Journal of International Business Studies (2008) 39, 180–183. doi:10.1057/palgrave.jibs.8400351 From the flow of submissions that arrive on the desk of the JIBS Editors, it appears that the issue of what makes a study sufficiently international to be of potential interest to JIBS and its readership is perhaps not so obvious to some contributors to the Journal. One of the top reasons for desk rejection is a misunderstanding by authors of JIBS’s position on what studies are ‘‘sufficiently international’’. Some leading journals in the business and management domain (such as Academy of Management Journal [AMJ ]) consider studies to be sufficiently international if they either involve a non-US setting or a non-US co-author – this is definitely not the case in JIBS. In the following discussion, which includes specific examples, we clarify what makes a study sufficiently international for JIBS and provide advice to help authors to determine in advance the suitability of their potential submissions to JIBS. As the leading journal in international business (IB, in short), JIBS entertains only submissions that are intrinsically international in nature. As noted in the JIBS Statement of Editorial Policy that can be found on http://www.palgrave-journals.com/jibs/jibs_ statement.html: