Welcome to Our Symposia

Abstract

Next article FreeEditor's NoteWelcome to Our SymposiaCyrus Ernesto ZirakzadehCyrus Ernesto Zirakzadeh Search for more articles by this author PDFPDF PLUSFull Text Add to favoritesDownload CitationTrack CitationsPermissionsReprints Share onFacebookTwitterLinked InRedditEmailQR Code SectionsMoreWith this issue, Polity launches a new intellectual venture: symposia. These are collections of essays by scholars with different perspectives on a particular political problem or phenomenon that seems important and pressing. The value of the symposium format lies in the exchange of perspectives (in contrast to a conventional stand-alone research paper that systematically hews a single line of reflection). Because each paper is part of a broader collection, the symposia articles tend to be shorter than Polity's regular research articles. As are the regular research articles that the journal publishes, all symposia articles are peer reviewed (double-blind), even though the authors of the symposia are invited to submit.The process for creating a symposium is straightforward. An editorial-board member with an idea for a symposium submits a proposal to the associate editors and editor-in-chief for their review. The editorial staff looks for the timeliness of the subject, the do-ability of the project, and the range of scholars the editorial board member wishes to invite. Then the board member invites scholars with different perspectives to comment on the topic that the editorial board member finds timely and deserving of broad commentary (not merely systematic analysis from a single point of view). The editorial board member, furthermore, acts as a “guest editor” and writes an introduction to the collection that helps readers understand how the contributing pieces converge with, diverge from, and complement one another.The symposia, once the review and production routines are fully established, will appear approximately every other issue. They will complement what successive editors of the journal have viewed as Polity's primary mission: the publication of cutting-edge research that meets high standards of scholarship, that will be of interest to political scientists in general, and that also challenges widespread assumptions and conventional wisdom. Approximately 70–80 percent of the pages in Polity will continue to be devoted to traditional research articles. Symposia will account for the remaining pages of each volume.To make room for the symposia, Polity's editorial staff—after receiving input from and conversing with members of the editorial board—has decided to stop publishing review essays. This will allow the journal to continue to publish the same number of research articles per annum as it has in recent years.Most symposia will be between 60 and 70 pages and will feature 3–4 articles. This inaugural symposium will be distinctive, however, because it is longer (an entire issue) and involves many more contributors than will appear in future symposia. The “Deeping Democracy” symposium has these traits because it comprises a series of articles that originally were commissioned by the American Political Science Association as part of an official task force on rethinking the meaning, possibilities, and need for democratic politics at the beginning of the twenty-first century. The commissioned articles were extensively edited and revised after the standard review process. Michael Goodhart, the chair of the task force and a member of Polity's editorial board, did a masterful job communicating with the authors during the review process and also in crafting an introduction that conveys the goals of this journal: the presentation of path-breaking research and fresh intellectual perspectives on important political topics, and to do so in a writing style that will render the innovative ideas meaningful not only for specialists in a single subfield, but for all political scientists and other scholars interested in politics.Readers will notice, I am sure, that the articles in “Deeping Democracy” do not simply describe experience without reflection on ideas, concepts, and theories. Conversely, the contributors do not analyze ideas, concepts, and theories without attention to implications for how humans perceive and interact with the political world. The authors see the practice of theorizing and the experience of observing as inextricably linked. The symposium thus remains firmly within the tradition of political research that Polity has promoted for decades. I cannot think of a better symposium with which to unveil Polity's new intellectual venture. Next article DetailsFiguresReferencesCited by Polity Volume 44, Number 4October 2012Welcome to Our Symposia The Journal of the Northeastern Political Science Association Article DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1057/pol.2012.22 Views: 86Total views on this site Copyright © 2012, Northeastern Political Science AssociationPDF download Crossref reports no articles citing this article.