Unpacking the gender gap in academic journal publishing: the experience of South European Society and Politics

This article adds a new case-study to the existing empirical analyses of gender dif- ferences in academic journals. The record of South European Society and Politics confirms the established pattern of a gender gap in published output, with its source at the submissions stage. It also reveals gendered preferences with regard to author- ship styles, highlighting a pattern of greater individualism and homophily for men and a more collaborative picture for female scholars; in particular, we found that co-authoring increases women’s publication footprint. Moving on to the journal’s gatekeepers, we also discovered gender imbalance. An investigation of rejection rates finds that the predominantly female editorial team made gender-neutral choices during the initial editorial review of submissions, but selected overwhelmingly male referees. While women are less successful than men in the blind peer review pro- cess, this is overshadowed by the difference in submission rates. Potential explana- tions for the latter were considered, including lesser access to academic networks as well as the “impostor phenomenon”, which afflicts women more than men. The article concludes that addressing the journal publishing gender gap requires broader changes in academic life.