Yet, we operate within an academic system that seems to actively constrain these efforts at reflexivity.

One of these constraints is the current system of academic publishing. It places high professional and private costs on scholars, and its exclusivity and competitiveness are a particular challenge for Early Career Researchers (ECRs), and scholars from non-Western contexts, marginalised groups and lower income households. Not only does this system constrain fair and cooperative scholarship, it also hampers innovative, creative or cutting-edge research methods and results that are urgently needed to address contemporary challenges to democracy.

The problems and potential solutions to bias and discrimination in current academic publishing have been widely discussed in academia, public debate and even popular culture.

This leads to the depressing irony that whilst many in our field study and advocate for greater inclusion, participation, and emancipation, we also depend on a publishing system that is exclusive, exclusionary, and restrictive.

ECRs, i.e. those who are within eight years of completing their PhD, are often told how they are the future of academia. However, with the many pressures ECRs face in their career progression, a future in academia is a daunting prospect for many of us. Precarious contracts, significant teaching responsibilities, a lack of support and a continuous pressure to publish can create barriers to academic career progression and become a burden on scholars’ personal lives and wellbeing.

ECRs navigate some crucial tensions: to have a chance at secure, long-term employment, they must fulfil success metrics often with limited resources and in a context of structural hurdles and relentless competition. Under such circumstances, how can ECRs contribute to the transformation of academic publishing in line with more democratic principles?

This question informed an open conversation between eight scholars of participatory and deliberative democracy in Spring 2022. Working in a research area where the onus is, rightfully, often on innovative and impactful research, we find that our drive to conduct such research is sometimes constrained by the need to fit within academic publication practices.

We also depend on a publishing system that is exclusive, exclusionary and restrictive.

The Conversation

Our conversation took place in April 2022 as a collaboration between the Journal of Deliberative Democracy and the PSA’s specialist group on Participatory and Deliberative Democracy. With some initial guiding questions, the conversation flowed freely as we shared our experiences.

Eight people participated in the conversation ranging in experience from a second year PhD student to a full Professor. This range of perspectives enabled the sharing of experiences from different positionalities, fostering genuinely constructive exchange based on solidarity and empathy. We had different experiences of academia and publishing. We were all passionate and gain fulfilment from our research, but many of us had reservations, anxiety, and frustrations with the current system. Current and recent PhD candidates shared their uncertainty about entering academia and having to navigate publications and prolonged precarity. Those with more years post-PhD justified these concerns, having experienced them. We shared between us a desire to push the boundaries of the neoliberal academy for a more collaborative and supportive environment.

Institutional Support

We first discussed the variety of institutional support that ECRs receive for publishing. Some of us had had supportive supervisors for the PhD, but not much help for publications specifically. Others had great support, but this ended with the PhD leaving people without ongoing mentorship in the postdoctoral phase. Support at this point is particularly important because it is most often a period of precarious employment and a time when ECRs are under pressure to get the publications needed to secure the next steps in their academic career. This is compounded by the fact that postdoctoral positions are often focussed on a specific project, with no time allocated for ECRs to publish work from their PhDs. The reality of this is that ECRs must spend time outside of work to write up, with the inevitable risks and pressure this puts on researchers who may have an already overwhelming workload.

Unsurprisingly, our experiences varied and not necessarily according to institution or region; PhD supervision is most often a highly individual experience, coupled with differing expectations of what an effective supervisor looks like. Some with experience of supervising PhDs were shocked to hear about a lack of support, but reflected that they sometimes found it difficult to engage PhD students in additional workshops and activities that fell outside the PhD itself. Disciplinary complexes also shape publishing practices, making it challenging to provide relevant support at departmental or institutional level.

Inside Knowledge

It can be difficult to pinpoint exactly what kind of support for publishing ECRs actually need and this led us to ask the possible reasons for this. One participant recalled how, as a less experienced researcher, they had often submitted articles before they were ready for publication, resulting in terrible reviews, rejection and dejection. One theorist amongst us found that the expected structure for empirical papers did not translate well for political theory and felt unsure what was a good structure for a theory paper.

There was some sense that this just comes down to experience, but this does not tell the full story. The nuances of exactly what will get an article published are often not explicit and knowing this requires interaction with those with more experience and access. For ECRs who have no prior or personal connections to academia, are working in contexts with limited resources, have limited access to mainstream networking (including conferences), and who are from backgrounds already underrepresented in the academy, it is even harder to gain access to this inside knowledge.

The gender and race gap in journal submissions is highly problematic, and this lack of diversity has been exacerbated by the pandemic. These intersectional exclusions often trap ECRs in precarious employment for longer. Furthermore, in a context of strong rhetoric on inclusive, decolonised and open access research, the hypocrisy of a lack of diversity in journal submissions is all the more strident.

It is not only the mechanics of writing that ECRs must be socialised in, but also knowledge about how to navigate the publishing process and the unwritten rules that govern it. This includes small things like the possibility of submitting a pitch or contacting a journal editor in advance of making a submission. This is not normally publicised, so unless they have been told that it is an accepted practice, which saves time and work for all parties, ECRs are left in the dark.

In a context of strong rhetoric on inclusive, decolonised and open access research, the hypocrisy of a lack of diversity in journal submissions is all the more strident.

It is extremely overwhelming to navigate the implicit and undocumented practices of academic publishing. It is difficult to navigate the wide range of different journals in each research area, and articles can be rejected, irrespective of their quality, because they do not speak to the right audience. Moreover, orthodoxy around structure and presentation can mean that authors pursuing alternative approaches are likely to have a much harder time getting their work published in mainstream or ‘top’ ranked political science journals, which is often seen as important for career progression.

To ECRs who do not have the requisite inside knowledge, the current academic publishing system is a black box. This reflects the broader contradiction at play in our work: we study and advocate for radical democratic thinking and practices whilst working in a highly exclusive and hierarchical system. This manifests in many concrete forms of discrimination and exclusion, and trying to navigate academic publishing as an ‘outsider’ is one of them.

Vicious Cycles

This led us to reflect on the broader context of academic publishing situated within the neoliberal academy. Citation rates, although recognized as a seriously flawed benchmarking method, are still often referred to for career progression. Maintaining an emphasis on publishing in exclusive and highly ranked journals perpetuates a cycle of exclusivity where research and performance assessments are based on publication in certain outlets or reaching certain standards of publication quantity.

In many Australian universities for example, scholars are expected to publish in certain journals only, whilst the UK’s Research Excellence Framework (REF) evaluation of university research output is used to guide funding allocations. The REF has been criticised as a cumbersome, expensive and unreliable measure of research quality, but REFrable publications continue to be a key criterion for recruitment in UK HE. These requirements serve to keep researchers locked in to a system which is increasingly criticised as having ‘a credibility crisis’ and creating unhealthy working environments.

Some participants relayed that they had been told by more senior colleagues to ignore the metrics and publish wherever they wanted. Yet interview panels often assess candidates based on the number of high-impact factor publications and their research strategy, which is expected to target high-ranking journals. We felt that the pressure to ‘break the cycle’ should not fall to ECRs in precarious positions.

A further tension ECRs face is whether to aim for high impact journals or high citations. Told that both are needed, there is sometimes a trade-off between choosing an open access journal where accessibility increases the likelihood of citations, versus a high impact journal stuck behind a paywall.

We felt that the pressure to ‘break the cycle’ should not fall to ECRs in precarious positions.

This comes with other considerations as well, where some of us felt that the prevailing business model of academic publishing is not aligned with what academic practice could or should be. Whilst academic institutions in many countries now require articles to be open access, this comes with a high cost, and for researchers without institutional funding it is unlikely to even be an option. This also excludes many practitioners working in the field whose knowledge and experience is invaluable, but who may lack the significant amount needed to publish open access. The same can be said for many academic conferences which charge exorbitant fees for attendance.

Similar issues arise within the open data movement: pre-registration and making data available is increasingly expected by reviewers, but satisfying these expectations requires relatively long-term research projects, experience and funding to produce data that can be made publicly available. For some of us, the current open access system is further evidence of the appropriation of an emancipatory agenda for profit. It, too, places the burden and cost of publishing on researchers who already struggle with limited funds.

The pressures to publish (or perish, allegedly) in certain outlets come at a cost to academics’ wellbeing and mental health, whilst juggling myriad other workloads. Moreover, it also narrows the scope of research academics aspire to. This in turn limits the field in terms of perspectives, experiences and methodologies. At a time when many in the field of participatory and deliberative democracy are making efforts to ensure their work is democratically grounded and not stuck in the ivory tower, the academic publishing system actively works against these normative goals.

Much more could be done to move academic publishing towards fair, more equitable and ultimately democratic practices.

The second part of this series proposes ways forward.

About the authors