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Start submissionAuthor Guidelines
update date: May 7, 2021
Author Guidelines are based on CSE’s White Paper on Promotion Integrity in Scientific Journal Publications, 2012 Update.
I. The Journal’s goals and scope
1. Journal’s description
The MGIMO Review of International Relations is a peer-reviewed journal on international relations. The Journal’s main goals and objectives are:
- To publish original research on international relations: contemporary international political science, history of international relations, regional studies, global and regional governance, and the world economy and international political economy. The Journal pays particular attention to the analysis of Russia's role in the international system and the system's impact on Russia.
- To further develop the Russian School of International Relations, the Journal seeks to consolidate and promote this School worldwide. The School has primarily been evolving around the Moscow State Institute of International Relations (MGIMO-University). MGIMO-University is home to the Russian International Studies Association (RISA, Russian branch of International Studies Association, ISA). Academician Anatoly V. Torkunov, the Rector of the University and the chief editor of the Journal, is the President of RISA. The Russian School of international relations combines the following areas of research: world politics, history of international relations, applied analysis of global problems, regional studies, and global governance. At the normative level, the School supports the democratic organization of international relations. It emphasizes the value of cultural and civilizational diversity and pluralism in studying, understanding, and managing international relations. Methodologically it is based primarily on qualitative research methods.
- To promote international scientific discussion and communication among scholars working within the Russian School of International Relations These scholars work in significant international relations research centers in Russia and abroad (USA, Canada, Great Britain, Germany, France, China) and publish their academic papers both in Russian and English.
2. Subject area and subject category
The MGIMO Review of International Relations publishes articles in the subject category “Political Science and International Relations,” subject area “social sciences.” Following the development of the Russian School of International Relations, the journal “MGIMO Review of International Relations” focuses primarily on the following themes within the subject category “Political Science and International Relations”:
- international politics,
- history of international relations,
- theory of international relations,
- international political economy,
- regional studies,
- international security,
- global governance.
The Journal emphasizes international politics, the history of international relations, and the international political economy.
The Journal's scope does not include International law. We also do not welcome articles on comparative politics. We would publish them only if the problems raised reflect regional or global trends.
3. Geographical scope
The MGIMO Review of International Relations has vast geography of authors, editorial board members, and reviewers. We receive articles and citations from Armenia, Australia, Austria, Canada, Finland, Germany, Great Britain, Kazakhstan, Mexico, Poland, Serbia, Slovakia, South Korea, Switzerland, Ukraine, USA. Recently the Journal has become popular among scholars from Iran and Turkey.
The editorial board consists of outstanding specialists in international relations from all over the world. More than one-third of the editorial board are international scholars. They either belong to the Russian School of International Relations or study Russia in international relations (USA, UK, France, Serbia, Bulgaria).
The rest of the members represent the Russian School of International Relations in the leading think-tanks from all over Russia (Moscow, St. Petersburg, Nizhny Novgorod).
II. Author Guidelines for Manuscript Submission
MGIMO Review of International Relations welcomes the best and most innovative original scholarly manuscripts on international relations, history of international relations, and international political economy.
The submission process is organized online. To submit a manuscript, an author should first register at https://vestnik.mgimo.ru/jour.
We accept manuscripts in three genres: research articles (study of primary sources), review articles (study of secondary sources), and book reviews (critical review of a recently published monograph).
Submitting an article to MGIMO Review of International Relations authors imply that:
- the article was not published earlier in another journal;
- the article is not under consideration in another journal;
- all co-authors agree with the publication of the current version of the article.
Before submitting an article for a review, ensure that the files contain all the necessary information, the sources for the figures and tables are indicated, all citations are given correctly.
A manuscript in any of the three genres must correspond to the profile of the Journal – international politics, history of international relations, and international political economy - and meet the following requirements:
Research article
(length without metadata: 32,000 – 80,000 symbols)
The research article is a scientific study of primary sources (cases – large N and small n – of a subject matter) to fill out a gap in collective understanding among scientists of how the world works (in our case – the world of international relations). It should produce important and original (new) knowledge about international relations.
Structure of a research article:
- Title. Try to put all of the topics together in the title using as few words as possible.
- Author’s name. In the case of a multiple-author article, the order of authors' names should reflect their contribution to the research. MGIMO Review of International Relationshas the following authorship criteria:
- a substantial contribution to research plan and design, data gathering or data analyses, and interpretation;
- preparation of the article or its critical review and editing in terms of significant intellectual contribution;
- approval of the final version of the article before submission.
- The list of authors should not include those who are not authors of the article. The names of those who are not authors but provided assistance or support should be mentioned in the Acknowledgments section.
- Author’s affiliation. Use the name of the affiliationwithout its postal address. Multiple affiliations are permitted. If the authors of the article have different academic affiliations, they provide it in superscript.
- Abstract (250-300 words). An abstract is a self-contained, short, and powerful statement that describes the article. It must contain the purpose, research question, methods, and results of the work. It should be a guide to the essential parts of your article. An abstract should answer four questions: What was done? Why did you do it? What did you find? Why are these findings useful and important?
- Keywords (8-10). Avoid using single words. Use word combinations that will increase the chances a reader will find your article through search engines.
- Introduction (Why did you start?).It should contain the aim of the article, research question, discussion on why this question is important, critical literature review on that research question (what alternative answers exist in academic literature), your original hypothetical answer to the question, research methods used to verify and falsify the hypothesis and road map of the article. The introduction should provide readers with the background information needed to understand your study. While writing, make sure your citations are
- Well balanced: If there are conflicting results on a question in the literature, have you cited studies with both kinds of results?
- Current: You should aim to cite references that are not more than ten years old if possible. However, be sure to cite the first discovery or mention it in the literature, even if it older than ten years.
- Relevant:This is the essential requirement. The studies you cite should be strongly related to your research question.
- Methodology (What did you do?). This is the part where you should describe what you have done to get the results of your research. Use subheadings to describe different stages or parts of your research process.
- Results (What did you find?). In this section, simply state what you found, but do not interpret the results or discuss their implications. As in the Methodological section, use subheadings to separate different results. Results should be presented in a logical order. In order of importance, not necessarily the order in which the research was performed. Use the past tense to describe your results; however, refer to figures and tables in the present tense. It is always a good idea to use tables and figures to illustrate your findings.
- Discussion (What does it all mean?). Discuss your conclusions in order of most to least significant. Compare your results with those from other studies: Are they consistent? If not, discuss possible reasons for the difference. Mention any inconclusive results and explain them as best you can. You may suggest additional research needed to clarify your results. Briefly describe the limitations of your study to show reviewers and readers that you have considered all the weaknesses of your research. Many researchers are hesitant to do this as they feel it highlights the weaknesses in their research to the editor and reviewer. However, doing this makes a positive impression of your paper as it makes it clear that you have an in-depth understanding of your topic and can think objectively of your research. Discuss what your results may mean for researchers in the same field as you, researchers in other fields, and the general public. How could your findings be applied? State how your results extend the findings of previous studies. If your findings are preliminary, suggest future studies that need to be carried out.
- Conclusion. State your main conclusions once again.
- References. In this section, references should be only on scientific literature. References on statistics, reports, legislative documents and norms, internet resources should be organized as footnotes. The list of references must be arranged alphabetically. References show the research context in which the article is written. The context should be inclusive concerning the research question and be global in scope. References are a good indicator of the field of science the article belongs to.
- Information about the author(s). Give your name, scientific degree, occupation title, affiliation, postal address, and e-mail.
- This section includes information on the financial aid and acknowledgments of those who helped prepare the article but are not the authors. Helping in the article's preparation means recommendations that improve the research, providing accommodation, authorization, clearance, and financial support.
- Conflict of interest statement. Conflict of interest is when people have conflicting or competing interests that can affect decisions made by the editors. Conflict of interest can be deliberate or potential but genuine. Personal, political, financial, scientific, or religious factors can affect objectivity. The author is obliged to inform the editors about a deliberate or potential conflict of interest by indicating such information in this section of the article. If there is no conflict of interest, the author has to inform editors about it using, for example, the following phrase: "The author declares the absence of conflict of interest."
Review article
(length without metadata: 32,000 – 80,000 symbols)
A review article is a scientific study of a body of research literature (secondary sources: research monographs, articles, reports) sampled around a particular domain (issue), a theory, or a method. It generally gives other scholars a «state-of-the-art» snapshot of a domain, a theory, or a method.
Review articles aim to:
- Resolve definitional ambiguities and outline the scope of the topic.
- Provide an integrated, synthesized overview of the current state of knowledge.
- Identify inconsistencies in prior results and potential explanations.
- Evaluate existing methodological approaches.
- Develop conceptual frameworks to reconcile and extend past research.
- Describe research insights, existing gaps, and future research directions.
For making a sufficient contribution, a review article needs to offer significant new insights based on its systematic comparison of multiple studies, rather than simply a «book report» that describes past research. This is difficult to achieve for authors who have not «lived» with the research domain, theory, or a method for many years because achieving it requires drawing some non-obvious connections and insights from multiple studies and their many different aspects.
Three types of review articles:
Domain-based review – synthesizes and extends a body of literature in the same substantive domain (issue or problem).
Theory-based review – synthesizes and extends a body of literature that uses the same underlying theory.
Method-based review – synthesize and extend a body of literature that uses the same underlying method.
Structure of a review article:
- Title.Try to put all of the topics together in the title using as few words as possible.
- Author’s name.In the case of a multiple-author article, the order of authors' names should reflect their contribution to the research. MGIMO Review of International Relations has the following authorship criteria:
- substantial contribution to research plan and design, data gathering or data analyses and interpretation;
- preparation of the article or its critical review and editing in terms of significant intellectual contribution;
- approval of the final version of the article before submission.
The list of authors should not include those who are not authors of the article. The names of those who are not authors but provided assistance or support should be mentioned in the Acknowledgments section.
- Author’s affiliation.Use the name of the affiliation without its postal address. Multiple affiliations are permitted.
- Abstract (250-300 words).An abstract is a self-contained, short, and powerful statement that describes the article. It must contain the purpose, research question, methods, and results of the work. It should be a guide to the essential parts of your article. An abstract should answer four questions: What was done? Why did you do it? What did you find? Why are these findings useful and important?
- Keywords (8-10).Avoid using single words. Use word combinations that will increase the chances a reader will find your article through search engines.
- Introduction(Why did you start?). Set out clear objectives for the review and articulate the specific research question or hypothesis that will be investigated. Define explicit criteria that can be used to assess whether any particular study should be included in or excluded from the review. Identify all potentially relevant studies, including both published and unpublished research. Describe methods you use to study the sampled research literature.
- Methodology(What did you do?). Data collection: Retrieve all the research literature identified in the introduction as the sample, and – data analysis – analyze it either through qualitative (for instance, comparison) or quantitative methods (for instance, using bibliometric statistics). Use subheadings to describe different stages or parts of your research process.
- Results(What did you find?). The analysis results need to be presented clearly and compellingly, using narratives, tables, and figures.
- Discussion. Core results that emerge from the review must be interpreted and discussed. These results should bring a deeper understanding of the topic, not simply a repetition of well-established knowledge. The author needs to describe the implications of these results for future research—state how your results extend the findings of previous studies.
- Conclusion.State your main conclusions once again.
- References. In this section, references should be only on scientific literature. References on statistics, reports, legislative documents and norms, internet resources should be organized as footnotes. The list of references must be arranged alphabetically. For review articles, references are even more critical than for a research article because they reflect not only the global research context of the study but the very subject matter of the research. The reference list must be extensive and global, containing no less than 60 items.
- Information about the author(s). Give your name, scientific degree, occupation title, affiliation, postal address, and e-mail.
- Acknowledgements. This section includes information on the financial aid and acknowledgments of those who helped prepare the article but are not the authors. Helping in preparation of the article means recommendations that improve the research, providing accommodation, authorization, clearance, and financial support.
- Conflict of interest statement. Conflict of interest is when people have conflicting or competing interests that can affect decisions made by the editors. Conflict of interest can be deliberate or potential but genuine. Personal, political, financial, scientific, or religious factors can affect objectivity. The author is obliged to inform the editors about a deliberate or potential conflict of interest by indicating such information in this section of the article. If there is no conflict of interest, the author has to inform editors about it using, for example, the following phrase: "The author declares the absence of conflict of interest."
Book review
(length without metadata: 20,000 – 40,000 symbols)
A book review is a report on critical reading of a recently published research monograph
Structure of a book review
- Title.Try to put all of the topics together in the title using as few words as possible.
- Author’s name.In the case of a multiple-author article, the order of authors' names should reflect their contribution to the research. MGIMO Review of International Relations has the following authorship criteria:
- substantial contribution to research plan and design, data gathering or data analyses and interpretation;
- preparation of the article or its critical review and editing in terms of significant intellectual contribution;
- approval of the final version of the article before submission.
The list of authors should not include those who are not authors of the article. The names of those who are not authors but provided assistance or support should be mentioned in the Acknowledgments section.
- Author’s affiliation.Use the name of the affiliation without its postal address. Multiple affiliations are permitted.
- Keywords (8-10).Avoid using single words. Use word combinations that will increase the chances a reader will find your article through search engines.
- Introduction (why did you choose this book?). Explain the book's significance in terms of both the discipline and practice of international relations.
- Description (what the book is about?) Please use the following template for the book's description.
Template for description |
Questions raised |
Main arguments |
Methods |
Use of theory |
Type of data |
Style of writing |
Sources of bias |
Limitations |
Intended audience |
- Critique.Internal critique is intended to reveal internal contradictions of the study under review: contradictions between research question and research design, type of data, theory, and methods. Please, try to answer the following questions:
- How well-developed are the arguments?
- Did the theoretical perspective introduce any potential bias?
- Are you convinced by the interpretations presented?
- Are the conclusions supported firmly by the preceding argument?
- How appropriate are the comparisons that are used?
- Did the response options, or measurement categories, or techniques used affect the data that were collected?
- Does the writing assume a causal connection when there may not be one?
- Are the conclusions based on only a few examples?
- Are inappropriate comparisons being made?
- Might there be other explanations apart from the one proposed?
- Are there any hidden assumptions that need to be questioned?
- Is enough evidence presented to allow readers to draw their conclusions?
- Does the line of reasoning make sense?
Contextual critique is intended to reveal any contradictions between the study under review and its context built by other research pieces on the same topic. Try to evaluate the originality and significance of the results in comparison with existing knowledge.
In this section, it is a good idea to suggest how to improve the study under review.
- Conclusion.List the main points of strength and weakness of the study and state your final evaluation of the monograph.
- References. In this section, references should be only on scientific literature. References on statistics, reports, legislative documents and norms, internet resources should be organized as footnotes. The list of references must be arranged alphabetically and numbered. The primary source of references in book reviews is a contextual critique of the monograph.
- Acknowledgements. This section includes information on the financial aid and acknowledgments of those who helped prepare the article but are not the authors. Helping in the article's preparation means recommendations that improve the research, providing accommodation, authorization, clearance, and financial support.
- Conflict of interest statement. Conflict of interest is when people have conflicting or competing interests that can affect decisions made by the editors. Conflict of interest can be deliberate or potential but genuine. Personal, political, financial, scientific, or religious factors can affect objectivity. The author is obliged to inform the editors about a deliberate or potential conflict of interest by indicating such information in this section of the article. If there is no conflict of interest, the author has to inform editors about it using, for example, the following phrase: "Author(s) declare(s) absence of conflict of interest."
Technical specifications
- Format. Manuscripts should be submitted in MS Word format.
- Length.The length of the main body of both research and review articles (without metadata: title, abstract, references, and author information) must be in the range between 32,000 and 80,000 symbols (spaces included). The length of the main body of a book review must be in the range between 20,000 and 40,000 symbols (spaces included).
- Page layout: left-3 cm, right-1.5 cm, top and bottom - 2 cm; font - Times New Roman, 14 pt, abstract and keywords are in Russian and English - 14 pt, references, and footnotes – 10 pt; intervals in the text – 1.5, in the references and footnotes – 1; text alignment – justified.
- Figures. Figures must be of high quality and printable. All figures must have captions. They should be numbered in the order of appearance. If there is only one figure, it does not need to be numbered. Intext references to figures should have the following form: "Fig. 3 shows that…", or "It is shown that… (see Fig.3)". Figure captions include the number and the title and are centered under the figure: "Fig. 2. Description of vital processes". No full stop is needed after the figure caption. Figures should be in black and white.
- Tables. Tables must be of high quality and printable. They should not be scanned or pictured so that they can be edited. All the tables must have captions. The tables should be numbered in order of appearance. If there is only one table, it does not need to be numbered. Intext references to tables should have the following form: "Table 3 shows that…" or "It is shown that … (see Table 3). The cations include their number and name and are centered abovethe table: “Table 2. Description of the vital processes”. No full stop is needed after the caption.
- Pictures. Photos, pictures, and other drawings should be uploaded separately in the special section of the form for article uploading in *.jpeg, *.bmp, .gif (.doc and *.docx if there are some marks on the photo). The resolution should be >300 dpi. The photo's file should have a name corresponding to the number of the photo in the text and a caption. Pictures should be in black and white.
- Footnotes. Footnotes can include references to anonymous Internet sources, textbooks, study guides, government regulations, statistical reports, articles in newspapers and magazines, extended abstract of dissertation, dissertations, authors' comments, and primary sources as archival records, memories, etc. can be in the footnotes.
- References. The Journal uses the SAGE Harvard reference style. References should include only peer-reviewed sources that were used in the manuscript (scientific articles and monographs). It is not recommended to include in references dissertations, textbooks, study guides, websites, statistical reports, articles in newspapers, magazines, or blogs. If it is necessary to refer to such a source, it should be done in the footnotes. Please indicate DOI for each reference source. If there is a reference to an article accepted for publication but not yet published, the reference should have an indication "in press". The authors have to get written authorization to refer to such documents and confirmation that the article is in print. Information from unpublished sources should be marked with the phrase "unpublished data/documents," and the author is to get written authorization to use such materials. In references to articles from journals, the author should give the year of publication, volume, number of an issue, and pages. In the article description, all authors should be included. References have to be verified, and citations should be double-checked on journals' or publishers' official sites. For transliteration, please use LC style (Library of Congress).
III. Submitting a Manuscript
All manuscripts are submitted online using a web form on the Journal's website.
IV. Communication between the Journal and authors
The editors of the Journal communicate with an author indicated in a manuscript as a corresponding author. On request, all authors who provided their e-mails can get communication from editors.
All submitted manuscripts are pre-checked by the Editor-in-Charge to verify that they correspond to the Author Guidelines. A manuscript can be declined at this point if it does not meet the requirements (does not correspond to journal aims and scope, not original, of small scientific value), or it can be returned to authors for a follow-up revision in order to eliminate errors or to add some missing data.
After the successful pre-check, the Editor-in-Charge passes the article to an editor, who finds two "blind" reviewers for the article setting the time limit for reviewing process. The author gets a notification about it.
In case of conflicting reviews, the editor can refer the article to a third reviewer and Deputy Editor-in-Chief or Editor-in-Chief.
If both reviews are positive, the article returns to the editor for preparing it for publication.
If the article needs to be revised, all comments and corrections suggested by reviewers are sent to the author. The author has two months to do corrections. If the author did not inform the editor about her plans for the article within the given time, the article is withdrawn from publication.
If the article is rejected, the author is informed by the editor.
A corresponding author of an accepted article gets the final version of the article for approval. The editor waits for a response for two days. If there is no answer from the author, the final version is considered approved.
V. Order of Disputing Editors’/Reviewers’ Decisions
If an author disagrees with editors' or reviewers' decisions, she can dispute them. In order to do so, the author has to:
- Correct the article according to the non-disputable comments of the editors or the reviewers.
- State her position on the disputable matter clear in the correspondence with her editor.
The editors should facilitate re-submitting the article that could be potentially approved for publication but was declined due to the necessity of major revision and should explain what needs to be done to accept the article.
VI. Plagiarism, Fabrication or Falsification
If an author is unethical and tries to publish plagiarized, fabricated or false information, the editors turn to COPE.
Unethical behavior is any author's actions aimed at deliberate manipulation of scientific information and behavior that defies ethical and scientific standards.
Falsification is the changing or omission of research results (data) to support claims, hypotheses, other data. Falsification can include the manipulation of research materials or processes. Manipulation of images or representations in a manner that distorts the data or "reads too much between the lines" can also be considered falsification.
Fabrication is the construction and/or addition of data, observations, or characterizations that never occurred in data gathering. Claims about results need to be made on complete data sets (as is usually assumed), where claims made based on incomplete or assumed results are a form of fabrication.
Plagiarism is, perhaps, the most common form of research misconduct. Researchers must be aware of citing all sources and taking careful notes. Using or representing the work of others as your work constitutes plagiarism, even if committed unintentionally.
Unethical behavior does not include honest mistakes and fair unplanned discrepancies in conducting, interpreting, and evaluating research methods and results or carelessness not related to the scientific process.
VII. Correcting Errors and Retracting Articles
When there are errors in the text that influence its comprehension but do not interfere with the results of the research, they can be corrected by changing it to a new pdf-file of the article and highlighting the error in the file itself or on the page of the article on the official site of the Journal.
When there are errors in the text that manipulate the research results or when there is plagiarism, fabrication, or falsification of information, the article can be retracted. The retraction can be initiated by the Journal, an organization, or an author. Retracted articles are indicated by the sign "Retracted" with a statement of the reasons for retraction. Information about retraction is sent to those databases that index the Journal.
Copyright Notice
Authors retain copyright and grant the journal right of first publication of the work, which is automatically licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY license). Users can use, reuse and build upon the material published in this Journal provided that such uses are entirely attributed.
Privacy Statement
Authors' names and addresses will be used solely for technical purposes of contact with the Author or reviewers (editors) when preparing the article for publication. Private data will not be shared with other individuals and organizations.
Copyright Notice
Authors retain copyright and grant the journal right of first publication of the work, which is automatically licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY license). Users can use, reuse and build upon the material published in this journal provided that such uses are fully attributed.
Privacy Statement
Authors’ names and addresses will be used solely for technical purposes of a contact with the Author or reviewers (editors) when preparing the article for publication. Private data will not be shared with other individuals and organizations.
ISSN 2541-9099 (Online)