Clique or journal community – Where does accountability lie in editorial decision making?
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Academic journals comprise communities of scholars working on related subjects. This presents a range of potential conflicts of interest. Commenting on two recent studies on editorial impartiality and citation concentrations, Adam Arian and John Sands consider the downstream effects of conflicts of interest and make the case for greater editorial accountability.
Academic publishing asks researchers to demonstrate the significance of their work. It should ask equally searching questions of those who decide which work deserves recognition. When publication in a highly ranked journal can shape careers, confer credibility and influence what others read, editorial authority carries responsibilities that extend well beyond its submission system.[1]
Two recent studies bring those responsibilities into focus. One examines conflicts of interest in elite peer review; the other investigates citation growth within connected finance journals. Together, they raise a difficult question: how confidently can institutions recognise research excellence when the processes that confer recognition are themselves vulnerable to concentrated influence?
When professional connections enter editorial decisions
Mindel and Ciriello examine two FT50 business journals from 2010–2024 . Just 54 scholars, representing 2.4% of contributing authors, authored or coauthored 788 papers, nearly half of the journals’ output. Within this prolific group, the researchers audited 946 author–editor relationships. They classified 49.7% as involving at least one definitive conflict of interest under their reasonable-observer framework, with another 11.6% potentially conflicted.[2]
These percentages relate only to the audited relationships, not all articles in the journals. The conflicts included prior co-authorship, professional ties, and reciprocal handling of one another’s papers. The study identifies risks to impartiality; it does not establish deliberate collusion or show that every affected decision was wrong.
Nevertheless, impartiality requires more than confidence in individual goodwill. A relationship can compromise the credibility of a decision even when those involved believe they have acted fairly. This is precisely why conflict management should be built into editorial procedures.
When citations become a source of advantage
Alexander and Cumming examine a different part of this process. Their analysis covers 26 journals over 2014–2024 and investigates citation patterns around the formation of Elsevier’s Finance Journal Ecosystem .[3]
Journal coordination can offer practical benefits, including easier transfers of manuscripts. The study finds mixed evidence for a general coordination effect, but stronger evidence of unusually rapid citation growth associated with concentrated author and editorial networks in a subset of journals.
One comparison is striking. During 2019–2024, the four most-cited authors in the study’s “quickly-evolving” cluster made 1,006 self-citations and 803 citations to each other’s work. The corresponding counts among the leading four authors in its traditional top-three journal cluster were 90 and 53. These are descriptive counts within the dataset, not comparisons adjusted for publication volume or proof that particular citations were inappropriate. Their significance lies in the wider pattern of concentrated citation activity documented by the study.
The papers examine different settings and do not establish a single coordinated system. Read together, however, they question two sources of academic authority: (1) the independence of publication decisions and (2) the breadth of recognition represented by citation counts. Publication prestige and citation success may look like separate endorsements of quality, yet both can be influenced by professional relationships.
For universities, the implication is uncomfortable. Counting prestigious publications and citations cannot replace examining what the research actually contributes to the body of knowledge.
Editorial roles reflect expertise — not intellectual rank
We see editorial appointments as commitments to scholarly service. They may recognise expertise, but they cannot certify intellectual superiority. An appointment gives someone responsibility for a process; its legitimacy depends on how that responsibility is exercised.
Editors must make difficult judgements, and disagreement with an author is inevitable. Accountability does not require universal agreement or the acceptance of every unconventional manuscript. It requires reasons that can be understood, consistent standards and a willingness to recognise the limits of one’s expertise .[4]
The danger arises when the prestige attached to office discourages scrutiny. An editor’s familiarity with a theory, method or professional circle can become an unexamined standard for judging everyone else. Under those conditions, intellectual difference risks being mistaken for intellectual weakness.
Good editorial leadership makes room for informed disagreement. It also accepts that close collaborators’ submissions require independent handling and that complaints about conflicts should be reviewed outside the relationships being questioned. Authority is most credible when its holder is willing to submit to these constraints.
The downstream effects of journal cliques
Publication gives findings visibility and a degree of credibility. Repeated citation can further increase their prominence in literature reviews , expert discussion and policy advice. If those signals are shaped disproportionately by insider relationships, relevant but less connected research may receive insufficient attention. Conversely, findings with weak foundations may receive more authority than their evidence warrants.[5][6]
As a hypothetical illustration, suppose a study finds that disclosure scores improve following a reporting reform. If this improvement is interpreted as evidence of changed corporate behaviour, and that interpretation carries into policy advice without further testing, a regulator could overestimate the reform’s effectiveness. This illustrates a possible risk in translating research into policy, rather than a documented outcome of the studies discussed here.
Overstated benefits or overlooked costs could direct public funds and organisational effort towards ineffective measures. Weak evidence could also encourage the rejection of useful regulation and allowing avoidable risks or information failures to persist. Better evidence helps decision-makers choose interventions that support investment and innovation while limiting unnecessary burdens.
There is also an opportunity cost within universities. If assessment systems reward publication volume and network-supported visibility, researchers may devote scarce time to producing more countable outputs instead of testing important assumptions, replicating influential findings or investigating neglected questions. The loss is the useful knowledge that might otherwise have been produced.
Weak editorial safeguards may also leave research agendas vulnerable to undue influence from actors seeking to advance commercial or political interests . Although the studies discussed here do not investigate such interference, their findings provide a reason to ask whether existing safeguards adequately protect independent scholarly judgement.
The two studies did not measure either policy failure or reduced economic productivity. Those are potential downstream consequences, establishing them would require tracing particular findings into decisions and outcomes. The argument is that research governance helps protect the reliability and diversity of an important input into that process.
Accountability must extend to the institutions granting authority
Individual editors cannot carry this responsibility alone. Publishers appoint them, universities reward their publications, and ranking systems assign value to particular outlets. Reform must address these interdependencies.
Journals should disclose handling editors for published papers and explain how relevant conflicts were managed. Publishers should maintain auditable records of assignments and recusals, with independent investigation where credible concerns arise. Aggregate decision data can support scrutiny without exposing confidential manuscripts or reviewers.
Citation monitoring should also examine patterns, including concentrated mutual citation and unusual changes in publication volume. Such patterns should trigger examination, with an opportunity for explanation. High productivity, collaboration and self-citation can all be legitimate; a monitoring system must distinguish warning signals from findings of misconduct.
Universities have an equally direct responsibility. The San Francisco Declaration on Research Assessment calls for evaluating research on its merits and rejecting journal metrics as substitutes for the quality of individual work. Applying that principle means giving substantive attention to contributions, including replication, datasets and evidence that changes practice, rather than treating journal placement as a completed quality assessment.[7]
Editorial appointments should have transparent criteria, defined terms and meaningful review. Where failures are substantiated, replacing a person should be accompanied by an examination of affected decisions and the procedures that allowed the problem to develop. Otherwise, the same vulnerabilities remain available to the next officeholder.
Academic publishing gains authority by promising disciplined scrutiny. Its own governance must be open to that scrutiny. The public value of research depends partly on whether worthwhile ideas can receive fair consideration and whether apparent influence withstands examination. Editorial prestige carries an obligation to make both possible.
This article gives the views of the author, not the position of LSE Impact or the London School of Economics. You are agreeing with our comment policy when you leave a comment.[8]