I’m very proud of the work I’ve done as editor of the Kennedy Institute of Ethics Journal over the last seven years. In 2017, the KIEJ published 35 articles, including six extended critical book reviews. Looking only at lead authors in the case of multi-authored publications, nineteen of these articles (54%) were by scholars presenting as women. Six of them (17%) were by scholars who publicly identify as disabled. Four of them (11%) were by scholars who publicly identify as non-white. Queer and trans status are less often public, but I know that we published work by several queer and trans authors that year. It is telling to compare those numbers to the journal’s record in 2010, the last complete year in which I was not involved in editing: That year, the journal published nineteen articles, of which four (21%) were by women, and none were by people publicly identifying as disabled or non-white (or queer or trans as far as I know).
I can identify four main things we did that I believe helped to diversify the journal.
First, we ran special issues on politically relevant topics, and in particular on topics of broad and timely interest that many journals would reject as ‘not really philosophy.’ These included an issue on the politics of obesity; an issue on Asian bioethics; an issue on Trump and the 2016 election; an issue on disability bioethics; and an issue on the politics of scientific expertise. All of these seemed to us likely to attract submissions from a more diverse set of contributors than would most philosophy topics (and they did). But furthermore, once articles on these topics and by these authors are published, it strongly signals to the philosophical community and to philosophers looking to place their work that we are a journal that is welcoming to diverse authors, and to more engaged, less traditional philosophical work.
Second, we started the critical book review program. Our book reviews are all open access and delivered by free subscription to the inbox of whomever wants them. (If you’re interested, you can subscribe at https://kiej.georgetown.edu/book-reviews/subscribe-for-email/.) This increased the visibility of the journal. And because we get to pick which books we review as well as who reviews them, this has given us a tool for promoting the work of scholars from marginalized groups at both levels. We go out of our way to review work in feminist, anti-racist, and other anti-oppression traditions whenever possible, and to amplify the work of scholars outside the mainstream.
Third, we changed our mission statement away from the language of “applied ethics,” which implies applying well-worn theories to particular cases, and replaced the original list of traditional and decontextualized topics in bioethics. Instead we now use the language of “practically engaged philosophy” and offer a list of topics that makes it clear that we are looking for papers that directly engage with pressing and current concrete issues, and that we are open to interdisciplinary and non-traditional approaches. By emphasizing emerging issues rather than traditional ones, we hope to attract younger scholars, who form a more diverse group on the whole. I worked hard from the start to use what l hope is my own reputation for being welcoming to anti-oppressive work and a wide and fluid range of methods and sources in order to rebrand the journal.
Fourth, and perhaps most contentiously, we have resisted the trend towards triple anonymous review. Because of my broad commitment to standpoint epistemology, I believe that knowing who wrote a piece is often important to assessing the value and meaning of what it says. I also want to be able to take extra care to mentor papers by scholars from marginalized groups, if they have potential but are not yet ready for publication. Given our roughly 85% rejection rate, many potentially excellent papers, including those by marginalized scholars, will simply get cut unless I go out of my way to recognize their potential and make sure they get good feedback and a chance to resubmit. While we do use a double-anonymous review system, my knowledge of who wrote a paper helps me contextualize the reviews it receives. Furthermore, my knowledge of the authors of our submissions has helped me to include more work by non-Anglophone scholars: Before either desk rejecting an awkwardly written paper or sending it out for anonymous review, I will often contact non-Anglophone author and ask them to resubmit it after getting help with proofreading and idiom from an Anglophone colleague.
On the topic of anonymity, I should also note that I am deeply convinced by the point that anonymous review is a privilege afforded only to work in mainstream areas of philosophy, written in a conventional voice, and hence it is an inherently conservative procedure. As Shay Welch pointed out eloquently at our APA panel this past spring, philosophers who work on marginalized topics or who have a distinctive voice or writing style really cannot receive anonymous review. Everyone qualified to review their work will already be able to tell or at least make a strong guess about their identity. So the idea that anonymous review levels differences and removes biases is a myth. Given that many of us take it for granted that formally and procedurally equal treatment tends to benefit the privileged rather than to promote genuine equality of access, it surprises me how many philosophers accept without question that more anonymity in the review process automatically promotes justice.
Clearly the place where the KIEJ still has a long way to go is in attracting a racially diverse set of authors. I’ve actively tried to work on this problem, in the ways described above, but also through direct invitations to scholars of color, and by being extra vigilant that our authors cite and engage with scholars of color when relevant. Sean Valles wrote a short piece on some of the background conditions that might explain my failure to racially diversify our special issue on Trump. I found it to be brilliant and helpful: https://kiej.georgetown.edu/comments-philosopher-color-reasons-didnt-write-real-paper-seemingly-ideal-venue-work/ I don’t want to co-opt his words, but hope that editors interested in taking this issue seriously will read his piece.
In writing this blog post, I was asked to “consider possible directions for positive change” in the diversification of publication in philosophy. My main suggestion is that journals focus on publishing work that is engaged with current, concrete issues, and that we take every possible measure to avoid gatekeeping and conservatism when it comes to what we recognize as legitimate philosophical topics, sources, methods, and writing styles. Of course, some philosophers from marginalized groups work on mainstream issues using conventional tools. But it is not surprising that marginalized scholars and younger scholars are often attracted to emerging issues and to broader and more creative methods, nor is it surprising that those who suffer concrete oppression and marginalization will tend to be interested in thinking critically about social issues. My new colleague, Olúfẹmi O. Táíwò (UCLA/Georgetown), recently said in an interview on Daily Nous, “It’s easy to get into the habit of responding to the field and the literature rather than directly to the world—that is, where the answers to the questions that the field and the literature are trying to answer live, and where all of the people live who have to deal with the fallout of the answers we endorse” (http://dailynous.com/2018/07/13/new-release-philosopher-musician-olufemi-taiwo/). My greatest hope for the future of the profession is that journals begin to systematically reward work that responds directly to the world, where all of the people live, as he puts it. If this happens, the benefits to the discipline in terms of both demographic inclusion and intellectual vibrancy and relevance will be enormous.
Rebecca Kukla
Rebecca Kukla is Professor of Philosophy at Georgetown University, where she is also a Senior Research Fellow in the Kennedy Institute of Ethics. She publishes in social epistemology, philosophy of language, philosophy of the applied sciences, and feminist/anti-oppression theory. She is also a current graduate student in Geography at CUNY, as well as a competitive amateur boxer and powerlifter.
Sure. Let bias blossom. How can that not be the answer?
Look, I’m 65 and have been in traditional academia for a total of 2.5 years. Since getting my Ph.D in 1978, I’ve probably received 1000 journal rejections, certainly enough to paper all the walls in my house several times over. I recognize that some of my articles aren’t exactly “mainstream.” And I know very well that I would only be harmed by the changes Professor Kukla recommends. There would be more papers by well-known writers, not fewer. No doubt, there might also be more papers appearing by women and minorities. But they are likely to be either by faculty members from good schools or by people personally know to some editor or referee. The old boy network was not a good thing for the marginalized…and neither will be the new girl network.
Let merit ring.
Walter, you can check for yourself by browsing our issues whether we publish mostly papers by well-known folks or folks at prestige institutions. Our tables of contents are easy to access online. You’ll see objectively that we do not. As I said, our procedures tend to privilege younger scholars and one thing I am proud of is how many grad students and new assistant professors end up publishing in our journal.
I just wanted to add that there was a time during which the great symphony orchestras of the world contained only men. This was seen as problematic, so–in spite of tremendous resistance from some quarters–blind auditions were implemented at many orchestras. This turned out to be auspicious: women began to be hired.
Blind reviewing at prestigious philosophy journals has had a similar effect: those particularly prejudiced against: adjuncts, those without academic positions at all, etc. occasionally got articles accepted in top journals. That was not a “conservative” development as Prof. Kukla suggests. It simply made it impossible for someone to get a piece published either because he/she was famous or because he/she had connections with an editor or referee. It was a way of crushing the “old boy network” in favor of fairness to all.
I don’t mean to suggest there can be no value in more diverse authorship. There may well be. But the way to that goal is not to revert to obviously unfair methods of editorship. One could, for example, require that a quarter (or whatever) of the journal’s articles be reserved for minority authors. It is hard to do that right, but it is an issue that universities and other employers have been dealing with for years. Whatever one does, it should be clear that welcoming back editorial biases is not the solution. It would have been no sensible fix to have female friends of conductors bypass blind auditions.
OK, really ending my rant this time. Thanks for the pulpit.
While I’m certainly no expert on appropriate manners of handling traditional institutional biases, I’d think that if one wanted to increase the amount of papers by young scholars, one could put age ranges in the submission guidelines and and come up with a way for such stratification to ensure that a certain percentage of papers by those under, say 30, get published. One could do the same for race and gender. But reversion to schemes in which explicitly allow personal biases to trump blind assessments of value ought not to be thought of as “a step forward” IMHO.
Cheers.
We are not of the view that quotas are the best way to proceed in any of these areas. Since we use double anonymous refereeing and no paper makes it through without two strong anonymous reviews, and we reject 85% of papers, I am pretty confident that no biases are trumping anonymous assessments.
Hi again – We do not think a quota system is the best approach for any of these categories.
Since ALL papers must go through an anonymous review process and receive strong positive reports from both anonymized reviewers, and since we reject 85% of our submissions, I am very confident that my biases are not allowing through any papers that aren’t excellent and more than deserving of publication, and that they are not superseding concerns about value.
I strongly applaud the diversification of topics.
But I am uneasy about the prospect of non-anonymous review for the reason that, simply, personal relationships with those reading my work can preempt the type of assessment that I could trust. That partly has to do with my lack of commitment to a robust standpoint epistemology, although I commit to it in a weak sense.
I think implementing quotas might do the job of diversifying and equalizing philosophical publishing better. First, it’s a transparent policy that is unapologetically political because the problems in academic publishing are political (i.e. path dependence of entrenched patterns of bias will not resolve itself and there needs to be a way to interrupt it without encouraging clientelism in publishing). Second, it preserves a good measure of “objective” merit assessment–authors’ works would/could be judged against the works of others in their quota category. Third, authors could still get “trustworthy” feedback from those committed to promoting the work of people like them, if not them. Fourth, it would better allow for disagreement between individuals WITHIN quota groups and thus discourage the homogenization/power politics of in-group discourses.
This is based on empirical evidence showing that quotas have worked quite well in other state-institutional contexts. I don’t know if quotas would work the same way in the publishing context. And if not, I take back the suggestion.
I don’t see why folks would complain about what Prof. Kukla and the KIEJ board is doing. From the standpoint of promotion/tenure evaluation, as long as journals are transparent about reviewing procedures, I’m not sure why it matters what procedures are used. Committees can evaluate the work in a manner consistent with whatever standards they have. From the standpoint of evaluating work quality, the review procedures don’t matter. Lots of great work has been produced at the invitation of volume editors, and lots of garbage has been published after triple-blind anonymous peer-review. Intelligent people will evaluate the work once it’s in print or otherwise publicly accessible.
At this point, there’s so much being published, and so much of it is garbage, that I’m more than happy to see some journals abandon the traditional blind-review standard to publish pieces by scholars who might not have other outlets because of existing intellectual biases. I hope to see KIEJ continue to do their part here by going out of their way to publish well-argued pieces from conservative or libertarian scholars, as their views are even more underrepresented in academia than the groups Prof. Kukla and the KIEJ board currently is helping to support.
I hope to see KIEJ continue to do their part here by going out of their way to publish well-argued pieces from conservative or libertarian scholars, as their views are even more underrepresented in academia than the groups Prof. Kukla and the KIEJ board currently is helping to support.
= = =
I agree that this would be a great thing. And I also don’t see the harm of having some journals do things differently from the way they’re done in most.