Comparative Political Studies
For more than 40 years, Comparative Political Studies has been the place to turn for the most timely information on methodology, theory, and research in the field of comparative politics.
The international political arena has become increasingly complex and active. As a result, interest and work in this field of study has grown dramatically in recent years. To keep up with the demand for scholarship, Comparative Political Studies has expanded its publishing frequency. Now you'll receive ten issues each year, filled with articles that are timely, cover a wide variety of topics, and are authored by the best people in the field.
In-Depth Coverage
The editorial team of Comparative Political Studies selects only the very best relevant, in-depth analyses of many cross-national political issues. Some of the subject areas you will find include:
- European Integration
- Regional Mobilization
- European Monetary Politics
- Labor Markets
- Democratic Consolidation
- Bargaining Institutions
- Peace Movements
- Electoral Systems
- Party Strategies
- Redemocratization
- Production Strategies
- Human Rights
International Forum
Comparative Political Studies is a forum for the exchange of ideas between scholars and students of comparative politics. Journal articles discuss innovative work on comparative methodology, theory, and research from around the world. Previous contributions have included exhaustive research to ensure that readers get the fullest picture on a global scale—from democracy in the Third World to civil-military relations in the Middle East, from electoral systems and party politics in Eastern Europe to economic performance in Latin America, from comparisons of political asylum in North America and Western Europe to national conflicts in Asian countries. Whatever the topic, Comparative Political Studies is always at the forefront of the field, providing valuable analyses with important implications for the formation of domestic and foreign policies.
Comparative Political Studies is a journal of social and political science which publishes scholarly work on comparative politics at both the cross-national and intra-national levels. We are particularly interested in articles which have an innovative theoretical argument and are based on sound and original empirical research. We also encourage submissions about comparative methodology, particularly when methodological arguments are closely linked with substantive issues in the field.
| Benjamin W. Ansell | University of Oxford, UK |
| David J. Samuels | University of Minnesota, USA |
| Dawn Teele | Johns Hopkins University, USA |
| Ashrakat Elshehawy | University of Oxford, UK |
| Sebastián Cortesi | Johns Hopkins University, USA |
| Sophia Lipkin | Johns Hopkins University, USA |
| Claire Adida | University of California, San Diego, USA |
| John Ahlquist | University of Wisconsin, Madison, USA |
| Octavio Amorim | Fundacion Getulio Vargas, Brazil |
| Yuen Yuen Ang | University of Michigan, USA |
| David Art | Tufts University, USA |
| Rachel Beatty Riedl | Northwestern University, USA |
| Pablo Beramendi | Duke University, USA |
| Johanna Birnir | University of Maryland, USA |
| Jason Brownlee | University of Texas, Austin, USA |
| Melani Cammett | Harvard University, USA |
| Giovanni Capoccia | University of Oxford, UK |
| Teri Caraway | University of Minnesota, USA |
| Kathleen Collins | University of Minnesota, USA |
| Pepper Culpepper | European University Institute, Italy |
| Catherine de Vries | Bocconi University, Italy |
| David Doyle | University of Oxford, UK |
| Todd Eisenstadt | American University, USA |
| Tulia Falletti | University of Pennsylvania, USA |
| Orfeo Fioretos | Temple University, USA |
| John Freeman | University of Minnesota, USA |
| Timothy Frye | Columbia University, USA |
| Jennifer Gandhi | Emory University, USA |
| John Gerring | Boston University, USA |
| Jane Gingrich | University of Oxford, UK |
| Matt Golder | Pennsylvania State University, USA |
| Sara Wallace Goodman | University of California, Irvine, USA |
| Jane Green | University of Manchester, UK |
| Sheena Greitens | University of Texas, USA |
| Guy Grossman | University of Pennsylvania, USA |
| Anke Hassel | Professor of Public Policy Hertie School of Governance, Berlin, Germany |
| Silja Hausermann | University of Zurich, Switzerland |
| Lisa Hilbink | University of Minnesota, USA |
| Sara Hobolt | London School of Economics and Political Science |
| James R. Hollyer | University of Minnesota, USA |
| Mala Htun | University of New Mexico, USA |
| Maria Inclán | CIDE, Mexico |
| Nate Jensen | University of Texas at Austin, USA |
| Cristobal R. Kaltwasser | Universidad Diego Portales, Chile |
| Philip Keefer | Inter-American Development Bank, USA |
| Judith Kelley | Duke University, USA |
| Neil Ketchley | University of Oxford, UK |
| Desmond King | University of Oxford, UK |
| Carl Henrik Knutsen | University of Oslo, Norway |
| Mona Lena Krook | Rutgers University, USA |
| Johannes Lindvall | Lund University, Sweden |
| Julia Lynch | University of Pennsylvania, USA |
| Lauren Maclean | Indiana University, USA |
| James Mahoney | Northwestern University, USA |
| Eddy Malesky | Duke University, USA |
| Philip Manow | University of Bremen, Germany |
| Rahsaan Maxwell | University of North Carolina, USA |
| Bonnie Meguid | University of Rochester, USA |
| Layna Mosley | University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, USA |
| Victoria Murillo | Columbia University, USA |
| Gabriel Negretto | CIDE, Mexico |
| Anja Neundorf | University of Glascow, UK |
| Irfan Nooruddin | Georgetown University, USA |
| Tom Pepinsky | Cornell University, USA |
| Timothy Power | Oxford University, UK |
| Philipp Rehm | Ohio State University, USA |
| Stephanie Rickard | London School of Economics, UK |
| Amanda Robinson | Ohio State University, USA |
| Frances Rosenbluth | Yale University, USA |
| Michael Ross | University of California-Los Angeles, USA |
| Gwendolyn Sasse | Oxford University, UK |
| Leslie Schwindt-Bayer | Rice University, USA |
| Rudra Sil | University of Pennsylvania, USA |
| Dan Slater | University of Chicago, USA |
| Milan Svolik | Yale University, USA |
| Margit Tavits | Washington University of St Louis, USA |
| Vera Troeger | University of Warwick, UK |
| Georg Vanberg | Duke University, USA |
| Ashutosh Varshney | Brown University, USA |
| Sara Watson | Ohio State University, USA |
| Rebecca Weitz-Shapiro | Brown University, USA |
| Kurt Weyland | The University of Texas at Austin, USA |
| Stephen Whitefield | University of Oxford, UK |
Manuscripts must be submitted via Sage Track at https://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/comppolstud.
For information on proposals for special issues and review essays, click HERE.
Guidelines for Authors and Reviewers:
CPS is committed to publishing the full range of scholarship political scientists produce. We welcome papers using any methodological approach, as long as the method is appropriate to the research question. Only manuscripts of sufficient quality and that meet the aims, scope and standards of the journal as detailed below will be sent out for peer review.
The following guidelines are central for evaluating submissions to CPS:
1. Papers should explore an important political phenomenon or causal process
2. Papers should clearly articulate a substantively important and theoretically relevant research question of subfield-wide interest and appeal.
3. Papers should locate the research within the appropriate literature on the subject.
4. Where appropriate, papers should explain their research design and logic of case selection. CPS is open to case-studies as well as large-N quantitative studies. Still, questions that might require answering include “What were the criteria used to select cases or research sites?” “How does the case selection help answer the paper’s main question?” “How might choosing other cases influence the paper’s conclusion?” or “How do the cases vary on independent and dependent variables?”
5. All submissions should clearly explain why the method or methods employed are appropriate to address the question the paper poses, and they should clearly explain the methodology adopted.
6. Papers should address issues of validation of evidence. This may involve the use of negative cases, counterfactuals, use of multiple methods, robustness checks, and comparisons with findings from other published research (both qualitative and quantitative). The paper should convince readers that the findings are reliable, and trustworthy.
7. The paper must transparently explain the data analysis process. It should describe the coding procedures (if any), the procedures for understanding and interpreting evidence gathered to support the paper’s argument, and the methodology used to establish and confirm (or disconfirm) the existence of themes and/or patterns in the data. Depending on the method and the data, some of this information may appear in footnotes or an (online-only) appendix.
8. Pre-Analysis Plans: Authors may (but are not required to) provide an anonymized version of any pre-analysis plan. If so, it should be submitted as supplementary material, and we will provide it to reviewers if they request.
9. Research ethics are centrally embedded in political scientists’ work. CPS’ publisher, Sage Journals (https://journals.sagepub.com), is a member of COPE, the Committee on Publication Ethics, which offers principles and guidelines pertaining to author and editorial conduct. Specifically, we take the issue of copyright infringement, attribution and plagiarism very seriously. Submitted articles will checked with duplication-checking software. When we find that a submission has plagiarized other work or included third-party copyright material without permission or with insufficient acknowledgement, we reserve the right to take action, including but not limited to: immediate rejection, publishing an erratum or corrigendum (correction); retracting the article; taking up the matter with the head of department or dean of the author's institution and/or relevant academic bodies or societies; or taking appropriate legal action.
10. Human subjects research: CPS adheres to the principles of ethical human subjects research as set forth in the “Principles and Guidance” issued in April 2020 by the American Political Science Association. Authors are responsible for familiarizing themselves with these standards. See https://connect.apsanet.org/hsr/principles-and-guidance/, and for affirming adherence to such standards. Authors will be asked whether their submission contains original research involving human subjects research during the submission process. If so, they must provide the IRB/Ethics Board approval number(s) from authors’ home institutions. (This information should NOT be contained within the submission itself, to preserve anonymity.) Authors may be requested to provide additional information in their submission about human subjects research practices, above and beyond IRB approval, at any point in the review process. Reviewers are requested to consider the paper’s ethical standards.
11. Replication materials: Papers that present quantitative analyses will not be granted final acceptance until replication materials (data, code, log files etc.) have been deposited at the CPS Dataverse, at https://dataverse.harvard.edu/dataverse/cps. Embargoes on proprietary data may be considered. Accepted papers may also include online-only appendices that explain and comment on data-gathering procedures, particularly if they employ qualitative analysis.
Manuscript Requirements:
Manuscripts may be created in Word and submitted in .doc format, or created in LaTeX and submitted in .pdf format. Articles should be double-spaced, with 1” margins all around, a 12-point font (Times New Roman preferred), and contain a maximum of 11,000 words. Please follow these formatting guidelines. Please do NOT prepare your manuscript for submission using "Sagej.cls" in LaTex. References, tables and figures do not count as part of this word limit. Longer submissions will not be considered. Footnotes and bibliographic citations for new submissions should follow the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association.
The paper’s abstract must state precisely the intellectual problem under consideration, the method or argument addressed to the problem, and the conclusions reached by the author(s). It must be no longer than 150 words.
The corresponding author must submit an anonymous manuscript with all identifying information removed. “Identifying information” includes all authors’ names and affiliations, any expressions of gratitude to colleagues and/or funding agencies, and lists of presentations at conferences or invited talks. The submitted file archive must be named “anonymized version.”
Self-Citations:
- Authors are limited to FOUR self-citations in the references, along the following lines:
a. If author "Smith" submits an article, he/she can include four self-citations. These can be to solo-authored pieces, or collaborative works that include Smith as an author.
b. If "Smith" and "Jones" submit a co-authored paper, 1) Smith can self-cite four times as per (a) above, and Jones can also self-cite as per (a), for a total of EIGHT self-citations. The number of self-citations cannot exceed FOUR PER AUTHOR.
- Authors should not use "Author" in the text to anonymize self-citations. Self-citations should be referenced just like any other reference in the text, and SHOULD be included in the references section.
CPS has recently changed its submission requirements to facilitate reviewing of articles on different platforms. To that end all submissions must now include tables, figures and other images at the appropriate place within the text, not separately at the end. Do not include "Table 1 Here" (e.g.) in the text at all - just insert the table or other image in an appropriate location.
ORCID:
As part of our commitment to ensuring an ethical, transparent and fair peer review process Sage is a supporting member of ORCID, the Open Researcher and Contributor ID. ORCID provides a unique and persistent digital identifier that distinguishes researchers from every other researcher, even those who share the same name, and, through integration in key research workflows such as manuscript and grant submission, supports automated linkages between researchers and their professional activities, ensuring that their work is recognized.
The collection of ORCID iDs from corresponding authors is now part of the submission process of this journal. If you already have an ORCID iD you will be asked to associate that to your submission during the online submission process. We also strongly encourage all co-authors to link their ORCID ID to their accounts in our online peer review platforms. It takes seconds to do: click the link when prompted, sign into your ORCID account and our systems are automatically updated. Your ORCID iD will become part of your accepted publication’s metadata, making your work attributable to you and only you. Your ORCID iD is published with your article so that fellow researchers reading your work can link to your ORCID profile and from there link to your other publications.
If you do not already have an ORCID iD please follow this link to create one or visit our ORCID homepage to learn more.
Review Process:
Comparative Political Studies employs a partial triple-anonymize review process to give authors a reasonably unbiased assessment of their research. We first conduct an internal, anonymize review. If editors decide to send a paper out for external review, administrative procedures require that CPS staff learn authors' identity. However, authors will remain anonymous to external reviewers throughout the process.
Authors may request that submissions not be sent to a maximum of 4 individuals, with a brief explanation as to why.
CPS does not accept simultaneous submissions, nor review manuscripts the journal previously rejected. Please confirm in your cover letter that the material has not been submitted to another journal or published elsewhere in substantially similar form or with similar content. Authors in doubt about what constitutes prior publication should consult the editors.
Obtaining English-Language Help:
Authors who would like to refine the use of English in their manuscripts might consider using the services of a professional English-language editing company. We highlight some of these companies at http://www.sagepub.com/journalgateway/engLang.htm.Please be aware that Sage has no affiliation with these companies and makes no endorsement of them. An author's use of these services in no way guarantees that his or her submission will ultimately be accepted. Any arrangement an author enters into will be exclusively between the author and the particular company, and any costs incurred are the sole responsibility of the author.
All inquiries on new manuscripts should be sent to the editors at cps@umn.edu.