World Politics Journal Broadens its Reach Beyond Academia

World Politics, a preeminent journal of international relations and comparative politics housed at Princeton University, celebrated its 75th anniversary in 2023. As the quarterly publication looks to its next era, its editorial team is committed to bringing its research to an audience outside academia.

Grigore Pop-Eleches, professor of politics and international affairs and current chair of the editorial committee, and executive editor Emily Babson have set an ambitious vision for the future of World Politics. “We’re trying to accelerate the transition from a traditional hard copy-based model to a more diverse set of digital strategies,” Pop-Eleches said, “including an active social media presence connecting our articles to current political events, as well as a recent initiative to interview authors of newly published articles about the broader relevance of their research beyond academic audiences.”

The Storied Teller, for example, is a new series on the World Politics website conceived and produced by Babson that features interviews with contributors asking them to distill their rigorous research into digestible takeaways for the well-informed lay reader.

James Raymond Vreeland, professor of politics and international affairs and former editorial committee member, considers this sort of public engagement a vital extension of the University’s mission to teach. “Imparting knowledge is the job,” he said. “We do this through our specialized publications for scholarly journals; we do this in the classroom; and now, increasingly, we can do this through all sorts of outlets accessible to people outside of academia.” Speaking to a wider audience also feeds Vreeland intellectually: “The process deepens my appreciation for the policy implications of my studies: By pushing myself to reach a wider audience, I reach a deeper understanding of the work.”

Such bite-sized distillations also have practical applications outside the proverbial ivory tower, says Naima Green-Riley, assistant professor of politics and international affairs and World Politics’ associate editor. Before she was an academic, she was a foreign service officer at the State Department. In her role, she often fielded “questions about systematic patterns and relationships in the world that I didn’t have the time or resources to investigate independently,” she said. “Given the nature of my job, any efforts by academics to summarize their work and clarify takeaways were very helpful. Social science research can be helpful to policymakers, but the research needs to reach that audience — a task that requires translation and building relationships with those in policy positions.”

In an age of misinformation and disinformation, when many ongoing political debates are increasingly either evidence-free or rely on questionable facts and arguments, it’s imperative that academics “play an active role in ‘translating’ their research findings to the wider public in accessible and engaging ways,” Pop-Eleches said. “Academic research can provide a powerful corrective for these worrying trends.”