Populism & Politics (P&P)

Populism and Politics (P&P) is an international refereed journal exploring polarisation, authoritarianism, conflict, solutions and responses in historical and contemporary contexts. P&P welcomes submissions across the arts, humanities, and social sciences, referencing the burgeoning field of populism studies.

As an interdisciplinary academic journal, P&P invites intellectuals, researchers, and scholars to think outside the box. In doing so, the journal encourages radical and critical approaches to populism studies, particularly papers adopting decolonial and gendered perspectives, addressing research questions related to Public Humanities and populism, and exploring practical ethics, policy, and other interdisciplinary avenues.

P&P aims to advance scholarship by encouraging scholars to produce interdisciplinary work at the intersection of humanities, social sciences, arts, and policy research. The development and application of new methodologies and approaches in populism studies are highly encouraged. Submissions may include, but are not limited to, fields such as law, political science, anthropology, sociology, psychology, economics, environmental studies, gender studies, and philosophy. Topics can encompass political, philosophical, and legal analyses of populism‘s scope and meaning, as well as the broader impact of populist discourse on political thinking, practices, public life, and governance.

P&P encourages the use of clear and accessible language. Submissions are evaluated based on scholarly quality, relevance, timeliness, novelty, and style. Upon successful peer review, each article will receive a unique international identification code, the ‘Digital Object Identifier’ (DOI).

In its guidelines for publication, P&P follows various university presses and other styles (OUP, Duke, MIT, Science Direct).

Peer Review

All articles undergo a rigorous peer review process. After an initial review, two external experts will peer review and give feedback. Each step is anonymized.

Submission Guidelines

  • P&P operates an exclusive submission policy and will not consider manuscripts published or submitted elsewhere.
  • Manuscripts should be approximately 6,000–10,000 words in length, accompanied by an abstract of 200-500 words with 3-6 keywords and a biographical note of 100-150 words. Please integrate all figures and tables into the body of the main text. Include page numbers.
  • All footnotes should follow the APA citation system. They should be kept to a minimum and not used for sub-texts.
  • Authors should submit their manuscripts to ecps@populismstudies.org with the subject title “Paper submission for P&P,” followed by Last Name, First Letter of the First Name, and Paper Title.
  • The submissions must include a cover page submitted as a separate file and an anonymized version of the main document. Please submit one regular one anonymised cover letter. The un-anonymised cover page must include the title, authors, affiliations, corresponding author contact information, abstract, and keywords. All files are expected to be Word documents.
  • Articles can use American or British English, remaining consistent in one style. In case of significant amounts of grammatical or spelling errors, papers might be returned to authors for further editing before we send the paper to reviewers.
  • On first submission, articles can use any formatting the author chooses. In the latest stage, the manuscript must be double-spaced, including quotations, notes, and references cited. The format must be one-inch margins on standard-size paper and use a typeface no smaller than 12 pts.

After Official Acceptance

  • If the article is accepted for the journal, these need to be provided: a Declaration of Conflict of Interest, a statement on Data and Code Availability, an Ethics Statement (naming which institution standards are considered), a declaration of contributions explaining the distribution of labour among the co-authors, if applies, funding information and acknowledgements.
  • If needed, authors are responsible for certifying that the article represents original work and does not overlap with any other articles by the authors under consideration or in press elsewhere. Any potential closely related submissions to other journals should be brought to the attention of the editors. If AI tools are used to generate the text, it must be clearly explained within the text and in the submission cover letter.
  • Authors may suggest up to three reviewers for the article. Please explain how these reviewers and the authors do not have conflicts of interest. An example of conflict of interest can include people at your institution or people you have co-authored or collaborated with within the last 5 years.
  • Be ready to certify that co-authors approve the submitted manuscript. Add their names, affiliations, email addresses and funding information. Indicate the corresponding author with their email address. AI tools cannot be listed as authors. Ensure the editors that the authors agree that your article will be published under a Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license, which allows free and unlimited reuse of articles without permission or fees.

Tables, Images, Figures, Data

Tables, images and figures may appear inline in your main text files, but please also supply them as separate files. Notations in the manuscript must indicate where tables and images are to appear.  Please use Arial or Helvetica fonts within figures.

Images of maps, charts, graphs, shapes, and diagrams are best rendered digitally as geometric forms called vector graphics. Vector images use mathematical relationships between points and the lines connecting them to describe an image. These file types do not use pixels; therefore, resolution does not apply to vector images. Save vector images as .eps or .svg files and embed the fonts.

Images of photographs, paintings, or scans can be provided as raster images. Raster images should be saved as uncompressed .tiff files to avoid quality loss; .jpg/.png file formats are acceptable for raster image but may result in a lower resolution. The resolution of raster files is measured by the number of dots or pixels in a given area, referred to as “dpi” or “ppi.”

  • Minimum resolution required for color half-tones: 300dpi
  • Minimum resolution for grayscale half-tones: 600dpi
  • Minimum resolution for combination half-tones and line art: 600-900dpi
  • Minimum resolution for monochrome line art (complex or finely drawn): 1200dpi

Tables should appear inline and be formatted as tables, not tab or comma delimited text. Please do not use shading or colored type in tables. These cannot be reproduced in an accessible manner in full-text html. If shading or colored type are required, the table will be reproduced as a figure in the full-text html.

Supplements (additional tables, figures, etc.) should be supplied as PDF files or any file type that is suitable (e.g. excel files, txt files) and should not exceed 100MB. 

P&P encourages all authors to openly share all data, code, and other materials that are essential for reproducing the article’s findings and conclusions, and for building on the published work. We strongly recommend you place data and visual materials in a repository with a robust persistence policy that will register and supply you with a persistent identifier like a DOI. Include this persistent ID in your reference listing.

  • If you plan to publish data sets, please cite these materials in your article’s text and include them in your references list. Either enclose them as supplementary material with your submission (if ≤100MB) or include a link to a public repository where the materials can be accessed.
  • All papers must include a statement on Data and Code Availability regardless of data/code will be shared or not. "Available upon request" is only acceptable with these explanations: The need for a formal data sharing agreement, The need for approval from the requesting researcher’s local ethics committee, The need to submit a formal project outline, Requirements for co-authorship or inclusion in the author byline.
  • Accompanying illustrations should be emailed as individual files (300 dpi or above) and, if applicable, be placed in a repository with a robust persistence policy. The authors are responsible for securing written copyright clearance on all photographs and drawings that are not in the public domain for worldwide rights and online publishing.

The Checklist for Submitting a Paper

  • Originality, thus, the validity of the research is well discussed, developed, and articulated.
  • The literature gap, research question, how the paper responds, and the significance of the contribution (in theory, methods, utilising new data, developing a counterargument, etc.) are explained early in the paper. They are contextualised within the critical literature review and presented with evidence and examples.
  • The argument/s must be presented in the context of existing or potential counterarguments.
  • The evidence/examples are convincingly presented (related data, comparison, etc.).
  • The paper is well situated in the scholarship, responding to the most recent publications.
  • The flow of the paper is good (connections to the research question and arguments and counterarguments are well discussed, referring to the main research question and argument throughout the paper).
  • The abbreviations are described in the first instance they mentioned.
  • The limits of the paper are well justified and presented to highlight the argument.
  • The conclusion analysed all that is asked, responded to, and left out in the paper.

Special Issues

P&P is open to special issue submissions. If interested, please email a 500-word description of the special issue, together with a list of potential contributors and paper subjects. Proposals are evaluated by the journal editors.

P&P Reviews

Short Book Reviews: On a single book, word limit: between 800 and 2000 words.

Long Book Reviews: On one or several books, word limit: 4000-4500 words.

P&P welcomes reviews of films, events, exhibitions, installations, digital projects, podcasts, and live performances. The word limit is 2000-4000 words but this can be discussed by the editors.

Artwork and Visual Essays

P&P encourages innovative approaches to knowledge production using arts and visual culture. Artists are encouraged to submit proposals of 300 words for projects that fit within the parameters of the journal. Please send the material, links and text via emailing ecps@populismstudies.org with the subject title “Artwork/ Visual Essay submission for P&P,” followed by the Last Name, First Letter of the First Name, and Paper Title.

Should you have any queries, please get in touch with us at the following e-mail addresses: ecps@populismstudies.org or skocaman@populismstudies.org

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