This is the tenth in my annual series of efforts to put together data on development economics journals that is not otherwise publicly available or easy to access (see 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024, 2025 for the previous editions). I once again thank all the journal editors and editorial staff who graciously shared their statistics with me.
Journal Quality
I compare journals here on three types of measures of quality and impact. The first, and most well-known, is the impact factor. The standard impact factor is the mean number of citations in the last year of papers published in the journal in the past 2 years, while the 5-year is the mean number of cites in the last year of papers published in the last 5. As noted in previous years, the distribution of citations are highly skewed, and while the mean number of citations differs across journals, there is substantial overlap in the distributions – most of the variation in citations is within, rather than across journals. Second, I include RePec’s journal rankings which take into account article downloads and abstract views in addition to citations. Third, I show (and order the journals by) the SJR (SCImago Journal Rank), which is a prestige-weighted citation metric – which works like Google PageRank, giving more weight to citations in sources with a relatively high SJR. These rankings across all the measures have remained pretty stable over the last couple of years.
How many submissions are received, and what are the chances of getting accepted?
Panel A of Table 2 shows the number of submissions received each year (see previous years posts for statistics before 2019). The total submissions in the 12 journals tracked is 16,767 papers, a 34% increase on last year, and 59% increase on 2022. In 2016, World Development received 2,300 submissions, and the JDE 1313. We see massive growth in submissions to both journals, especially in the last year, with 1276 more submissions in the last year at World Development, and 830 at JDE. This pattern of a surge in submissions in the last year is also seen at World Development Perspectives and the Review of Development Economics, whereas submission numbers have been flat at WBER and EDCC.
Several of the journals that have received large increases in submissions report that this increase in submissions reflects a rise from several regions of the world, but especially China. The JDS reports that 28% of total submissions are now from China, and that almost half of papers published in 2025 had at least one co-author based in developing countries, mostly from China and India, but with increasing numbers from Africa. Review of Development Economics also notes a big increase in submissions from China, and that they had 35 papers published last year with one or more authors in China, and now have two associate editors based in China. Figure 1 below from the JDE shows the rapid growth in submissions from China (note the log scale on the Y-axis), with submissions from China now outnumbering those from Europe and North America. Note there is also a rise in the last year or so from SSA, LAC, and MENA, but from a much lower base.
Figure 1: Differences in Submission Growth at the JDE by Author Region
Panel B of Table 2 shows the total number of papers published in 2025 in each journal. 1147 papers were published in 2025 across these journals – a 22% increase on last year. So whenever anyone purports to make claims about the topics, methods, or other commonalities in development research, remind them there is a lot of development research!
Finally, panel C of Table 2 shows the acceptance rates. The ratio of the number of papers published to those submitted is approximately the acceptance rate. Of course papers are often published in a different year from when they are submitted, and so journals calculate acceptance rates by trying to match up the timing. Each journal does this in somewhat different ways, which are not always consistent (and I have approximated this by number of papers published/submitted for a couple that seemed most off). We see that because the number of articles published at many journals has increased with the number of submissions, acceptance rates have been relatively stable at many journals. Of course the quality of submissions varies across journals and with the number of new submissions, and so comparing acceptance rates across journals does not tell you what the chances are of your particular paper getting accepted is at these different journals.
How does this compare to AEA journals?
The AEA journals are to be commended for their very transparent annual reports published in the AEA papers and proceedings. AER received 2,114 submissions in 2025 and published 115, with a desk reject rate of 34%. One point to note is the editor saying that “I think maintaining an acceptance rate in the 8 to 10 percent range should be possible without affecting the AER’s position among economics journals”. AER Insights received 786 submissions, published 32, with acceptance rate of 3.4%, and desk-rejection rate of 54%. AEJ applied received 886 submissions, published 44. 10 of these came from transfers from papers submitted to AER or AER Insights. The acceptance rate is around 6%.
So note that World Development gets 2.5 times as many submissions as the AER, and JDE 1.5 times as many. So thank your editors, you can imagine how much work it is when they have so many papers to deal with.
Paul Goldsmith-Pinkham also has a recent substack looking at working paper trends on arXiv, NBER working papers, and SSRN, and does not see big increases in papers there.
Updates on the JDE Short Paper and Registered Report Tracks
The Journal of Development Economics has two other categories of papers that differ from other development journals:
The short paper format received 215 submissions in 2025 (compared to 205 submissions in 2024 and 148 in 2023), and 37 short papers were published (up from 13 last year). So short papers are only 7% of submissions – whereas I am sure many more would be good fits for this format. These papers follow the model of AER Insights, ReStat, etc in which papers are either conditionally accepted or rejected, and so any revisions are minor and are not sent back to referees. This can be much speedier, but can be riskier, since a paper which might get a major revision with a lot of work to do would likely get rejected in this format. Note that there is nothing to prevent you sending short papers to other journals, even without separate categories – editors (and referees) are happy to get short papers to review.
The JDE registered reports had 52 submissions for Phase 1 reports, although many were mislabeled or did not meet the formal criteria. 23 went to referees, and there were 15 phase 1 acceptances, and 5 phase 2 papers accepted for publication. (Recall phase 1 is acceptance of papers pre-results, and phase 2 is when the authors come back with the completed study). The JDE notes that researchers increased access to real-time implementation data has led us to clarify our policies regarding the timing of submissions for the JDE pre-results review (Registered Reports Stage 1). Changes are reflected in the updated text on our Registered Report web site: see author guidelines on https://jdepreresults.org/
How long does it take papers to get refereed?
In addition to wanting to publish in a high quality outlet, and having a decent chance of publication, authors also care a lot about how efficient the process is. Table 3 provides data on the review process (see the previous years’ posts for historic data). The first column shows the desk rejection rate, which averages 74%. Column 2 uses the desk rejection rates and acceptance rates to estimate the acceptance rate conditional on you making it past the desk rejection stage. On average, 40% of papers that get sent to referees gets accepted, with this varying a lot across journals.
The remaining columns give some numbers on how long it takes to get a first-round decision. The statistics “Unconditional on going to referees” includes all the desk rejections, which typically don’t take that many days. The average conditional on going to referees is in the 2-5 month range. The last columns then show the percent of papers with decisions within 3 and 6 months, including desk rejects. Even with so many desk rejections, this is a lot of papers that needs referees, and we see a small share of papers still struggle to get decisions within 6 months.
What are journals doing about AI?
The first half of this year has seen researchers experimenting with proof-of-concept tests that you can have agentic AIs write an entire economics paper that look somewhat reasonable. This has led to concerns that journals may get deluged with even more submissions. My sense is that the 2025 numbers are too soon to reflect this, but it is something that I thought I’d ask editors about. I asked whether they had noticed any rise in what appear to be AI-generated submissions, as well as whether their journals have AI policies.
The general view was that journals so far do not appear to be receiving many submissions that they or reviewers see as “AI slop” or purely produced by AI, but are seeing more use of AI by authors to more clearly communicate some of their research and improve their language (especially by non-native English speakers).
In terms of journal policies toward AI use, these policies at the moment seem publisher-specific, rather than journal specific, with several journals noting they are in the process of drafting policies. Here is Taylor and Francis (JDS), Wiley (Development Policy Review), and Elsevier (JDE, WD). My read of these policies is that they currently require authors to disclose how they have used AI, and make clear that authors are ultimately responsible for all content in their manuscript. If you use AI in your papers, it is worth being very careful and checking these policies- Scott Cunningham notes that given that these policies are at a publisher, not journal level, if you run afoul of a publisher’s policies, there is a risk of being banned from being able to submit to multiple journals.
Journal submission fees
Several years ago, EDCC introduced a $50 submission fee to help deal with the surge in submissions. They note that there are fee waivers for graduate students and authors from low-income countries as defined by the World Bank – so to reach out to the journal office to request these waivers.
Earlier this year, JDE also introduced a $50 submission fee, reduced to $25 for full-time students, and with a full waiver for corresponding authors from LMICs based on the AEA country list. They want to hear from any authors if they experience any difficulties with the waiver system. The fees are to be used to identify and address manuscripts with longer than expected review times, and to develop a system of spot checking replication files, as well as to involve the associate editors more in the journal.
Other Updates
Several journals had changes in their editorial boards, which you can see on their websites. A couple of changes in the scope of the journals:
· The Journal of Development Effectiveness notes they are taking a broader interpretation of ‘development effectiveness’ to encourage submissions that are not just impact evaluations.
· Development Policy Review has also updated its Aims and Scope.
Finally, thanks again to all the editors for all the time and effort they devote to improving the quality and visibility of development research. As you can see, they have a lot to deal with!
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