Last updated June 2017
Vision
We believe that sustained, rigorous, and open dialogue is crucial to understanding security in a broad sense of the term. In our search to publish work that is theoretically-innovative and empirically robust, Security Dialogue publishes special issues, in which guest editors work alongside the editor and associate editors to curate a directed collection of articles around one theme, question, or literature. Guest editors widen our editorial community and expand our discussion beyond the ‘usual suspects.’ To accommodate different kinds of conversation, Security Dialogue publishes single special issues, which are comprised by 5 articles with an introduction by the guest editors, and double special issues, which are comprised by 8 articles with an introduction by the guest editors. Single issue proposals must be submitted with a full list of abstracts of 8-9 articles (accounting for peer-review attrition). Double special issues must be framed as an open call for submissions, and submissions are then adjudicated by the guest editors and editor.
We encourage all guest editors to consider questions of diversity, both in terms of the intellectual content of the content and the prospective authors. We celebrate the growing diversity of the security studies field and a crucial value behind the special issue is precisely leveraging the format to empower new scholars to the dialogue. Because successful special issues often require an established network, intellectual capital, and some raw skills that might be a challenge for new or junior scholars, both editor and managing editor will support guest editors closely. We encourage junior or new editors, who might not yet have had the opportunity to direct a larger project, as well as more established scholars.
All proper proposals are considered by our editorial team, the editor and associate editors, who decide on the direction of the journal through consensus. In consultation with the managing editor, a schedule will be established. We accept proposals on a rolling basis. Due to page budgets, we are restricted to publishing only one double issue per publication year.
Instructions
Please submit to sd@prio.org a maximum 4 page general proposal that sets out (1) the core intellectual project of the special issue, and its relation to the readership of Security Dialogue (i.e. debates that have been engaged in the journal OR debates that are central to our concerns but not yet in the journal), (2) a brief biographical sketch of the guest editors and contributors, (3) a list of abstracts, (4) a bibliography of five important sources/influences/interlocutors and (5) a brief expakandum about how diversity has been addressed in this proposal.
We expect that the call for papers will set out a clear intellectual project that seeks to engage new and established scholars to contribute to that discussion. Because guest editors must be open to choose papers from the submitted abstracts, we do not expect that the proposal will include a full slate of paper abstracts, but we have found it very helpful to have a couple of examples of what kind of contributions would be particularly welcome, so that we can assess the editorial direction of the project.
