Comments on: The Political Economy of Academic Conferences

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E-LIST Archives » Blog Archive » Links — Tue, 12 Jul 2005 22:10:18 +0000

[...] Advice on conference paper submissions http://crookedtimber.org/2005/06/07/the-political-economy-of-academic-conferences [...]

By: Unknown Professor

Unknown Professor — Fri, 10 Jun 2005 13:33:34 +0000

I’ve been on numerous program committees over the years for finance conferences, and even served as chair for one of the major tracks at one meeting. My experience may not be universal, but having talked with a lot of my peers, it’s probably not too far off the mark.

The typical reviewer is given between 5 and 12 papers do make decisions on, and usually spends less than 15 minutes per paper reviewing them. So, the best advice I can give (for those in my field) is to make sure the abstract, intro, and conclusions read very, very well. In particular, make sure that you state what your paper is about and WHY ANYONE SHOULD CARE by the second paragraph of the introduction (and hopefully sooner).

I often make my decision on whether a paper is worth accepting in less than 5-10 minutes. A poorly written abstract and introduction often leaves a bad enough taste in my mouth that the game is over.

If it’s an empirical paper, I’ll then go to the tables. If they’re self-contained (i.e. the description of the dataset and the explanations of the variables are included in the table), it makes my life easier, and (if the paper has any merit) greatly increases the chance of the paper being accepted. Of course, if the paper’s worthless, it’s also easier to see this if the tables a re poorly constructed.

A submission is not unlike a sales pitch – convince the reviewer that you’ve got something that’s worth them spending their time on, and most will be willing to accept it. Don’t make the reviewer do all the work figuring out if the paper is worth conference time.

By: Simstim

Simstim — Thu, 09 Jun 2005 10:46:55 +0000

Eszter: In my experience (as a former undergrad, postgrad, TA and clerical officer in various academic departments) a large minority, in some cases a majority, of academics will simply not read instructions at all and will give you what they have in whatever format/timescale they feel like. These same people are, of course, most put out when the same happens to them…

By: vivian

vivian — Thu, 09 Jun 2005 00:48:24 +0000

Henry: as a political scientist, thanks for the advice and the labor (labour?) you gave your committee.

Eszter: That’s really interesting – my advisor (long experience, as smart and socially savvy as they come) told me to send the dissertation intro, best chapter and conclusion with all job applications, regardless of what the ad said. On the theory that the committee would then choose which 30pp bits to read based on their curiosity and interests. Do you suppose there is a variety of preferences out there, or was this a spectacularly bad piece of advice?

By: Chris Williams

Chris Williams — Wed, 08 Jun 2005 09:47:36 +0000

I’m with John on the theme. The UK’s Social History Society conference has recently dropped it, which means that the number of papers that we have to sit through on ‘shoe-horning my area of expertise into this year’s theme’ plummeted. Which is nice.

My experience of this is rather depressing. I was on a sub-panel for [large social-science annual conference] in 2000, and learned to my chagrin that the conference organisers expected us to accept all the proposals we were sent, without regard to quality. Their own political economy had the accent on economy rather than politics, and was driven entirely by bums on seats.

By: John Quiggin

John Quiggin — Wed, 08 Jun 2005 00:40:02 +0000

I’ve always thought that the idea of an annual meeting having a theme is a really bad one. It simply adds gratuitous randomness to the whole process.

By: Eszter

Eszter — Wed, 08 Jun 2005 00:11:11 +0000

Helpful post, thanks. I’ve been meaning to write something similar regarding graduate applications. I have a question for you: does APSA impose word/page limits on submissions? If yes, did it bother you when people went over them?

Personally, I really dislike it when people ignore word/page limits. It may just be that submitters don’t realize how many submissions arrive on the desk of evaluators and so they do not realize that an extra page or two times 150 (say in the case of grad applications to a program) is considerable. I find it disrespectful and also makes me wonder about people’s ability to follow directions.

By: mark

mark — Tue, 07 Jun 2005 21:09:53 +0000

Henry,
I have filled a similar role for ISA (the International Studies Association) three times in recent years and would second all the points you raise here. The situation at ISA is a bit easier than at APSA (as I understand it.) We received fewer applications than is the norm at APSA and thus have to reject fewer papers. There are a couple of points I would add to your comments:
1. Try to make your proposal relevant to the section to which you are submitting it. We have rejected a number of very interesting proposals that could have made for great presentations because they were simply not relevant to the section. This issue is especially important if you are only submitting a single paper proposal (as opposed to a panel proposal.) If your topic is somewhat esoteric it becomes that much harder to find other papers to add to it to make a coherent panel. In my experience the task of trying to maintain some kind of logical consistency when putting papers together to make a panel was one of the most difficult parts of the process.
2. Related to this, it is probably fair to say that panel proposals have an easier time of it. We rejected far fewer panel porposals than we did individual papers. That said, we put together a list of about 50 proposed panels for ISA main office each year and 30-35 of those paenls were ones which we put together from single paper submissions.
3. We paid less attention to people’s second choice of section to which they submitted their proposal. this does not mean it is irrelevant, but rather that as we put panels together we sought co-sponsorship from other sections that seemed most appropriate. Still, make sure you select two sections to submit the proposal to since if your first choice cannot fit it on the program, it will be passed along to your second choice.
4. If you submit a panel proposal make sure it is complete – ie: it contains 4/5 papers, a chair and a discussant. The program organizers have enough to do already without having to find a discussant for your incomplete panel proposal.
5. It probably doesn’t enhance your chances of being accepted, but it will certainly endear you to the program organizers if you are willing to be chair/discussant on a panel. Indeed, I would especially recommend this for junior faculty. The workload is usually less than you think (unless you come across a presenter with a 60 page paper) and it is a good way to network (particularly for introverted academics!) And, if you do have someone on your panel with a 60 page paper email the program organizers and see if they can find a second discussant to help you out – we’ve done it in the past.
6. Finally, a few more informal points:
a. It probably helps if you are an active member of the section in question. If you show up at section business meetings and/or receptions, we will probably try not to tick you off by rejecting your paper.
b. After you’ve been accepted: Please realize I don’t know about every academic feud and the fact that I put you on the same panel as someone who was rude about your work 5 years ago is not some sadistic plot. I apologize, but it was not intentional.
c. For God’s sake SHOW UP. If you can’t make it to the conference let the organizers know in time to find a replacement – especially if you are a chair or discussant. If you develop a reputation as someone who may not show up for your panel your proposals are likely not to be accepted at future conferences.