Submitting to Migration Politics
We do not accept unsolicited submissions. Submissions go through the tracks. Unsolicited submissions will be rejected.
If you have been selected to one of the tracks, please submit your manuscript here.
Submission tracks
In-person residencies are a defining feature of the journal, offering time and space for scholars to develop their articles in a focused, collaborative setting. We hold one in-person residency per year in Krems (early autumn). Residencies last one week and comprise a group of 6-8 authors-in-residence, and have each year a defined thematic focus aligned with the research expertise of the organising Senior Editorial Fellows.
Virtual residencies are offered once a year (winter or early spring). They contribute to making the journal more accessible to scholars with care responsibilities, teaching obligations, or mobility limitations. Virtual residencies follow the same format as the in-person residencies in terms of length (one week) and group size, and thematic focus.
Special Issue (SI) are issued once a year (spring). All special issue themes relevant to the broader scope of Migration Politics are considered. Each SI is expected to include approximately 7–8 articles. The journal’s editorial team will evaluate proposals based on the quality of the proposal and its alignment with the journal’s scope and mission. Once accepted, two members of the editorial team will oversee the peer review process.
Finally, Migration Politics also has an Open Track, a submission pathway designed to support research developed through sustained scholarly exchange before formal peer review. The Open Track is intended for scholars who wish to develop their work by engaging in meaningful exchanges with peers from our Editorial College (and beyond) prior to submitting a manuscript for peer review. We publish a call for paper proposals once a year (summer). Submissions should offer innovative theoretical and/or empirical insights into the politics of migration, in line with the journal’s scope. Upon acceptance of paper proposals, authors are invited to develop and submit full papers for peer-review.
Author instructions
Submission, review, and publication are handled through SciPost. Please find information about the process and formatting requirements here.
AI guidelines
Migration Politics recognizes the transformative potential of AI-powered writing assistants and tools. We believe that AI-assisted writing will become ever more common. AI is also increasingly used in software analysing research data. While these tools can offer enhanced efficiency, it is also important to understand their limitations and to use them in ways which adhere to principles of academic and scientific integrity. As a journal, Migration Politics supports and believes in the value of human creativity and human authorship. Large Language Models (LLMs) cannot be listed as an author of a work, nor take responsibility for the text they generate. As such, human oversight, intervention and accountability is essential to ensure the accuracy and integrity of the content we publish.
We acknowledge that many academics and scholars are already using assistive and generative tools to enhance their productivity and assist in their academic writing. We have developed these guidelines to support authors submitting articles for Migration Politics.
The distinction between Assistive AI tools and Generative AI tools
For the purposes of these guidelines, we distinguish between Assistive AI tools and Generative AI tools as follows:
Assistive AI tools
Assistive AI tools make suggestions, corrections and improvements to content you’ve authored yourself. Content that you’ve crafted on your own but refined or improved with the help of Assistive AI tool is considered “AI-assisted”.
Generative AI tools
This term refers to the use of AI tools to produce content, whether in the form of text or images. Even if you’ve made significant changes to the content afterwards, if an AI tool was the primary creator of the content, the content is considered “AI-generated”.
Disclosure
You are not required to disclose the use of assistive AI tools in your submission. All content, including AI-assisted content, must undergo rigorous human review prior to submission. This is to ensure the content aligns with our standards for quality and authenticity. Authors hold final responsibility over the content.
We admit the use of generative AI in the following exceptional cases: creating code, transcriptions and translations. In these cases, generative AI can be used but it must be disclosed. Authors must retain full control, understanding, and responsibility for all code, transcriptions, and translations. Unsupervised AI-generated code is not permitted. You must clearly reveal such AI-generated content within your submission: detail where and how the AI-generated content was used and provide this disclosure along with your submission. Submissions that rely on AI-generated code in a manner that replaces substantive human contribution or judgment may be deemed non-compliant with the journal’s standards. Where we identify published articles or content with undisclosed use of generative AI tools for content generation, we will take appropriate corrective action.
Prohibited use
- We do not accept generative AI to create the manuscript text, images or interpretation. We consider such practices as opposed to our principle of slow science.
- Never use generative AI to artificially create or modify core research data.
- Never share any sensitive personal or proprietary information on an AI platform as this may expose sensitive information or intellectual property to others. Any information that you share with AI tools like ChatGPT is collected for business purposes.
- Editors and Reviewers must uphold the confidentiality of the peer review process. Editors must not share information about submitted manuscripts or peer review reports in generative AI tools. Reviewers must not use AI tools to generate review reports.
Review process
Manuscripts submitted to Migration Politics will first be considered by the Senior Editorial Fellows. If the team decides to send the paper out for review, they will select a member of the Editorial College to be the Lead Editor for the paper, with responsibility for selecting reviewers and writing decision letters based on those reviews. The Lead Editor requires a minimum of two reviewers to reach a decision on the paper. The Lead Editor will make revise and resubmit decisions independently. If the Lead Editor decides to reject or accept a paper for publication, this decision will be reviewed by a quorum of no less than five members from the Editorial College.
FAQ
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General
Is Migration Politics indexed?
All papers that appear in Migration Politics are indexed in Google Scholar (through its association with SocArXiv). Migration Politics has an ISSN 2949-8872. As the first paper appeared in the journal in 2022, it is not yet indexed in Web of Science. The company that owns Web of Science (Clarivate) requires a minimum number of papers to be published before indexing a journal. It usually accepts journals 5 years after their first publication. Migration Politics will apply for indexing as soon as we qualify.
What do you mean by “original paper proposals”?
Proposals for papers submitted to Migration Politics should not be under review at another journal or academic publisher (for an edited book) at or after the moment of submission. Proposals can be based on working papers. Acceptance for an in-person or virtual residency, or an invitation to develop a full paper for the open track entails a commitment to submitting the final version of the manuscript to Migration Politics for review.
Can I get an extension to a proposal deadline?
No. Proposal deadlines are fixed. We do not offer extensions under any circumstances. We get a high volume of submissions so to be able to timely communicate the outcome we need to start shortlisting straight after the deadline and cannot wait for late submissions. If you are unable to submit by the deadline, keep an eye out for future calls.
Who can submit? Do you accept proposals by early career scholars without a PhD (e.g. based on their MA thesis)?
We accept submissions from scholars who either hold a PhD or are currently in the final phase of their PhD training. Alternatively, we also accept submission from experienced researchers without a PhD who have at least 5 years of research experience and a minimum of two peer reviewed academic articles published. We do not accept submissions from early career scholars who have not had PhD training, and we do not accept proposals based on Master theses.
My fieldwork is not completed/has not started yet, can I still apply?
No. The data on which your proposal is based should already have been collected. As we all know, data collection does not always go as planned. It might be that an author cannot write the envisioned paper because they have not been able to collect the data or the data steers the paper in a (very) different direction, that is less fitting for the journal. As we have a very limited number of places we therefore only invite authors who have collected data at the time of submitting the proposal and include preliminary results in their proposal.
Can I submit a proposal in a language other than English?
No. The working language of Migration Politics is English. However, with a variety of AI tools available to translate or correct the style of imperfect English we hope that the journal is also accessible for authors usually writing in another language than English. When using AI, please consider our AI guidelines.
Do you accept co-authored papers?
Yes, but please note the limitations for in-person residencies.
I am/my co-author is based at the University for Continuing Education Krems, can I still apply?
If you or your co-author are based at the University for Continuing Education Krems, you cannot apply for the in-person and virtual residencies. But we do accept submissions (co-)authored by scholars based at the University for Continuing Education Krems/Danube University Krems for the open and special issue tracks.
Residencies (in-person and virtual)
What costs does the in-person residency cover?
Authors are expected to co-finance transportation and accommodation costs for the residencies through their institutional and project-related budgets whenever possible. If full funding is not available through your institution, resources can be requested from the journal to (co-)finance the following costs:
- Round trip to Krems (by train if the travel distance is less than 1,500 km)
- Six nights of accommodation on the university campus in Krems
- Costs of visa for those who need one to enter Austria
- Two meals
The residency does not cover travel insurance, transportation from the airport or within Krems, any additional hotel nights and the remaining lunches and dinners. Funding of accommodation and travel are conditional on the submission of a full draft paper one month before the start of the residency.
Do I have to participate in the whole programme?
Yes, we expect authors to make time to participate in the residency programme for the entire duration of the programme. The residency programme is built on intensive exchange between the other residents, the Senior Editorial Fellows and moments of reflection/writing for authors. Such a programme cannot work without full time commitment. Participants are required to reserve the entire week to work on their paper and participate in the sessions.
Can my co-authors join me in the in-person residency programme?
We can only cover a round trip and one week of accommodation for one author per paper. In consultation with the Senior Editorial Fellows, additional authors of selected papers may join the residency if they are able to cover their own travel and accommodation or can join some of the sessions of the residency online.
Can my co-authors join me in the virtual residency programme?
Yes, absolutely! We encourage co-authors to use the virtual residency as a space to engage and reflect with each other and push their paper further. Please indicate in your application how many authors will be attending the residency. Please note that, if participating, all authors must be present during the entire duration of the virtual residency.
Are participants required to submit their article to Migration Politics and is there a strict deadline for that?
Yes, taking part in a residency implies a commitment to submitting the final version of the manuscript to Migration Politics for publication. There is no strict deadline for submission, but the expectation is that authors submit their papers within the next six months following the residency. During the residency, each participant will establish and present a timeline for reviewing and finalizing their manuscripts for submission.
Open Track
Is there a strict deadline for submitting full drafts to the open track, after being invited to submit a full paper?
No, but individual deadlines for submission of full paper drafts will be agreed with authors, following the acceptance of paper proposals and in line with the timeline for feedback sessions with members of the Editorial College and optionally, other scholars (tentatively planned to take place between October 15, 2026 and February 15, 2027). Full papers should be submitted one month ahead of feedback sessions.
I already have a full paper. Do I still need to prepare a paper proposal?
Yes. The initial selection of papers will be based on paper proposals (i.e. extended abstracts) both to ensure comparability of submissions and to ensure an efficient and fast review process, you may indicate in your proposal that a full paper version is already available. If you already have a paper, you can indicate a preference for an early feedback session.
What is the rationale of the feedback session with a member of the Editorial College / another scholar?
Traditional systems of peer-review offer only limited opportunities for exchange of arguments and discussions on how to best address criticism. Feedback sessions are intended to offer a space to identify and address possible points of critique and ways to address them, and to strengthen the argumentation of papers, before papers are submitted to peer review.
Why do I need to identify members of the Editorial College and other scholars for feedback sessions?
The Migration Politics Editorial College is the central body involved in initial review of paper and special issue proposals to Migration Politics as well as the main body determining the direction of the journal. Members of the Editorial College cover a wide range of expertise and are a rich resource for providing feedback. Authors may, but are not obliged to, suggest other scholars outside the Editorial College in addition to Editorial College Members, especially to cover thematic, disciplinary, geographic or other expertise not covered by Editorial College Members.