About this journal
Aims and scope
Third World Quarterly ( TWQ ) is the leading journal in the field of Global South studies, focussed on historical and contemporary structures and relations of inequality and development. It was launched in 1978, in the context of the North-South Dialogue and the then-emerging New International Economic Order. TWQ is committed to a just and equitable future for what is historically known as the ‘Third World’.
The journal has a legacy of publishing progressive and exploratory content that is anti-racist, anti-imperialist and anti-sexist. It continues to shape academic and policy agendas across political and development discourses, as well as the postcolonial trajectories of Global South nations and peoples. TWQ articles showcase the agency and rising power of the Global South in setting the agenda and providing alternatives to Western ideologies, global inequities, and responses to the global permacrisis.
TWQ has a broad remit and publishes a wide range of research on social justice, environmental sustainability, health, statebuilding, mobilities, security, financial systems, peacebuilding and human rights, culture and art, among other topics. The journal encourages contributions from across the social sciences and humanities, including but not limited to:
- international relations;
- development studies;
- women’s, gender and queer studies;
- race, class and ethnicity studies;
- heterodox economics and critical political economy;
- and historical and sociocultural research.
TWQ welcomes interdisciplinary contributions as well as case studies that are theoretically informed. The journal also fosters bridge building between policy research and practitioner relevance. TWQ supports and disseminates the voices of early career researchers, especially from the Global South, and welcomes proposals for ground-breaking special issues that interrogate crucial topics relevant to the journal’s mission and bring together scholars from diverse backgrounds.
Peer review
The journal is edited by a global and multidisciplinary team of Academic Editors. All submitted manuscripts are subject to initial appraisal and, if found suitable for further consideration, are then subject to double-anonymous peer review by two or more external reviewers; all peer review is conducted via the journal's ScholarOne platform. For special issues, the review process itself is conducted by the guest editors, but is then reviewed by one of the journal’s Academic Editors who will make the decisions on each article taking into consideration the Guest Editor's recommendation. The journal may occasionally publish shorter Viewpoint pieces, which are by invitation only and are reviewed by the editorial team before publication.
Details on how to submit proposals for special issues are to be found here.
Journal metrics
Usage
- 845K annual downloads/views
Citation metrics
- 1.9 (2023) Impact Factor
- Q2 Impact Factor Best Quartile
- 2.6 (2023) 5 year IF
- 4.1 (2023) CiteScore (Scopus)
- Q1 CiteScore Best Quartile
- 1.681 (2023) SNIP
- 0.810 (2023) SJR
Speed/acceptance
- 5 days avg. from submission to first decision
- 93 days avg. from submission to first post-review decision
- 24 days avg. from acceptance to online publication
- 17% acceptance rate
Understanding and using journal metrics
Journal metrics can be a useful tool for readers, as well as for authors who are deciding where to submit their next manuscript for publication. However, any one metric only tells a part of the story of a journal’s quality and impact. Each metric has its limitations which means that it should never be considered in isolation, and metrics should be used to support and not replace qualitative review.
We strongly recommend that you always use a number of metrics, alongside other qualitative factors such as a journal’s aims & scope, its readership, and a review of past content published in the journal. In addition, a single article should always be assessed on its own merits and never based on the metrics of the journal it was published in.
For more details, please read the Author Services guide to understanding journal metrics.
Journal metrics in brief
Usage and acceptance rate data above are for the last full calendar year and are updated annually in February. Speed data is updated every six months, based on the prior six months. Citation metrics are updated annually mid-year. Please note that some journals do not display all of the following metrics (find out why).
- Usage: the total number of times articles in the journal were viewed by users of Taylor & Francis Online in the previous calendar year, rounded to the nearest thousand.
Citation Metrics
- Impact Factor*: the average number of citations received by articles published in the journal within a two-year window. Only journals in the Clarivate Science Citation Index Expanded (SCIE), Social Sciences Citation Index (SSCI), Arts and Humanities Citation Index (AHCI) and the Emerging Sources Citation Index (ESCI) have an Impact Factor.
- Impact Factor Best Quartile*: the journal’s highest subject category ranking in the Journal Citation Reports. Q1 = 25% of journals with the highest Impact Factors.
- 5 Year Impact Factor*: the average number of citations received by articles in the journal within a five-year window.
- CiteScore (Scopus)†: the average number of citations received by articles in the journal over a four-year period.
- CiteScore Best Quartile†: the journal’s highest CiteScore ranking in a Scopus subject category. Q1 = 25% of journals with the highest CiteScores.
- SNIP (Source Normalized Impact per Paper): the number of citations per paper in the journal, divided by citation potential in the field.
- SJR (Scimago Journal Rank): Average number of (weighted) citations in one year, divided by the number of articles published in the journal in the previous three years.
Speed/acceptance
- From submission to first decision: the average (median) number of days for a manuscript submitted to the journal to receive a first decision. Based on manuscripts receiving a first decision in the last six months.
- From submission to first post-review decision: the average (median) number of days for a manuscript submitted to the journal to receive a first decision if it is sent out for peer review. Based on manuscripts receiving a post-review first decision in the last six months.
- From acceptance to online publication: the average (median) number of days from acceptance of a manuscript to online publication of the Version of Record. Based on articles published in the last six months.
- Acceptance rate: articles accepted for publication by the journal in the previous calendar year as percentage of all papers receiving a final decision.
For more details on the data above, please read the Author Services guide to understanding journal metrics.
*Copyright: Journal Citation Reports®, Clarivate Analytics
†Copyright: CiteScore™, Scopus
Editorial board
Founding Editor:
Shahid Qadir
Academic Editors:
Shahram Akbarzadeh, Deakin University, Australia
Morten Bøås, Norwegian Institute of International Affairs, Norway (Special issues)
Matt Davies, Newcastle University, UK
Jing Gu, Institute of Development Studies, University of Sussex, UK
Ingrid Kvangraven, King's College London, UK
Marianne H. Marchand, Universidad de las Américas Puebla, Mexico (Special Issues)
Sam Okoth Opondo, Vassar College, USA
Mustapha Kamal Pasha, Aberystwyth University, UK
Elizabeth le Roux, University of Pretoria, South Africa (Kassahun Checole Prize Editor)
Heloise Weber, University of Queensland, Australia
Managing Editor:
Madeleine Hatfield ( [email protected]) - Yellowback, UK
Special Issue enquiries: please download and complete TWQ’s proposal form then send to [email protected]
Third World Quarterly Editorial Board:
Chair of the Editorial Board: Shahid Qadir
Arshin Adib-Moghaddam - SOAS University of London, UK
Nadine Ansorg - University of Kent, UK
Philip G. Alston - New York University School of Law, USA
Bülent Aras - Sabanci University, Istanbul, Turkey
Stacy Banwell - University of Greenwich, UK
Tom Bentley - University of Aberdeen, UK
Asit K. Biswas - University of Glasgow, UK
Saturnino M. Borras Jr - IISS Erasmus University, The Netherlands
Shaun Breslin - University of Warwick, UK
Benedicte Bull - University of Oslo, Norway
Jessica Byron-Reid - University of the West Indies, Trinidad
Noam Chomsky - University of Arizona, USA
Admos Chimhowu - University of Manchester, UK
Christopher Clapham - University of Cambridge, UK
Philip Cunliffe - University of Kent, UK
Radhika Desai - University of Manitoba, Canada
David Duriesmith - University of Sheffield, UK
Maziyar Ghiabi - University of Exeter, UK
Barry Gills - University of Helsinki, Finland
David S.G. Goodman - University of Sydney, Australia
Kevin Gray - University of Sussex, UK
Siba N'Zatioula Grovogui - Cornell University, New York, USA
Adam Habib - SOAS, University of London, UK
Sandra Halperin - Royal Holloway, University of London, UK
Shahar Hameiri - University of Queensland, Brisbane, Australia
Sam Halvorsen - Queen Mary, University of London, UK
Adrian Hewitt - Overseas Development Institute, London, UK
Jason Hickel - IEST, Autonomous University of Barcelona, Spain
Mehran Kamrava - Georgetown University, Doha, Qatar
Cristóbal Kay - IISS Erasmus University, The Netherlands
Tugrul Keskin - Shanghai University, China
Allen Kiconco - University of the Witwatersrand, UK
Patsy Lewis - Brown University, Providence, USA
Rirhandu Mageza-Barthel - University of South Africa, South Africa
Matias Margulis -University of British Columbia, Canada
James Mittelman -American University, Washington DC, USA
Sabelo J Ndlovu-Gatsheni - University of Bayreuth, Germany
Babatunde Obamamoye - Australian National University, Australia, and Obafemi Awolowo University, Nigeria
Chris Ogden - University of St Andrews, UK
Obasesam Okoi - University of St Thomas, US
Umut Özkirimli - Barcelona Centre for International Affairs, Spain
Swati Parashar - University of Gothenburg, Sweden
Randolph Persaud, American University, USA
Giulia Piccolino - Loughborough University, UK
Jan Nederveen Pieterse - University of California, Santa Barbara, USA
Nana K. Poku - University of Kwazulu-Natal, South Africa
Shahid Qadir (Chair)
Margot Rubin - Cardiff University, UK
Abdi Samatar - University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, USA
Yezid Sayigh - Carnegie Middle East Center, Beirut, Lebanon
Jivanta Schottli - Dublin City University, Ireland
Philipp Schulz - University of Bremen, Germany
Benjamin Selwyn - University of Sussex, UK
Timothy M. Shaw - University of Massachusetts, Boston, USA
Emiliano Treré - Cardiff University, UK
Diana Tussie - FLACSO, Buenos Aires, Argentina
Afua Twum-Danso Imoh - University of Bristol, UK
Tim Unwin - Royal Holloway, University of London, UK
Peter Uvin -Claremont McKennaCollege, California, USA
Arturo Valenzuela - Georgetown University, Washington DC, USA
Ritu Vij - Aberdeen University, UK
Thomas G. Weiss - The City University of New York, USA
Tiffany Willoughby-Herard, University of California, Irvine, USA
Abebe Zegeye - Centre of Research and Development in Learning, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia
Abstracting and indexing
Third World Quarterly is currently noted in: A Current Bibliography on African Affairs, ABC POL SCI: A Bibliography of Contents: Political Science & Government, America: History and Life, Asian Business Contents, British Humanities Index, Historical Abstracts, International Development Abstracts, International Political Science Abstracts, Periodica Islamica, Political Science Abstracts, Sage Public Administration Abstracts, Social Policy/Planning & Development Abstracts, Social Science Citation Index and Sociological Abstracts.
Open access
Third World Quarterly is a hybrid open access journal that is part of our Open Select publishing program, giving you the option to publish open access. Publishing open access means that your article will be free to access online immediately on publication, increasing the visibility, readership, and impact of your research.
Why choose open access?
- Increase the discoverability and readership of your article
- Make an impact and reach new readers, not just those with easy access to a research library
- Freely share your work with anyone, anywhere
- Comply with funding mandates and meet the requirements of your institution, employer or funder
- Rigorous peer review for every open access article
Article Publishing Charges (APC)
If you choose to publish open access in this journal you may be asked to pay an Article Publishing Charge (APC). You may be able to publish your article at no cost to yourself or with a reduced APC if your institution or research funder has an open access agreement or membership with Taylor & Francis.
Use our APC finder to calculate your article publishing charge
News, offers and calls for papers
News and offers
Calls for papers
Fund information
Third World Quarterly
Global South Colloquium FundPromoting the voices of Global South researchers in academic knowledge production and exchange.
We are pleased to announce that the Global South Colloquium Fund is now considering new rounds of funding for 2024-25.
Third World Quarterly (TWQ) is committed to supporting its researcher and readership communities in their work relating to the Global South, and therefore supports a TWQ Global South Colloquium Fund (GSCF).
GSCF has as its main purposes (a) enabling participation (especially of early career researchers) in international meetings; and (b) enabling of work by Global South researchers, and especially those committed to a critical approach to Global South issues, to be presented and disseminated with maximum impact in online or face-to-face meetings.
The fields of especial relevance for support include academic production and knowledge exchange in the research and policy-relevant fields of:
- Global South Studies
- International Relations and Political Science
- International Political Economy
- Development Studies
- Area Studies and related disciplines
- Sociocultural Studies.
Since its inception, Third World Quarterly has been particularly keen to encourage transnational and regional cooperation to ensure diverse debates at the highest levels of academic research. The GSCF is therefore currently offering two main elements of financial support.
Meeting Support
First, GSCF is making available grants for supporting a meeting (in person, remote webinar, or hybrid), seminar or panel session which would cover issues pertinent to the Global South research agenda. The Fund also has a preference for supporting events which seek to further the debate, discussion and dissemination of ideas and issues with relevance at the global level, rather than matters of purely local concern.
Meetings to be held in, or in the case of remote online meetings, organized from the Global South will be given preference in each year’s funding round, but this does not preclude events elsewhere being supported.
GSCF hopes that papers from such meetings could be submitted for consideration and publication, as a special issue of or a feature in Third World Quarterly, although the final papers would be required to undergo independent peer review evaluation, as is standard practice.
Assistance for Early Career Researchers
The Fund might also, for example, support a reception for Early Career Researcher (ECR) delegates or an ECR Panel Session at a bigger conference. We are keen to encourage ECRs pursuing a research agenda in relevant fields.
Again, we are interested in receiving Special Issue proposals arising from ECR meetings or collaborations, to encourage younger scholars. Author and editorial solidarity assistance may be available for ECR teams with an appropriate Editorial Board Member to aid submission to the Journal.
Travel Grants
Second, the GSCF has available travel grants up to a maximum of GBP£500/USD$600, to help support the travel costs of those attending a relevant event, with preference (but not exclusively) given to ECRs from the Global South.
Third World Quarterly recognizes the important networking and intellectual opportunities that event attendance affords, but is aware of the often-inhibitive financial demands of doing so. The Fund’s travel grants will only cover travel costs after an event registration is confirmed, but will not cover registration, accommodation or subsistence costs.
Again, we would look forward to receiving a submission to Third World Quarterly based on any paper given, but acceptance would be subject to independent peer review. The TWQ GSCF seeks, wherever possible, to cover the total amount of support requested, but may only be able to offer partial support. We will only support attendance at each event for a single delegate from an individual institution.
Apply
To express an interest in applying to the fund, please email Dr David Green, the TWQ GSCF Coordinator: [email protected]
I recently attended a Workshop on Urban Mixed Methods at the University of Toronto. The funds that the GSCF offered me were very crucial in making this happen. The Workshop allowed me to reflect on and sharpen my Ph.D. research methodology. I intend to apply these during my preliminary fieldwork in several informal settlements in Ghana in December 2023.
- Gideon Azunre, a Ghanaian and a second-year Ph.D. candidate at Concordia University in Montreal, Canada
18 issues per year
Associated with:
- Third World Thematics: A TWQ Journal (2016 - current)
Third World Quarterly (TWQ) is the leading journal of scholarship and policy-relevant research in the broad field of Global South studies and is now welcoming proposals in this field. Special Issue proposals must be in line with the journal’s aims and scope and should present innovative, interesting research on critical issues and core debates affecting the Global South.
Prospective Guest Editors are encouraged to submit thematic collections of articles that are coherent, robust, and original contributions to scholarship. The journal’s focus is on internationally comparative or regional research. Special Issues about a single country will not normally be considered.
Cross-disciplinary, critical, and innovative approaches are encouraged, with each article expected to have strong empirical underpinnings. Although each article should be able to stand alone, the journal expects to see a clear connection between each article and how it contributes to the overarching argument of the Special Issue.
Special Issues published in TWQ will be considered for re-edition in the Routledge ThirdWorlds book series to increase their reach.
TWQ welcomes authorship teams from diverse backgrounds and values gender-balanced proposals. The journal also encourages the dissemination of research by early career researchers, especially from the Global South, and proposals are expected to include scholars from the areas under research.
Since its inception, TWQ has sought to encourage transnational and regional cooperation to ensure diverse debates that move forward academic research. Guest Editors may wish to consider applying for the Global South Colloquium Fund (GSCF), which offers financial support for workshops and other events that enable the collaborative work of Global South researchers.
Submission Instructions
Prospective Guest Editors should complete the journal’s proposal form electronically and return it to the Third World Quarterly editorial office by email. Proposals are being accepted on an ongoing basis and will be reviewed by the Special Issues Coordinating Editors. Guest Editors will be advised of the outcome as soon as possible.
Global Souths Hub Website is now LIVE!
Global Souths Hub, a news and resource website developed alongside the renowned academic journals, Third World Quarterly (TWQ) and Central Asian Survey (CAS), is now live and looking for contributions.
The free-to-access news and blog site will foster connections and disseminate the perspectives of scholar-activists, academics, researchers, policymakers, practitioners, and individuals intrigued by the complexities and possibilities within the field of Global South Studies. The website will host advice for early career researchers, blogs from experts in the field, conference write-ups, videos, compelling content from both journals, and more.
As an emerging interdisciplinary research area, the Global Souths Hub will stimulate collaborations and ignite meaningful initiatives by amplifying diverse voices (see ‘ Who we are’ for more information). For 2024, the Hub is now looking for contributions that inspire ideas and encourage debate (visit ‘ How to Contribute to the Hub’ to find out more).
Stay tuned for upcoming events, webinars, and opportunities to engage with experts in the field.
You can also follow the Global Souths Hub on X or LinkedIn.
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