For purposes of tenure or promotion, authors of articles for The Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy are sometimes asked by their administrators to clarify the scholarly nature of this publication and the character of its review process. Our mission statement indicates its scholarly orientation:
The Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy was founded in 1995 for the purpose of providing detailed, scholarly information on key topics and philosophers in all areas of philosophy. The IEP is free of charge and available to all internet users world wide. The present staff of 25 editors and approximately 200 authors hold doctorate degrees and are professors at colleges and universities around the world, most notably from the United States, Great Britain, and Australia. The submission and review process of articles is the same as that with printed philosophy journals, books and reference works. The authors are specialists in the areas in which they write, and are frequently leading authorities.
Our peer review process is rigorous and meets high academic standards. The author submits the article to a specific Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy area editor, who reads through the article and makes an initial judgment about its overall quality. Many submissions are rejected at this stage. The area editor then sends the promising submission to qualified referees. Usually there are two referees per article. The area editor evaluates the reviews from the referees, makes a decision whether to publish, and sends a recommendation to the authors. Most submissions are then revised, in either their form or substance. In some cases more rounds of revision are required, and we sometimes must reject entries because of inadequate revision. More commonly, any problems with entries are fixed with revision – as one might expect when well-qualified people are recruited to write entries. This is a common pattern for scholarly journal articles and reference works.
Consequently, the quality of our articles is at the same level as that of the best multi-volume encyclopedias of philosophy which appear in print. However, an article published in our Encyclopedia surveys its field and so is not equivalent to a journal article that advances the field. Nevertheless, it is
also the case that journals from time to time publish or commission review
articles that do not necessarily have this function and that IEP articles
can be considered as comparable to such review articles.
We hope that this information is helpful to deans and members of hiring, promotion and retention committees, and that they will recognize the significant contribution to the field of philosophy that occurs when an author writes an article for the Encyclopedia. For additional information about the Encyclopedia or for information about a specific article, please contact the general editors.
Founder and General Editor
James Fieser,
University of Tennessee at Martin
General Editor
Bradley Dowden,
California State University Sacramento
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