About the Journal of Cold War Studies

Please direct all editorial inquiries, comments, and electronic submissions to the JCWS email account: jcws@fas.harvard.edu.

For all subscription-related inquires for both the print and the electronic versions of the Journal, please see MIT Press for ordering information and rates.

Additional information can be found at the JCWS page on the MIT Press's website.

 

Scope

The Journal of Cold War Studies features peer-reviewed articles based on archival research in the former Communist world and in Western countries. Some articles offer reevaluations of important historical events or themes, emphasizing the changes of interpretation necessitated by declassified documents and new firsthand accounts. Other articles seek to bring new evidence to bear on current theoretical debates. Many existing theories of international and domestic politics have relied on generalizations from the Cold War period, but until very recently the evidence for these generalizations was tenuous at best. Articles in the Journal of Cold War Studies use declassified materials and new memoirs from the former Eastern bloc and Western countries to illuminate and raise questions about numerous theoretical concerns, including theories of decision-making, deterrence, bureaucratic politics, institutional formation, bargaining, diplomacy, foreign policy conduct, and international relations. Drawing on the latest evidence, articles in the Journal subject these theories, and others, to rigorous empirical analysis. The Journal's emphasis on the use of new evidence for theoretical purposes is in no way intended to exclude solid historical reassessments, but articles set within a theoretical context are particularly encouraged.The Journal's Editorial Board consists of 44 distinguished political scientists, historians, and specialists on international relations.

 

Discussion Forum  

Since 1999, the H-Diplo website, a site that links several thousand historians and political scientists, has been featuring regular discussions of JCWS articles.  In some cases, several commentators evaluate an article or group of articles in the JCWS; in other cases, a single commentator evaluates a JCWS article.  Hundreds of such discussions have appeared.  You can find an archived set of the discussions, by article, here.

 

To Submit or Subscribe

Submission Guidelines for manuscripts and a Cold War Studies Style Guide are now available. Please follow the following link
Find out how to subscribe to the Journal of Cold War Studies. Please visit MIT Press.

 

Description

In 1999 the Project began publishing the Journal of Cold War Studies, which has been praised by authoritative outlets such as Library Journal and Foreign Policy. The latter said in its Summer 1999 issue that "the Journal of Cold War Studies promises to be a leading forum for path-breaking archival research" and that "the journal fills an important void for historians and political scientists studying the Cold War."