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How to read a series of desk-rejections after promising reviews at top journals?

In our July “how can we help you?” thread, a reader asks:

I have a nice paper in ethics that I thought was very promising and I still believe in, and it got pretty good reviews at Ethics and a great generalist journal, but they both ultimately rejected it. Now I just went through almost a year racking up 6 desk rejections at other generalist journals of similar caliber *after* those good reviews at the other journals, and I just submitted it somewhere else today.

Do people have advice on how to read the situation?

Not sure, but I guess my initial read is that this just goes to show how random the review process can be. If I were the OP, I’d try to make sure that I addressed whichever criticisms were raised at the earlier journals, and perhaps get an outside eye or two to read the manuscript along with the earlier comments. Maybe something went wrong at the revising stage (assuming the OP did this)?

What do readers think?

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14 responses to “How to read a series of desk-rejections after promising reviews at top journals?”

  1. Anonymous

    I’d recommend not reading much into it. I had a paper rejected after R&R at a very decent journal, and then five desk rejections, and then an R&R that led to acceptance. My feeling is that some papers have a hard time getting past the desk, but once past the desk, experts will know the value.

    Anything actionable? Maybe try journals that have a general policy of desk rejecting little and reviewing most. This is very unfortunate to me, of course, as my favourite journals are those that desk reject most papers, and I end up not publishing in my favourite journals, ever.

    Reply
  2. Anon 2

    I have not published in top journals (equivalent to Ethics), but if OP attempted 8 submissions at that level, and the result is 6 desk-reject and 2 reject with comments, then is the next step to submit to a mid-tier journal or a specialist journal?

    Reply
    1. Anonymous

      As OP, I can tell you that my plan so far is to go through the whole Leiter top 20 (skipping some here and there for different reasons) and then to the specialist journals, and only then to generalist journals outside the top 20 if it comes to that

      Reply
  3. anon

    This happened to me too with what i consider my best paper — positive R&R at a tippy top journal, followed by a mix of desk rejections, rejections with negative comments, and only occasional rejections with positive comments. It’s been rejected many times now, and I worry I’ve overreacted to the slew of referee comments I’ve received. Probably the first version I sent in was best, although I don’t feel good reverting to that version because many of the things referees pointed out really were mistakes. (Mistakes that, alas, made the paper prettier.) My plan now is to spend some time editing it for style and marketing, and then just keep plugging along.

    In another story, I had a paper get rejected by several generalist journals, including second tier ones, only to eventually be published at the best journal I sent it to. The lesson is in part that this is all random, but also in part I think that some journals are looking for different kinds of papers than others in ways that crosscut prestige. Also, maybe there’s a bit of referee priming bias. (“This is a paper I’ve been asked to review for Phil Review, so it must be good! Let me figure out why… This is a paper I’m being asked to review for a mid tier journal, so it must have already been rejected many times! Let me figure out why…”)

    Reply
  4. Anonymous

    Not an ethicist, so what happened sounds pretty alien to me: is there no reason at all for the six desk rejections? Also the high rate of desk rejection itself is surprising to me. in my field, I have almost never got desk rejected, and for the two times they did, the editors did say reasons and one even said that I could resubmit if the journal they recommended did not work out (sounds strange yes, but it was indeed what they said).

    Reply
    1. Anonymous

      OP here: Not a word explaining any of the desk rejections

      Reply
    2. Anonymous

      Mind sharing which sub-field you’re in? I am in phil of mind and my experience is the same as OP.

      Reply
      1. Anonymous

        logic and philsci

  5. Anonymous

    I would agree that it says most about the irrationality of the review process. But FWIW, I’ve heard people deal with this in different ways. Some refuse to make any changes to the first version and just keep submitting, others take all reviews very seriously and keep tayloring. I’m afraid there isn’t one dominant strategy.

    Reply
  6. Anonymous

    OP here: Thank you for your perspectives! I’ve seen some people write that over many years they never got desk-rejected at all, and that was pretty confusing to me given how many times my papers have been desk-rejected. It’s reassuring to see that I’m not alone in this.

    Reply
  7. Daniel

    My experience with desk rejections for ethics and political philosophy papers at journals is that it is basically random. Probably in some cases there are different preferences that different journals have, as one of the anonymous posters above has suggested, and this may explain some of the rejections, but I see no real way to figure out these preferences unless I start compiling a detailed spreadsheet tracking various journal editors, which would be ridiculous. So for all intents and purposes it might as well be completely random.

    Reply
  8. dazesensationallye39c0dc2cd

    I bet it’s random and meaningless, but I always try to take any negative feedback seriously, because one reviewer’s reservations could very easily be shared by editors with first passes. As importantly, I too often find that one reviewer’s minor quibble is another’s fatal flaw, and the quibbles that may have come out in the mostly positive Ethics reviews could very well be what’s getting it desk rejected elsewhere. So it’s worth addressing any criticisms you received along the way, even if only superficially. If nothing else, it’s a way to substantively improve the paper that can’t hurt.

    Reply
  9. Freedom

    I’m not sure I want to say that acceptances are random per se. I notice that some journals tend to curate each volume with a similar essay theme. Sometimes you see more ethics focused collections and some you see more epistemology essays or other subfields. It seems random because so many submissions are of different topics and categories. It’s just hard predicting what kinds of essays they want for the next volume. Unless you submit a specialist journal, it will be “random”. Getting your ideas polished, criticized, and published is far more epistemically valuable than trying to publish in the Top 5 journal lottery. Some of the most valued and life changing articles I’ve read weren’t even written in philosophy journals.

    Reply
    1. Anonymous

      If a journal wants the papers in a particular issue to be around a certain theme, they don’t need to desk-reject anything that doesn’t fit the theme. They can put papers through the process and publish them in a later issue if they get accepted.

      Reply

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