Journal rankings · indicator year 2019
Choose a field to open its ranking, or a journal to find its row in its subfield’s list.
Subfield ranking · 2019
Political Science and International Relations journal rankings 2019
326 ranked journals · Subfield in Social Sciences
Political Science and International Relations has 326 ranked journals in 2019. The median OJR rose 0.13 on 2018 to 1.85, above the world average of 1.00; Q1 starts at OJR 3.57. The top three are American Political Science Review, Journal of democracy, and International Security.
Ranks and citation indicators: 2019. Journal access status and listed APC: source snapshot September 23, 2026.
Journals whose main subfield sits in this category and that published at least 30 citable documents (articles, reviews and conference papers) in 2016–2018, the window the 2019 score is computed on.
The OpenJournalRank Indicator (OJR) is a free, publicly available metric of a journal’s field-normalized citation impact, computed from open OpenAlex citation data. It compares citations to a journal’s papers from the previous three years with the world average for papers of the same subfield, year and type, so 1.00 is the world average and values can be compared across fields. It is computed with the NCI3 method.
The middle OJR among ranked journals in this category: half score higher, half lower. 1.00 is the world average for papers of the same subfield, year and type.
The dot is this category, the solid tick is the median of all ranked journals and the dashed line is the world average.
Share of ranked journals in this category that are fully open access, so every paper is free to read. Hybrid journals, which sell subscriptions and open single papers for a fee, are not counted.
Median list price of the article processing charge, in US dollars, among ranked journals in this category that list a price above zero. Journals with a listed APC of $0 and journals with no known price are left out of this median. The At a glance table below gives a second median that includes the $0 prices.
Subfields of Social Sciences (22)
326 ranked journals
Filters
Rank is the position by OJR within the list on screen; 1 is the highest. | OJR is field-normalized 3-year citation impact: 1.00 is the world average for papers of the same subfield, year and type, so values compare across fields. The badge is the journal’s quartile in this list. | Citations per paper over a two-year window, counted from OpenAlex. It is not field-normalized, so compare it only between journals of the same field. ▲ or ▼ is the change from 2018. This is OpenJournalRank’s own count, not Clarivate’s Journal Impact Factor. | Citable documents (articles, reviews and conference papers) published in 2016–2018, the window the 2019 OJR is computed on. A journal needs at least 30 to be ranked. | Share of the journal’s 2016–2018 papers that are free to read in any open-access form. The green OA tag next to a title marks a fully open-access journal. | List price of the article processing charge in US dollars. “$0 listed” means the listed price is zero; a dash means no price is listed. | The line is the journal’s OJR from 2010 to 2019. | Compare |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1American Political Science ReviewCambridge University Press · United States | 13.81Q1 | 8.50 3.31 up from 2018 | 228 | 54% | $3,550 | ||
2Journal of democracyJohns Hopkins University Press · United States | 13.76Q1 | 5.24 0.62 down from 2018 | 221 | 3% | — | ||
3International SecurityThe MIT Press · United States | 12.62Q1 | 5.71 0.94 up from 2018 | 78 | 33% | — | ||
4American Journal of Political ScienceWiley · United States | 12.24Q1 | 8.18 1.40 up from 2018 | 149 | 39% | $4,100 | ||
5South European Society & PoliticsTaylor & Francis · United Kingdom | 11.15Q1 | 5.83 1.95 up from 2018 | 88 | 60% | — | ||
6Journal of European Public PolicyRoutledge · United Kingdom | 11.10Q1 | 6.75 1.37 up from 2018 | 293 | 55% | — | ||
7Comparative Political StudiesSAGE Publishing · United States | 9.73Q1 | 5.99 0.29 down from 2018 | 201 | 35% | $3,900 | ||
8European Journal of Political ResearchOAWiley · United Kingdom | 9.53Q1 | 5.01 0.86 up from 2018 | 179 | 57% | $3,550 | ||
9Government Information QuarterlyElsevier BV · United States | 9.43Q1 | 8.01 1.03 up from 2018 | 211 | 43% | $4,360 | ||
10West European PoliticsTaylor & Francis · United Kingdom | 9.41Q1 | 4.13 0.51 up from 2018 | 223 | 72% | — | ||
11European Journal of International RelationsSAGE Publishing · United Kingdom | 8.67Q1 | 5.56 2.01 up from 2018 | 104 | 48% | $3,900 | ||
12European Union PoliticsSAGE Publishing · United Kingdom | 8.39Q1 | 4.64 0.45 up from 2018 | 93 | 32% | $3,650 | ||
13Eurasian Geography and EconomicsTaylor & Francis · United Kingdom | 7.76Q1 | 3.62 0.51 up from 2018 | 94 | 17% | — | ||
14The Journal of PoliticsUniversity of Chicago Press · United States | 7.68Q1 | 4.94 0.54 up from 2018 | 352 | 18% | — | ||
15JCMS Journal of Common Market StudiesWiley · United Kingdom | 7.52Q1 | 4.65 1.40 up from 2018 | 285 | 46% | $4,170 | ||
16Swiss Political Science ReviewWiley · United Kingdom | 7.37Q1 | 4.75 1.88 up from 2018 | 88 | 62% | $3,140 | ||
17British Journal of Political ScienceOACambridge University Press · United Kingdom | 7.32Q1 | 4.73 2.09 up from 2018 | 224 | 47% | $3,550 | ||
18Political BehaviorSpringer Science+Business Media · Netherlands | 7.10Q1 | 4.18 0.68 up from 2018 | 184 | 25% | $2,990 | ||
19The Chinese Journal of International PoliticsOxford University Press · United Kingdom | 7.00Q1 | 2.38 0.65 up from 2018 | 53 | 25% | $3,981 | ||
20Journal of Education PolicyTaylor & Francis · United Kingdom | 6.84Q1 | 3.17 0.29 down from 2018 | 191 | 38% | — | ||
21The British Journal of Politics and International RelationsSAGE Publishing · United Kingdom | 6.76Q1 | 4.63 1.39 up from 2018 | 155 | 44% | $3,650 | ||
22Journal of Political IdeologiesRoutledge · United Kingdom | 6.57Q1 | 1.66 0.53 down from 2018 | 53 | 35% | — | ||
23Problems of Post-CommunismTaylor & Francis · United States | 6.50Q1 | 1.74 0.04 up from 2018 | 122 | 23% | — | ||
24The ForumDe Gruyter · Germany | 6.36Q1 | 3.62 2.03 up from 2018 | 161 | 23% | $2,712 | ||
25Security StudiesTaylor & Francis · United Kingdom | 6.32Q1 | 4.29 2.18 up from 2018 | 81 | 14% | — | ||
26Quarterly Journal of Political ScienceNow Publishers · United States | 6.10Q1 | 3.56 0.81 up from 2018 | 47 | 28% | — | ||
27Higher EducationSpringer Science+Business Media · Netherlands | 6.09Q1 | 4.19 0.84 up from 2018 | 360 | 46% | $2,290 | ||
28Police QuarterlySAGE Publishing · United States | 5.85Q1 | 2.52 0.71 down from 2018 | 61 | 20% | $3,650 | ||
29Political Research QuarterlySAGE Publishing · United States | 5.83Q1 | 2.68 0.02 up from 2018 | 268 | 18% | $3,650 | ||
30Political StudiesSAGE Publishing · United Kingdom | 5.69Q1 | 3.42 1.14 up from 2018 | 178 | 51% | $3,650 | ||
31Journal of European IntegrationTaylor & Francis · Netherlands | 5.64Q1 | 2.29 0.48 down from 2018 | 187 | 52% | — | ||
32Policy & PoliticsPolicy Press · United Kingdom | 5.57Q1 | 4.57 0.39 up from 2018 | 103 | 53% | — | ||
33Environment and Planning E Nature and SpaceSAGE Publishing · United Kingdom | 5.54Q1 | 3.58no 2018 value | 36 | 40% | $3,650 | — | |
34International AffairsOxford University Press · United Kingdom | 5.51Q1 | 3.69 1.61 up from 2018 | 743 | 13% | $4,936 | ||
35European Law JournalWiley · United Kingdom | 5.46Q1 | 2.41 0.61 down from 2018 | 114 | 34% | $3,570 | ||
36Comparative EducationTaylor & Francis · United Kingdom | 5.43Q1 | 2.48 0.55 down from 2018 | 127 | 34% | — | ||
37Journal of European Social PolicySAGE Publishing · United Kingdom | 5.39Q1 | 3.02 0.58 down from 2018 | 126 | 44% | $3,650 | ||
38Party PoliticsSAGE Publishing · United Kingdom | 5.36Q1 | 2.92 0.92 up from 2018 | 202 | 41% | $3,650 | ||
39Journal of Southeast European and Black Sea StudiesRoutledge · United Kingdom | 5.28Q1 | 1.53 2.24 down from 2018 | 104 | 16% | — | ||
40Electoral StudiesElsevier BV · Netherlands | 5.26Q1 | 2.31 0.07 down from 2018 | 334 | 34% | $2,840 | ||
41Public Opinion QuarterlyOxford University Press · United States | 5.25Q1 | 3.35 0.01 up from 2018 | 188 | 31% | $3,969 | ||
42GovernanceWiley · United Kingdom | 5.24Q1 | 3.94 0.85 up from 2018 | 134 | 27% | $3,730 | ||
43Acta PoliticaPalgrave Macmillan · United Kingdom | 5.21Q1 | 1.59 1.13 down from 2018 | 122 | 35% | $3,190 | ||
44Philosophy & Public AffairsWiley · United States | 5.19Q1 | 2.66 0.11 up from 2018 | 48 | 23% | $3,460 | ||
45Contemporary Security PolicyTaylor & Francis · United Kingdom | 5.17Q1 | 1.68 1.37 down from 2018 | 93 | 55% | — | ||
46Journal of Contemporary ChinaRoutledge · United States | 5.13Q1 | 2.81 0.63 up from 2018 | 200 | 21% | — | ||
47American Politics ResearchSAGE Publishing · United States | 5.13Q1 | 3.21 1.26 up from 2018 | 139 | 14% | $3,650 | ||
48Journal of Eurasian StudiesOASAGE Publishing · Netherlands | 5.11Q1 | 3.28 0.72 up from 2018 | 44 | 100% | $0 listed | ||
49European SecurityTaylor & Francis · United Kingdom | 4.94Q1 | 3.00 0.04 down from 2018 | 80 | 32% | — | ||
50Area Development and PolicyTaylor & Francis · United States | 4.81Q1 | 3.08 0.03 down from 2018 | 75 | 7% | — |
Subfields of Social Sciences, with Political Science and International Relations highlighted.
- Sociology and Political Science1,325
- Education724
- Political Science and International Relations326
- Communication74
- Gender Studies64
- Safety Research56
- Health53
- Public Administration51
- Law48
- Linguistics and Language48
- Urban Studies48
- Transportation46
- Library and Information Sciences44
- Demography38
- Anthropology37
- Geography, Planning and Development31
- Cultural Studies8
- Development3
- General Social Sciences3
- Human Factors and Ergonomics1
- Archeology0
- Life-span and Life-course Studies0
Journals
Citations made in 2019. Corpus-wide, 83.4% of core-journal articles and reviews published that year have at least one matched reference; the share varies by journal and field.
82 additional Political Science and International Relations journals with metrics are unranked under this release’s eligibility rules: a journal needs at least 30 citable documents in 2016–2018, at least 80% of them with a subfield, and a positive world-average expectation. Ranks are within the whole category; filters hide rows without re-ranking. OJR excludes self-citations.
At a glance
Indicator year: 2019. Publication window: 2016–2018. How these summaries are calculated
- Ranked journals
- 326
- Window papers (baseline)
- 251,957 +6.8% from indicator year 2016
- Median OJR
- 1.85 -3.7% from indicator year 2016
- Rising journals (2025)
- 18
Window papers are the baseline paper population: citable papers (articles, reviews and conference papers) from 2016–2018 in all journals of the world-average baseline, including non-core journals, counted by each paper’s own subfield. They are not the papers of the ranked journals alone.
| Measure | Year series | 2000 | 2001 | 2002 | 2003 | 2004 | 2005 | 2006 | 2007 | 2008 | 2009 | 2010 | 2011 | 2012 | 2013 | 2014 | 2015 | 2016 | 2017 | 2018 | 2019 | 2020 | 2021 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ranked journals | 185 | 187 | 198 | 211 | 222 | 236 | 243 | 248 | 255 | 260 | 270 | 279 | 287 | 287 | 294 | 301 | 308 | 318 | 321 | 326 | 332 | 333 | 339 | 334 | 334 | 322 | |
| Window papers (baseline) | 87,090 | 92,551 | 99,427 | 106,761 | 113,825 | 122,173 | 130,947 | 139,764 | 148,869 | 159,463 | 170,900 | 180,910 | 191,534 | 201,200 | 210,369 | 223,416 | 235,982 | 245,820 | 247,938 | 251,957 | 262,579 | 278,323 | 289,523 | 291,064 | 289,519 | 294,162 | |
| Median OJR | 0.81 | 0.99 | 0.90 | 1.09 | 1.12 | 1.31 | 1.27 | 1.42 | 1.603 | 1.68 | 1.77 | 1.74 | 1.73 | 1.78 | 1.69 | 1.83 | 1.92 | 1.87 | 1.723 | 1.85 | 1.67 | 1.71 | 1.602 | 1.63 | 1.52 | 1.718 |
How to read these rankings
- OJR, the OpenJournalRank Indicator
- A field-normalized 3-year citation impact, computed from OpenAlex with the NCI3 method. It divides the citations a journal’s papers received by the world average for papers of the same subfield, year and type, so 1.00 is the world average and 2.00 means twice as many citations as expected. Because it is normalized, it can be compared across fields. Read the methodology
- Quartiles
- Q1 to Q4 split the ranked journals of the list you are viewing into four equal groups by OJR. A journal’s quartile depends on the list: the same journal can be Q1 in its subfield and Q2 among all journals.
- Impact factor (2-year)
- Citations per paper over a two-year window, counted from OpenAlex. It is easy to compare with familiar impact factors but is not field-normalized, so compare it only within a field. It is not Clarivate’s Journal Impact Factor. Why it differs from the Journal Impact Factor
- Rank ranges
- Each rank in the latest year carries a likely range from 1,000 resamples of the journal’s papers. Where two journals’ ranges overlap, the data cannot tell them apart, so treat neighbouring ranks as ties.