Journal rankings · indicator year 2020
Choose a field to open its ranking, or a journal to find its row in its subfield’s list.
Subfield ranking · 2020
Law journal rankings 2020
48 ranked journals · Subfield in Social Sciences
Law has 48 ranked journals in 2020. The median OJR fell 0.09 on 2019 to 0.90, below the world average of 1.00; Q1 starts at OJR 1.80. The top three are Journal of Law and Courts, The Journal of Legal Pluralism and Unofficial Law, and Transnational Environmental Law.
Ranks and citation indicators: 2020. 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 2017–2019, the window the 2020 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)
48 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 2019. This is OpenJournalRank’s own count, not Clarivate’s Journal Impact Factor. | Citable documents (articles, reviews and conference papers) published in 2017–2019, the window the 2020 OJR is computed on. A journal needs at least 30 to be ranked. | Share of the journal’s 2017–2019 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 2011 to 2020. | Compare |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1Journal of Law and CourtsUniversity of Chicago Press | 3.84Q1 | 2.00 1.32 up from 2019 | 49 | 11% | $3,550 | ||
2The Journal of Legal Pluralism and Unofficial LawTaylor & Francis · United Kingdom | 3.71Q1 | 2.16 1.07 up from 2019 | 61 | 25% | — | ||
3Transnational Environmental LawCambridge University Press · United Kingdom | 2.59Q1 | 1.77 0.14 down from 2019 | 85 | 63% | $3,550 | ||
4Justice System JournalTaylor & Francis · United States | 2.57Q1 | 1.34 0.67 up from 2019 | 59 | 4% | — | ||
5Feminist Legal StudiesSpringer Science+Business Media · Netherlands | 2.50Q1 | 1.46 0.26 down from 2019 | 73 | 46% | $2,190 | ||
6The Law TeacherTaylor & Francis · United Kingdom | 2.33Q1 | 0.84 0.47 up from 2019 | 126 | 29% | — | ||
7Journal of Consumer PolicySpringer Science+Business Media · Netherlands | 2.04Q1 | 2.49 0.96 up from 2019 | 91 | 55% | $3,390 | ||
8Law & Society ReviewCambridge University Press · United States | 2.00Q1 | 1.24 0.01 down from 2019 | 183 | 13% | $3,550 | ||
9International Journal of Law in ContextCambridge University Press · United Kingdom | 1.90Q1 | 2.21 0.21 up from 2019 | 130 | 48% | $3,550 | ||
10The International Journal of Evidence & ProofSAGE Publishing · United Kingdom | 1.88Q1 | 1.41 0.50 up from 2019 | 81 | 50% | $3,650 | ||
11Law and CritiqueSpringer Science+Business Media · Netherlands | 1.84Q1 | 1.09 1.72 down from 2019 | 55 | 50% | $3,090 | ||
12Modern Law ReviewWiley · United Kingdom | 1.80Q1 | 1.04 0.26 down from 2019 | 249 | 38% | $3,400 | ||
13Media IndustriesOAMichigan Publishing · United States | 1.76Q2 | 1.43 0.65 up from 2019 | 49 | 100% | — | ||
14Review of European Comparative & International Environmental LawWiley · United Kingdom | 1.74Q2 | 2.61 1.48 up from 2019 | 99 | 63% | $3,750 | ||
15Journal of Political EcologyOAUniversity of Arizona · United States | 1.61Q2 | 2.22 0.21 down from 2019 | 157 | 100% | — | ||
16Journal of Law and SocietyWiley · United Kingdom | 1.40Q2 | 0.86 0.24 down from 2019 | 156 | 53% | $3,170 | ||
17Legal StudiesCambridge University Press · United Kingdom | 1.34Q2 | 0.85 0.07 down from 2019 | 127 | 57% | $3,550 | ||
18International Journal of Discrimination and the LawSAGE Publishing · United Kingdom | 1.33Q2 | 1.00 0.65 up from 2019 | 32 | 50% | $3,650 | ||
19Journal of Human Rights and the EnvironmentEdward Elgar Publishing | 1.26Q2 | 1.58 1.47 down from 2019 | 31 | 26% | — | ||
20Philosophy Theory and Practice in BiologyOAUniversity of Michigan Library · United States | 1.05Q2 | 1.72 0.19 up from 2019 | 50 | 100% | — | ||
21Journal of Social Welfare and Family LawTaylor & Francis · United Kingdom | 0.98Q2 | 0.84 0.16 down from 2019 | 120 | 33% | — | ||
22Open Library of HumanitiesOAOpen Library of Humanities · United Kingdom | 0.96Q2 | 0.67 0.21 up from 2019 | 185 | 100% | — | ||
23International Journal of Legal DiscourseDe Gruyter · Germany | 0.92Q2 | 0.67 0.13 down from 2019 | 41 | 30% | $2,712 | ||
24Australian Feminist Law JournalRoutledge · Australia | 0.91Q2 | 0.92 0.52 down from 2019 | 51 | 25% | — | ||
25Global JuristDe Gruyter · United States | 0.89Q3 | 1.04 0.42 up from 2019 | 72 | 47% | $2,712 | ||
26Law Culture and the HumanitiesSAGE Publishing · United Kingdom | 0.78Q3 | 0.52 0.17 up from 2019 | 106 | 19% | $3,650 | ||
27Theoretical Roman Archaeology JournalOATheoretical Roman Archaeology Conference · United Kingdom | 0.75Q3 | 1.05 0.85 up from 2019 | 32 | 100% | — | ||
28Journal of Librarianship and Scholarly CommunicationOAPacific University Library · United States | 0.74Q3 | 1.24 0.15 up from 2019 | 70 | 100% | — | ||
29Journal of Property Planning and Environmental LawEmerald Publishing Limited · United Kingdom | 0.73Q3 | 0.59 0.08 down from 2019 | 34 | 44% | — | ||
30Canadian Journal of Law and Society / Revue Canadienne Droit et SociétéOACambridge University Press · United Kingdom | 0.68Q3 | 0.74 0.30 up from 2019 | 94 | 97% | $3,550 | ||
31Zeitschrift für RechtssoziologieDe Gruyter · Germany | 0.66Q3 | 0.74 0.58 up from 2019 | 55 | 24% | $0 listed | ||
32Indiana Journal of Global Legal StudiesIndiana University Press · United States | 0.63Q3 | 0.79 0.31 up from 2019 | 82 | 7% | — | ||
33Zygon®OAWiley · United States | 0.60Q3 | 0.67 0.02 down from 2019 | 232 | 91% | $2,630 | ||
| 0.55Q3 | 0.44 0.10 up from 2019 | 38 | 100% | — | |||
35International Journal for the Semiotics of Law - Revue internationale de Sémiotique juridiqueSpringer Science+Business Media · Netherlands | 0.51Q3 | 0.33 0.14 down from 2019 | 168 | 57% | $3,090 | ||
36Tilburg Law ReviewOABrill · Netherlands | 0.49Q3 | 0.28 0.10 up from 2019 | 32 | 100% | — | ||
37International Journal of the Legal ProfessionTaylor & Francis · United Kingdom | 0.47Q4 | 0.38 0.14 down from 2019 | 41 | 28% | — | ||
38Liverpool Law ReviewSpringer Science+Business Media · Netherlands | 0.40Q4 | 0.53 0.20 up from 2019 | 45 | 62% | $3,090 | ||
39Journal of Electronic PublishingOAMichigan Publishing · United States | 0.38Q4 | 0.55 0.11 up from 2019 | 34 | 100% | — | ||
40REI - REVISTA ESTUDOS INSTITUCIONAISOAFederal University of Rio de Janeiro · Brazil | 0.33Q4 | 0.16 0.06 up from 2019 | 138 | 100% | — | ||
41Datenschutz und Datensicherheit - DuDSpringer Science+Business Media | 0.30Q4 | 0.16 0.11 down from 2019 | 487 | 29% | $3,190 | ||
42IDP Revista de Internet Derecho y PolíticaOAOpen University of Catalonia · Spain | 0.27Q4 | 0.30 0.05 up from 2019 | 100 | 100% | — | ||
43Environmental Policy and LawIOS Press · Netherlands | 0.26Q4 | 0.36 0.15 up from 2019 | 140 | 11% | $0 listed | ||
44Journal of law and policyUnited States | 0.21Q4 | 0.04 0.02 down from 2019 | 54 | 0% | — | ||
45Revista de Estudos Empíricos em DireitoOARede de Pesquisa Empírica em Direito · Brazil | 0.19Q4 | 0.20 0.06 up from 2019 | 105 | 100% | — | ||
46Legal Information ManagementCambridge University Press · United Kingdom | 0.17Q4 | 0.19 0.08 down from 2019 | 146 | 33% | $3,550 | ||
47Derecho Animal Forum of Animal Law StudiesOAUniversitat Autonoma de Barcelona. Facultat de Dret · Spain | 0.12Q4 | 0.23 0.02 up from 2019 | 150 | 100% | — | ||
48Amicus CuriaeOAUnited Kingdom | 0.08Q4 | 0.04 0.03 down from 2019 | 70 | 100% | — |
Subfields of Social Sciences, with Law highlighted.
- Sociology and Political Science1,333
- Education727
- Political Science and International Relations332
- Communication79
- Gender Studies64
- Safety Research55
- Health54
- Urban Studies52
- Public Administration51
- Linguistics and Language49
- Law48
- Transportation46
- Library and Information Sciences41
- Demography40
- Anthropology37
- Geography, Planning and Development33
- Cultural Studies8
- Development3
- General Social Sciences3
- Human Factors and Ergonomics1
- Archeology0
- Life-span and Life-course Studies0
Journals
Citations made in 2020. Corpus-wide, 86.1% of core-journal articles and reviews published that year have at least one matched reference; the share varies by journal and field.
18 additional Law journals with metrics are unranked under this release’s eligibility rules: a journal needs at least 30 citable documents in 2017–2019, 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: 2020. Publication window: 2017–2019. How these summaries are calculated
- Ranked journals
- 48
- Window papers (baseline)
- 99,517 +9.5% from indicator year 2017
- Median OJR
- 0.901 -1.3% from indicator year 2017
- Rising journals (2025)
- 3
Window papers are the baseline paper population: citable papers (articles, reviews and conference papers) from 2017–2019 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 | 26 | 24 | 26 | 24 | 26 | 25 | 25 | 32 | 34 | 34 | 36 | 39 | 37 | 40 | 45 | 42 | 46 | 46 | 47 | 48 | 48 | 48 | 47 | 45 | 46 | 46 | |
| Window papers (baseline) | 20,760 | 23,088 | 25,138 | 27,078 | 29,298 | 32,993 | 37,542 | 42,263 | 45,900 | 49,233 | 52,379 | 56,365 | 60,266 | 63,498 | 67,376 | 75,231 | 83,225 | 90,875 | 93,598 | 96,498 | 99,517 | 107,426 | 115,990 | 118,267 | 121,355 | 126,586 | |
| Median OJR | 0.526 | 0.55 | 0.483 | 0.478 | 0.482 | 0.41 | 0.535 | 0.43 | 0.530 | 0.70 | 0.65 | 0.52 | 0.88 | 0.86 | 0.74 | 0.87 | 0.8856 | 0.91 | 0.95 | 0.99 | 0.901 | 0.85 | 0.896 | 0.8862 | 0.83 | 0.81 |
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.