The Proportion of Global South Scholarship in Elite International Law Publications

This article examines the representation of Global South academics in elite international law publications. It first discusses the increasing pressure for Global South legal scholars to publish in a remarkably narrow range of journals and with renowned ‘international’ book publishers, and the daunting challenges in getting work accepted. Then, the article presents evidence on authorship and, for books, editorship, from international law journals indexed in Clarivate Analytics’ Web of Science and edited international law books published by Cambridge University Press and Oxford University Press. The evidence shows that both authorship and editorship are dominated by scholars from the Global North, especially the UK and the US. This may surprise no one but the difference between Global North and Global South representation is striking and should act as a wake-up call to publishers, editors, authors and institutional leaders.