I write to you as the new executive editor of International Security, the first woman to hold this position. I am taking the opportunity graciously provided by the Duck of Minerva team to introduce myself to you. I also want to thank my most recent predecessors, Sebastian Rosato (pro tem), Morgan Kaplan, and Sean Lynn-Jones – himself an institution — for their contribution to the continued excellence of International Security and for their help and support over the past six months.

International Security is known for its outstanding record as a leading security studies journal. It is also known for its authors’ rigorous analysis, challenges to the conventional wisdom, and contributions to policy relevant research. Neither the journal nor our authors could flourish without the thoughtful and generous contributions of our reviewers.

Since its founding in 1976, International Security has welcomed manuscripts on a variety of subjects relevant to security studies. As the world and the discipline have changed, so has the work authors contribute and the journal publishes. During the Cold War, Soviet-U.S. relations and analyses of hard power dominated its pages. In the post-Cold War period, ethnic conflict and civil war gained new attention. Work on non-state terrorism increased after the al Qaida attacks on the World Trade Center, the Pentagon, and Congress. With the U.S.-led Global War on Terror that followed 9/11, and the current period of hegemonic competition, we have seen authors using an increasing variety of theoretical and methodological approaches to address intra- and inter-state security issues.

The theoretical foundations of international relations, comparative politics, political theory, and social science methodology remain salient for International Security’s authors, while the field and the journal expand attention to gender, ideology, political and social psychology, and experimental and survey research.

The subjects of scholarly attention are changing as well. We have published research in the rising fields of human and environmental security, foreign-imposed regime change and military intervention, and regional nuclear and non-nuclear competition. China and its relationship with the world remain popular topics, as do questions of global hierarchy and the relationship between rising and declining powers.

International Security continues to receive and publish manuscripts making a theoretical contribution, an historical contribution, an empirical contribution, or a policy contribution. Most authors focus on one or another of these contributions. Any given article does not have to do everything!

We encourage authors to submit work that relates to security studies broadly writ, whatever their prism, approach, or subject. International Security’s focus on security will remain while we continue recognizing growing literatures and shifting approaches within the field. The greater the variety in subject and approach, as well as authorship and reviewer background and interests, the stronger the journal.

We welcome submissions from a variety of institutions globally. Authors might find our guide to authors helpful. We encourage members of traditionally unrepresented groups to submit their work and also to review manuscripts.  As with authors, diversity among reviewers provides valuable perspective to the editors and ultimately to readers.

I am excited to be working with the International Security team – Publications Coordinator Monica Achen, Deputy Editor Amanda Pearson, Editor in Chief Steve Miller, and Editor Owen Cote – as well as with our colleagues at MIT Press. Perhaps most importantly, I look forward to working with you, my colleagues.

You can learn more about me in this interview with MIT Press.

Editor’s note: we agreed to run this message quite some time ago— and then promptly dropped the ball. Dr. Hazelton waited patiently before emailing to remind me. She correctly pointed out that if we waited much longer, we’d be posting this on the one-year anniversary of her appointment! We hope readers find Dr. Hazelton’s post informative despite the delay.