Value to Society

The first pieces of the daily mail that every good editor opens are those large, flat envelopes that obviously contain manuscripts. How thick are they? (A seasoned editor can tell the number of pages by feeling the thickness.) What's the subject? What's said in the introduction and conclusion? How's the writing? Nothing gladdens an editor's heart more than receiving a well-written article that's sure to be read with keen interest by his audience. The prospect of finding such gems is what puts the excitement in his day and is, indeed, the reason why he became an editor in the first place. Every article is approached with keen anticipation, an expectation of learning something new and exciting--and something that's of value to society--plus being able to share it with readers around the world.

'Readability Ratio'

Virtually every manuscript contains--in this editor's 20 plus years of experience--a publishable article. That is to say, they have in them a set of ideas and information that, if extracted and presented by a skilled writer, would be of high interest to the editor's readers. When a manuscript is rejected, then, it is almost always because the author has forgotten that readers' time (and patience) is limited and that they will not, say, read a 75-page article in order to extract 20 pages of useful ideas and information. It is this ratio of the useful core to the number of pages used that determines readability. Getting an article published is one thing; getting it actually read by its intended audience is a much more difficult (and important) matter. Unread articles are of course the bane of good editors everywhere--and their readers. (The reader compliments we've most prized over the years have been those telling us that every issue of this journal is read cover to cover.)

The 'Substantive Orientation'

How, then, does one go at matching an article to a particular audience, e.g., to the readers of the Antitrust Law & Economics Review? Professional writers are of course expert at this. First, they identify the publication that has the audience they want to reach. Next, they study carefully its previous issues, noting the length of their typical articles, their style, and other mechanics observed in their pages. Even more importantly, they carefully assess--from the articles previously published and especially from those written by a periodical's own editors--the publication's orientation or perspective on its subject, its approach to the substance of the questions it addresses. In other words, what are its editors trying to accomplish?

Maximizing Competition

Monopolies, as related in our "Antitrust Overview" (above), are in the business of levying a private "tax" on the public--thereby redistributing income and wealth in their favor and creating unjust inequalities--plus shielding themselves from the competitive pressures that would force them to be more efficient and innovative. As America's only anti-monopoly journal, our purpose is of course to do what we can to promote effective competition around the world--encouraging the maximum number of firms consistent with efficiency--and thus reducing those artificial inequalities while increasing the wealth of all societies. Our readers generally share this public-interest objective and hence look to us to find researchers and writers with a similar orientation including, as noted, economists, lawyers, historians, political scientists, and students in all of these disciplines that have an interest in monopoly and antitrust. If you have such an anti-monopoly interest--or know someone who does--we would very much like to hear from you.

Studies Wanted

It is the anatomy of real-life monopolies that are of special interest to our readers (see, e.g., the papers on the U.S. motorcycle monopoly in two of our recent issues, Vols. 26:1 and 26:2, above) since such studies cast light on the mechanics of monopoly power in general and on the nature and magnitude of its costs to society. More broadly, the categories of good public-interest antitrust studies that we especially welcome include the following:

• Studies of the overall monopoly costs in a particular country (e.g., Japan, Haiti);
• Monopoly costs in a specific economic sector (e.g., Japan's distribution sector);
• Monopoly costs in a particular industry (e.g., the U.S. auto and health-care industries);
• Monopoly costs in an industry's various geographical markets (e.g., health-care overcharges in Minneapolis);

History and Political Science

• Monopoly costs of particular practices in specific industries (e.g., predatory pricing in the U.S. airline industry);
• Monopoly costs found in particular antitrust cases decided in various countries over the years;
• Price declines that followed antitrust cases in any industry in any country;
• Costs of monopolies that the antitrust authorities in the various countries should be currently prosecuting but aren't;
• Scale economies in any industry;
• Historical studies of monopolies in particular countries and eras (e.g., the U.S. during the Progressive era); and
• Political science studies of how monopoly power has evaded antitrust by winning political protection in various countries and eras (e.g., in the U.S., Japan, and Australia).

'Lean and Concise'

In general, articles are most likely to be accepted by this journal that do not exceed 20 pages (double-spaced typing), including footnotes. In our experience, the lengthier papers tend to be repetitive and hence would be likely to go unread by the busy professionals who read this journal. A useful rule of thumb is that there is no such thing as a too-short article, that publishability and article length are almost always inversely related. Indeed, some of the most trenchant insights in antitrust have been expressed in brief Notes and Comments (of say 5 to 10 pages) and in even briefer letters to the editor. Lean, concise writing is almost invariably irresistible--which means that having a spouse or close friend with an English major can be a valuable asset for the antitrust writer.

'What One Has to Say'

Finally, a manuscript's attractiveness is greatly enhanced if it is submitted in plain typewritten style, without the clutter of font/style variations that are permitted by modern word processors. It is what one has to say--and how well one says it--that is important to a public-interest journal like this one. (If the article can also be supplied in disk format, that fact should be mentioned in the submittal letter.) Articles should be mailed to:

Charles E. Mueller, Editor

Antitrust Law & Economics Review

Box 3532

Vero Beach, FL 32964