Books

In philosophy, a book is not equal to a fixed number of articles, and a book of a certain number of pages should not be equated to the same number of pages published in a series of articles.

There are no fixed criteria for assessing the quality of a book or a publisher in the discipline of philosophy. However, not all publishers are equal.  The characteristics of a quality press for the publications of books in philosophy include, but are not limited to, the following:

• established university academic press, established non-university academic press, or press which serves as the publishing arm of an established academic society
• external, blind review of the work by established senior scholars in the appropriate specialization, including the possibility of a second level of review by scholars of a similar stature if the book is being considered for inclusion in a series
• a lengthy and rigorous review period in which the author responds to requests for revision from the reviewers

Conversely, the following are some indicators that a press is not a quality venue for publishing in the field of philosophy:

• the publisher conducts most of its reviewing in-house
• the review process is brief and/or cursory, and/or the author is not required to address requests for revision from the reviewers
• the press’ contributions to academic scholarship are uneven or questionable

Works self-published by the author, or which the author pays a press to publish, are not considered evidence of scholarship.