Can We Change the Topic, Please? Assessing Theoretical Divides in International Relations Scholarship

International relations scholars worry that factional divides along theoretical lines stifle research potential.

Data & Methods

This study uses topic modeling on a corpus of article abstracts from prominent IR journals spanning over two decades. This generates a new dataset tracking the evolution of international relations scholarship.

Key Findings

The analysis provides evidence supporting concerns about academic factionalism:

• Foundational paradigms are closely linked to numerous research topics, despite not being present in most studies.
• These paradigm-driven works have higher citation counts than non-paradigm-driven ones.
• Surprisingly, these highly cited studies appear less likely to be groundbreaking or "pathbreaking" compared to others.

Why It Matters

The findings reinforce recent scholarship on the limitations of citation metrics. While citations effectively measure scholarly impact overall, they are sensitive to how research topics and theoretical frameworks shape academic discourse.