Global governance research: exploring patterns of growth, diversity, and inclusion

Abstract

Global governance has been widely embraced as an object of analysis and as a way of “seeing” world politics. Yet we still know little about how publishing has evolved. This article presents the first systematic exploration of these patterns. It uses an original dataset of global governance research to answer three first-order questions: How has publishing varied over time? What issues have scholars focused on? And who has been publishing in the field? The authors found that research has grown and become increasingly diverse—but selectively so. Some marginalized issues feature more prominently than in the rest of international relations, but there are blind spots too. Further, while research is less American and women have been comparatively more active relative to other areas, geographical diversity remains extremely limited. Scholars based in the Global South have been the first authors of less than 14 percent of all publications. To conclude, the article reflects on implications for the field.