Keep calm and cite better: Impact factor pressures and review articles in the history of economics

Clarivate Analytics’ suppression of the Journal Impact Factor (JIF) for three history of economics journals in 2018 resulted from the publication of a single review article solicited for History of Economic Ideas (HEI). That episode highlights several connections between JIF pressures on authors and editors, on the practice of writing review articles, and on the field of history of economics. We examine the different roles and proliferation of review articles, discuss recent examples of review articles in the history of economics literature, and conclude with a brief discussion of review articles, in connection with the way historians of economics cite.