In our August "how can we help you?" thread, a reader writes:
I'm wondering how to deal with the following as a journal referee:
1) The manuscript, which discusses a recent paper, just flat-out misses an argument that that paper makes for a particular premise P. It is clear that they missed it because in the manuscript, the author writes, "It isn't clear what the argument for P is." In fact the author of paper being discussed does argue for premise P. I know not only because I am the author, but *more importantly* because I pulled up the paper to make sure I argued for it. I want to flag this to the referee without making it obvious that I am the author being discussed. How can I do this?
2) The manuscript deserves an R&R. But its tone is perhaps overly polemical, even hostile at times. I would say this even if the paper that the manuscript discusses were not myself. For instance, the manuscript contains asides like, "...the paper, characteristically, does not contain real-world examples of [the philosophical phenomenon]". As a referee, how can I flag that these hostile-sounding asides are unnecessary? Again, without revealing that I am the author of the paper being discussed.
Another reader gave what I take to be good answers to both questions:
1) just cite the relevant passage and refer to yourself in the third person. They might guess it’s you, but they won’t have enough evidence for that to be a great guess (even though it’s true), and your responsibility is to avoid revealing your identity, not to avoid your identity being guessed at all costs.
2) the quoted passage makes it clear that the author strongly disprefers your methodology, but it doesn’t come across as hostile to my ear. (As a reader, I find that these sorts of asides can be helpful, as they make it clear what kind of philosopher I’m reading.) Of course, if it *isn’t* characteristic of your writing (or of the literature? out of context I’m a bit unclear on the charge) that it does not contain real-world examples, then that’s an error you can point out.
Indeed, the passage the referee refers to doesn't seem to me problematically hostile. It could well be that the author the paper is criticizing (the reviewer!) doesn't provide any real-world examples, and this could well be a problem with the reviewer's work. That being said, I do think there are two things here that a reviewer could potentially take legitimate issue with. First, suppose it's the case that real-world examples are irrelevant to the issue at hand. In that case, I think it could be fine for a reviewer to point this out and say that the aside is unwarranted. Second, suppose it's the case that in their work, the reviewer has provided real-world examples and the aside in question misleads readers into thinking they haven't. In that case, once again I think it would be fine as a reviewer to point this out. Still, I think it's important to be judicious here. I don't think it's a reviewer's job to defend their own work in a review. Correcting egregious misrepresentations is fine, as is criticizing errors that affect whether the paper should be published. But suppose the aside in question here is merely an aside, having no real bearing on the paper's main argument, and that the reviewer being criticized really didn't provide any real-world examples in their work. In that case, I think the thing to do is probably to let it go.
In any case, this brings us to a final issue the follow-up commenter raised above:
Here’s a related question of my own. I get that folks think that journal article tone needs to be policed. Even if that’s true, is it the referee’s place to do the policing? Shouldn’t the reviewer focus on scholarly merits? The editor, who represents the journal and its style, can police tone if they like.
For my part, I'm inclined to think that unless a journal gives clear directions on how referees should evaluate papers (which some journals do via worksheet questionnaires), it should be up to the individual referee how they evaluate a given paper. This, I think, is why it is called peer-review. I mean, I personally think the primary focus should be on the quality of the scholarship and arguments. However, we all have different views about what a good paper should look like, and some of our peers can think that presentation and tone can be important. For example, during my time as a graduate student I was often upbraided by some of my mentors for writing with too aggressive of a tone. In retrospect, I'm very thankful for it. Generally speaking (though I do think there can be warranted exceptions), I'm inclined to think that we owe each other 'scholarly respect' (or whatever you want to call it). Fortunately, when I review papers for journals, it nearly always seems to me that failures in this regard converge with scholarly failures--that, for example, haughty dismissals of an author tend to misrepresent them in ways that very much warrant correction on purely scholarly grounds.
But these are just my thoughts and experiences. What are yours?
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