Guide for Authors

Instructions for Submitting Articles

Published by The Association of Private Enterprise Education (APEE), The Journal of Private Enterprise brings together the work of scholars from disciplines including economics, entrepreneurship, ethics, finance, history, law, management, philosophy, and religion who have done research on topics pertaining to systems of private enterprise worldwide.

Articles of 12 to 15 pages of double-spaced text are preferred, but longer manuscripts will be considered if the content appears worthwhile. In addition, a regular section of The Journal is devoted to educational notes that average five pages. These short accounts describe innovations in teaching topics in private enterprise of interest to journal readers.

1. There is no submission fee.

2. Submissions should be uploaded to our Editorial Manager portal.

3. If you are so inclined, please fill out the recommended reviewers field, as that helps us compile our list of primary and backup referees.

Formatting Instructions for Accepted Articles

1. Reference list: Before publication, references must be formatted exactly according to The Journal of Private Enterprise guidelines. These are similar to American Economic Association guidelines, with some modifications based on the Chicago Manual of Style. See our formatting references guide for examples of how to cite the most common types of publications.

2. In-text citations: Sources should be cited in the text by the author's name and year of publication, for example (Smith 1996, p. 3). A full reference list should appear at the end of the article. Only references that are cited in the text should appear in the reference list.

3. Footnotes: Only notes that add comments beyond the citation require a separate footnote. Please use footnotes rather than endnotes.

4. Acknowledgements: Acknowledgements and related information should appear in a footnote indicated by an asterisk after the last author's name; further footnotes should be numbered consecutively and indicated by superscripts.

5. Contact information: We do not publish author contact information, but do provide the name of the institution each author is affiliated with. Please also provide the best email address for us to reach you during the editing process.

6. Abstract: All papers should include an abstract of not more than 100 words.

7. JEL codes: All papers should include one to three Journal of Economic Literature (JEL) codes below the abstract.

8. Keywords: All papers should include three to six keywords below the abstract. Keywords should be lowercase (unless they are proper nouns) and separated by commas.

9. Spelling, Grammar, and Style: Articles should conform to current stylistic guidelines based on the Chicago Manual of Style and Merriam Webster's Collegiate Dictionary.

10. Format: Please keep the formatting and layout of the text as simple as possible, as we will format your article to fit The journal’s layout.

11. Sections: Please break up the paper into several sections to make it easy to read. Use bold text and Roman numerals for section headings; use italics and capital letters for section subheadings (section subheadings are optional). Please do not use your word processor’s automatic formatting to number the sections.

Example:

I. Introduction

This paper will explain why Austrian economics provides a better analytical framework than Keynesian economics.

A. History of Austrian Thought

The Austrian school of economics originated in...

B. History of Keynesian Thought

Keynesianism is associated with John Maynard Keynes...

12. Emphasizing text: Use italics as needed; please avoid all caps and underlining.

13. Figures and Tables: Figures and tables should be no more than 4.5 inches wide and preferably no more than 7.5 inches in length. They should also be in grayscale, not color. Should you wish to include a figure or table that is larger than these dimensions, please contact the editor for guidance.

To ensure that your table is the appropriate width in Microsoft Word, please follow these instructions: Select your entire table. Right click and choose “table properties.” In the “table” tab, check the “preferred width” box and type 4.5, then change the “measure in” drop-down menu to “inches.” Click “OK” to close the table properties box.

To ensure that other types of images are the appropriate width in Microsoft Word, please follow these instructions: Select your entire figure. Right click and adjust the shape width box to 4.5”.

Images should be consecutively numbered using Arabic numerals. Figures and tables should be numbered separately (e.g., Figure 1, Table 1, Figure 2, Table 2). Explanatory titles should be part of the text, above the image, rather than part of the image. Likewise, the source and notes for the image should be included as text directly below the image.

Text in the image should be 10 point Garamond to ensure readability. In cases where space is a concern, the smallest acceptable size is 8.5. For all image types, there should be no external borders (i.e., no box around the entire image).

Authors are required to format tables, so they appear professional and are easy to interpret. Please check recent issues of The Journal for samples. For example, do have a table with uniform borders around each cell, or for regressions, do not just report t-statistics. Include notes like: *, **,*** denotes significance at the .10, .05, .01 levels, two-tailed test. Clearly highlight the dependent variable and, when reporting independent variables, minimize the use of abbreviations. Your statistics software may like abbreviations, but do not require readers to interpret abbreviations when you can simply type out names. Minimize the use of abbreviations in the rest of your text.