ecj-literature-positioning

• SKILL.mdcore · 4,726 bytes

# Literature Positioning & Introduction (ecj-literature-positioning)

## When to trigger

- The related-work section reads as an annotated list ("X did A. Y did B.")
- The introduction never states crisply what economics learns from this paper
- A reader outside your subfield cannot tell which literature the paper contributes to or why they should care
- You are unsure whether you have engaged the work the result speaks to across fields, not just your niche

## What EJ wants from positioning

EJ introductions are economic arguments aimed at a **broad international readership**, not literature catalogs for a subfield. Because EJ's defining bar is **broad interest plus a substantial contribution**, the intro must make a generalist economist — not only your closest five competitors — finish the first pages knowing: the economic question, why it matters widely, what was already known, the precise gap, and what you do about it. Positioning is judged on whether you placed the paper against the **right** literature *and* explained the stakes in terms a non-specialist grasps.

A frequent EJ failure is an intro written **for the subfield**: dense with niche citations and acronyms, with the broad relevance assumed rather than argued. Connect to the wider economic conversation (the theory or policy question the result bears on), then locate the precise contribution. EJ has a long history across all fields, so the canonical antecedent may be foundational and decades old — engage it, do not only cite the recent applied frontier.