Preparing a discussion

Guidelines

Presenters may select papers that lie in the general area of Economics and Management of Science and Innovation published recently (2022, 2023, 2024). To ensure a high level of quality and fit with the audience, papers to be presented need to be chosen among those published in a selected number of academic journals and working papers listed below. The presentation should last 30–40 minutes (including clarifying questions). It will be followed by a 20–30

minutes session of general discussion. 

Presenters should prepare slides to stimulate the discussion among participants. Presentations should be drafted following some common guidelines. Please bear in mind that participants may not have read the paper. In the first part of the talk, presenters should provide a concise and clear summary of the paper by addressing, among others, the following questions:

1. 1. What is the research question, and why is it interesting, i.e., how does it improve our understanding of some big issues?

   2. What theory does the paper build on/exploit/develop?

   3. What is the method, and what are the data?

   4. Is causality an emphasis of the paper? If yes, what are the main threats to causality, and what do the authors do about them?

   5. What are the main findings?

In the second part of the talk, the presenter should provide her/his own personal view on some of the main aspects covered in the paper. Typical questions that should be answered include, but are not limited to:

1. 1. What is truly exciting/new/original about the paper?

   2. Why was the paper published: what elements sold it to the journal (e.g., theory contribution, framing, methods, data, phenomenon)?

   3. What are the main limitations/shortcomings of the paper?

   4. How could we answer the same question differently?

   5. What would be the ideal experiment to answer the data?

   6. What are your ideas for follow-up papers?

List of journals

Presenters should choose a paper published in 2021, 2022, or 2023 in any of the following journals (listed alphabetically). The list has been established to cover a variety of fields dealing with innovation. Establishing a list of relevant journals is always a challenge, and we are well aware that the present list does not cover all innovation-related journals. However, we had to draw the line somewhere...

• Academy of Management Journal 

• Academy of Management Review  

• American Economic Journal: Applied Economics

• American Economic Journal: Economic Policy 

• American Economic Journal: Microeconomics

• American Economic Review

• Econometrica

• Economic Journal

• Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice

• European Economic Review

• International Journal of Industrial Organization

• Journal of Business Venturing

• Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization 

• Journal of Industrial Economics

• Journal of Law & Economics

• Journal of Law, Economics, and Organization

• Journal of Management Studies

• Journal of Political Economy

• Journal of Public Economics

• Journal of the European Economic Association 

• Management Science

• Nature

• Organization Science

• Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences

• Quarterly Journal of Economics

• RAND Journal of Economics

• Research Policy

• Review of Economic Studies

• Science

• Strategic Entrepreneurship Journal

• Strategic Management Journal 

Working papers from the NBER or the CEPR will also be accepted.