Abstract

I HAVE BEEN PRIVILEGED TO SERVE a society whose guiding principle and raison d’être are to serve the academic interests of its constituency, namely, economic researchers who employ rigorous methodologies. The Society has maintained a consistent range of activities over the years, but this should not deter us from discussing in the future two major questions: Should we remain within the present scope of the Society or rede- fine it to achieve a broader common denominator? Should we restrict ourselves to the traditional functions of publishing the journal, organizing conferences, and conferring honors, or should we expand our activities, especially in light of recent technological advances? 2. NEW JOURNALS I will start with what I think is the most important issue that we currently face, namely whether to establish two or three additional journals that would publish worthy papers that have been rejected from Econometrica due to overspecialization. The idea is that authors would be allowed to request the transfer of referee reports from the main journal to the somewhat more specialized journals. This would speed up the process and allow for more efficient use of the scarce refereeing resources available to Econometrica. Such an idea was suggested in 2002 in the report of the Committee for Electronic Issues and received mixed reactions. A new committee will make its recommendations about the desirability of such an initiative at the upcoming meeting of the Executive Committee. I very much hope that, in spite of the reservations, the Econometric Society will take up the challenge. This would be a major step in the current campaign to exclude commercialism from publishing and would be a groundbreaking innovation in the publication procedures currently employed in economics. The choice of the domains for the “baby Econometrica” will also delineate the Society’s boundaries.