Scientific Journal Editorial Roles: Editors, Associate Editors, and Boards

A manuscript submitted to Nature or the New England Journal of Medicine doesn't simply land in a queue and wait its turn. It enters a structured hierarchy of editorial decision-making that determines whether it gets reviewed, who reviews it, and whether it ultimately sees publication. Scientific journal editorial roles — editor-in-chief, associate editors, handling editors, and editorial boards — divide that labor deliberately, with each tier carrying distinct authority and accountability.

Definition and scope

At the top of any journal's editorial structure sits the editor-in-chief (EIC), sometimes titled "editor" at smaller publications. This person holds final authority over every acceptance and rejection decision and is responsible for the journal's scientific direction, scope enforcement, and integrity policies. The EIC is typically appointed by the publisher or sponsoring society — the American Chemical Society, for instance, appoints EICs for journals like JACS and ACS Nano through its Publications Division — and serves a defined term, often three to five years.

Below the EIC, associate editors (AEs) or handling editors manage the day-to-day flow of manuscripts. A journal receiving 5,000 submissions per year cannot have a single person read every paper; the AE layer makes that volume operationally possible. AEs are typically active researchers in a specific subfield, which is precisely why they're recruited — subject-matter depth that allows them to identify appropriate peer reviewers and evaluate the technical merit of reviews returned.

The editorial board occupies a different functional space. Board members are often distinguished scientists who lend credibility and advisory support rather than handling manuscripts directly. Their role is more ambassadorial than operational: they may recommend policy positions, suggest scope adjustments, or — at society journals — represent the membership's scientific interests to the publisher.

A fourth role worth naming separately is the section editor or specialty editor, common at broad multidisciplinary journals like PLOS ONE or Science Advances, where editorial responsibility is partitioned by discipline rather than by volume alone.

How it works

The editorial process runs roughly like this once a manuscript arrives:

  1. Initial screening by editorial staff or EIC — manuscripts are checked against scope and basic formatting requirements; a significant fraction are desk-rejected at this stage without external review.
  2. Assignment to an associate editor — the EIC or an editorial coordinator routes the paper to an AE whose expertise matches the submission's subfield.
  3. Reviewer selection and invitation — the AE identifies potential peer reviewers, inviting typically 2 to 3 per manuscript (though high-volume journals sometimes aim for 3 to 4 to account for declining rates, which routinely exceed 50% at competitive journals).
  4. Review collection and evaluation — the AE reads returned reviews, assesses whether they cover the manuscript's key claims, and may solicit additional reviews if the initial set is contradictory or incomplete.
  5. Editorial recommendation — the AE drafts a recommendation (accept, major revision, minor revision, or reject) and forwards it to the EIC.
  6. Final decision — the EIC makes the binding decision, which may align with or override the AE's recommendation.

This structure matters because it creates an internal check. An AE who is overly lenient — or overly harsh — is visible to an EIC reviewing recommendation patterns over time. The peer review process depends on this editorial layer to maintain consistency across a journal's output.

Common scenarios

Conflict of interest recusal is one of the most routine editorial situations. If a submitted manuscript comes from a researcher at the same institution as the handling AE, or from a frequent collaborator, the AE is expected to recuse and the manuscript is reassigned. Journals like eLife publish explicit conflict-of-interest policies for editors, distinguishing between financial conflicts, institutional affiliations, and recent co-authorship (typically defined as within the past three to four years).

Editorial board turnover follows different logic. Board members at many journals serve rolling terms without handling manuscripts, so turnover tends to be slower and less disruptive than AE transitions. When journals undergo scope changes — shifting, say, from print-era narrowness to broader digital-era coverage — board composition changes often signal that shift to the research community before any formal policy statement does.

Guest or special-issue editors represent a distinct variant. These are external researchers appointed for a single thematic issue, operating with AE-level authority for that collection only. The manuscript submission process for special issues sometimes differs from the standard track, including modified timelines and reviewer pools.

Decision boundaries

The clearest boundary in journal editorial structure is between operational authority (the EIC and AEs, who make binding decisions) and advisory authority (the editorial board, which does not). A board member cannot override an EIC's rejection decision; that distinction is structural, not merely traditional.

A subtler boundary runs between desk rejection and reviewed rejection. Desk rejections — those issued by an AE or EIC before peer review — are faster but carry less detailed feedback. Reviewed rejections come with referee reports. Authors navigating responding to peer reviewer comments are dealing with reviewed decisions; desk rejections typically offer little to respond to.

The question of who has authority over retractions sits at the EIC level, not the board. Retraction decisions — governed by guidelines from the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) — require EIC sign-off, often in consultation with the publisher's legal and ethics teams. The editorial board is rarely involved in individual retraction cases.

Understanding how editorial hierarchies function is foundational to navigating scientific publishing — whether as an author, a reviewer, or a researcher exploring the broader landscape of scientific journals for the first time.

References

Read Next

The Peer Review Process: How Scientific Articles Are Evaluated A manuscript submitted to a journal does not simply get accepted or rejected by an editor — it travels through a structured... The Manuscript Submission Process: Step-by-Step Guide for Authors The process varies by journal, discipline, and publication model, but the underlying architecture is largely consistent across... Responding to Peer Reviewer Comments: Strategies for Authors A response to reviewers is a formal document, a negotiation, and occasionally a test of patience, all at once.