Feminist Knowledge Production and Editorial Praxis: A Bibliometric and Qualitative Analysis of the Journal of International Women’s Studies (2014–2024)

This study presents a bibliometric and editorial analysis of the Journal of International Women’s Studies (JIWS) from 2014 to 2024, examining its scholarly output, citation impact, and evolving feminist priorities. Drawing on Scopus-indexed data, we analysed 1,255 articles authored by 1,705 contributors using SciVal, Biblioshiny, VOSviewer, and Microsoft Excel. Findings indicate a 7.05% annual growth in publications and a consistent citation rate of 2.84 per article, highlighting the journal’s expanding academic engagement. Single authorship dominates at 48.7% with international co-authorship at 8.1%. The journal’s reach extends widely into the Global South, particularly to India and Indonesia. Our keyword analysis identified 3,777 unique terms, including “intersectionality,” “feminist activism,” and “gender justice.” These findings are enriched by editorial insights that frame the JIWS as a transnational, collaborative, and activist-oriented publication. The JIWS’ editors emphasise their commitment to inclusive feminist epistemologies that reject monolithic portrayals of “Western” or “Third World” feminisms. The journal has recently introduced genres such as policy briefs and feminist reflections and continues to run a global fellowship program that redistributes publishing royalties to support feminist researchers. The Journal’s strategy for increasing visibility includes publishing special issues and multilingual abstracts, expanding indexing, and mentoring authors through the review process. Two recent special issues on reproductive justice and digital feminism signal the evolving thematic focus of this field. Forthcoming issues address migration, post-menopausal selfhood, and gendered labour divisions in the Global South. This study highlights the importance of contextualising bibliometric data within the journal’s activist mission, thus contributing to feminist knowledge production by analysing both the metrics and the meanings that shape the journal’s intellectual trajectory.