The RGS-IBG scholarly journals portfolio comprises four journals (Area, Geo: Geography and Environment, The Geographical Journal, and Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers). Along with the Royal Meteorological Society, the RGS-IBG is also associated with the Wiley title WIREs Climate Change. Each year papers published in Society journals are downloaded more than one million times worldwide.
The Society seeks to ensure that there is a high-quality publishing option within the RGS-IBG publishing portfolio that is appropriate for every geographer, recognising that researchers have differential access to resources, have different needs and expectations, and face different pressures according to their career stage, access to funding, institutional context, and geographical location.
All of the Society's journals offer options for Open Access publishing and all RGS-IBG journals will consider for review papers that have been made available on not-for-profit pre-print servers. Authors and subscribers are also able to share read-only version of papers that have been published behind a paywall with those who might not otherwise have access by generating a link on Wiley Online Library.
The Society is committed to offering a plurality of publishing options to enable researchers to reach the widest possible audience with their work and to maximise access to scholarly content published by the RGS-IBG titles. All our journals are published by Wiley on behalf of the Society. All journals are members of, and subscribe to the principles of, the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE). Over 6,700 institutions subscribe to Area, The Geographical Journal and Transactions of The Institute of British Geographers. These titles are also made available to around 6,500 additional institutions via philanthropic initiatives. Papers published in Geo: Geography and Environment are immediately freely available to read and download.
Fellows, Associate Fellows and Student Members can read our journals online as part of their membership. If you have any queries about accessing online journals, please email webmaster@rgs.org
Access online journals
Our titles
Area publishes concise high quality papers and commentaries that shape key debates within and beyond the discipline. Area is an outlet for new debates and emerging scholars.
Edited by: Professor Sarah Marie Hall (University of Manchester), Professor Alan Latham (University College London) and Dr Julian Leyland (University of Southampton).
Geo is a fully open access international journal. With the environmental crisis worsening, geographers can play a crucial role in conceptualizing and addressing these issues. Geo therefore seeks innovative, interdisciplinary, and impactful scholarship that addresses environmental challenges from a geographical perspective with the aim of providing a critical arena for research on topics such as climate change, sustainable development, and decolonization of environmental knowledge.
Edited by: Dr Karen Bickerstaff (University of Exeter), Dr Christopher Darvill (University of Manchester), Dr Laurie Parsons (Royal Holloway University, London) and Le Yu (Tsinghua University)
The Geographical Journal has been the academic journal of the Royal Geographical Society, under the terms of its Royal Charter, since 1893. It publishes original research papers, review articles, and commentaries from across the discipline, with particular reference to public debates, policy-orientated agendas and notions of 'relevance'.
Edited by: Professor Darren Smith (Loughborough University), Professor Ben Anderson (Durham University), Professor Parvati Raghuram (The Open University) and Professor Robert Wilby (Loughborough University).
Transactions publishes the very best scholarship from around the world and across the whole spectrum of geographical research. It publishes ‘landmark’ articles that make a substantial theoretical, conceptual or empirical contribution to the advancement of geographical understanding. Transactions papers stimulate and shape research agendas in human or physical geography, and/or showcase the contribution of geographical research to advancing knowledge within and beyond the discipline.
Edited by: Professor Katherine Brickell (King's College London), Professor Colin McFarlane (Durham University), and Professor Matthew Sparke (University of California, Santa Cruz). The editors are supported by a team of 10 Editorial Board Members.
WIREs Climate Change is a Wiley journal published in association with the Royal Geographical Society (with IBG) and the Royal Meteorological Society. It provides an important forum to promote cross-disciplinary discussion of a global phenomenon with long-term societal impact.
Edited by: Professor Maria Carmen Lemos (University of Michigan) and Dr Dan Friess (Tulane University).
Members, Fellows, Associate Fellows and Student Members have digital access to WIREs Climate Change as part of their membership package.
ACCESS WIRES CLIMATE CHANGE
Our publishers
The RGS-IBG journals portfolio is published by Wiley. The contract and tendering process for the Society academic publishing portfolio is competitive and overseen by the Society’s Council. Our existing publishing contract with Wiley is for 2019-2023 and we have also signed with them to cover the period 2024-2028. The Society works with a commercial publisher because a major publisher provides services to researchers, libraries, and funders that an organisation the size of the Society could not deliver independently in a sustainable manner, including increased engagement with Open Access publishing.
The RGS-IBG publishing portfolio is critical to the Society’s mission to advance geographical knowledge. Working with a commercial publisher helps ensure that the Society can offer a range of high-quality publishing options that meet current and future researcher needs in a financially sustainable manner. The Society uses income received from the publishing contract to support the delivery of the journals and book series, and to support the Society’s charitable activities of advocating for geography and geographers.