Rje Literature Positioning

---
name: rje-literature-positioning
description: Use to position a manuscript against the industrial-organization frontier for The RAND Journal of Economics (RJE) — staking the contribution against prior IO work without a standalone survey, and citing in the RJE author-date style (no page numbers, no issue numbers). Positioning, not a literature review.
---

# Literature Positioning (rje-literature-positioning)

## When to trigger

- The related-work section reads like a survey instead of a positioning argument
- You are unsure which IO literatures your article must engage
- You need citations to conform to the RJE Style Guide

## Positioning at the IO flagship

RJE is the **flagship industrial-organization journal** (formerly the Bell Journal of Economics), so referees are IO insiders who know the canon and the current frontier. Positioning must show **exactly what your article adds to the IO conversation** — a new structural method, new estimates for a market, a new mechanism, or a theoretical result — not summarize the field. Engage the **specific strand** your contribution touches:

- **Demand & differentiation:** discrete-choice / random-coefficients (BLP-style) demand and its descendants.
- **Supply, conduct & market power:** oligopoly pricing, conduct testing, pass-through, markups.
- **Entry, exit & dynamics:** static and dynamic entry/investment games.
- **Regulation & antitrust:** merger analysis, regulated-industry studies, market design.
- **Organizations & contracts:** vertical relationships, incentives, firm boundaries.
- **Auctions & mechanisms** where competition is the object.

For each relevant strand, name the **closest prior articles**, state what they established, and pinpoint the **gap your work closes**. Distinguish a **method** contribution (you estimate something previously hard to identify) from a **substantive** one (you answer a market/policy question prior tools could not).

## Citation form (RJE Style Guide)

- Author-date in-text, **name and year only, no page numbers** (e.g., "Berry, Levinsohn and Pakes, 1995").
- Reference list alphabetical, unnumbered, **no issue numbers** in journal citations.
- Avoid numbered or footnote-style citations.

## Anti-patterns

- A chronological survey with no claim about your marginal contribution
- Citing general-econ landmarks while ignoring the specific IO strand you extend
- Page numbers in in-text cites or issue numbers in references (off RJE style)
- Claiming novelty against a literature you have not actually engaged

## Output format

```
【Strands engaged】[demand / conduct / entry-dynamics / regulation / organizations / auctions]
【Closest prior work】[3-6 articles, author-date]
【Gap closed】one sentence
【Contribution type】method / substantive / theoretical
【Citation style】author-date, no page/issue numbers? [Y/N]
【Next step】rje-identification-strategy
```