We have just submitted a revised version of an article to Research Policy. Looking at their very latest issue, I noticed it is a special issue on a very related topic to ours. Look at the list of authors in that special issue:

Res. Pol. Volume 41, Issue 7, Pages 1121-1282 (September 2012)

Edited by Jan Fagerberg, Hans Landström and Ben R. Martin

• Jan Fagerberg, Hans Landström, Ben R. Martin
• Jan Fagerberg, Morten Fosaas, Koson Sapprasert
• Hans Landström, Gouya Harirchi, Fredrik Åström
• Ben R. Martin, Paul Nightingale, Alfredo Yegros-Yegros
• Samyukta Bhupatiraju, Önder Nomaler, Giorgio Triulzi, Bart Verspagen
• Ben R. Martin
• Howard E. Aldrich
• Tommy Clausen, Jan Fagerberg, Magnus Gulbrandsen
• Ismael Rafols, Loet Leydesdorff, Alice O’Hare, Paul Nightingale, Andy Stirling

2 out of 9 without direct links to the editors? Excuse me? I know that it is customary (if not strictly clean) to give the guest editors an article slot (besides the editorial). However looking at the list of authors in this special issue, it reeks of a closed small circle dividing up the special issue between themselves. I have no insights into the editorial processes of this very special issue, so things might very well have been proper and nice. But, if not, this is not the way to go about in research. Things like this upset me.