A series gives a body of work a shape and gives readers a reason to come back. We publish under a single imprint and are actively looking for series editors.
Our Series
Series will be listed here as they are established, each with its editors, scope, editorial board and published titles.
The Press would rather begin three series that are needed than a dozen that are not. If your field needs one and does not have one, please get in touch.
One Imprint
Everything the Press publishes appears under the Bassi Foundation Press imprint. There are no plans for sub-imprints. A reader who sees the name should be able to infer that the book cleared independent peer review and an Advisory Board recommendation.
Series sit within the imprint. A series signals subject and editorial direction; the imprint signals process.
What a Series Editor Does
- Shapes the intellectual direction of the series and defines its scope.
- Commissions actively. A series that no one is asking authors to write for does not develop.
- Advises on proposals to the series and on reviewer selection.
- Writes a short assessment of each proposal for the Advisory Board.
- Represents the series at conferences and to the field.
What a series editor does not do is decide. Proposals to a series go through the same external peer review and the same Advisory Board recommendation as anything else. A series editor's enthusiasm gets a proposal read properly; it does not get it published.
Peer Review and Editorial Policy
Terms
- Appointment is for a renewable term of five years.
- Co-editors are welcome, particularly across regions or subfields.
- An editorial board for the series is optional; we will help you assemble one.
- Series editors declare interests and recuse themselves from proposals involving close colleagues, collaborators or former students, on the same terms as the Advisory Board.
Proposing a Series
Send a two-page outline before preparing anything longer; an early conversation is more useful to both sides than a long document. The outline should cover:
- The intellectual rationale: what the series is for, and what it does that existing series do not. Name the series you would be competing with.
- Scope and readership: the boundaries of the series and who reads within them.
- Capacity: a realistic view of whether the field can sustain three to five books a year. Most series fail on this rather than on quality.
- Editors: who you are, and your standing in the field.
- A first tranche: two or three specific titles or authors who would plausibly be in the opening list. This is the part that makes a proposal credible.
- The open-access case: why open publication matters for this field in particular.
Series proposals are reviewed externally and go to the Advisory Board in the same way individual titles do. Write to proposals@bassi.foundation.
Fields We Would Particularly Like to Hear From
Fields where we judge the gap between what is written and what is openly available to be widest:
- Law in jurisdictions under-served by Anglophone publishing
- History and area studies grounded in archives and languages outside the usual centres
- Bioethics and health policy with a practitioner readership
- Science and technology studies, particularly on governance and regulation
- Interdisciplinary work that falls between two established series and is therefore in neither