---
name: jel-writing-style
description: Use when revising a Journal of Economic Literature (JEL) survey for the JEL voice — authoritative, accessible to non-specialist economists, long-form, signposted, with a strong opening and abstract. Polishes prose and structure; it does not design the framework (jel-organizing-framework) or assign codes (jel-classification-system).
---

# JEL Writing Style — the Survey Voice (jel-writing-style)

## When to trigger

- The framework and coverage are settled and it is time to make the survey *read* well
- A non-specialist economist would get lost or bored in the current draft
- The opening buries the field's importance under machinery or throat-clearing
- The abstract reads like a paper abstract ("we find…") rather than a survey abstract

## The JEL voice: authoritative + accessible + long-form

A JEL survey is read by **non-specialist economists** — smart, but not in this subfield. The voice is that of a trusted, fair expert teaching the field to a colleague from another area. Four qualities define it:

1. **Authoritative.** Confident judgments about what is known, what is contested, and how good the evidence is. The reader wants the author's *appraisal*, not neutrality-as-evasion. But authority is earned by comprehensiveness and balance, never asserted.
2. **Accessible.** Technical machinery is explained with intuition first, notation second. A method is motivated by the question it answers before any formalism. Jargon is defined or avoided; an outsider should follow the argument.
3. **Long-form and signposted.** Surveys are long; the reader needs a map. Strong section/subsection architecture that mirrors the organizing spine, plus periodic "where we are / where we go next" cues, so the reader never loses the thread.
4. **Synthesis prose, not summary prose.** Sentences make papers *talk to each other* ("Whereas X finds…, the design in Y suggests…"), rather than marching paper-by-paper.

## The survey opening arc

A JEL introduction differs from a research-paper intro. The arc:

> **frame the field** (what it studies, why it matters to economists broadly) → **why a synthesis is needed now** (new evidence / method shift / policy salience) → **the organizing question and the spine** (the map the reader will be given) → **what the survey concludes and the open questions** (the payoff, stated up front) → **roadmap** (brief).

State the bottom line early. A survey that withholds its conclusions to a final section wastes the non-specialist's time and reads as indecisive.

## The abstract

A survey abstract describes **what the survey does for the reader**, not a single empirical finding: the field, why a synthesis now, the organizing idea, and the headline state-of-knowledge takeaway. Avoid "we estimate / we find a coefficient of…"; that is a primary-paper abstract. (Confirm any length/format limits in the AEA JEL style guide via `jel-submission`.)

## Length and the reader's stamina

JEL surveys are long, and length is a privilege, not a license. Every section must earn its pages by advancing the argument about the field; coverage for its own sake (the confirmatory tier of `jel-comprehensiveness-and-balance`) belongs in compact citation clusters, not in paragraph-length summaries. Use subsection summaries and a recurring return to the spine so a reader who puts the survey down can re-enter it without rereading.

## Checklist

- [ ] Opening follows the arc: frame field → why now → organizing question + spine → conclusions + open questions → roadmap
- [ ] Bottom-line state of knowledge stated early, not withheld to the end
- [ ] Technical material introduced intuition-first, notation-second; jargon defined or avoided
- [ ] Section architecture mirrors the organizing spine; periodic signposting present
- [ ] Prose synthesizes (papers in dialogue), not summarizes (paper-by-paper)
- [ ] Author's appraisals are explicit and labelled as the author's read where contested
- [ ] Abstract describes the survey's contribution to the reader, not a single estimate
- [ ] A non-specialist economist could follow start to finish

## Anti-patterns

- The annotated-bibliography drone: "Smith (2010) finds… Jones (2012) finds…" with no connective argument
- Opening with method/notation before the field's question and stakes
- Withholding the survey's conclusions until the final section
- Notation-first exposition that locks out the non-specialist (JEL's core reader)
- A primary-paper abstract ("we find a coefficient of 0.3") on a survey
- Neutrality-as-evasion: refusing to appraise because appraising feels risky
- Under-signposting a long manuscript so the reader loses the thread

## Output format

```
【Opening arc】frame → why-now → question+spine → conclusions+open-questions → roadmap? Y/N
【Bottom line early】state of knowledge stated up front? Y/N
【Accessibility】intuition-first; jargon controlled; non-specialist can follow? Y/N
【Signposting】architecture mirrors spine; periodic cues? Y/N
【Synthesis prose】papers in dialogue, not listed? Y/N
【Abstract】survey-style (contribution to reader), not a single estimate? Y/N
【Next step】→ jel-classification-system (assign JEL codes) → jel-submission
```