arecon-topic-selection
Use when judging whether a literature is an Annual Review of Economics (ARE)-scale review topic — mature, important, and genuinely in need of an authoritative, accessible synthesis — and framing the review's animating question. Decides fit; it does not gather the literature (arecon-literature-synthesis).
Profile →npx skills add brycewang-stanford/Awesome-Journal-Skills --skill arecon-topic-selection --agent claude-code
Same command for any agent — swap --agent for codex, cursor, copilot.
Weekly change comes from our own snapshots, not the repository page — it measures attention, not adoption.
# Topic Selection for an ARE Review (arecon-topic-selection) ## When to trigger - You have a candidate field and need to know if it is "ARE-shaped" - A topic feels either too narrow (a single-question review) or too sprawling (a whole subfield) - You are deciding between ARE and a sibling outlet (JEL, JEP, a Handbook chapter, a field journal's review section) - The literature is young/fast-moving and you suspect it is not yet ready for an annual-volume review ## What ARE is for ARE is the **Annual Reviews** economics survey series: a yearly volume of **invited, authoritative review articles** that are **accessible to economists outside the subfield**, not only to its specialists. The reader is a competent economist who wants to enter, teach, or locate the open questions of a field they do not currently work in. That reader profile — and the annual-volume cadence — sets the fit bar. ## The four ARE-fit tests A literature belongs in ARE when it passes all four. If it fails one, route accordingly. 1. **Maturity.** There is a *body* of research — multiple research lines, accumulated evidence, recognizable debates — not a handful of recent working papers. A field still being born produc
- When to trigger
- What ARE is for
- The four ARE-fit tests
- Decision table
- Framing the animating question
- Checklist
- Anti-patterns
- Output format
What does the arecon-topic-selection skill do?
Use when judging whether a literature is an Annual Review of Economics (ARE)-scale review topic — mature, important, and genuinely in need of an authoritative, accessible synthesis — and framing the review's animating question. Decides fit; it does not gather the literature (arecon-literature-synthesis).
How do I install it?
Run `npx skills add brycewang-stanford/Awesome-Journal-Skills --skill arecon-topic-selection --agent claude-code` — it drops the skill into your project so the agent can pick it up. Swap the --agent value for codex, cursor or copilot if you use one of those.
Where does this skill come from?
From brycewang-stanford/Awesome-Journal-Skills, a repository with 909 stars. We read it straight from the repository tree rather than a submitted listing, so what you see here is what is actually published.
Is a popular skill a good skill?
Not necessarily. Stars measure attention, not adoption — a repository can trend for a week and be abandoned. That is why we show the weekly change from our own snapshots next to the total, instead of a single flattering number.