This issue of the
Defense Acquisition Research Journal is a retrospective of the 100 issues that have been published in the span of almost 30 years. This issue traces the path that defense acquisition research, as presented in these pages, has taken from the end of the Cold War until today. To this end, we are reprinting selected articles from our history, which chronicle how the field has evolved.
As the former managing editor, Norene Johnson, recounted in the
Defense ARJ issue 87 (January 2019), since its inauguration in 1994, the journal “has stayed true to the publisher’s original intent—to specifcally meet the requirements of the Defense Acquisition Workforce, giving Acquisition professionals a forum to publish scholarly research pertaining to subject matters relevant to the Defense Acquisition community.”
While we have stayed true to the original intent of meeting the requirements of the Defense Acquisition Workforce, the subjects of interest have of course changed over the span of three decades. For the first decade until 2004, those subjects were: Acquisition Reform, Acquisition Strategy, Management, Organizational Behavior, Interoperability, and Cost and Schedule.(1) From 2004 until the present, Acquisition Reform, Management, and Cost and Schedule (including cost growth and analysis) remained at the top of the list, but other priorities changed. Systems Engineering, Contracts, and Performance and Technology became new priorities for defense acquisition research, which correlates with the 21st-century rise of network-centric warfare and web-enabled capabilities.(2)
Over that three-decade span, the journal has undergone several name changes. In this issue, we are reprinting the most widely read and cited article from each of these incarnations. The journal was first issued under the name
Acquisition Review Quarterly (1994–2003), with its opening remarks penned by John M. Deutch, then United States Deputy Secretary of Defense. He is also the author of the premier article from that period, “Consolidation of the US Defense Industrial Base” (issue 8, Fall 2001), which opens this issue.
In 2004, the journal became the
Defense Acquisition Review Journal (2004– 2010). In that period, the most cited article was John Rice's “Adaptation of Porter’s Five Forces Model to Risk Management” (issue 55, July 2010), which is the second article in this issue.
In 2011, the journal took the name
Defense Acquisition Research Journal, under which it is published today. To date, the most widely read article has been Robert Tremaine's “The High Flying Leadership Qualities: What Matters the Most?” (issue 77, April 2016), which is the third article.
We also reprint the first book review from our Defense Acquisition Professional Reading List, written by Michael Pryce about
The Polaris System Development: Bureaucratic and Programmatic Success in Government by Harvey Sapolsky (issue 57, January 2011).
We are pleased to welcome to the Editorial Board Dr. Cynthia R. Cook of the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
1. Subjects from 1994–2004 from Elder, Mitchell J., "An Eleven Year Retrospective of the Acquisition Review Journal" (March 2005). Wright-Patterson AFB, OH, Air Force Institute of Technology: Theses and Dissertations no. 3831, https://scholar.aft.edu/etd/3831.
2. Subjects from 2005–2021 from online keyword searches conducted by Emily Beliles, January 2022.
