The journal was founded in 1998 and was originally called "Bulletin of Moscow Pedagogical University". The editor-in-charge was Doctor of Historical Sciences, prof. O.V. Volobuev, members of the editorial board - O.N. Naumov (Executive Secretary), O.F. Kudryavtsev, N.I. Smolensky, V. G. Seyranyan, A. N. Fuchs. The first issue of the journal marked the beginning of the tradition which made possible its further development: the authors of 16 publications were both third-party researchers (from Perm Pedagogical University and the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences) and the employees of Moscow Pedagogical University.

In 2004, certain changes took place in the editorial board of the journal. Its composition was as follows: N.I. Smolensky (executive editor), A.V. Belov (executive secretary), V.V. Zhuravlev, E.V. Yufereva, A.I. Pirogov, A.L. Alafaev. A distinctive feature of the first years of the journal’s publication was the lack of a clear publication structure. The headings were constantly changing. Such fluctuations in content were caused by the search for an optimal model for placing materials in the journal. Gradually, the structure took its shape. The permanent headings were "The History of Russia of the Middle Ages and Modern times", "The contemporary history of Russia", "General History", "Political Sciences".

The changes in the field of authorship were even more significant. As the content analysis of the journal of 2006-2008s shows, the authors of more than half of the articles were third-party teachers from educational and scientific institutions of Russia. Among them were researchers from Bryansk, Orel, Krasnoyarsk, Kovrov, Vladikavkaz, St. Petersburg and Moscow (including St. Petersburg State University, Moscow State University, Institutes of General and Russian History of the Russian Academy of Sciences). Such a change in the geography of the authors indicates that the "Bulletin" was increasingly attracting the attention of the academic community throughout the country. This was largely due to the quality of journal publications, although, of course, their level was not and could not be the same. The improvement of the quality of the journal influenced the growth of its citation, expressed in the value of the impact factor of the publication. Currently, the editor-in-chief of the journal is Professor, Doctor of Historical Sciences V.E. Bagdarasyan.

One of the main tasks of the editorial board is to maintain the scientific level of the journal without making it, however, somehow frozen and unchanged. The way to solve this problem today is to go beyond the national, i.e. domestic third-party participation, and to attract foreign researchers as authors. The second task is to expand the field of problems and publications of a debatable nature. Currently, this is done mainly in relation to the problems of the methodology of history, which are addressed within the framework of "round tables" in the journal's publications of recent years. The third task is constant attention to the quality, that is, to the level of publications. One of the means of solving this problem is the requirement to maintain the necessary ratio between the number of publications of graduate students and applicants for the degree of candidate of sciences, on the one hand, and candidates and doctors of sciences, especially the latter, on the other hand. These are the main results of publishing work in the “Bulletin” over the past 20 years and the problems that the editorial board should deal with - not only in the nearest future.

Materials from the following article were used - Smolensky N. I. “The journal "Vestnik MGOU. Series: History and Political Sciences” is twenty years old” // Bulletin of the Moscow State Regional University. Series: History and Political Sciences. - 2018. - No. 5. - pp. 8-9.