Dialogue Earth Submission Guidelines: Publishing Climate and Environment Analysis

Key Takeaways

• Dialogue Earth, the outlet formerly known as China Dialogue, publishes evidence-led comment and analysis on climate, energy, biodiversity and food systems, with translations across several languages and a strong Global South focus.
• Submissions start with a short pitch: two or three paragraphs naming the argument, the evidence, the author's standing, and the reason the timing matters. Comment pieces usually run 700 to 1,000 words.
• Editors accept pieces that stake out a specific position with cited data and disclosed affiliations. Broad overviews, campaign copy and unsourced claims get declined.
• The outlet suits researchers, NGO analysts, policymakers and practitioners with regional or thematic depth, especially those writing from or about Asia, Latin America and Africa.
• Against Carbon Brief, The Conversation, Mongabay and Climate Home News, Dialogue Earth is the clearest route for argued, multilingual analysis rather than breaking news.

1. Introduction

A large share of climate expertise never reaches the public. A researcher in Jakarta tracks which coal plants have closed and which slipped their retirement dates. An NGO lawyer in São Paulo has watched a new forest-offset rule fail in practice. A ministry adviser in Delhi can explain why a state solar tender undershot its target. Academic journals take many months and put results behind paywalls. General newspapers want a news peg and usually assign staff writers. So the analysis sits in a slide deck.

Dialogue Earth exists for this situation. The outlet, registered as a charity in the UK and editorially independent of its funders, publishes comment and analysis from people close to the evidence, then translates that work through its regional desks. This article explains how its submission process runs, what its editors accept and reject, how it compares with other climate outlets, and what to settle with an editor before you draft. It is written for researchers, NGO staff, policymakers and practitioners deciding where to place a piece of climate and environment analysis.

2. What Dialogue Earth is and who it fits

Dialogue Earth is a nonprofit, non-partisan venue for argued analysis, strongest where climate questions meet China, South Asia, Latin America and Africa.

It launched in 2006 as China Dialogue, a bilingual English and Chinese site covering China's environmental record at a time when few outlets did, founded by the journalist Isabel Hilton. In 2023 it changed its name to Dialogue Earth as coverage expanded to global topics: energy transition, biodiversity, oceans, food systems and climate finance. It publishes in English and distributes translations in languages including Chinese, Spanish, French, Portuguese, Hindi and Bahasa Indonesia. Work is published under a Creative Commons licence, so other outlets can republish pieces with attribution, which extends a single article's reach well past the site itself.

Its strengths:

• Nearly two decades of operating history, with a deep archive on China's environment and energy policy that general outlets lack.
• Multilingual distribution that multiplies readership across regions.
• Editorial independence backed by its UK charity registration.
• A willingness to publish practitioners as well as journalists and academics.

Its limitations:

• A small newsroom with no same-day news operation.
• Competitive comment slots.
• Comment contributions have generally been unpaid; commissioned reporting and features are paid, with terms agreed case by case.

The fit is clearest for authors whose authority comes from region or subject depth. A water-policy scholar in Kathmandu, a fisheries scientist in Senegal, or a former official involved in a power-market reform can all write with standing here. Authors who need a fast, news-day platform or a large general audience should look elsewhere.

3. How the submission process works

Start with a short pitch, agree scope and length with an editor, then expect a substantive edit and fact-check before publication. Dialogue Earth takes pitches through its editorial team via the contact routes on its site, and the practical guidelines below reflect how that process runs.

A scenario shows what a workable pitch looks like. An energy researcher in Jakarta has government data showing that several announced coal-plant retirements slipped by two years. The pitch opens with the claim ("Indonesia's retirement schedule is drifting, and the revised data shows by how much"), names the dataset, states the author's role in tracking it, and points to an upcoming policy review that makes the piece timely. A few sentences carry all of that.

Two habits raise acceptance odds. Put the argument in the first line of the pitch email, because editors read pitches quickly. And link the underlying sources, since a claim an editor can verify in two minutes moves faster than one that needs a request.

4. What editors accept and what they reject

A piece earns a slot by staking a specific, evidence-backed position. It loses one by reading like a report summary or a campaign.

What works, based on the outlet's published author base and stated editorial approach: pieces that take a contested point and argue it with public data; first-hand accounts from practitioners involved in a policy or project; underreported geographies, especially where the author is based in the region described; and timing anchored to something readers can locate, such as a tender decision, a summit or the release of a national dataset.

Two scenarios show the difference. An academic with a new study on hydropower risk in the Himalayas should write the argument the study supports, cite the study, and take a position against a prevailing assumption, for instance on how much installed capacity planners can safely add. The study alone is a paper summary; the position is an article. An NGO communicator with campaign materials on illegal logging faces a different test: strip the campaign framing, disclose the organisation's role, and argue from public datasets such as satellite-derived deforestation figures. Editors keep the outlet non-partisan, so they expect disclosed funding and affiliations and sourced claims on contested events.

Rejection reasons are consistent across commissioning editors in this field: a draft that restates a new report without a position; promotional framing of an organisation or technology; undisclosed conflicts of interest; and projections presented as settled fact. If your central figure comes from a model, name the model and its assumptions in the draft. That habit prevents the most common round of edit-stage disputes.

5. How Dialogue Earth compares with other climate outlets

Each venue occupies a different slot, and choosing wrong costs weeks of delay.

Fit notes follow from the table. If your argument depends on Chinese-language sources or China policy, Dialogue Earth's archive and translation capacity have no close substitute among these outlets. If your contribution is a single study you co-authored, The Conversation's editor network will probably move faster. If you can report, Mongabay pays for the work. If your subject is the UN negotiations circuit, Climate Home News is the natural first stop.

For authors whose climate work touches technology policy, such as critical minerals, grid digitalisation or rules for carbon removal, Global Tech Observatory (globaltechobs.com) accepts outside expert commentary on technology policy. Its advantage is a focused readership of policy professionals; its limitation is reach, since it is a smaller specialist site without the archive or name recognition of the outlets listed above.

6. FAQ

Q1. Do I need journalism experience to write for Dialogue Earth?

No. The outlet publishes researchers, NGO staff, former officials and practitioners. What matters is a specific argument, evidence you can source, and a clear statement of who you are. Editors handle structure and style.

Q2. Does Dialogue Earth pay contributors?

Comment pieces have generally run unpaid. Commissioned reporting and longer features are paid, with rates agreed with the commissioning editor before drafting starts. Confirm the terms during the pitch exchange so there is no ambiguity after delivery.

Q3. Can I republish my piece elsewhere?

Third parties can republish Dialogue Earth work under its Creative Commons licence (CC BY-NC-ND), which requires attribution, forbids commercial use and forbids edits. For your own cross-publication, ask the editor about exclusivity during the pitch exchange; practice varies between comment and commissioned work.

Q4. How long should my piece be?

Aim for 700 to 1,000 words for a comment piece and make every section earn its place at that length. Longer analysis and reported features are sized with the editor at commissioning.

7. Conclusion

Dialogue Earth rewards a particular kind of submission: an author with real standing, a specific claim, sourced data and a reason the piece matters now. If you have a study, a dataset or first-hand experience with climate and environment policy in China, South Asia, Latin America or Africa, it is one of the few outlets that will carry your argument across languages. If you need news-day speed, freelance reporting rates as the main draw, or the largest possible general audience, the comparison above points to better matches. The practical next step takes an hour: read the past month of coverage on your topic, write down the argument nobody there has made, and draft a three-paragraph pitch that states the claim, the evidence and your standing.