Submission Guidelines

Thank you for your interest in writing for Liberalism.org, a project of the Institute for Humane Studies. Here are the rules and guidelines we ask you to follow when sending submissions.

Submission Process Basics

We welcome original submissions from freelance authors on American public policy, economics, political science, culture, and related fields. Authors with relevant expertise are strongly preferred.

Please keep essays to approximately 1,500–2,500 words. Charts, graphs, and other illustrations are welcomed as appropriate. Hyperlinks are the preferred way to document sources. We kindly request that all contributors disclose any financial or other relationships that may cause the appearance of a conflict of interest.

Contact Information

Please direct all correspondence to [email protected].

Word Processing

All written contributions must be submitted via Google Docs. Please share them with [email protected]. Make sure that privileges are set to “Editor,” and that they’re enabled for “Anyone with the link.” Edits will be returned, with changes tracked, the same manner that they were submitted.

Some submissions may require media capabilities beyond Google Docs; for these, we prefer that contributors use Google Workspace; these applications ensure style compatibility with the rest of our corpus.

Style Guide

We follow the Chicago Manual of Style, 18th edition (2024). Please refer to it as needed. Questions that fall outside the manual will be resolved at the editor’s discretion and in a way compatible with the publication’s overall style and tone. Occasional exceptions may also be made.

Review

All submissions will receive a response in a timely manner. We will contract to publish those we deem potentially suitable, and edits will be returned promptly to allow author and editor to reach agreement. Authors of published work will receive a modest honorarium during the month of publication or the month following. The editor reserves the right to consult confidentially with IHS personnel and others about all matters of editorial judgment.

Nonprofit Political Speech

As a nonprofit, IHS is forbidden from endorsing candidates, parties, or pending legislation. Please refrain from such endorsements as you write. Content that violates this guideline will be edited to fit IHS’s legal situation. If an endorsement is found integral to a piece’s argument, that piece may be rejected.

Guidelines on Voice and Tone

New writers may do best to read some of our work before writing, but the following guidelines should give some idea of what we’re looking for.


  • We focus on the common ground among liberals. We welcome essays from across the family of liberal views. We believe that only by incorporating diverse—and divergent—views can we strengthen the liberal project.


  • Our liberalism guides our editorial choices. This means that we expect our writers to advance liberal solutions (broadly construed) and do so with a liberal temperament (broadly construed).


  • We welcome the experience of the new and the other. Liberalism is the rare worldview that doesn’t reflexively fear change. Our openness is an advantage. We look on the world with hope and wonder. We are curious and open-minded.


  • We emphasize agency expressed from below rather than decisions imposed from above. Though we recognize the importance of formal institutions, we believe that the world needs more and better stories of polycentric coordination and individual empowerment.


  • We focus on solutions. Articles that just diagnose a problem are easy to write and easy to ignore. Wherever possible, we offer a workable, evidence-based solution to the problem at hand.


  • We ground our claims in sound research. We serve the IHS community, a network of advanced students and professional researchers. We value the findings of specialists who do sound empirical research. We believe that this work furthers the cause of liberalism in the world.


  • We are unflappable in the face of moral panics. Much commentary and news coverage, especially on television and social media, seeks to invest the consumer in stories of looming catastrophe. Whenever possible, we look to deflate these moral panics.


  • We avoid language that dehumanizes our opponents or other groups of people. We disagree with non-liberals on matters of consequence and urgency. How they’re settled will affect millions of people who don’t participate in the discussion. We serve the wider public badly when we proceed by invective. We likewise serve the public badly when we presume that groups of people, particularly those with unchosen characteristics, are questions in need of a political answer.