Submissions Guidelines

Kindly read our submission guidelines thoroughly and familiarize yourself with our publication before submitting a pitch or full article.

The Public Source is an independent media organization and also a political project that provides a platform to disseminate ideas from a variety of leftist perspectives. While we don't shy away from promoting ideas we may disagree with, our Dispatches and Reports are not op-eds; they are commentaries, analyses, and observations informed either by lived experience or research. Claims must be substantiated and ideas carefully argued. 

The following are general guidelines meant to ensure miscommunication between author and editor is minimal and that both parties' responsibilities, expectations, and labors are respected. A nascent publication that has involved various communities since its inception, we welcome your feedback and will incorporate it into these guidelines.

The Public Source is keen on giving a platform to aspiring journalists and writers, just as it is interested in publishing the work of experienced authors. Our editors are generous with their feedback and expect contributors to be diligent when addressing their comments.

Submission Process

  1. Pitches or full articles should be submitted through our online portal, or shared via Google docs if the author has an established relationship with a commissioning editor. 

  2. Review Process: Submissions are reviewed by the editorial committee once a week. If you have not heard back from us within three weeks, it is fair to assume we will not be commissioning your article.

  3. Once a pitch has been accepted and a deadline agreed on, authors are kindly asked to adhere to it as firmly as possible and inform their commissioning editor if they anticipate delays. 
  4. Unsolicited articles may not already have been published elsewhere. Financial compensation is determined by the editorial committee on the basis of the submission's relevance to the mission of The Public Source. 
  5. Once submitted, The Public Source holds the exclusive right to publish, translate, and use an author's text, including but not limited to non-commercial use as outlined by the Creative Commons license under which we operate. Our partner organizations occasionally translate and republish our material on their own sites, which increases the circulation of your work. 

Editing Process

  • The Public Source invests considerable time and effort and aspires to continuously develop a practice of care in its editing process.
  • We believe this process should be both collaborative and done in a timely manner; therefore, we ask authors to respond to their editor's feedback within two working days.
  • Editors may do up to five rounds of revisions, if deemed necessary, but usually no more than three, to elevate the text's potential and relevance.
  • After the second round of revisions, we may choose to end the editing process, if we find that an author is not thoroughly and thoughtfully engaging with our feedback, without paying a kill fee.
  • In rare instances, an author may decide to withdraw their article. Once one round of edits has been completed, however, the decision to withdraw is at the discretion of the editor, and the request is likely to be rejected unless compelling reasons are provided by the author.

Writing Process & Style

  1. Our editors play a key role in the writing process as well and are available to provide support. Contributors are free to reach out to their commissioning editors if they are stuck and/or need additional resources to complete their articles (e.g., contacts, reading material, etc.).
  2. Word length: Dispatches range between 900 and 1,200 words, or form part of a series of up to three articles not exceeding 3,500 words.
  3. The Public Source follows the AP Stylebook, 55th Edition, and uses American English.
  4. To clarify or source a claim, hyperlinks are preferred; if they are not available, you may use endnotes.
  5. Authors are asked to provide a brief, two-sentence bio with their submission. 

Writing Habits

We encourage you to refer to George Orwell's six elementary rules (“Politics and the English Language,” 1946) for clear and effective writing:

(i) Never use a metaphor, simile, or other figure of speech which you are used to seeing in print. 

(ii) Never use a long word where a short one will do. 

(iii) If it is possible to cut a word out, always cut it out. 

(iv) Never use the passive where you can use the active. 

(v)Never use a foreign phrase, a scientific word, or a jargon word if you can think of an everyday English equivalent. 

(vi) Break any of these rules sooner than say anything outright barbarous.

Compensation 

The Public Source is firmly committed to remunerated work, despite all the challenges of operating an independent platform in Lebanon at this time. In the interest of helping us build a sustainable model of independent journalism and writing, we ask contributors to self-select one of the following based on their income, wealth, or other economic consideration. Our payment options are based on a simple model, "earn what you need." 

  • Between $100-200 (determined by the editor and author on the basis of the complexity of the text)
  • I would like to gift my fee back to the collective pool to subsidize additional work
  • I would like to gift my fee to an initiative or organization of my choice  

Once an article is published, payment is fulfilled within 30 days of the receipt of an invoice.