Submit

Submitting articles

In the context of our major redesign, only one issue will be published in 2027 (issue 10). It will be open-themed, and submissions are invited by the end of June 2027, with publication later in that year.

The Journal publishes a mixture of commissioned and unsolicited content. Prospective authors are advised to read through the information presented below, as well as our mission statement and aims, to help with preparing a submission. The submission process is handled by email. In order to initiate correspondence with us, please get in touch using our contact form.

Important notes

• To ensure that we can process your submission, please contact us early in the writing process with a bullet-pointed proposal of what you plan to cover.
• While we are looking for intellectual rigour, contributions should – owing to the breadth of topics covered within the scope of the Journal – be aimed at a non-specialist audience.
• We are particularly keen to be sent pieces with practical messages offering a ‘way forward’.
• At the time of submission please supply: [A] a short paragraph to summarize for peer reviewers how your piece is ecocentric in its approach (an essential condition for publication); [B] confirmation that your piece has not been published already in any form and is not in consideration for any other website or publication; and [C] confirmation that no generative artificial intelligence (AI) tools were used to draft, write, or substantially revise your piece.
• We are unable to accept pieces in which the references have not been formatted to our house style (see below).
• Finally, please note that we cannot pay contributors.

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Topic areas

Topics that we cover in the journal include, but are not limited to, the following. Items in bold italics are those for which we are, at present, especially keen to receive submissions, but all topics mentioned are of great importance to us as a publication.

• Animal welfare
• Animism
• Biodiversity and bioabundance
• Earth-centred law
• Ecological aesthetics and art
• Energy and climate change
• Human overpopulation and overconsumption
• Natural history and its practice
• Philosophical aspects of ecocentrism
• Practical aspects of living ecocentrically
• Protection and restoration of wilder habitats
• Religious support for protecting the ecosphere
• Urban life and its ecological potential
• Waste and toxics

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Main content types

Opinion

• 500–1000 words (the closer to 500 the better) plus up to five references
• Provides a concise viewpoint on a particular issue

Reflection

• 1000–2000 words (the closer to 1000 the better) plus up to ten references
• Offers a more developed perspective on a particular issue

Long article

• 2000–3000 words plus up to 20 references
• Considers a broader issue in a balanced fashion

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Other content types

Book review

• 750-1500 words plus up to five references

Meeting report

• 1000-2500 words plus up to five references

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Peer Review

Factors that will be taken into account in peer review will be:

• Clarity and accuracy of prose
• Novelty of the ideas presented
• Whether or not criticism is fair and constructive (and balanced with positive alternatives)
• Potential impact in meeting one or more of the journal’s aims

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Submitting Fiction

We are currently open for general submissions of eco-fiction. The process is handled by email exchange. You can submit stories to tecfiction@gmail.com. Alternatively, you can get in touch with the Fiction Editor by using our contact form.

Fiction guidance (Taylor Hood, Fiction Editor (originally by Joe Gray))

We are especially keen to be sent stories which have a plot (i.e. some causal inter-relation between goings-on), which are set on the Earth that we know, that we knew, or that we might some day experience, and which offer rich descriptions of places and characters, be they non-human or human.

Within these bounds, we have a preference for stories in which the concerns of non-human actors are conveyed without imposing a human perception and understanding of the world on them. The genuine interests of these agents, in all cases, should be more than sufficient to merit the empathy of readers.

Please note that we are NOT open to simultaneous submissions and that submissions must be no longer than 2000 words. Authors wishing to challenge themselves with shorter word counts are very much encouraged to do so. Narratives with intrigue and unexpected developments will be looked on favourably, but stories whose only real punch comes from a twist late on will not.

We generally favour stand-alone pieces, but in exceptional circumstances we will consider excerpts from longer works, such as novels. Relatedly, we have a strong preference for new pieces but will occasionally accept republications. In all cases, authors retain the copyright on their work.

Finally, and most importantly, we are looking for pieces that in some way further the ecocentric worldview. This means that while stories that place humans as central characters are welcomed, if they consider ecological issues merely, or mostly, in terms of their implications for that one species, they are unlikely to be accepted.

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Submitting Poetry

To get in touch with the Journal about submitting poetry, please use our contact form; the process will then be conducted via email. We accept submissions at any point in the year. Accepted poems will be run in the next available slot.

Poetry rationale & guidance (Victor Postnikov, Poetry Editor)

Life far exceeds humans. For millennia, ecopoets have understood it as a far greater enterprise. In their poetry, we can hear the voices of those who came long before us, who live with us, and probably will live without us. Now, however, they face extinction and die in silence, deafened by the roar of civilization. The time has come to renew the old understanding that all life, including humanity, speaks a common language.

The mission of ecocentric poetry, or ecopoetry, is to help us empathize with non-human entities, be they a whale, a tree or a mountain. For we are all kin. Through metaphor and imagery, it speaks directly to our hearts and genes. We begin to realize that we have evolved together and share a common fate. They don’t deserve to die from our greed and stupidity. Indeed, if they perish we too will die from a “great yearning of Spirit” (in Chief Seattle’s words).

To a large extent, we are still in the infancy of poetically describing ourselves as fully natural beings. Philosophically and scientifically there are ecocentric discourses, but we haven’t evolved poetically en masse, and our language is still quite poor in that respect. Or maybe we have forgotten the language that existed when, in the words of Tagore, “our forefathers lived their lives in inconceivably glorious universe departing with a sense of wonder in the eyes and devotion still intact – when every touch of universe having struck a chord in their heart-lute producing chanting melodies that were always anew”? In a similar manner, by breaking through old anthropocentric ideas and life-modes, ecopoetry discovers the richness and unfathomableness of a more-than-human world.

The change to an ecopoetic world is more complex than one might assume. It will require a change in the whole attitude to life, including language. (Whitman speaks to this.) A mindset that is bogged down in the anthropocentric limitations of present-day language is incapable of recognizing and transcending Otherness – whether of a creature or a ‘thing’ – and therefore can’t respond appropriately. The whole system of discourse must be changed, the whole system of values. And this is what ecopoetry seeks and stands for.

Robinson Jeffers, an American ecopoet of great moral stature, gives one of the best definitions of ecopoetry: “It is based on a recognition of the astonishing beauty of things and their living wholeness, and on a rational acceptance of the fact that mankind is neither central nor important in the universe; our vices and blazing crimes are as insignificant as our happiness… Turn outward from each other, so far as need and kindness permit, to the vast life and inexhaustible beauty beyond humanity. This is not a slight matter, but an essential condition of freedom, and of moral and vital sanity.”

In preparing your submission, please bear in mind the following important points:

• We are seeking poetry with an ecocentric tone.

• Poems should be concise, and we will consider at most two at one time.

• Submissions should include a short biography.

• We are not in a position to provide feedback on poems that we opt not to run.

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Submitting Art

You are advised to contact the Art Editor in advance if you would like to make a submission, with a brief description of what you plan to send through. To do this, please use our contact form. Once you have heard back from the Journal, you may be asked to send through some low-resolution examples of your work.

Art guidance (Stephanie Moran, Art Editor, and Salomón Bazbaz Lapidus, Art Advisor)

We are inviting artists to submit artworks to The Ecological Citizen and are interested in pieces on any of the themes listed below. We are seeking full-page spreads across 2–4 pages, single-page artworks and individual smaller drawings and images. We are looking for a range of artworks that fit with the ecocentric ethos of the Journal.

Artworks may relate to the Journal’s topic areas listed below, or be images of animals and other nature including but not limited to: observational drawings, landscapes of all kinds, macro and cosmic perspectives, and animal vision.

We are also looking for artists to respond to written articles with smaller drawings; please contact the Art Editor, via the contact form linked to below, if you would be interested in making work specifically in response to submitted articles.

Artworks must be suitable to place in an online journal format, to fit onto A4 pages, and should be provided in high resolution (300 dpi) at intended size for the A4 page.

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Author guidance: Structure

Please submit the text along with any tables and boxes together in a single word-processor file (.doc or .docx format), in black Times New Roman 12pt font throughout, and send through any figures as individual files.

The file should contain the following sections.

[A] Information

[B] Abstract and Keywords

• For Long Articles only: An unstructured abstract of 150–200 words, which should be written in the third person
• For all pieces: Up to five suggested keywords (please note that there is a drop-down menu of the keywords we use here)

[C] Main body

• Please write the main body of the submission in the first person
• There should not be a heading used before the first paragraph of the main body, but otherwise headings should be used liberally to break up a piece, with up to two heading levels allowed

[D] Acknowledgements

• This should include, but not be limited to, any sources of funding received by the author(s) in relation to the article

[E] Reference list

• Please format this in accordance with the house style below

[F] Tables and boxes

• Please include titles and legends along with the tables and boxes

[G] Titles and legends of figures

• The figures should be submitted as separate files from the main submission document

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Author guidance: House style

General

• Please include titles and legends along with the tables and boxes
• Abbreviations should be defined at the point of their first usage, with the full version followed by the shortened form in brackets
• Try to limit the number of abbreviations used in the submission
• Articles submitted in American English will be edited to UK English
• Write dates in the format exemplified by: ‘7 August 2016’

Figures, tables and boxes

• Please include titles and legends along with the tables and boxes
• Figures, tables and boxes should work as stand-alone items, and thus abbreviations should be defined in a legend, independently of their appearance or non-appearance in the article
• A ‘table’ has more than one column; a ‘box’ is a single-column list or a block of text
• Number figures, tables and boxes consecutively and independently, according to their first point of citation, and use ‘a’, ‘b’ and so on to denote subcomponents
• For footnote symbols, use the following order: *; †; ‡; §; ||; ¶; **; ††; ‡‡; §§; ||||; ¶¶

In-text citations

• Please include titles and legends along with the tables and boxes
• Use the name-and-year (Harvard) system for in-text citations – e.g. ‘This has been exemplified by Arnold and Barnes (2012) and also described elsewhere (Chang, 2009)’
• Where there are three or more authors, give the first author’s surname followed by: ‘and colleagues’, or an equivalent phrase, if in the flow of the text; or ‘et al.‘ if in brackets – e.g. ‘(Dravid et al., 2009)’
• Where multiple references are cited at the same point in the text, they should be ordered chronologically first, and then alphabetically – e.g. ‘(Chang, 2009; Dravid et al., 2010; Arnold and Barnes, 2012)’
• If the same author or authors have multiple publications in the same citation, each citation after the first should be given with the year only – e.g. ‘This has been demonstrated in three papers (Dravid et al., 2007; 2010; Arnold and Barnes, 2012)’
• Where direct quotations are provided, please provide the page number from the original source in the citation
• Statements supported by a personal communication should be indicated as such, including the name of the person – e.g. ‘(personal communication with Mark Franklin)’ – but not listed in the references section

Reference list

• Please include titles and legends along with the tables and boxes
• Arrange references alphabetically first (breaking ‘ties’ on the first author by using the second author, and so on), and then chronologically
• If two or more references are so similar that they would lead to duplicated in-text citations, add lower-case letters immediately after the years (starting with ‘a’ and working along in the order of the reference list), in both the reference list and the in-text citation – e.g. ‘(Day et al., 2010a; 2010b)’
• Express page ranges without redundant numerals after the dash
• Present up to two initials for each author, with hyphenated first names indicated with a hyphen

Citing journal articles

• Write journal names in full
• Format journal article citations in the style of the following example: ‘Harris AB, Harris J-M and Khan E (2021) Green economies: Determining if they are possible. Journal of Green Economies 9: 1243–8.’
• Issue numbers should not be given, but supplement details should be included, in parentheses between the volume number and the colon that follows it – e.g. ‘Journal of Green Economies 9 (Supplement 2): 13–19.’
• Papers accepted but not yet published should be included in the reference list as ‘in press’ – e.g. ‘Harris J-M (2019) Green economies: Where next? Journal of Green Economies 12: in press.’

Citing conference presentations

• Format conference-presentation citations in the style of the following example: ‘Jahani F (2018) Lessons from the front line. Presented at: 15th International Congress on Green Cities (oral 43). Freiburg, Germany, 11–13 March.’

Citing books and book chapters

• Format whole-book citations in the style of the following example: ‘White F and Moore B (2021) Being Green: What it actually means (2nd edition). Academic Press, London, UK.’
• Format single-chapter citations in the style of the following example: ‘Fisher G (2020) Green education. In: Merrington B and Kriek U, eds. Green Citizenship: An introduction. Ecological Press Inc, NY, USA: 15–32.’

Citing online materials

• Format web document citations in the style of the following example: ‘Ng F (2013) Being green. Available at https://is.gd/49X1b9 (accessed May 2021).’
• Format single-chapter citations in the style of the following example: ‘Fisher G (2020) Green education. In: Merrington B and Kriek U, eds. Green Citizenship: An introduction. Ecological Press Inc, NY, USA: 15–32.’