The International Law News is interested in content that falls into several different categories. First, we are happy to consider short briefings, around 150 words, which provide readers with a quick insight on current events, such as a recent court decision, new legislation or an important policy announcement. Second, we welcome articles, around 750 – 1,000 words, which provide readers with practical analysis and advice that they can use in their practices. Finally, in appropriate cases, we will publish longer-form content that offers a deeper analysis of a particular topic and includes a modest amount of footnotes and references to other sources in order to provide readers with a full picture of the topic and ideas about how to incorporate the analysis into their work. Longer-form content should not be a small law review article, but does provide contributors with an opportunity to discuss more complex matters. Long-form content should not exceed 2,500 words unless an exception is approved in advance by the Editor-in-Chief.
The International Law News is scheduled to be published quarterly during the second week of January, April, July and October, although consideration is being given to publishing more frequently depending on demand and the development of a reliable pipeline of contributors. In that regard, we are open to ideas for regular contributions on a particular topic that can run in each issue. A submitted piece could take anywhere from a few days to a few months to move from submission to publication, depending on the nearest publication date, available peer reviews, length of piece, and editorial calendar, though it’s best to plan for about a month’s turn-around time. Contributors are strongly urged to provide us with at least one month to review and edit a submission (e.g., submissions for the April issue should be delivered by the end of February); however, we also welcome communications letting us know that a submission will be made so that we can plan our editorial calendar.
Content should be submitted to Alan Gutterman, the current Editor-in-Chief of the International Law News, at [email protected]. Please submit your article as an MS Word file or an RTF file, via an e-mail attachment. At this time, Alan will review the submissions and determine, at his sole discretion, when they are accepted and what editorial changes might be appropriate. Eventually we will form an Editorial Board to assist in those activities and we welcome volunteers who would be interested in actively editing content to conform it to our guidelines. Among the factors that will be considered when submissions are reviewed are relevance, value, originality, timeliness, accuracy of law, quality and consistency with our guidelines. We present a variety of topics to readers, and so submissions may be rejected because of overlap with others already accepted. While we do not reprint republished articles, we are willing to work with contributors to re-purpose client alerts. A submission does not guarantee the piece will be published. Please note that because of deadline pressures, you may not see the final digital version until the submission is published.
All submissions should conform to the following guidelines:
- Our standard reference books are Webster's Collegiate Dictionary (for spelling and hyphenation); The Chicago Manual of Style (for all style, punctuation, and capitalization matters in written text as well as general rules of book making); A Uniform System of Citation (the Blue Book—for citation forms in endnotes) and The Elements of Style (by Strunk and White). Note that Blue Book rules apply only to citations.
- Always use endnotes (as few as possible) and do not bury information in the endnotes (endnotes should consist almost exclusively of citations). Minimize spot citations; in other words, Id. is not that important.
- Include two or three biographical sentences for each author.
In the event that a submission does not comply with the guidelines, it will be returned to the author for review and correction.
When making a submission for an article or long-form content, please provide a short summary (two sentences). In addition, all submissions should be accompanied by a short biographical statement, two or three sentences, that will be published along with the submission.
If a submission is accepted for publication, authors are expected to sign a publication agreement granting the ABA the right of first publication (a submission cannot be published unless and until such an agreement is signed).
