International Organizations Editing and Proofreading Services

Multilateral documents are written by committee in a language most of the drafters did not grow up speaking, and then negotiated word by word by delegations whose instructions conflict. The result is a genre with its own grammar: bracketed text, agreed language recycled from earlier resolutions, verbs graded by strength, and paragraphs that survive because nobody could agree on anything shorter. Working in it well means understanding that the imprecision is frequently the achievement, and knowing which imprecision is load-bearing and which is simply tired drafting.

We edit what international organisations, agencies and secretariats produce — reports to governing bodies and executive boards, resolutions, decisions and conclusions, negotiated outcome documents and chair's texts, secretariat background and information documents, evaluation and oversight reports, country and thematic programme documents, funding appeals and donor reporting, guidance and normative material for member states, technical standards and handbooks, statements and speeches for senior officials, joint communications with partner agencies, and public information and advocacy material. Our editors are used to agreed language, to house drafting conventions, and to authors writing in English as an additional language, which in this sector is most of them.

The distinction between drafting imprecision and negotiated ambiguity is the judgement that matters most in this work, and getting it wrong in either direction causes trouble. An editor who tightens "should take into account, as appropriate and in accordance with national circumstances" into something cleaner may have destroyed the formula that allowed twelve delegations to accept the paragraph. An editor who leaves every hedge untouched produces a document nobody can implement. We work by treating negotiated formulations as fixed unless you tell us otherwise, flagging rather than changing anything that looks load-bearing, and concentrating on what is genuinely fixable: inconsistent terminology across a long document, paragraphs where the subject has been lost through successive amendment, English that reads awkwardly without carrying any negotiated content, and summaries that no longer match the text they summarise. The result reads better without anybody discovering at adoption that their compromise has vanished.

Everything you send is treated in strict confidence, including documents under negotiation and material before circulation to members. We are editors rather than legal or policy advisers and offer no view on substance, mandate or interpretation. What we can do is improve clarity and consistency while leaving the negotiated architecture exactly where your delegations left it.