The aim of this dual special issue project—simultaneously published in two languages in two distinguished international journals (International Journal for Crime, Justice and Social Democracy and Critica Penal y Poder) —is to support the goal of Southern criminology to level inequalities in the valuing of criminological knowledge in the Global North and the Global South (Carrington, Dixon et al. 2019; Carrington, Hogg et al. 2019; Carrington, Hogg and Sozzo 2016). In opening ‘dialogues’ and collaborations between South and North, we aim to highlight the important contributions made by writers on the environment, justice and good ways of living to the democratisation of knowledge and pursuit of cognitive justice (Santos 2009, 2014, 2018).