Foreign Country Information Guide

About

The following bibliography is a selective guide to information sources located in the J. Paul Leonard Library and to selected Internet sources. It is designed to facilitate research in such areas as international relations, comparative politics and international economics. Most of the materials listed in this guide are located in the Reference Area (Ref), 1st floor, or Government Publications (Govt), 5th floor.

Some databases listed in this bibliography may only be available in the Library or to SFSU students, faculty and staff outside the Library. For information about the location of, and access, to these databases, go to the Library's Database Selector page (http://www.library.sfsu.edu/find/dbs/dbselector.php) and to the guide on Off-campus Access (http://www.library.sfsu.edu/services/computers/remote.html).

For some suggestions on how to do online research to document a foreign country's position on key issues, see the Library guide on Researching Online for Countries' Positions.

For the latest information about library services and resources, go to the Library Web site (http://www.library.sfsu.edu).

Locating Books

If you wish to find books on a particular country, check InvestiGator, the library's catalog, under the name of the country as a subject. More specific subheadings can also be used, for example:

Mexico-Commerce	Mexico-Military Relations
Mexico-Description and Travel	Mexico-Relations
Mexico-Economic Conditions	Mexico-Social Conditions
Mexico-Economic Policy	Mexico-Statistics
Mexico-Foreign Economic Relations	Industry and State-Mexico
Mexico-Foreign Relations	Latin America-Maps
Mexico-History	Political Parties-Mexico
Mexico-Military Policy

You should also check the catalog under the name of the region your country belongs to and the names of relevant regional organizations, for example, "Latin America" and "North America."

To locate other subject headings consult the Library of Congress Subject Headings (located in the Reference Area), or do a keywords search on InvestiGator and see what the subject headings are. You can search InvestiGator by author, title, subject, keyword and other identifiers, and you can limit your search by date of publication, language and format.

Some books and book chapters are retrievable on the CIAO and the Oxford Scholarship Online databases.

If a book is not in the Library's collection or not "available," you may be able to request it through Link+ (http://csul.iii.com/), an online catalog for a number of California academic and public libraries.

To access CSU, UC and other online catalogs, go to the Library's Web site and select "Find...More/Other Libraries".

Country Background Sources

Background Notes (http://www.state.gov/r/pa/ei/bgn/). U.S. State Department, irregular. Basic information on countries of the world compiled by the State Department Staff. Also available on the Business Source Premier database.

Country Commercial Guides. U.S. Commerce Dept., annual. Available on the NTDB on the STAT-USA database and on the EXPORT.GOV Web site (http://www.export.gov/mrktresearch/index.asp). Provide political, business and economic profiles of countries and key statistical data. Also useful are the Country Commerce and Country Finance databases (EIU).

Country Reports on the the Business Source Premier database. Publications include: [Country name] Business Forecast Report, [Country name] Quarterly Forecast Report (Business Monitor International), [Country name] Country Monitor (Global Insight), [Country name] Country Profile (Datamonitor), [Country name] Country Review (CountryWatch), [Country name] Economic Competitiveness, [Country name] Economic Studies (ICON), Country Profile [Country name] (EIU), Country Report [Country name] (EIU) (the availability of the latter is delayed), Political Risk Yearbook: [Country name] (PRS Group). To retrieve a list of Country Report titles, search the country name in Publications (with by Subject and Description selected). You can also search the country you are interested in as a Subject (combined with other Text words as appropriate), and then look at the sources listed under the sub-category, Country Reports.

Country Reviews. Semi-annual. Available on the CountryWatch database. Includes data and political, economic, business and environmental background for each country.

Country Studies/Area Handbooks (U.S. Army/American University field Staff). Irregular. Publication suspended due to budget cuts. Location: Main Collection. Useful compendia on countries of strategic interest to the U.S. Recent area handbooks are listed by title in the online catalog under the name of the country, with the subtitle, "A Country Study" (eg, China: A Country Study). The latest Country Studies are also available on the Library of Congress Web site and are now being updated by the shorter Country Profile series: http://lcweb2.loc.gov/frd/cs/.

Culturegrams: the Nations around Us. 4 vols. Orem, UT: Axiom Press, annual. (Ref GT 150 C85). Includes information about cultural norms. Published in partnership with Brigham Young University.

EIU Viewswire database, 2003- . Analytical and statistical extracts from EIU publications such as their Country Reports. Viewswire and other Economist Intelligence Unit publications are also searchable on the Factiva database (Viewswire coverage there more selective but more current and goes further back in time).

Encyclopaedia Britannica and Book of the Year.
(Ref AE5 E364 & Encyclopaedia Britannica Online). The online version (called Encyclopaedia Britannica Online) includes articles and data from the Encyclopaedia, multimedia and links to other Web sites.

Europa World Yearbook: A World Survey. London: Europa Publications, annual. (Ref JN 1 E85). A 2-volume set on international organizations and countries of the world. The following regions have separate yearbooks: Africa South of the Sahara (Ref DT 351 A37), South America, Central America, and the Caribbean (Ref F 1406.5 S68x), The Far East & Australasia (Ref DS 1 F3), The Middle East and North Africa (Ref DS 49 M5), Western Europe (Ref D 967 W47x), Central and South-Eastern Europe (Ref HC 244 E224x) and Eastern Europe, Russia and Central Asia (Ref HC 244 E225x).

International Year Book and Statesmen's Who's Who. London: Information Services Ltd., annual. (Ref JA 51 I57). Covers information on international organizations and political, statistical, and directory information about each country of the world. A biographical section gives sketches of world leaders in government, church, commerce, industry, and education.

ISI Emerging Markets database. Macroeconomics section. Data, forecasts and analysis for Latin American, Central and East European and selected Asian, African and Middle Eastern countries.

The Statesman's Yearbook: Statistical and Historical Annual of the States of the World for the Year... New York: St. Martin's, annual. (Ref JA 51 S7). Contains basic descriptive and statistical information about the governments of the world. Useful bibliographic references are given for each country.

World Guide. Oxford: New Internationalist Publications, biennial. (Ref HC 59.69 .G843). Includes topical narratives and data as well as a country specific section (all from developing countries' perspective).

Worldmark Encyclopedia of the Nations. 11th ed. Detroit: Gale, 2004. 6 vols in 1. (http://opac.sfsu.edu/search/i?SEARCH=0787677736). The latest edition (12th ed., 2007) is available on the Opposing Viewpoints database. An encyclopedia of geographic, historical, political, social and economic information on countries. Volume 1 treats the United Nations system. Volume 6 profiles World Leaders.

News Sources

Annual Register: A Record of World Events. London: Longman, Green, annual. (Ref D 2 A7). Discusses events of the year by geographic region. Treats subjects such as arts, literature, politics, religion, science and technology and includes important documents. Another useful source for the text of important documents is Historic Documents (Ref E 839.5 H57).

Keesing's Record of World Events. (Ref Index). Summarizes news about countries and international issues.

The BBC Country Profiles (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/country_profiles/default.stm) and the Guardian World News Guide (http://www.guardian.co.uk/worldnewsguide/) provide useful links to major Internet news sources arranged by country.

For a more complete list of news sources, look at the News and Opinion research guide.

Political Parties and Constitutions

Constitutions of Nations. Rev. 3rd ed. The Hague: Nijhoff, 1965-1970.4 v. in 7. (Ref JF 11 P427). Provides texts of constitutions of all countries in English. Constitutions are grouped by continents: v. 1: Africa, v. 2: Asia, Australia, Oceana (2 vols.) (Ref K 3157 E5 P4 1984), v. 3: Europe (2 vols), v. 4: The Americas (2 vols.).

Constitutions of the World. Ed. by Robert L. Maddex. Washington, D.C.: Congressional Quarterly, 1995. (Ref K 3157 E5 M33). Analyses the major features of the constitutions of 80 countries.

Encyclopedia of World Political Systems. By J. Denis Derbyshire and Ian Derbyshire. 2 vols. New York: St. Martin's Press, 2000. (Ref JF 51 D465). Provides comparative analysis as well as country-by-country profiles.

Political Handbook of the World. Issued in cooperation with the Council on Foreign Relations. Binghamton, N.Y.: CSA Publications, annual. (Ref JF 37 P6). Contains articles on political developments in each country as well as an overview of current political issues for the previous year. Also includes a chronology of world events.

Political Parties of the World. 6th ed. London: John Harper, 2005. (Ref JF 2051 D39). Treats the officially recognized political parties in each country. Companion to Revolutionary and Dissident Movements (Ref JC328.3 .D43 2004).

World Encyclopedia of Parliaments and Legislatures. Ed. by Thomas Kurian. 2 vol. Washington, DC: Congressional Quarterly, 1998. (Ref JF 511W67).

World Encyclopedia of Political Systems and Parties. 3rd ed. Ed. by George E. Delury. 3 vols. New York: Facts on File, 1999. (Ref JF 2011 W67).

To locate other constitutions on the Internet, connect to foreign and international law sites such as those listed at the end of this bibliography, or search Internet search engines such Google and Ask.com using the search terms COUNTRY NAME and CONSTITUTION.

Statistical Sources

The following is a very selective list of statistics sources. For a more complete list, look at the Foreign Country Statistics research guide and search the LexisNexis Statistical database and the OFFSTATS Web site (http://www.library.auckland.ac.nz/subjects/stats/offstats/).

CountryWatch database. "Country Review" and "Data." Some comparative country data also available on the CIAO database.

Economist Pocket World In Figures. London: Penguin, annual. (Ref HA 155 E268).

International Monetary Fund. International Financial Statistics, annual with supplements. (Govt Desk; monthlies in Pers and Govt: IIS fiche 3840-P5).

Penguin State of the World Atlas. 7th ed. London: Penguin, 2003. (Ref G1021 S65).

United Nations Development Programme. Human Development Report, annual. (Govt Desk HD72 H85).

U.S. Central Intelligence Agency. World Factbook, annual. (Govt Desk: PrEx3.15:year and https://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/index.html).

World Bank. World Development Indicators. (Govt Desk HC59.69 .S63 and Govt database) and World Development Report (Govt Desk). Selected World Bank data available at: http://www.worldbank.org/data.

In addition, several sources lead to the Web sites of foreign countries' National Statistical Offices: for example, PSU Libraries' National Statistical Agencies and Offices links (http://www.libraries.psu.edu/socialsciences/international/statoffices.htm), University of Michigan's Foreign Government Data Sources (http://www.lib.umich.edu/govdocs/stforeig.html) and the UN Statistics Division's National Statistical Systems links (http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/inter-natlinks/sd_natstat.htm).

Military and Armaments Sources

The Military Balance. London: The International Institute for Strategic Studies, annual. (Ref UA 15 M56x and online).
An annual quantitative assessment of the military power and defense expenditures of the countries of the world. They also publish an annual Strategic Survey (U 162 S77 and online).

SIPRI Yearbook: World Armaments and Disarmament. Oxford: Oxford University Press, annual. (Ref UA 10 S2). Tracks statistics and trends.

U.S. Library of Congress. Congressional Research Service. Conventional Arms Transfers to Developing Nations, annual.
One of several useful U.S. government publications available at http://www.fas.org/asmp/resources/govtdocs.htm.

A good place to begin research on the Internet is with the International Relations and Security Network (http://www.isn.ethz.ch/).

Dictionaries, Directories, and Compendia of Documents

Basic Documents in International Law. 5th ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002. (Ref KZ 64 B37). One of a number of compendia that provide the text of basic international law documents.

Chiefs of State and Cabinet Members of Foreign Governments. (Govt PrEx3.11/2 & https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/world-leaders-1/index.html). A list with bimonthly updates.

Encyclopedia of Associations: International Organizations Volume. Detroit: Gale, annual. (Ref AS 7 E52x and available on Gale's Ready Reference Shelf database).

Encyclopedia of International Relations and Global Politics. Edited by Martin Griffiths. New York: Routledge, 2005. (Ref JZ1160 .E53). A useful encyclopedic dictionary.

Encyclopedia of the United Nations and International Agreements. 3rd ed. New York: Routledge, 2003. 4 vols. (Ref KZ 4968 O84). Contains information on the U.N. and on international agreements, organizations and terminology. In many cases includes the text of documents and bibliographies.

Historic Documents. Washington, DC: Congressional Quarterly, annual. (Ref E839.5 .H57). Focus on US primary source documents, but includes key foreign and international texts.

Oxford Companion to Politics of the World. 2nd ed. New York: Oxford Univ.Press, 2001. (Ref JA 61 O95). Medium size entries on concepts and countries. Includes bibliographies.

Sage eReference Encyclopedias database. Includes the Encyclopedia of Governance, the Encyclopedia of Human Geography, the Encyclopedia of Terrorism, Encyclopedia of United States National Security, the Encyclopedia of World Poverty.

Locating Periodical Articles and Other Research

Periodicals provide current information on countries and regions and studies on very specific topics. Most periodicals are located on the second floor arranged in alphabetical order by shelving title. Current issues are in the Current Periodicals Area or online. Back issues are in bound form, online or in microformat. To determine if the library has a periodical title, check InvestiGator, the online catalog, and the Library's Electronic Journal List. If you already have a citation to an article from a footnote, bibliography or other source, you can use the Citation Lookup Tool (http://sfx.calstate.edu:9003/sfsu/cgi/core/citation-linker.cgi) to find the article.

To determine if other local libraries have a periodical, check their online catalog (many local online catalogs are accessible from the Library's Web site (http://www.library.sfsu.edu) under "Find...More/Other Libraries".

To identify articles and other research on your subject, use indexes and abstracts. The print indexes and abstracts are shelved in alphabetical title order in the Reference Area, except as noted. To access the indexes in electronic (database) format, go to the Library's home page (http://www.library.sfsu.edu) and select "Find...Articles & Databases". For suggestions about Locating Scholarly Journal Articles, go to http://www.library.sfsu.edu/research/guides/ir-scholarly-journals.html. Good places to check to see if a particular periodical is available in one of the Library's full text databases are the Library's Electronic Journal List (http://sfx.calstate.edu:9003/sfsu/a-z/default) and CUFTS (http://lib-cufts.lib.sfu.ca/CUFTS/sbt.cgi). Most of the indexes in electronic format are also available via off-campus access. The most useful indexes and abstracts are:

ABI/Inform Global database, 1971-
Academic Search Premier (EBSCOHost) database, dates vary
Air University Library. Index to Military Periodicals, 1962- . 1988- searchable at
   http://www.dtic.mil/dtic/aulimp/search.html.
   Also useful is SCAMPI (Staff College Automated Military Periodicals Index)
   http://www.dtic.mil/dtic/scampi/search.html.
Alt-PressWatch database, dates vary.
Alternative Press Index, 1969- .
America: History and Life, 1964- (for U.S. and Canada). Searchable as a database, 1964- .
Bibliography of Asian Studies (BAS) database, 1971- .
Business Source Premier database, dates vary.
CIAO (Columbia International Affairs Online) database, 1991- .
Contemporary Women's Issues database, 1992- .
CountryWire, current year. Real time newswire on the CountryWatch database.
EconLit database, 1969- .
EIU Viewswire database, 2003- .
Ethnic NewsWatch database, dates vary.
Factiva (Dow Jones & Reuters), dates vary.
Guide: http://www.library.sfsu.edu/research/instruction/lndjcommands.html.
GenderWatch database, mid-1970s- .
Geography database, 1990- . Includes International Development Abstracts.
Google Scholar.
   http://www.library.sfsu.edu/find/scholar.html
HAPI (Hispanic American Periodicals Index). Searchable as a database, 1970- .
Handbook of Latin American Studies, 1935- . Also available at http://lcweb2.loc.gov/hlas.
Historical Abstracts, Part B (20th Century), 1971- . Searchable as a database, 1955- .
IngentaConnect database, 1988- (Including article alert and article delivery services).
Index Islamicus database, 1906-
International Index to Black Periodicals database, 1900-
International Political Science Abstracts, 1951- .
ISI Emerging Markets database, dates vary.
JSTOR database, dates vary, but extensive retrospective coverage.
LexisNexis Academic databases for the latest news articles in print,
   broadcast and newswire sources, for foreign news sources and for international law sources.
Guide: http://www.library.sfsu.edu/research/instruction/lndjcommands.html.
Middle East: Abstracts and Index, 1978-.
Middle Eastern & Central Asian Studies database, 1900-
OxResearch database, 1986- .
P.A.I.S. International, 1915-2005.
Project Muse database, dates vary.
ProQuest Dissertations & Theses database, 1861- .
ProQuest Newspapers and ProQuest Historical Newspapers databases, dates vary.
RAMBI (Index of Articles on Jewish Studies) database (http://jnul.huji.ac.il/rambi).
Readers Guide to Periodical Literature, 1900- . Searchable as a database, 1890-1982.
Social Sciences Citation Index. Searchable as the Web of Science database, 1956- .
Social Sciences Index, 1974- . Searchable as a database 1907-1984.
Sociological Abstracts database, 1963- .
United States Political Science Documents, 1975-1989.
Worldwide Political Science Abstracts database, 1975- .

Newspaper articles are also an excellent source of current and highly specific information on countries. For a list of newspaper and television news indexes and Internet news sources, see the News and Opinion research guide.

Borrowing Items from Other Libraries

If a book is not in the Library's collection or not "available," you may be able to request it through Link+ (http://csul.iii.com/), an online catalog for a number of California academic and public libraries. If our library does not own the periodical, book or other publication you need, you may request that Document Delivery Services obtain a photocopy of an article or borrow the book from another library. Document Delivery Services is located in the Circulation Services area, 1st floor. Subsidized self-service document delivery for selected articles not in the library collection is available through the IngentaConnect database. For more information about these services (including online order forms), go to the Library's Web site (http://www.library.sfsu.edu) and select "Borrowing Items from Other Libraries". If you would rather visit another library in person, you can connect to the online catalogs of local libraries from the Library's Web site under "Find...More/Other Libraries".

Government Publication Sources

The Government Publications Department will be closed during the Library building project, but you can request materials that are not available in the Reference/Research Assistance Collection.

Government Publications on the 5th floor collects many useful and current publications on foreign countries. For more information about the department and for links to selected government Web sites, go the Library's home page (http://www.library.sfsu.edu) and select "About the Library...Departments/Collections/Government Information," and look at the research guide on Government Information. To locate government publications it is generally necessary to use subject indexes such as those listed below. To access the indexes that are available in database form, go to the Library home page (http://www.library.sfsu.edu) and select "Find...Articles & Databases".

FBIS (Foreign Broadcast Information Service) translates foreign print and broadcast news sources and government statements. The older Foreign Broadcast Information Service translations are in Government Publications on microfiche; the full text of these older reports from selective regions are also available online on the Foreign Broadcast Information Service (FBIS) Daily Reports database. Foreign Broadcast Information Service (FBIS) Index (online database, 1975-1996) indexes the microfiche. Later FBIS Publications are available on CD-ROM (check Investigator for holdings). Another useful (and more current) translation service is BBC Monitoring (formerly Summary of World Broadcasts) which is available on the LexisNexis Academic and the ProQuest Newspapers databases.

GPO database, 1976- .
Corresponds to the (Monthly) Catalog of U.S. Government Publications, 1895- (print index continued by database).

LexisNexis Congressional database (includes selected full text documents), and CIS (Congressional Information Service Index) Index, 1970- . Index U.S. congressional hearings and reports; recent hearings are catalogued on InvestiGator. Also useful for locating the full text of Congressional hearings and presidential and State Department briefings are the Federal News Service and CQ Transcriptions on the LexisNexis Academic and the Factiva (Dow Jones & Reuters) databases.

AccessUN (Index to United Nations Documents and Publications) database, 1966- .
A very comprehensive index to U.N. publications (including proceedings and periodical articles). An even more useful index to UN and related publications is UNBISnet (http://unbisnet.un.org/).

Index to Proceedings (of the General Assembly, Security Council, Economic and Social Council, Trusteeship Council), 1946- (dates vary).
Indexes the United Nations official records.

For a more complete list of United Nations indexes, databases and reference sources, take a look at the research guide on United Nations Publications.

MELVYL® Catalog (U.C. online catalog) or WorldCat (OCLC online catalog). Useful for searching for publications of international government organizations and foreign governments.

ASI (American Statistics Index), 1974- . Indexes U.S. government publications which include statistics.

IIS (Index to International Statistics), 1983- . Indexes publications of international organizations which include statistics.

SRI (Statistical Reference Index), 1980- . Indexes non-federal U.S. publications which include statistics.

All three of the above indexes are searchable as the LexisNexis Statistical database which includes selected full text publications. Take a look at the guide on Locating Sources found in this database (http://www.library.sfsu.edu/research/instruction/statuniv.html).

Most recent government publications in the Library collection are searchable on InvestiGator. (Some older documents are only listed in the Government Publications card catalog.) Many recent government publications are also now available on the Internet; you may want to look them up on search engines such as Google.

You will find many additional government publications only by searching the indexes/databases above. Be sure and ask for help at the Research Assistance Reference Desk or the Government Publications Desk if you are not sure how to locate publications you've found through searching these indexes/databases.

Publications in the main Government Publications collection are shelved in the following order:

  US government publications shelved by Superintendent of Documents (SD or SUDOC) number

  International governmental organization documents shelved by Agency name and then Title

  UN Official Records shelved by UN document number

  Other UN documents with document numbers shelved by number

  UN documents without document numbers shelved by Agency name and then Title

  Documents of international governmental organizations whose name files alphabetically after United Nations shelved by Agency name and then Title

International organization publications: many publications of international organizations (e.g., U.N. Economic Commissions, OECD, World Bank) are available in the IIS microfiche collection, not the Government Collection. If you do not find a publication of an international governmental organization online or listed in InvestiGator or in the Government Publications card catalog, be sure to look the title up in the IIS Index or the LexisNexis Statistical database to see if it is in the IIS microfiche.

Other Research Guides

The library publishes a number of other useful research guides. Ask at the Research Assistance Reference Desk or the Government Publications Desk for the following:

Citing References
Foreign Country Statistics
International Law--A Checklist
International Marketing
Maps and Atlases
News and Opinion
Political Science
United Nations Publications

Foreign Country/ International Affairs Internet Sites

The sites listed below lead to some of the best Web sites for international relations research. To do keyword searching of the Internet, use Internet search engines such as those listed on the Library Web site under "Find/under Find Tools select Other Tools" (http://www.library.sfsu.edu/find/searchtools.html) and The BEST Search Engines (http://www.lib.berkeley.edu/TeachingLib/Guides/Internet/SearchEngines.html). CAUTION: anyone can post information on the Internet; find out more about how to evaluate Web sites: Evaluating Web Pages (http://www.lib.berkeley.edu/TeachingLib/Guides/Internet/Evaluate.html).

Virtual Library: International Affairs
http://www.etown.edu/vl/

Google's Top International Relations Sites
http://directory.google.com/Top/Science/Social_Sciences/Political_Science/International_Relations/

International Documents Task Force Web Links
http://www.ala.org/ala/godort/taskforces/internationaldocuments/links.htm

Foreign Governments and International Governmental Organizations (Northwestern Univ. Library)
http://www.library.northwestern.edu/govpub/resource/internat/foreign.html
http://www.library.northwestern.edu/govpub/resource/internat/igo.html

Governments on the WWW
http://www.gksoft.com/govt

University of Michigan Documents Center
http://www.lib.umich.edu/govdocs/

Intute: Social Sciences (formerly SOSIG World Resources)
http://www.intute.ac.uk/socialsciences/

Offical WEB Locator for the United Nations System of Organizations (and other International Organizations)
http://www.unsystem.org

ISA's Directory of Internet Resources
http://isanet.ccit.arizona.edu/netsources.html

Law Library of Congress Nations of the World
http://www.loc.gov/law/guide/nations.html

Foreign and International Law Internet Sites
http://www.library.sfsu.edu/research/guides/international-law.html#intlaw

Map Collection (Univ. of Texas at Austin)
http://www.lib.utexas.edu/maps/

World Affairs Council Library
http://www.itsyourworld.org/library/

Yahoo's foreign and international links
http://www.yahoo.com/government/countries
http://www.yahoo.com/government/international_organizations

(Rev. 6/19/08 AK)