Handout to accompany presentation by Harold Colson, IR/PS Library
Fall 2009
This
guide outlines the research products and sites that are tapped most frequently
and successfully by
students across the IR/PS curriculum. Several
of the items highlighted here are essential to the completion
of
your upcoming assignments in this class, and nearly all of them will come into
play at some time in your
IR/PS career. Subscribed products are highlighted in yellow; you will
need proxy or VPN to access them
from off campus.
Getting
current, authoritative economic indicators for a country (or a group of
countries) is one of the most
common research needs within IR/PS, and a dozen or so publications (print,
online) here answer most of the
recurring queries. Far and away the top
two statistical sources are:
World
Development Indicators (World Bank)
Annual print edition at: IR/PS Reference HC 59.69 W62
WDI web subscription: http://uclibs.org/PID/96593
The print WDI carries recent data plus selected back years; use the web
version for time series
retrievals.
Provides 869 economic, demographic, social, and environmental statistics, some
as far back as 1960.
See full list of indicators for 2009 at:
http://go.worldbank.org/K9QNYA8260
See also Global Development Finance (GDF): http://uclibs.org/PID/129448
International
Financial Statistics (IMF)
Yearbook edition in print at: IR/PS Reference HG 3881 I6262
Current monthlies in print at: IR/PS Current Shelves HG 3881 I626
IFS web subscription: http://www.imfstatistics.org/imf
Online user guide and help page: http://ifs.apdi.net/imf/help/ifshelp.htm
The latest yearbook edition has
annual data 1997-2008; the monthlies have recent monthly and
quarterly
numbers plus annuals back to 2002. Use
the web database (covers 1948- )
for longer time
series and
extensive multi-country extractions. Provides exchange rates, balance of
payments, money
supply, total
imports and exports, GDP, population, and much more.
The IFS page includes links to our Balance of Payments Statistics (BOPS), Direction of
Trade Statistics (DOTS),
and Government Finance Statistics (GFS)
subscriptions.
Other
recurring data hunts involve these publications:
Asian Development Outlook (Asian Development Bank)
Yearbook editions in print at: IR/PS Stacks HC 411 A74
2009 edition online with country reports
and statistical appendix at:
http://www.adb.org/documents/books/ado/2009/default.asp
China Data Online
National, provincial, county, and
city statistics, plus census data
Global Financial Database (GFD)
http://www.globalfinancialdata.com
GFD
provides some 6500 historical and current financial and economic data series
from over
150 countries. 14,000 US stock price series and 3,000 global
stock price series are also available.
Many series reach back with deep data runs
to prior centuries. Easy graphing and downloading is
available on the
system.
“Human Development Indicators” data online
at: http://hdr.undp.org/en/statistics/data/
International Trade Centre (UNCTAD/WTO)
http://www.intracen.org/tradstat/welcome.htm
Gives country
and product import and export totals, 2001-2005
Key Indicators of Developing Asian and Pacific
Countries (ADB)
Print edition at: IR/PS Reference HC 411 K4
2009 edition online at: http://www.adb.org/Documents/Books/Key_Indicators/2009/default.asp
Online PDF
and XLS country tables have data for years 1990 to 2008.
Also try new Statistical Database System:
http://sdbs.adb.org
SourceOECD
Interactive subscription database of OECD
books, periodicals, and statistics.
Country coverage includes
members
Statistical Yearbook for
Print edition at: IR/PS Reference HA 1665 S73
2008 edition online at: http://www.unescap.org/stat/data/syb2008
Also time series database online at: http://www.unescap.org/stat/data/main/goalindicatorarea.aspx
Statistical Yearbook for Latin America and the
Print edition at: IR/PS Reference HA 755 A68
2008 edition online at: http://websie.eclac.cl/anuario_estadistico/anuario_2008/
Yearbook edition in print at: IR/PS Reference HF 1016 U54
Free interactive data access at: http://www.unctad.org/Templates/Page.asp?intItemID=1890
The data available from the UNCTAD
Handbook of Statistics online are structured into these
parts:
International merchandise trade, International merchandise trade by region,
International merchandise trade by
product, International merchandise trade indicators,
International trade in services,
Commodities, International finance, Development indicators
UNdata
Interactive free
database of UN and IGO country data series, including economic, social
and environmental indicators. Coverage as far back as 1944.
UN COMTRADE
http://comtrade.un.org/db/default.aspx
Detailed commodity imports and exports statistics by country,
1962-present.
World Investment Report (UNCTAD)
Yearbook
editions in print at: IR/PS Stacks HG 4538 W67
See country FDI “ Fact
Sheets” and “Profiles” with data
at:
http://www.unctad.org/Templates/Page.asp?intItemID=3198&lang=1
Free access to their interactive FDI
database at:
http://www.unctad.org/Templates/Page.asp?intItemID=3199&lang=1
We
also carry many country statistical yearbooks in the HA section of IR/PS
Reference. In addition,
national statistical offices, central banks, and government ministries in most
countries maintain websites
with varying amounts of official country data online.
These
sites can help in various ways: BMO,
EIU, and Global Insight for ready reviews of country political
and
economic developments, including investment environments and industries; Investext for quality
brokerage house reports on countries, industries, and companies; WDS and e-Library
for World Bank research
and
policy publications. The IMF
“Country Reports” include detailed reviews of economic policy issues in
certain member nations. Other
international agencies covering Latin America and Asia also offer websites
with member country data and economic surveys.
The
PDF reports in Investext can save considerable
time previously spent researching global firms
and
industries via press sources. In fact,
they contain much information that is not available to us
in
any other way!
EIU.com http://portal.eiu.com/index.asp?autologin=bulk
Global Insight
http://myinsight.globalinsight.com/servlet/cats?pageContent=home&imask=1
Business Monitor Online
http://www.businessmonitor.com/enter
Investext http://research.thomsonib.com/gaportal/?ExpressCode=univcalsd
World Development Sources (World Bank) http://www-wds.worldbank.org
World Bank e-Library http://uclibs.org/PID/129801
IMF http://www.imf.org ADB http://www.adb.org
IDB http://www.iadb.org WTO http://www.wto.org
APEC http://www.apecsec.org.sg/ ASEAN http://www.aseansec.org/
ESCAP http://www.unescap.org/ ECLAC http://www.eclac.org
Country Commercial Guides
http://www.stat-usa.gov/mrd.nsf/vwCCG_Country?OpenView&Count=-1
Country Reports on Human Rights Practices
http://www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/hrrpt/2008/index.htm
Although
weak in scholarly content, LexisNexis Academic and Factiva are by far our best products for
global journalism as drawn from thousands of general and specialty
newspapers, magazines, newsletters,
and
wire services. ISI Emerging Markets
adds hundreds of “in-country” news and industry publications,
many in languages other than English.
(Its
reports, company financials, bank and brokerage house commentaries, and other
wonders also lurk
within – try it! LADB and Latinnews.com offer weekly recaps of
political and economic developments
in
LexisNexis Academic http://www.lexisnexis.com/us/lnacademic
Factiva http://uclibs.org/PID/32497
ISI Emerging Markets http://site.securities.com
Access World News http://uclibs.org/PID/98452
Latin America Data Base (LADB) http://ladb.unm.edu
Latinnews.com http://www.latinnews.com
World News Connection (FBIS) http://wnc.dialog.com
There
is no “one-stop shopping” for scholarly literatures spanning the IR/PS
curriculum, so a proper
retrieval
strategy generally requires visits to several databases, each of which carries
particular strengths
and
weaknesses (not to mention different search interfaces). Among the products selected below for
this class, Business Source Complete and Academic Search Complete
offer the best “on-the-fly”
access to viewable article texts and images (PDF), drawn from strong sets of
academic, trade,
and general periodicals. Try the other databases as needed for extended disciplinary coverage.
Academic Search Complete - scholarly journal and general magazine coverage
from 11,000 publications; over 5000 with HTML or PDF full-text
Business Source Complete - scholarly journals, trade mags, country reports,
industry and company profiles; carries 6800 titles with HTML or PDF full-text
EconLit - economics journal articles, book chapters, papers, and dissertations
JSTOR - complete searchable backfile runs of top journals in economics,
political science, finance, business, history, sociology and other fields; most
recent 2-3 years of
titles generally not available here
PAIS International - global policy literature from journals, books, government pubs
Web of Science (SSCI) - over 7000 scholarly journals in all fields; includes law,
political science, international relations, economics, business, area studies,
development; many citations have links to our licensed e-journal content
Worldwide Political Science Abstracts - literature appearing in 1100 journals
LexisNexis Academic carries some 300
full-text law reviews in its Legal Research section; law review
articles often work well with IR/PS concerns
in trade, investment, regulation, and intellectual property.
Additional law reviews are online via Westlaw Campus: http://uclibs.org/PID/95262
The
scholarly editorial and publishing process takes months to get new manuscripts
into print, but these
two
sites organize and distribute early versions of relevant academic papers for
use now. Many, but not
all,
of these papers will eventually appear in journals or books.
CIAO - full-text international affairs papers from institutes and centers worldwide
RePEc/IDEAS - economics “working papers” worldwide; many are ready to
download here months or years prior to actual publication
SSRN - full-text papers in economics, finance, politics, management, marketing, and
more
Google Scholar - finds full-text papers from academic sites, plus references to
published articles