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Define and get an overview of your topic or find definitions of key terms and concepts
- Oxford Reference (Online)
- Encyclopedia of Government and Politics (online)
- Greenwood Encyclopedia of International Relations
- Encyclopedia of International Relations and Global Politics (online)
- Beyond parliament : human rights and the politics of social change in the global south
- Citizenship and social movements perspectives from the global south
- The effects of globalization in Latin America, Africa, and Asia : a global south perspective
- Institutions of the global south
- International Relations: the key concepts JZ1160 .G75 2013 (online)
Relevant Insitutions
- IMF (International Monetary Fund)
- OECD (Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development)
- United Nations Economic and Social Council
- United Nations Conference on Trade and Development
- World Bank
- World Trade Organization
- Group of Twenty
- Government Information - Canadian or International background information
- Think Tank - search limited to think tanks dealing in public policy, including NGOs (non-governmental organizations)
- EIU.com (provides excellent coverage in 2 sections. Country reports, which provide trends and outlook information and country profiles, which provide background and statistics)
- globalEdge (University of Michigan Broad School of Business) - information by Country, Trade Bloc, Industry and by US State
- CIA The World Factbook (provides information on the history, people, government, economy, geography, communications, transportation, military and transnational issues for 266 world entities)
- Business Source Complete
Additional resources available via subject guide Country Information
Search statement
A search statement includes a list of keywords, combined using Boolean Operators (AND; OR; NOT)
- AND - this will combine concepts, all of which must be found in your list of results
- Nigeria AND oil
- OR - either this concept or that concept (or both). This is helpful for generating a list of synonyms. Use synonyms to anticipate the different ways different authors may refer to the same idea. A thesaurus can be helpful for this
- internet OR web OR online
- NOT - do not include this concept
- Mexico NOT city
- Quote marks - find a specific phrase
- "human rights"
- Truncation - any other combination of letters to follow
- canad* - will find canada, canadian, canadian's, etc.
- journalis* - will find journalism, journalist, journalistic, etc.
- Combine one or more of these operators
- Put a list of synonyms in brackets
For example:
(smartphone OR "mobile phone" OR "cell phone") AND society
Explore the following guide to learn more about how to write an outline for your essay.
News Sources
- Consult the News Guide for details of news sources
- Tips for searching newspaper databases.
For current Canadian newspapers/news
To search for a specific newspaper, choose "Journals" option in OMNI, type the exact title, then "Search inside" to retrieve articles within that single newspaper.
Search engine OMNI located on the library home page, allows you to search across many of the library's collections simultaneously. Including books, ebooks, journal titles, games, music, videos, government information, maps, and more.
- Columbia International Affairs Online
- International Political Science Abstracts
- Business Source Complete
- Scopus
- GEOBASE
- Worldwide Political Science Abstracts
See our list of recommended databases on the Political Science subject guide, which includes:
Why use journal articles?
- They are more up-to-date than most books.
- They are “peer reviewed” by other scholars in the field who check for academic integrity.
- Every article will contain cited references that appear as footnotes and/or bibliographies.
Citation
This guide provides basic information on how to cite sources and examples for formatting citations in common citation styles.
You do not need to cite common knowledge (widely-known, generally-accepted information that is not attributable to one source).
Why is Citing Sources Important?
- To give credit to ideas that are not your own
- To provide support for your argument
- To enable your reader to find and read the sources you used
- To avoid infractions
What Needs to be Cited?
- Exact wording taken from any source, including freely available websites
- Paraphrases of passages
- Summaries of another person's work
- Use of another student's work
- Use of your own previous work
- Research methods for political science : quantitative and qualitative approaches JA71.5 .M34 2010
- The political science student writer's manual JA86 .S39 2017
- Political research : an introduction (online)
- The craft of political research JA71 .S45 2017
- Writing in political science : a practical guide JA86 .S36 2005
- Writing a research paper in political science : a practical guide to inquiry, structure, and methods JA86 .B34 201
- Political theory : methods and approaches JA71 .P63 2008
