Political Science

Grey literature is an important source of information for research in public policy that:

• adds a valuable global perspective
• provides detailed overviews on specific populations
• may be only source of local information

Grey literature is defined as "information produced on all levels of government, academics, business and industry in electronic and print formats not controlled by commercial publishing" ie. where publishing is not the primary activity of the producing body." —ICGL Luxembourg definition, 1997. Expanded in New York, 2004

Library resources

• Grey Literature Guide
• Omni (the Library's main search box) (change Content Type to types of grey literature such as government documents, conference proceedings etc.)
• Dissertations and Theses Global
• Google Scholar (change country, for example, to find international material)
• Databases such as Canadian Business & Current Affairs and Web of Science
• Business Source Complete (select publication type "Grey literature")
• Think Tanks guide

Government Information

• Canadian Government guide
• Canadian federal government documents

News Sources

Consult the News Guide for details of news sources. Tips for searching.

For current Canadian newspapers/news

• Canadian Newsstream
• Eureka.cc
• Factiva
• Nexis Uni

For historical Canadian & other newspapers

• Globe and Mail: Canada's Heritage from 1844
• New York Times Archives
• Toronto Star: Pages of the Past
• Times Digital Archive

Policy Policy Collections and Working Papers

• Policy Commons
• Canadian Public Documents Collection (1996-2019) - Canadian public policy, health and medical research.
• Conference Board of Canada eLibrary - Centre for the North, Centre for Food in Canada, How Canada Performs, etc.
• National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) Working Papers
• Policy File Index - Indexes research in U.S. public policy.
• Brookings Institute
• Social Research and Demonstration Corporation - develops, field tests, and rigorously evaluates new programs
• Think Tank Search from Harvard Kennedy School
• Think Tanks and Policy Centres

Dissertations

• Dissertations and Theses Global
• Theses Canada/Thèses Canada
• Dissertations and Theses@Carleton
• EThOS
• Foreign Doctoral Dissertations

Further Grey Literature resources

• GreyNet International directory of organizations in grey literature
• Grey Matters
• Grey Literature Database - Canadian Evaluation Society

Thesis & Dissertation Writing Guides

• Mapping your thesis; the comprehensive manual of theory and techniques for masters and doctoral research
• Doing dissertations in politics a student guide (online)
• Research literacies and writing pedagogies for masters and doctoral writers (online)

• The political science student writer's manual

How to write a literature review

• SAGE Research Methods (supports beginning and advanced researchers throughout a research project, from writing a research question, choosing a method, gathering and analyzing data, to writing up and publishing the findings)

What is a Literature Review?

• Conducting a Literature Review
• Am I the Only One Struggling to Write a Literature Review? (Sage Research Methods)

What are the Purposes of a Literature Review?

• situate your work in its discipline/area/subfield
• develop an understanding of how knowledge in your discipline/field/area has changed over time
• develop mastery of what's known in your area, and part of the larger discipline that contains it
• compare different conceptual or sub-disciplinary approaches to your topic
• compare and contrast different theoretical schools or leading researchers in your area
• identify methodologies that you might use in your work

Keep Track of your searches

• Literature Reviews: Keep Track (UBC)

Citation searching: find missing citations, track references and find related articles

• Excellent step-by-step guide for using Web of Science for tracking citations

Tips for effective searching

If you find one relevant article for your research it can lead to other relevant papers by the following:

• using the databases, including Omni, look to find all papers & books published by the author or co-authors
• explore the bibliography in the paper for sources
• using Web of Science or Scopus, look for articles that cite the article you found. Remember, some databases will also list citing articles but those lists are limited to the current database. The Web of Science and Scopus are more comprehensive, with coverage from multiple databases.
• Remember to see if an citing article has itself been cited.

Web of Science
Select Cited Reference Search from top tool bar.
You have the article
Burstein, P. 2003 "The impact of public opinion on public policy: A review and an agenda." Political Research Quarterly Volume: 56 Issue: 1 Pages: 29-40

Enter the author in cited author box
Burstein P* (use surname, first initial and truncation symbol)
Retrieve abbreviation of journal name from list provided, and enter year of publication. POLIT RES QUART
Enter cited year: 2003

From the list, select the ariticle and click on Finish Search at the top of the list.
Results show the article has been cited 410 times - the most recent in 2019.

Note the option Create Alert to be notified of any future citing of this article.

Scopus
Choose Author Search from top tool bar.
Enter author's name and affiliation if known
Onwuegbuzie, Anthony John
Select displayed result. All published articles by the author will be listed. Click on article for citing references.

Onwuegbuzie, Anthony John and Nancy L. Leech, "Validity and qualitative research: An oxymoron?" Quality and Quantity Volume 41, Issue 2, April 2007, Pages 233-249. This article, published in 2007, has been cited 228 times, the most recent in 2019.

Google Scholar also tracks how many times an item is cited by other documents

Journal Ranking

Journal Citation Reports - Provides citation-based metrics to rank journal within a given discipline. Choose Select Categories and limit by subject areas such as:

• Public Administration
• Economics
• Political Science

Additional resources

• Conducting a Literature Review (Carleton University guide)
• How to write a literature review (Concordia University Libraries)
• Literature reviews (University of N. Carolina, Chapel Hill)
• Conducting research literature reviews : from the Internet to paper Q180.55.M4 F56 2010
• Doing your literature review : traditional and systematic techniques H62 .J44 2011
• How to research Q180.55.M4 B59 2010 [chapter 4]
• Information skills : finding and using the right resources ZA3075 .G75 2010 [chapter 2]
• The literature review : a step-by-step guide for students LB2369 .R525 2012
• Social research methods : qualitative and quantitative approaches HM571 .N48 2011 [chapter 5]
• Systematic approaches to a successful literature reviewLB1047.3 .B6 2012
• Telling a research story: writing a literature review LB2389.F43 2009
• Writing literature reviews : a guide for students of the social and behavioral sciences H62 .G35 2017​
• Information skills: finding and using the right resources ZA3075 .G75 2010
• The postgraduate research handbook : succeed with your MA, MPhil, EdD and PhD LB 2371.W576 2008