How to do research in Government Information and Public Policy

START WITH GOOD KEYWORDS

Topic-specific keywords will help improve your results in a general multidisciplinary database like Google, Google Scholar, HOLLIS, or Academic Search Premier.

Add keywords like these to your search:

• Statistics, directories, reports
• Geographic or administrative divisions - Shengen Area, Southeast Asia, sub-Saharan Africa 

UPGRADE YOUR SEARCH: KEY DATABASES

The best tool for your project may be a specialized search engine, also known as a database. These databases are subject-specific or format-specific search tools:

ProQuest Congressional (via HarvardKey) -- Proquest Congressional is a major source of information about the members of Congress and their legislative activities and a primary resource for accessing the many publications of Congress.

PAIS Index (via HarvardKey)  – Indexes the public and social policy literature of public administration, political science, economics, finance, international relations, law, and health care. International in scope, PAIS indexes publications in English, French, German, Italian, Portuguese, and Spanish. The database is comprised of abstracts of thousands of journal articles, books, directories, conference proceedings, government documents and statistical yearbooks.

Dig Deeper

Library staff maintain a series of research guides to various kinds of government information, from various branches, departments, and agencies of the U.S. federal government to Canada, Great Britain and intergovernmental organizations such as the United Nations.

Databases for Government, Political Science, and International Relations - explore the full list of Harvard Library databases in this subject category.

CONNECT WITH US

Hugh Truslow, Head of Social Sciences and Visualization, is available to support researchers via email or in-person consultation.