COLLECTIONS:

Special Collections

University Archives

Collection Preservation

Research Collections:
Political Science Collection

Collection Overview
Development of the political science collection follows the research and teaching emphases of the Political Science Department. The needs of the department have required the maintenance of a strong collection of monographs and documentary series, and also a strong collection of periodicals. The collection supports advanced study in the areas of American politics, comparative politics, international politics and political theory. The strongest area of emphasis in both the graduate program and in the collection is political philosophy, with emphasis on Greek, German, English and French political philosophy. American politics remains strong, and strength in the area of the judiciary has grown alongside of earlier emphases on the political institutions of the presidency and Congress. Supporting this area are the papers of Thomas P. O'Neill, Jr., the Rev. Robert F. Drinan, S.J., Edward Boland and Margaret Heckler in the Congressional Archives of the John J. Burns Library. The O'Neill Chair in American Politics has strengthened teaching in that area. There has been a recent growth in emphasis on public policy, especially dealing with environment and health. The collection also supports the research of the many students who are attracted to international politics at the M.A. level. There is also interest in political history. East Asian and Latin American politics are additional areas of growing emphasis. Approval plans for the major European languages support research. Electronic indexes and full text databases are playing an increasingly important role in collections.

Robert Bruns
Political Science Bibliographer
1-617-552-4832
E-Mail: bruns@bc.edu

Selected Resources

In the O'Neill Library:

• In political theory, sources include the collected works and critical editions of the major Western philosophers, including those political philosophers such as Xenophon, Socrates, Aristotle, Bacon, Machiavelli, Hobbes, Montesquieu, Hume, Locke, Rousseau, Adam Smith, Nietzsche and Marx; recent political science courses have been devoted to these thinkers.

• In American politics, sources include such documentary series as presidential papers and documents, Congressional papers and documents, Massachusetts documents, U.S. Reports, recent and historical census reports, the microfilmed holdings of the presidential libraries going back to Franklin Roosevelt (with the exception of the Kennedy Library, which students are expected to consult locally), polling and voting information, the ICPSR (Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research) datafile, and national party documents and convention proceedings.

• In comparative politics, recent parliamentary documents for Great Britain and Ireland are on the shelves (Ireland and Northern Ireland going back to the 1920's), and in microform; also in microform the British Labour Party archives, the archives of the Trades Union Congresses, the Northern Ireland Political Literature collection, British treasury documents, the Public Record Office documents, Austrian archives, Nazi Party papers, and several series of Russian documents and newspapers. For research on early North America and Europe, the large microform sets Early English Periodicals, Early English Books, Early American Imprints, American Periodicals Series and Eighteenth Century serve as aids to research. Microfilmed documents on selected countries of Latin America, Asia, and Africa aid research in comparative politics for those areas.

• In international politics, the major documentary series for the United States and Europe are on shelf and in microform. Also in microform are the League of Nations and United Nations documents. Documents on selected foreign countries, events, and individuals also strengthen collections. For example, there are extensive print and microfilm holdings on the Vietnam War.

• There are extensive holdings in philosophical and political science journal literature.

• Indexes on CD-ROM: Database of Classical Bibliography (L'année philologique), International Medieval Bibliography, Urbadisc, Wellesley Index to Victorian Periodicals 1824-1900.

• Full text databases on CD-ROM: CETEDOC Library of Christian Latin Texts; Dictionary of American Biography; Thesaurus Linguae Graecae; Thomae Aquinatis Opera Omnia..

On the Web (Restricted to the BC Community):

• Subject indexes to the literature:  ABC Political Science (389 core journals in political science), GPO (1976-) (index to government publications), ICPSR (Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research) (index to the world's largest archive of computerized social science data), PAIS International (public affairs 1972- in a variety of journals), Philosopher's Index.

• General indexes: Article First (index of articles from 12,600 journals 1990-), Dissertation Abstracts Online, Expanded Academic Index ASAP (academic and popular journals 1980- with some full text), FRANCIS Bulletin Signalétique (indexes 3,699 journals in European languages), Index to Early American Periodicals 1700-1850 (indexes the periodicals contained in the microfilm set American Periodicals Series), Index to Theses (Great Britain and Ireland), Hispanic American Periodicals Index (indexes articles on U.S. Hispanic and Latin American topics in English, French, German, Italian, Portuguese and Spanish for more than 400 scholarly journals worldwide, 1970-),  Periodical Contents Index (PCI) (over 3,000 scholarly journals in several Western languages from their first issues to the present), Poole's Plus ("The Digital Index of the Nineteenth Century" includes an electronic version of  Poole's Index to Periodical Literature and a number of other indexes), Readers Guide Abstracts (popular journals 1983-), Social Science Citation Index (Web of Science), Uncover Reveal (over 18,000 recent multidisciplinary journals, fax copies for a fee, automated alert service).

• Full text databases: Access UN (1966-) (UN documents and publications full text from 1966 to recent months), Alt-Health Watch (full text and image database of 160 international publications on health care), CIAO (Columbia International Affairs Online) (full text reports from think tanks and full text books), Congressional Universe (Congressional publications indexed 1970-, full text of Congressional reports, documents, prints, bills, Congressional Record, transcripts of prepared testimony and selected questions and answers 1988- , and others), Lexis-Nexis Academic Universe (recent full text news, business, legal, medical and reference materials), Patrologia Latina Database, Past Masters, World News Connection (translations of foreign news).

• Full text electronic journals: electronic journals in political science may be found at the following e-journal gateways: JSTOR and Project Muse.

Research Guides
More information about available resources can be found in the following resource guide: Political Science.

Interdisciplinary Elements of Subject Area
While the area of political science is well defined by the Library of Congress classification schedule of "J," there are many other classification areas with items of interest to political scientists. The classification "K." or law, which is an area collected extensively by the Law Library, also has areas of interest collected in O'Neill such as those areas dealing with constitutional law or the judiciary. Political scientists interested in political philosophy are attracted to the "B," or philosophy section, or they may be attracted to the classics in the "D" or "PA" sections. History sections having various Library of Congress classifications for individual countries in the "Ds" and "Fs" are of interest to political scientists. Sociology and economics, which are in the "H" section, are also extensive areas of overlap. Some major political science journals are located in the beginning of the "H" section. Interest in environmental politics intersects with the "G" and "T" call numbers, among others, and interest in health policy with the "Rs". The Library of Congress "U" section deals with "Military Science," but includes large numbers of works on national security of interest to the subfield of international politics. The flexibility of the Political Science Department's program accentuates the interdisciplinary tendency.

Formats and Types of Materials
Formats collected include print, electronic, microform, and audiovisual. The Political Science Department benefits from Boston College's membership in the ICPSR (Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research) datafile (for access see http://www.bc.edu/bc_org/avp/ulib/ref/icpsr.html) and the library's access to other research databases available in the library and through remote access. Reference works include the major indexes and abstracts in political science, atlases, bibliographies, dictionaries, encyclopedias, directories and research guides.

Languages
Political science materials published in Western languages are emphasized, particularly English, French, German, Italian, Russian and Spanish. Significant texts in Greek and Latin are also collected. Other languages are selectively collected.

Geographic Areas (Subject Approach)
Coverage is primarily the United States and Europe, with increasing attention to East Asia and Latin America, and also include materials on Africa, other parts of Asia, and the Middle East.

Time Periods (Subject Approach)
Most collecting deals with current issues, political structures and processes, but there are substantial areas of historical interest as well, dealing with such areas as the history of governmental or political development, or the evolution of political theory.

Date of Publication
Collection development is mostly of current titles, but includes retrospective acquisition of the classics in the field and the retrospective acquisition of political history.

Subject Areas Collected by Library of Congress Classification Number
BCAT, the online catalog, can be searched by LC classification number to get a better idea of what specific titles the political science collection contains.  For example, the command c=JX1974 will produce the beginning of a list of works on arms control. This list can be browsed by pressing the F8 key or typing f and pressing the Enter/Return key.