Research Guides: Political Science: Overview

Megan's Recommendations for Getting Started

Library Search - Advanced This link opens in a new window
Use this to search across databases, but sure to filter results as much as possible. If you need broader understanding and context, look for books by limiting to the Library Catalog. For articles, add subject filters like "political science" to help narrow results.

Ebsco Political Science Search
First stop for articles from political science. This link searches across three databases with content relevant for political science.

PAIS This link opens in a new window
Start with this for topics related to national and international government and public policy.
Westlaw Campus Research This link opens in a new window
Start here for law review articles, case law, or for articles about governmental systems. For articles, click Secondary Sources. Search for case law by citation or by major topic, and filter for Supreme Court cases.
For all current SMU students, faculty & staff
JSTOR This link opens in a new window
Useful for political theory or for discovering sources that you may not have turned up in searching the other political science databases.

Country Politics & Economy
Find resources for researching a specific country's government, politics, economy, and more.
International Relations & Foreign Policy
Find scholarly sources, policy papers, primary sources by region, and resources on U.S. foreign policy and global security
Political Economy
Recommended databases, data sources, and research organizations.
Political News & Opinion
Recommended news publications
Political Theory
Resources for classical and modern approaches to political theory.
U.S. Law & Government Information
Covers primary and secondary sources for all three branches of government and Texas and other state governments.
U.S. Politics
Covers elections, interest groups, polls, and political speech.

Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Politics This link opens in a new window
Excellent for background information with cited sources on political science scholarship.
Oxford Bibliographies: Political Science This link opens in a new window
Brief descriptions and citations to major works on political science topics.
Annual Reviews This link opens in a new window
Offers reviews of the research on specific topics. This database includes the Annual Review of Political Science.

Political Science encyclopedias search
Search across major scholarly encyclopedias on political science topics. Add your own keywords to this Library Search string by clicking Search Criteria.

International Encyclopedia of Political Science
Publication Date: 2011
Look up major concepts and topics in political science, find references to major works.