Public Policy & Administration

This research guide lists major resources useful for public administration research. This is by no means an exhaustive list so if you do not find what you need, please contact me either by e-mail, phone, or in person in Young Library.

Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Research (ICPSR): Getting Started

World Bank Open Data: The World Bank's Open Data initiative is intended to provide all users with access to World Bank data. The data catalog is a listing of available World Bank data sources. 

UN Data:  Users can search and download a variety of statistical resources compiled by the United Nations (UN) statistical system and other international agencies.

International Monetary Fund (IMF) eLibrary:  Provides access to the IMF’s periodicals, books, working papers and studies, and data and statistical tools.

Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) i-Library: Online library of the OECD, including its books, papers and statistics, which serves as the knowledge base of OECD's analysis and data.

Eurostat: Produces European statistics in partnership with National Statistical Institutes and other national authorities in the EU Member States. 

CEPALSTAT: The gateway to all the statistical information of Latin America and the Caribbean countries collected, systematized and published by the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean.

Quality of Government Institute: The main objective of the institute's research is to address the theoretical and empirical problem of how political institutions of high quality can be created and maintained, and the effects of quality of government on a number of policy areas, such as health, the environment, social policy, and poverty. The Standard Data includes over 2000 coded variables divided into sixteen thematic categories such as Quality of Government, Economy, Media, Environment, and Political System etc. Read the Codebook to determine if the variable you need is covered in the dataset. 

Database of Political Institutions: Presents institutional and electoral results data such as measures of checks and balances, tenure and stability of the government, identification of party affiliation and ideology, and fragmentation of opposition and government parties in the legislature, among others. The current version of the database, hosted by the Inter-American Development Bank, expands its coverage to about 180 countries for 40 years, 1975-2017.

Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI): Provides 5 datasets that center on multilateral peace operations; military expenditures; arms transfers and arms embargoes; and national reports on arms exports.

Global Terrorism Database: An open-source database including information on terrorist events around the world from 1970 through 2018. 

ACLED (Armed Conflict Location and Events Dataset): Collects real-time data on the locations, dates, actors, fatalities, and types of all reported political violence and protest events across Africa, East Asia, South Asia, Southeast Asia, the Middle East, Central Asia & the Caucasus, Latin America & the Caribbean, and Southeastern & Eastern Europe & the Balkans.

• Harvard Kennedy School Think Tank Search: A custom Google Search engine that searches more than 600 think tanks for policy reports.
• Find Policy: Find policy reports from 17 leading think tanks in the areas of climate, economy, development, foreign policy, health care, and public policy. Use the tabs (at the top of the page) to search in any one of the subject areas.
• Google NGO Search: Use this Google Custom Search Engine to search for current online documents, publications, and websites from nongovernmental organizations. 
• 2020 Global Go To Think Tank Index Report: Includes lists of top global think tanks by area of research. Note: area of research rankings start on page 136.
• Writing about think tanks and using their research: A cautionary tip sheet: This is written for journalists, but contains useful tips for evaluating think tanks.