Guide of the Week: US Foreign Policy
For historic background and access to current foreign policy information, try this week's "Guide of the Week" from the ALA GODORT Handout Exchange Wiki:
Government Documents on U.S. Foreign Policy (Bert Chapman, Purdue University, 1999) Last updated 3/10/2008Bert truly starts his guide at the beginning with The Revolutionary Diplomatic Correspondence of the United States (6 vols.) and moves on to such current resources such as:
- Foreign Consular Offices in the U.S.
- United States Contributions to International Organizations
- Legislation on Foreign Relations Through (year)
- Commission for Assistance to a Free Cuba
- European Union "Common" Foreign and Security Policy
Army Journal removal highlights need for digital deposit
According to Secrecy News, the Army has pulled the unclassified Military Intelligence Professional Bulletin from the open web:
The former MIPB website states that “The MIPB is now being hosted on the Intelligence Knowledge Network (IKN). (AKO account required).” AKO (Army Knowledge Online) accounts can only be obtained by military and contractor personnel. The MIPB, which is unclassified, has long been available on the world wide web and has even been sold commercially. Back issues from 1995 to 2005 are available online from the FAS website, though no longer from the Army.In addition to being sold commercially, this journal was also distributed through the Federal Depository Library Program until 2006, according to its entry in GPO's Catalog of Government Publications at http://catalog.gpo.gov. After 2006, it went online only and access was through a PURL. As of today, that PURL directed folks to the takedown page. Libraries that depended on the "official repository" of the Army for post-2005 issues were out of luck. If these digital copies had been instead deposited to depository libraries, access might have gone on unhindered. Unless the Army had asked GPO to have depositories destroy their electronic archives of MIPB. But even then, the fact that multiple digital copies of MIPB existed would have triggered GPO's public process laid out in ID 72: Withdrawal of Federal Information Products from GPO’s Information Dissemination (ID) Programs. With that public process and the fact that prior issues were widely available, I think that the MPIB archive would have been safe. Instead, the Army as "The Official Repository" has made the online archives go away until FAS gets its FOIA request responded to. Or maybe it will come sooner. The fact that MPIB had a PURL indicates that GPO may have been archiving it. But can they now post their copy of the archive? Do they need to consult the Army first? What if the Army says no? Has anyone contacted GPO Help on this issue yet? What kind of a response have you gotten? Be sure to be kind to GPO as the decision on documents withdrawals rests with the agency. In this case, the Army. Don't blame Ric Davis if the Army nixes an FDLP restoration of the 2005-2009 MIPB archive. It's cases like these where decisions are made with a flip of the switch without a public process that makes us wary of the Official Single Repository of Federal Publications, no matter who the federal agency is. Sunlight and good decision making require digital deposit outside the federal government. Continue reading
Guide of the Week: International Documents Collection
If you want a quick way to find International Government Organizations or their publications, start with today's Guide of the Week from the ALA GODORT Handout Exchange Wiki:
International Documents Collection (Northwestern University Library, for the GODORT International Documents Task Force, 2008)Northwestern is attempting to keep a comprehensive list of International Government Organizations (IGO) that maintain a web presence. They currently list many IGOs from the African Development Bank to the World Tourism Organization (WTO). To facilitate access to the publications and other IGO information, the guide maintains a Google Custom Search Engine. Northwestern staff use the following criteria to add IGOs to their list: Criteria used to maintain the Northwestern University Library IGO list:
- The primary audience for the site is the Northwestern University community.
- The international organizations included in the list are intergovernmental organizations (IGOs).
- International Documents staff intend the list to be comprehensive. They include all the IGOs of which they are aware. However, an IGO must have a web page to be included in the list. If any person recommends an IGO to add to the list, staff add it to the list.
- The list links to sites in English, when available.
- In general, the list links only to the main page (i.e. welcome or home page) of the IGO's web site. The list links to web pages that are located within an IGOs web site if:
- it is the web page of the IGO's statistical division or statistical publications.
- it is the web page of the IGO's publications, if there are a substantial number of full-text publications available there.
- it is a web page that is often used.
- it is a web page which had been used by staff or a patron as a source of information, but which is extremely difficult to locate using the site's navigation functions.
- If you have any questions or suggestions please email them to mailto:govinfo@northwestern.edu.
Guide of the Week: U.S. Intelligence Community
Today's Guide of the Week from the ALA GODORT Handout Exchange Wiki is for people wanting history and background relating to the US intelligence community: U.S. Intelligence Community (Jerry Breeze, Columbia University, 1999) Last updated 1/29/2008 This guide starts out with an introduction worth quoting:
This is a selective guide to resources at Columbia University Libraries and on the Internet, for conducting research on U.S. government agencies involved in intelligence activities, the classification and declassification of government documents related to intelligence activities, and Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests. Some of the items included may also have information about commercial espionage or intelligence activities of foreign governments, but that is not the focus of this guide. Please consult CLIO [Columbia's catalog] for other materials in the Columbia University Libraries.For a selective guide, it is chock full of print and internet resources relating to the intelligence community. The guide contains links to secondary and primary intelligence materials and is divided into the following sections:
- General
- Background Information
- Bibliographies & Indexes
- Periodicals/News/Blogs
- Intelligence Reform
- Congressional Oversight & Budget
- Classified/Declassified
- FOIA (Freedom of Information Act)
- Other Web Sources
- Agency Specific
- Office of the Director of National Intelligence
- Central Intelligence Agency
- Defense Intelligence Agency
- Department of Energy
- Department of State
- Federal Bureau of Investigation
- National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency
- National Reconnaissance Office
- National Security Agency
- National Security Council
- Other Agencies
Call for Action: Sign Read the Bill!
Our busy friends at the Sunlight Foundation have started a petition drive to demand that Congress post non-emergency bills for 72 hours prior to voting. This would allow both the public and Members of Congress time to read a bill before a vote. Whether you're a liberal outraged at the USA Patriot Act or a tax-cutting conservative outraged at the stimulus bill, you should be for getting Congress to STOP and READ what they're doing to the nation. If you agree, drop what you're doing and visit www.readthebill.org and add your voice to the movement that asks nothing more than that important legislation gets read. And if you're not convinced that rushed legislation is a bad thing, go read the case studies of bad bills. Then sign the petition. Continue reading
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